Korean sex industry going global

The fight on comfort women issue is getting heated. Koreans keep spreading lies around the world, and informed Japanese are standing up to counter the lies with historical evidence. It is high time that people see the facts about the issue. In fact, people should see not only the facts back then, but also the reality on Korean sex industry today, and think about the issue in entirety.
 
I translate below an article by Otaka Miki, published on August 18, 2013 on ZakZak (Sankei digital inc.), which gives you details and excellent insights on this.

**********************************

Appalling reality of Korean “sex-industry export”: 100,000 Korean prostitutes around the world 

The reality of South Korea as “the big sex-industry exporting country” is attracting attention. Korean media reports that there are 100,000 Korean prostitutes around the world, and they represent the highest percentage of foreign prostitutes in the United States. Korean President Park Geun Hye criticizes Japan that “Japan should have courage to look straight into the past,” and “Japan should take responsible and sincere measures”; yet, it is Korea that should review the history and the reality.

In July 2013, a statue of comfort woman was installed in city of Glendale, California. This was backed up by Korean groups in the U.S., and the groups have a plan to install the same in over 20 cities across the country. The nationalistic passion to fabricate history and disgrace another country is itself a theme in the field of psychiatric medicine, and it would be too kind to see it as “rancor against 36 years of Japanese administration”. 

An article that greatly helps one understand the comfort women issue was published in Chosun Ilbo (Korean newspaper) on June 15, 2012: “Expanding Korean-style sex industry: the reality overseas” – “The shameful reality of Korea as the great sex-industry exporting country”. The content of the article was appalling. 

First of all, the article says: “With regard to Korean prostitutes abroad, national assembly member Kim Ok Lee, during the assembly audit on the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family in October 2010, asserted that `the numbers of Korean women who engage in prostitution overseas are approximately 50,000 in Japan, 2,500 in Australia, and 250 in Guam, reaching over 100,000 globally.’”

The article analyzes that one of the reasons for overseas prostitution is money: “10 Korean prostitutes captured by police at a brothel in Canada in May 2012 said ‘We came here because we heard that we could earn a lot in a short time’. A 36-year old female manager of the brothel always told the prostitutes that they could earn 20 million won (about US$ 18,700) in one month.” 

The article also shows the ratio of foreign prostitutes in the U.S., and the top three are Korean 23.5%, Thai 11.7%, and Peruvian 10%. Since the domestic prostitution prohibition law was strengthened in Korea in 2004, and traveling to the U.S. without visa was allowed in 2008, Korean prostitutes have flown out at once. 

On the other hand, in Korea, several hundreds of prostitutes in white shroud with their faces painted white demonstrated on the street, shouting “let us work!”, which was broadcasted over internet to the world. 

They claim at the constitutional court, “we are sex workers, and workers have the right to work. It is against the constitution that a law intervenes in private acts of adult men and women”, and deliberation is ongoing at the court. 

According to the survey done by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family in 2007, the size of adult-entertaining industry in Korea is estimated to be about 14.1 trillion won (approx. US$ 13.2 billion), and there are about 270,000 women working in sex-related business. This is equivalent to approximately 6% of the national budget of the year (239 trillion won, or US$ 223 billion), according to the Chosun Ilbo. 

There are so many Korean women who want to work in the sex industry even today (when prostitution is illegal). Thinking calmly, anybody would see that there was no need to use a rough measure to “forcefully take away” women 70 years ago when prostitution was legal. Weren’t comfort women commercial sex workers in wartime? 

Today, in China near the border with North Korea, there are tens of thousands of North Korean female defectors who are sold by Chinese dealers to prostitution businesses or poor farmhouses, and are forced into “sexual slavery.” Yet, we never hear about “rancor against 1000 years of dependency on China and tribute of beautiful women.” (note: Korea had been a tributary state to China most of the time in its history, and had been paying tribute to China including women).   

When South Korea took part in the Vietnam War, the number of Lai Dai Han, or children born to Korean soldiers and Vietnamese women, was estimated to be 10,000 – 30,000. They are severely discriminated against as “children of enemy”; however, Korean government has not taken any measures. Instead of promoting anti-Japan propaganda, wouldn’t solving this problem be far more humanitarian? 

Sam Keen, former editor of US bimonthly magazine “Psychology Today”, states in his book “Faces of the Enemy” as follows: “by forcing on others all the characteristics that one has inside and does not want to admit, s/he reduces anxiety and guilt.”

Anyhow, Korea enthuses to install comfort women statues in other countries besides the United States. Before that, why not add a plaque to the statue with the following explanation? :

“This is to attest the Korean government that has been blaming another country for its deteriorated culture, and the sad history of the Korean peninsula where women have been sold since the ancient times.”    
    
(Otaka Miki is a journalist who have interviewed many renowned persons including Dalai Lama and 14^th and former PLO chairman Yasser Arafat, and have published several books).