Former sex slave cries out for justice - thestar.com

 

The war ended 65 years ago, but the trauma of the atrocities she endured as a sex slave at the hands of Japanese soldiers is still clearly etched on Won Ok Gil’s face, and burns deep in her heart.

Born in what is now North Korea, Gil was only 13 when she was lured from her village by the promise of factory work, only to be beaten and gang raped by Japanese soldiers.

When she developed a sexually transmitted disease, a doctor removed her ovaries, so she could not get pregnant, and put her to work as a sex slave. She was later transported to China and forced to work as a “comfort woman” in a military brothel.

Settling in South Korea after the war, Gil took all sorts of jobs to survive. In 1998 she decided to break her silence and now travels around the world seeking justice for the tens of thousands of women conscripted, coerced or kidnapped by the Japanese to work as sex slaves during the war.

She also wants an apology from the Japanese government, but at 83 fears time is running out. Many of her fellow victims have already passed on and the diminishing voices of the survivors have been forgotten, she fears.

“I only have one wish. That the Japanese government admit that they have committed these crimes so that the world will be in peace,” Gil told delegates to the International Conference for Educators on the History of World War II in Asia on Saturday in Toronto. “That’s the one wish I have. To hear a sincere apology from the Japanese government to me, and that they ask for forgiveness.”

The first Japanese “comfort stations” were set up in Shanghai in 1932. As Japan continued its military expansion in Asia, it found itself short of Japanese prostitutes so the military turned to the local population for women.

The United Nations estimates that some 200,000 women worked in these military brothels. Chinese scholars put the number at double that, saying the UN figures don’t take into account the approximately 200,000 women pressed into sex service during Japan’s occupation of China.

While Canada, the U.S. and the European Parliament have all passed resolutions condemning the treatment of these women, Japan has not. Japanese scholars put the number at less than 20,000 and some argue the women worked voluntarily as prostitutes, the conference heard.

“As recently as 2007 the then-Japanese prime minister denied that any women were force to be sex slaves,” said Joseph Wong, founder of The Association for Learning and Preserving the History of World War II in Asia. “According to the prime minister, these ‘comfort women’ voluntarily worked as prostitutes and were better paid then the soldiers.”

Those remarks were roundly condemned around the world, but Japan has yet to acknowledge that it systemically pressed women into becoming prostitutes during the war, Wong told the conference, held at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.

“Japan’s attitude has been very wishy washy in that the prime minister told a group of reporters that Japanese government and military had no involvement in the sexual slavery issue,” Wong said.

Gil was in Toronto to say that is bald-faced lie.

She urged the educators who heard her speak to take the message back to their classrooms and spread the word about what really happened to women like her.

And she’s still waiting for her apology.

AS I GET OLDER I DON’T UNDERSTAND

As I get older I don’t understand
Children spending summer indoors
Texting and playing video games
And downloading iTunes

As I get older I don’t understand
The rising cost of the essentials
Food, shelter and clothing
And lack of health care provided for everyone

As I get older I don’t understand
The lack of manners and courtesy
Loyalty, camaraderie, chivalry
And the lack of respect for human dignity

As I get older I don’t understand
The violence in movies and video games
In music and books and magazines
And the bloody carnage in our city streets

As I get older I don’t understand
The lack of trust and faith
And love and peace and freedom
Of speech becoming a licence to be hateful

As I get older I don’t understand
How fast life slips by
How little we have loved
How little we have made a difference

September 19, 2010
Nick van Heeren

THE TEA SHOP

The girl in the tea shop
Is not so beautiful as she was,
The August has worn against her.
She does not get up the stairs so eagerly;
Yes, she also will turn middle-aged,
And the glow of youth that she spread about us
As she brought us our muffins
Will be spread about us no longer.
She also will turn middle-aged.

THE UNKNOWN CITIZEN

by W. H. Auden


(To JS/07 M 378
This Marble Monument
Is Erected by the State)
He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a
saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the War till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.
Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his
generation.
And our teachers report that he never interfered with their
education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

I'M GETTING OLD

    I'm getting old. I feel it coming on. Not just in my body which is slowly breaking down and deteriorating. But I also feel it inside. I'm getting old. I feel it coming on.

    I'm getting old. I feel it coming on. Not just in my mind with loss of memory and forgetting of names. But I also feel it in my spirit. I'm getting old. I feel it coming on.

    I'm getting old. I feel it coming on. Not just in my reminiscing or longing for the good old days. But I feel it in my loss of hope. I'm getting old. I feel it coming on.

    I'm getting old. I feel it coming on. Not just in my lack of patience or love or desire for goodness. But I feel it in my heart. I'm getting old. I feel it coming on.

    I'm getting old. I feel it coming on. Not just in the graying of hair and obesity of weight. But I feel it in my being. I'm getting old. I feel it coming on.

    At what point in time do hope and despair and energy and fatigue blend and become one? At what point in time does compromising and being stagnant and cold become the standard of normalcy? At what point in time does promise become loss of opportunity? Faith becomes disillusionment. Trust becomes wariness.

I'm getting old. I feel it coming on.

FIRING RANGE

My experience with firearms is really limited. When I was a kid my neighbours had BB guns and let me shoot them off from time to time. Our targets were mainly street lights, snakes and a new house that was built in the middle of our sandlot baseball field.

I remember my friend Carl aiming at a bird flying by and pulling the trigger and actually hitting the poor thing in mid-air. It fell like a stone to the ground dead. We looked at each other so surprised that the robin was dead. Then his old aunt, Edna, from across the street started yelling and screaming that we were murderers and should be ashamed of ourselves. We responded by running away as fast as we could!

A couple of years ago I had a problem with my computer's motherboard. I phoned up a friend of mine, Richard, who was a programmer and knew how to work on computers as well to make an appointment for him to look at it.

He took my computer apart, showed me how it had been poorly designed and why my motherboard had fried. He then said for me to come along with him for a car ride.

We went downtown and parked in a seedy little alley that runs adjacent to our main street. We got out of his vehicle and walked through a door and then went down a flight or two of stairs. It was dark and damp. I had never been told of this subterranean area that was right below our downtown district.

We then entered through a set of heavy doors, possibly of steel, and walked into a firing range. Richard opened up the case he was carrying and pulled out a gun. He explained that it was a German luger from World War Two. He loaded it, described how it worked, and let me take aim at some targets at the far end of the gallery.

I was not a very good shot. But I also felt sick inside. If this was a real German Luger I wondered if it had seen any action. How many Nazis or German people had used this gun to blow out the brains of precious Jewish citizens?

I knew that Richard could sense how uncomfortable I was shooting a gun. He didn't press me to take another round when the gun was emptied. We left shortly after and he never asked me back there again. I am not disappointed.

TINY RIPPLE OF HOPE

When I was a youngster my heroes were athletes such as Mickey Mantle or Johnny Bower. As a Christian my ultimate hero would of course be Jesus. Another hero of mine is Robert Kennedy, the younger brother of the assassinated John F. Kennedy.

A couple of years ago I filled in as an interim pastor at an Evangelical Covenant Church in Buffalo, NY. I have listened to my sermons online but the one that I felt was my best effort dealt briefly with the life of RFK.

For the next little while I am going to have a bit to say about RFK but I am going to start off with a quote from what is regarded as his most famous speech. It was delivered in Capetown, South Africa in 1966.

It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.

This has been an immense week of spiritual stress and emotional fatigue. This quote has set me back on course.

THOUGHTS WHILE GOING THROUGH A VERY DEPRESSING DAY

I think it is about time America forgot about saving the rest of the world and took care of their own. I read an article in Atlantic Monthly about the economy and how one segment of society in particular is in dire straits. This is the inner city ghetto. Unemployment is at an all-time high in the black communities and people are earning their living in the underground economy. When that low-life Sirhan Sirhan snuffed out the life of Robert Kennedy he also snuffed out any hope of America waging war against poverty. Can you imagine how powerful the American society could have been if the trillions of dollars spent on wars in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq and Afghanistan had been kept within their borders? Greedy insurance companies wouldn't have corrupted the health care system. Inner city schools would enjoy the same benefits as white suburban schools. Crime would be greatly diminished because when people have productive jobs they have no need to turn to crime. When the people have hope would they still turn to dope?

 

OBAMA, LBJ AND THE YOUNG BRITISH SOLDIER

The thought has crossed my mind that as the American lead Coalition continues in the futile efforts to reform Afghanistan that President Obama is becoming another LBJ. You know LBJ? He was the President who is always thought of synonymously with the war in Vietnam. I am afraid that the short-lived Obama Administration will leave behind a legacy of digging ourselves deeper and deeper into an unwinnable situation.

When I think of trying to win a war in Afghanistan one always thinks of previous efforts by the British and the Russians. Neither was successful. It is totally illogical to think that we can do any better than our predecessors in the Afghan nation. I will have more on this in the weeks and months and years ahead.

Kipling, well noted for The Jungle Book, wrote the following poem about the young British soldier. The final stanza is most relevant for today.

The Young British Soldier

When the 'arf-made recruity goes out to the East
'E acts like a babe an' 'e drinks like a beast,
An' 'e wonders because 'e is frequent deceased
         Ere 'e's fit for to serve as a soldier.
         Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
         Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
         Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
         So-oldier OF the Queen!

Now all you recruities what's drafted to-day,
You shut up your rag-box an' 'ark to my lay,
An' I'll sing you a soldier as far as I may:
         A soldier what's fit for a soldier.
         Fit, fit, fit for a soldier . . .

First mind you steer clear o' the grog-sellers' huts,
For they sell you Fixed Bay'nets that rots out your guts --
Ay, drink that 'ud eat the live steel from your butts --
         An' it's bad for the young British soldier.
         Bad, bad, bad for the soldier . . .

When the cholera comes -- as it will past a doubt --
Keep out of the wet and don't go on the shout,
For the sickness gets in as the liquor dies out,
         An' it crumples the young British soldier.
         Crum-, crum-, crumples the soldier . . .

But the worst o' your foes is the sun over'ead:
You must wear your 'elmet for all that is said:
If 'e finds you uncovered 'e'll knock you down dead,
         An' you'll die like a fool of a soldier.
         Fool, fool, fool of a soldier . . .

If you're cast for fatigue by a sergeant unkind,
Don't grouse like a woman nor crack on nor blind;
Be handy and civil, and then you will find
         That it's beer for the young British soldier.
         Beer, beer, beer for the soldier . . .

Now, if you must marry, take care she is old --
A troop-sergeant's widow's the nicest I'm told,
For beauty won't help if your rations is cold,
         Nor love ain't enough for a soldier.
         'Nough, 'nough, 'nough for a soldier . . .

If the wife should go wrong with a comrade, be loath
To shoot when you catch 'em -- you'll swing, on my oath! --
Make 'im take 'er and keep 'er: that's Hell for them both,
         An' you're shut o' the curse of a soldier.
         Curse, curse, curse of a soldier . . .

When first under fire an' you're wishful to duck,
Don't look nor take 'eed at the man that is struck,
Be thankful you're livin', and trust to your luck
         And march to your front like a soldier.
         Front, front, front like a soldier . . .

When 'arf of your bullets fly wide in the ditch,
Don't call your Martini a cross-eyed old bitch;
She's human as you are -- you treat her as sich,
         An' she'll fight for the young British soldier.
         Fight, fight, fight for the soldier . . .

When shakin' their bustles like ladies so fine,
The guns o' the enemy wheel into line,
Shoot low at the limbers an' don't mind the shine,
         For noise never startles the soldier.
         Start-, start-, startles the soldier . . .

If your officer's dead and the sergeants look white,
Remember it's ruin to run from a fight:
So take open order, lie down, and sit tight,
         And wait for supports like a soldier.
         Wait, wait, wait like a soldier . . .

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
         An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
         Go, go, go like a soldier,
         Go, go, go like a soldier,
         Go, go, go like a soldier,
         So-oldier of the Queen!

MUBAR IN AFGHANISTAN

The temptation is pretty strong to replace the sanitized MUBAR (Messed Up Beyond All Recognition) with the down and dirty FUBAR. If you don’t know what FUBAR is then you are a better person than me, and I won’t explain it to you.
What brings me to this place is the senseless slaughter of the medical workers in Afghanistan – 6 Americans, one German, one British and 2 Afghan translators. The driver, an Afghan, was allowed free because he begged for his life and quoted the Quran. There are strong suspicions that the driver was in on this spree.
There was nothing to be achieved by killing these people. They were solely there for humanitarian purposes. These doctors understood the law of the land and although they may have been Christian they were in compliance of the laws forbidding witnessing for Jesus.
So it was purely murder out of demonic hatred with the purpose of robbery.
MUBAR.
These killers are inhuman. To massacre unarmed and innocent people, people who loved the Afghan people and were bringing relief for sight problems, for no motive other than hatred and thievery tells me a few things.
There is no winning with these people. The British tried, the French tried, the Soviets tried, and they all were humbly defeated.
What makes us think the American-lead coalition will be any different?
My God, can’t President Obama see that he is going to wind up in the history books as another LBJ if he doesn’t pull out soon?
This is the present day Vietnam, and there is no hope for victory.
Even if you drive out the Taliban this is a male-dominated society that has always treated women with great indignity.
Education has never reformed a culture, no matter how much we wish it could.
John Dempsey, who works in Kabul for the U.S. Institute of Peace, says Christian groups will have to consider their position.
He said: "I don't think they necessarily need to withdraw but I certainly think after what's happened earlier this year, and of course today's attack, they have to reassess what it means to be a Christian organisation in a country where they often are the ones singled out and targeted, and there may be measures they could take to improve their security for themselves.
"So I think there is still room for Christian organisations to operate in many parts of the country, but they'll have to be careful in terms of selecting where those might be." (BBC News)
So if we pull out does it mean that all the innocents and soldiers have died in vain? Maybe. But not necessarily so. If it takes the death of these workers, or the death of native Afghans blown to bits by errant coalition missiles, or even the death of professional soldiers to bring us to the realization that there must be alternative ways to deal with the Afghan problem, then so be it.
However, if we continue on the course we are set up currently then there is no hope.
And my friends, this is truly FUBAR.

MARY GAUTHIER, LESBIANS AND JUDGING

I guess I still have a long way to go in the personal standard I have set to treat everyone with equality.
The other day I was listening to the music of Mary Gauthier. She had caught my attention while searching for tracks on emusic.com. Her sound and style reminded me a lot of Lucinda Williams who happens to be one of my favorite performers. I found it interesting that they are both natives of Louisiana.
As I continued my research of Mary I soon discovered that she is a lesbian.
My initial reaction was of disappointment.
Then my secondary reaction was of further disappointment. Disappointment with myself.
Why should I stop enjoying and appreciating the work of an artist because they are homosexual? I shouldn’t and neither should anybody else.
As a Christian, I realize that most of my fellow believers look down at gay people with disgust and revulsion. This is not as it should be. We are all created equal in God’s sight. The scriptures tell us that we have all sinned and have fallen short of the perfection that God requires from His creation. It took God’s son, Jesus, dying on the cross that has broken the wall that had previously kept sinners set apart from a most Holy God.
Now the question was posed to me this evening by my oldest daughter: Are homosexuals born that way? I can go a little further and ask “Are “alternative lifestyles” sinful in the eyes of God?”
A cursory reading of the Bible would seem to indicate that a gay lifestyle is sinful. Which means this “sin” can be lumped in with lying and cheating and bigotry and gossiping and overeating and a host of other vices. I believe that some gays are born that way and if it is sin then why should we treat this situation more harshly than we have other sins when it comes to accepting people into the fellowship of the church?
I became a Christian back in 1980. Before then I drank too much, definitely ate too much, fibbed from time to time, laughed at dirty jokes, looked at women with lust in my eyes and watched bad movies. Since that time, over the past 30 years as a believer, I have occasionally done all these things and even more! Yet I am still accepted as a member in good standing at my church.
Yet gays are not allowed into the evangelical church as members. I have a hard time believing that sexual sin is the most horrible sin in God’s books. The problem is the church puts such a powerful emphasis on perceived sexual sins that these types of sins are far graver than any others. (Though rarely do you hear any messages in the church today about pre-marital sex, or sex among single adult Christians.)
Is being a lesbian worse than being a bigot? Is being a lesbian worse than being a “self-righteous, holier than thou” member in the church? Is being a lesbian worse than being a person always willing to cast the proverbial first stone? Is being a lesbian worse than the one who is so quick to gossip and slander the one who is sitting a few pews over in God’s House of Worship?
Really, honestly, what do you think?
The key to spiritual health is simply to take care of one’s own business before judging others.
Pretty radical, isn’t it?
We are so quick to judge and ban the gay community yet not so willing to throw the self-righteous and the bigot and the gossiper under the bus.
Perhaps this is a good thing or else there would be no one left in our evangelical churches.

GOD OF PHOBIA AND HATE

I had a dream last night
Where God appears to people
At the great judgment
As an object of their
Own personal
Hatreds
And phobias
And paranoia’s

Hence

To the homophobic
God is gay
To the white supremacist
God is black
To the anti-Semite
God is YHWH
To the filthy rich
God is impoverished
To the American Republican
God is a Democrat

Who is God to you?

Another Hot Day

This summer reminds me of the summers I used to experience as a child. Hot, humid and always having to maintain our fluids. A good day to hang out at the beach.

It's been a while

I wish we could soak up pain with a sponge. God says he carries our pain, which He does, but...it lingers, it stings, it crushes, it never goes away. It's always there, always a burden, always foremost on our minds, always a crippling blow. Stifling, depressing, a heaviness beyond description. God help us all.

THE BEAUTIFUL SNOW

This poem is written anonymously. It is one of my favorites.
(Found in manuscript among the personal effects of a prostitute, 22 years of age, who died in the Commercial Hospital, Cincinnati, O.)

Once I was pure as the snow, but I fell,
Fell like the snowflakes from heaven to hell;
Fell to be trampled as filth on the street
Fell to be scoffed, to be spit on and beat;
Pleading--cursing--dreading to die,
Selling my soul to whoever would buy,
Dealing in shame for a morsel of bread,
Hating the living and fearing the dead.
Merciful God, have I fallen so low?
And yet I was once like the beautiful snow.

Once I was fair as the beautiful snow,
With an eye like a crystal, a heart like its glow,
Once I was loved for my innocent grace--
Flattered and sought for the charms of my face!
Fathers,--mothers,--sisters,--all,
God and myself have I lost by my fall;
The veriest wretch that goes shivering by,
Will make a wide sweep lest I wander too nigh;
For all that in on or above me I know,
There is nothing so pure as the beautiful snow.

How strange it should be that this beautiful snow
Should fall on a sinner with nowhere to go!
How strange it should be when the night comes again,
If the snow and the ice struck my desperate brain.
Fainting,--freezing,--dying alone,
Too wicked for prayer, too weak for a moan,
To be heard in the streets of the crazy town,
Gone mad in the joy of the snow coming down;
To be and to die in my terrible woe,
With a bed and shroud of the beautiful snow.

Helpless and foul as the trampled snow
Sinner, despair not! Christ stoopeth low
To rescue the soul that is lost in sin,
And raise it to life and enjoyment again.
Groaning--bleeding--dying for thee
The crucified hung on the cursed tree,
His accent of mercy fell soft on thine ear,
"Is there mercy for me? Will He heed my weak prayer?"
O, God! in the stream that for sinners did flow,
Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.

The Butterfly

EDNA LOUISE CAN YOU FIND THIS FOR ME? #5

I love older movies. Musicals are really not my favorite but I always enjoy watching South Pacific. I have to be honest but Mitzi Gaynor sure looks good in those white shorts. Anyhow,(to get back on topic) I would love to have the soundtrack for South Pacific in an LP format. If you could be on the lookout for this, there are at least three different covers to choose from. Thank you!

EDNA LOUISE CAN YOU FIND THIS FOR ME? #4

Most people remember their first kiss or first car or first drink but I also remember the first book I read from a library. It was Danny and the Dinosaur by Syd Hoff. The library was on Elm St. in Ridgeway, Ontario. It was a 2 story converted house and Danny and the Dinosaur was the first book I borrowed. I also recall going into the old Dell's Department store and spending my 25 cent allowance on a thin stamp collector's book. Edna Louise, I know I could order this book from Amazon but do you think you could find this for me? Thanking you in advance!

TENNESSEE JED

lEVON HELM - this is from his Electric Dirt CD as performed on Letterman. An awesome performance.

EDNA LOUISE CAN YOU FIND THIS FOR ME? #3

It's nothing unique to be among the millions of people who cut their computer teeth on a Commodore 64. When I moved a few years ago and was forced to downsize, it broke my heart to give away all my C64 stuff - keyboards, drives, monitors and thousands of programs. If only they had come up with this C64 laptop a few years ago, I could still be enjoying the C64.Edna Louise, can you find this for me?

EDNA LOUISE CAN YOU FIND THIS FOR ME? #2

The ultimate in television portability.

PINBALL WIZARDS ON ICE

Driving on ice - everyone's nightmare behind the wheel. Here are some pinball wizards on ice