Many angered as a Harvard professor says comfort women were not sex-slaves but were prostitutes

A professor published an essay claiming that all comfort women, including the Korean comfort women, were not sexual slaves but were actually prostitutes who traded their service for their own gain.

He states that the comfort women who were forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese military were committing acts of prostitution to pursue a profit.

On the 28th of last month, Sankei Shinbun newspaper reported that a Harvard professor published an essay denying the sexual slavery of the comfort women. According to the reports, an essay with the title "Contracting for sex in the Pacific War" was published on the 65th volume of the 'International Review of Law and Economics,' which is scheduled to be published in March. 

The author of the paper is J. Mark Ramseyer, a professor at Harvard University. He is also known as an expert in social law and a pro-Japanese scholar.

Professor Ramseyer lived in the Miyazaki Prefecture, Japan, until he was 18 years old. Hence, he is fluent in Japanese and has written many books jointly with Japanese scholars.

According to the abridged version of the essay, Ramseyer claims that the comfort women were an extended service provided by the prostitution businesses that were permitted by the Japanese government. The prostitution business and the prostitutes pursued their own interests and laid down conditions for their services.

He claimed that prostitution was legal at the time, and there were around 15,000 legal prostitution businesses with over 51,000 prostitutes in 1924, which was the Japanese colonial era.

Professor Ramseyer then explained that the fault was with the prostitution business that kidnapped and forced women into prostitution for the Japanese military. He added that the comfort women were only victims who were duped into prostitution by these businesses.

Such claims are consistent with the testimony of a few comfort women who were victimized as they stated they were tricked when someone told them they would be working at a factory or were just taken.

However, Professor Ramseyer's argument is highly worrisome because it can be used to pass on the responsibility to the business owners and claim that the Japanese government and the Japanese military are not responsible.

The Sankei Shimbun newspaper reported that currently, the Japanese military has been mistaken for forcing women into sexual slavery, and that image has been spreading around the world, stressing the significance of professor Ramseyer's essay.