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== A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion ==
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
* ]<!-- COMMONSBOT: discussion | 2020-09-24T19:08:20.195221 | Memorare Comfort Women Statue and Historical Marker, Roxas Boulevard.jpg -->
Participate in the deletion discussion at the ]. —] (]) 19:08, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

== Were there comfort men as well ==

or was it just the women the japanese used for comfort <!-- Template:Unsigned IP --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 12:44, 26 November 2020 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

== Sociological questions ==

Aside from the appalling injustice to women, what does the comfort women phenomenon say about the character of Japanese males? Was the ruthless exploitation simply a passing phase brought about by the stresses of war, or did it reveal something deeper about Japanese character? The rape of Nanking occurred 13 years before WWII. Why is there no discussion of this issue? Is such a question politically incorrect because is might lead to stereotyping? Does truth matter anymore? When did social science become the servant of ideology? <!-- Template:Unsigned IP --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 12:30, 23 December 2020 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

] is extremely common throughout history, regardless of race, culture or time period. The attempt by the Japanese government to replace widespread rape with institutionalized prostitution was certainly novel, but upon examining the rationale behind the establishment of the system you should quickly realize that a similar idea could have occurred to anyone in power.

The main reason for why the Japanese government chose to invest in the project was due to its perceived usefulness in controlling the spread of STDs among frontline soldiers, and as a way to prevent rape, which they feared would instill hostility in the local populace and consequently make them more difficult to rule. Of course, we know in hindsight that the system ended up failing to live up to these expectations. On that note, there is little evidence indicating that this system of prostitution caused more damage than it prevented; for all we know, victims of the system may well have been treated considerably better than victims of uncontrolled wartime rape, given how (seemingly) many of them survived to tell the tale.

For a modern day example of governments that display a similar level of utilitarianism, we need not look further than the CCP in China, or the modern North Korean government. And utilitarianism is far from a trait unique to governments in Far East Asia; the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were infamous for their ruthless functionalism. And who knows, the Allies may have dabbled in similarly questionable pursuits, and we might simply be unaware of this due to lack of historical records. Either way, we do know wartime rape has always been (and still is) commonplace on all continents.

As for the reason for why wartime rape is so prevalent, several sociological, psychological and evolutionary biology-based explanations have been proposed. Gottschall's article "Explaining wartime rape" (published in the Journal of sex research in 2004) offers a good review on the subject.
] (]) 13:23, 23 December 2020 (UTC)


== Semi-protected edit request on 30 September 2023 ==
== The recruitment of voluntary comfort women at the beginning of the war ==


{{edit semi-protected|Comfort women|answered=yes}}
Since a user decided to start an edit war to revert to an older version of the introductory sentence that defines the term "comfort woman", I will add this talk section to address their point.
I request for the Category:Crimes against humanity to be added to the External Links. ] (]) 12:36, 30 September 2023 (UTC)
:Already in 'see also', which is the correct place for such links. ] (]) 12:40, 30 September 2023 (UTC)


== Semi-protected edit request on 1 December 2023 ==
As is already mentioned in the article, the system started out as a program of voluntary prostitution, but derailed into a form of sexual slavery once the army could no longer bring enough voluntary prostitutes from Japan to meet an ever-increasing demand for comfort women, and consequently chose to outsource the process of procuring the sex workers to local middlemen. (pp 3-5) is already given in the article.


{{edit semi-protected|Comfort women|answered=yes}}
As such, given that voluntary "comfort women" did in fact exist, the first sentence of the article should take this into account in order to maintain neutrality and accuracy.
Change "World war 2" to "World War II".
] (]) 16:14, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
Change "World War 2" to "World War II". ] (]) 00:26, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
:{{done}}<!-- Template:ESp --> Thank you, - <span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS">] <small>(])</small></span> 00:40, 1 December 2023 (UTC)


== Misquotation of source ==
:This topic would not exist if it was only about paid, voluntary prostitutes. The basis of the topic, the global outrage against the Japanese, comes from taking women and girls from occupied lands and forcing them into sexual slavery.
:You have repeatedly tried to ] the Japanese comfort women program, to explain the Japanese actions as logical or reasonable. Insisting on the mention of paid prostitutes is part of that push. You are trying to skew the topic away from global outrage, but that's how it is presented in the great mass of sources, so your push is non-neutral. ] (]) 16:41, 31 January 2021 (UTC)


Only doing this because I do not have an account valid to edit semi-protected pages. The 95th source is misreferenced, in quotes it says "public restrooms", yet the cited source says "public toilets". ] (]) 07:28, 20 April 2024 (UTC)
:: Accurately portraying history is not an attempt to normalize anything, there were voluntary women who were apart of the comfort women program just as there were those who were there against their will, purposefully omitting one while keeping the other is biased. Misplaced Pages is not about outrage but about building an encyclopedia, "global outrage" is not the focus of the article historical accuracy is, please remember that. ] (]) 03:18, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
:done ] (]) 07:40, 20 April 2024 (UTC)


== Semi-protected edit request on 20 June 2024 ==
:::Establishing a ] is biased, not neutral. If a tiny fraction of the comfort women was voluntary, then giving that fraction equal prominence is false balance and biased. ] (]) 06:09, 1 February 2021 (UTC)


{{edit semi-protected|Comfort women|answered=yes}}
:::: Assuming your hypothetical example of giving equal prominence to both voluntary and unvoluntary women without regard to portraying matters as they actually were historically were true then yes that would be false balance.
"Only in the 1990s did the Japanese government begin to officially apologize and offer compensation. However, apologies from Japanese officials have been criticized as insincere."
::::"false balance is biased, if a false balance is done then that is biased", yea no shit buddy. If your going to say something say something of substance and not this pointless nonsense. ] (]) 06:36, 1 February 2021 (UTC)


This quote is highly dishonest and written from a Pro-Korean and Anti-Japanese view point.
Guys, just reminding that it'd be good to remain civil and avoid any personal attacks in this talk page, especially on a really controversial topic like this. After all, all edits are presumed in good faith and should be treated as such. Feel free to consult ] for any guidelines on how to handle a talk page discussion. ] (]) 07:49, 1 February 2021 (UTC)


Japan has paid reparations for comfort woman multiple times under various treaties. However, if that is not direct enough due the treaties never stating comfort woman, then look at the fact that Japan offered to pay comfort woman's directly but were rejected by the Korean government.
== Lead sentence ==


The Korean government asked Japan to give the payments to the Korean government directly and they'll redistribute the funds. Japan agreed to this. However, Korea took the money to fund their businesses and roads and then continued to claim Japan never paid. ] (]) 23:59, 20 June 2024 (UTC)
I'm opening this discussion to head off what looks like a developing edit war over this. So far, it involves myself, {{u|Jpgordon}}, and {{u|Bavio the Benighted}}; is the most recent edit. The crux of the matter is the word ''were''. Later in the article, it is made clear that Comfort Women included not only women and girls forced into ] by the ], but also other women, some of whom might have been involved in such activity prior to WW-II, and/or some of which might be involved in this activity voluntarily. The linked most recent change reverted the wording back to use the word ''were'', which might be taken to imply that Comfort Women consisted only of the particular women and girls mentioned immediately thereafter, with an edit summary saying that a change to make it clear that others might have been involved requires discussion. Please discuss. Barring consensus to the contrary, I propose that this last change be reverted or that wording to the same effect be adopted. ] ] <small>(earlier ''Boracay Bill'')</small> 18:29, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
:] '''Not done:''' please provide ] that support the change you want to be made.<!-- Template:ESp --> ] (]) 00:32, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
* Support ''"Comfort women were mainly women and girls forced into ] by the ] in occupied countries and territories before and during ], or who participated in the earlier program of voluntary prostitution"'' or something similar. It's a more accurate opening statement. --] (]) 19:40, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
*I'm only involved because of the edit warring; I don't have a strong opinion otherwise. ]<sup><small>]</small></sup> 00:49, 1 February 2021 (UTC) :{{partly done|Partly done:}}<!-- Template:ESp --> Unsourced statement removed. ] <small> (]) </small> 00:35, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
*I think it would be poisonous to insert a ] into the lead sentence by giving the tiny fraction of voluntary prostitutes any kind of mention. Of course we should tell the reader about them later, but not in the first sentence. The tiny fraction of voluntary prostitutes is not why we have this topic. Rather, the women and girls who were coerced and forced into sexual slavery are the topic. By far the majority of our sources describing this topic do so by first telling about the forced and coerced girls and women. We should follow that style. ] (]) 06:16, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
*Agree with ]. Also, the intro lead already has a reference to it anyways as "Originally, the brothels were established to provide soldiers with voluntary prostitutes in order to reduce the incidence of wartime rape, a cause of rising anti-Japanese sentiment across occupied territories". I think it'd be fairer to not include reference to 'voluntary', which seems to form only a minority of comfort women in the rest of the article and was mostly before much of the controversy, to which this topic is relevant, arose. ] (]) 07:42, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
* Support A non insignificant number were willing prostitutes, I find issue with the "sex slave" wording as most historians avoid that label, there were an amount who were deceived by independent brokers and recruiters but they did not make up the majority and they were not sex slaves<ref name="ramsayer japan forward">{{cite web |title=Recovering the Truth about the Comfort Women |url=https://japan-forward.com/recovering-the-truth-about-the-comfort-women/}}</ref> , however thats not a discussion im willing to have right now.


== Semi-protected edit request on 23 July 2024 ==
:Source/further reading if anyone is interested in learning in depth about this issue:
:Wartime Military Records on Comfort Women: Information War against Korea, United States, and Japan by: Archie Miyamoto
:Comfort Women and Sex in the Battle Zone by: Ikuhiko Hata


{{edit semi-protected|Comfort women|answered=yes}}
:To say that only a tiny fraction were voluntary prostitutes is simply historical distortion. ] (]) 08:13, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
I request in the See Also section where it says "]" to be changed to "]". ] (]) 13:23, 23 July 2024 (UTC)
:* Just responding to the 'voluntary' argument here. I've added my argument and sources against this (which suggest that the broad majority of comfort women were coerced and did not volunteer) below in the "Relevance of Ramseyer" section, which I won't copy-paste here just to save space. I'd like to comment on ]'s suggestion regarding the term 'sex slave' and point out that this label was officially been recognized by several academics and organisations, such as by the United Nations in McDougall's 1998 report (added in the section below). It would therefore not be inappropriate to use it. ] (]) 14:06, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
:{{done}}<!-- Template:ESp --> ] (]) 14:02, 23 July 2024 (UTC)


== Apply quotation marks to euphemisms ==
:* I've been looking at the talk page archive for this topic, and it seems there was a consensus reached around this opening statement "Comfort women were women and girls forced into a prostitution corps created by the Empire of Japan. The name "comfort women" is a translation of a Japanese name ianfu (慰安婦). Ianfu is a euphemism for shōfu (娼婦) whose meaning is "prostitute(s)". The earliest reporting on the issue in South Korea stated it was not a voluntary force, and since 1989 a number of women have come forward testifying they were kidnapped by Imperial Japanese soldiers" (from Archive 6). Much of the archived talk page seems to support against using 'voluntary' as ] (though this is based on my skim-reading of the talk pages). I thought it'd be relevant here. ] (]) 14:23, 1 February 2021 (UTC)


"Comfort women" is a euphemism for sexual slavery, according to sources here and at ]. As such, the euphemism needs to be written in quotation marks, at minimum.
:* A couple of points:
::*I don't find a source-supported assertion in the article to the effect that all but a "tiny fraction" (from above) of comfort women were forced into providing sexual services. Discussion above seems to hinge on an editorial consensus re the tininess of this fraction. If reliable sources exist supporting a characterization re the tininess of this fraction, it seems to me that the article ought to characterize this and ought to cite those sources. If sources differ, this ought to be handled according to ]. In the absence of this, or in the absence of a consensus among sources that the fraction is tiny, I think that the implicit assertion, ''were'', in the lead sentence, which relies on the fraction being tiny, does not belong there. '''added''': 1993 NYT article reports that the Jpapense government has acknowledged that there were a large number of comfort women and that "recruiters resorted in many cases to coaxing and intimidating these women to be recruited against their will". It doesn't have any information re the proportion forced, though.
::* The ] article wikilinked a couple of times above is "about the media term", and probably not directly applicable here. ] seems closer, but not dead on; I have the impression that the argument being made here re that is similar to the argument there that "one should not be looking for a middle ground between information and disinformation." The problem with that is the difficulty of distinguishing which is which.
: ] ] <small>(earlier ''Boracay Bill'')</small> 18:32, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
{{ref talk}}


To repeatedly use the euphemism without quotation marks normalizes the euphemism, and in this case normalizes a redefinition of sexual slavery that was promoted originally by Japan in defence of the Japanese Army, who imprisoned and enslaved the Koreans "in brothels" (according to sources).
== Relevance of Ramseyer ==


After the lede, the words 'sexual slaves' should be used instead of "comfort women". Another possibility in the lede is to use 'so-called "comfort women" '. ] (]) 16:57, 14 November 2024 (UTC)
Added discussion section for the relevance of Ramseyer's view. I realize that he's a university professor, but not sure about the relevance of his view here. First, it's just added in the 'History' section with the opinion that 'comfort women' were not forced, which pushes a claim that effectively denies what most of the article states and which could add ]. Second, it's published in Japan Forward, a nationalist and far-right (according to some media outlets like Forbes) tabloid newspaper published by ] (See ]'s section on Bias in Sources). I would delete it, as I have been trying to do and as it's new content; from what I understand from WP:ONUS, it's up to whoever first added Ramseyer's view here to include it in the article. Just in case someone tries to report edit-warring though, I added a discussion here. ] (]) 07:38, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
*Do you have that forbes article calling japan forward far right and nationalist? "Tabloid" certainly is not accurate. I dont think Ramseyers claim denies most of the article, some women were certainly coerced that however does not make them sex slaves, i dont think Ramseyers believes no women were coerced at all. He is not the only one who denies that comfort women were sex slaves historian ikuhito hata does as well as a number of korean professors including Lew Seok-choon of Yonsei University, Park Yuha of Sejong University, and Professor Lee Yong-hoon of Seoul University to name just a few. It is not an unpopular position ] (]) 08:23, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
*] is the fifth major newspaper, and still has 1.3 milion circulation in Japan last year. It is not recognized as a "Tabloid" media. And there is no bias in comparison with official ] documents on this topic.] (]) 11:08, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
**Here's the Forbes article ("https://www.forbes.com/sites/adelsteinjake/2017/10/30/japan-may-be-moving-right-politically-but-its-communist-party-still-holds-some-sway-with-voters/?sh=22e23ed07dfc"). On the note about 'tabloid', I'm not referring to ], but its publication 'Japan Forward'.
::On whether there was coercion, I'd like to make two points. First, I'm aware that there is recent argument by the Japanese government that there was no coercion involved. However, the broader consensus is that, in the vast majority of cases, there was significant coercion and no 'volunteers'. International sources include the ] Report in 1996, which details that women were deceived with promise of high-paying jobs and abducted and defined the comfort stations as 'military slavery', <ref>{{cite web |title=FURTHER PROMOTION AND ENCOURAGEMENT OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND FUNDAMENTAL FREEDOMS, INCLUDING THE QUESTION OF THE PROGRAMME AND METHODS OF WORK OF THE COMMISSION |url=http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/commission/country52/53-add1.htm |publisher=Economic and Social Council, United Nations |access-date=1 Feb 2021}}</ref>, UN special rapporteur Gay J. McDougall, who concluded that the Japanese Army violated the prohibition against slavery,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gay J |first1=McDougall |title=Systematic Rape, Sexual Slavery and Slavery-like Practices during Armed Conflict ( E/CN.4/Sub.2/1998/13) |journal=United Nations, Economic and Social Council |date=June 22, 1998}}</ref> and Amnesty International <ref>{{cite web |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140329015834/http://www.amnesty.org.au/svaw/comments/21574/}}</ref>, as well as official positions of countries like the United States (see ]), China, South Korea and Malaysia. Academic sources include Gabriel Jonsson of ] <ref>{{cite journal |last1=Jonsson |first1=Gabriel |title=Can the Japan-Korea Dispute on ”Comfort Women” be Resolve |journal=Korean Observer |date=Autumn 2015 |volume=46 (3) |url=https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:882170/FULLTEXT01.pdf}}</ref>, ] of ] <ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hayashi |first1=Hirofumi |title=Disputes in Japan over the Japanese Military "Comfort Women" System and Its Perception in History |journal=The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science |date=May 2008 |volume=617 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25098017}}</ref>, John Lie of ] <ref>{{cite journal |last1=Lie |first1=John |title=The State as Pimp: Prostitution and the Patriarchal State in Japan in the 1940s |journal=The Sociological Quarterly |date=Spring 1997 |volume=38(2) |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4120735}}</ref>, and Shogo Szuzki of the ] <ref>{{cite journal |last1=Suzuki |first1=Shogo |title=The Competition to Attain Justice for Past Wrongs: The "Comfort Women" Issue in Taiwan |journal=Pacific Affairs |date=June 2011 |volume=84(2) |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23056761}}</ref>, all of whom support and provide evidence that the vast majority of comfort women were coerced. ] of ] particularly cautions against the 'volunteer' theory, for several reasons. First, the fact that "no positive sources exist supporting claims that comfort women were forced labor" must be treated with doubt, as "it is well known that the great majority of potentially damaging official documents were destroyed in anticipation of the Allied occupation". Second, the relative silence of victims caused their later testimony to be denied as historical evidence, despite the fact that "the comfort women system succeeded in keeping the women who had been made comfort women silent" and who later gave evidence with the help of women's support groups (at pg 131).<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Chizuko |first1=Ueno |title=The Politics of Memory: Nation, Individual and Self |journal=History and Memory |date=Fall/Winter 1999 |volume=11(2) |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/his.1999.11.2.129}}</ref>
::The fact that the vast majority of comfort women were coerced was also acknowledged by the Japanese government until recently (up until around the 1990s). For example, the Japanese government in 1993 admitted coercion in recruiting comfort women, though denying any compensation in documents such as in Takagi Kenichi's address to the ] in 1994<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Takagi |first1=Kenichi |title=The War Compensation Issue of Japan: Its Devleopment and Assignments" paper presented at the annual meeting of the Association for Asian Studies, Boston Massachusetts |date=March 1994}}</ref>, and the 1993 ], until it was questioned by then-Japanese Prime Minister ]. The result is that the broad consensus (excluding the current arguments made by the Japanese Government) is that the broad majority of comfort women were coerced.
::Second, regardless of the arguments above, I'm not sure about the relevance of including Ramseyer's viewpoint in the history section, unlike possibly the viewpoint of the Japanese government, which ] asserts. The contribution to the article is minimal with a simple assertion, which appears to make no significant contribution to the article as a whole and goes against the broader consensus presented by the article. To include his view would be to invite ] and should therefore be deleted. ] (]) 13:57, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
*::: The article you linked made no mention of Japan forward and while they did mention the Sankei Shinbun in passing they did not call them far right or nationalist. I understood that you were calling japan forward a tabloid but i disagree with that.
:::The arguments of the Japanese government is not that there was no coercion involved in any cases at all, this is a misconception. I would caution against using sources from the 90s like the ones from the UN as completely definitive as consensus changes with time, with the unearthing of new evidence, and with the dying off of political and ideological motivations, they should be cross referenced with the most recent scholarship and have their validity properly tested. The United States House of Representatives House Resolution 121 used the debunked and now retracted seiji yoshida memoirs as proof, a group of Japanese academics and historians criticized it heavily in an advertisement ran in the Washington Post. It cannot be taken seriously and im not sure if it counts as a binding and official position of the US government or just a ruling by lawmakers at the time. Amnesty International is ideologically driven and is not an authority on history, they are a human rights focused organization that ironically has been criticized for violating the human rights of its staff "Staff reported multiple accounts of discrimination on the basis of race and gender and which women, staff of colour and LGBTQI employees were targeted or treated unfairly."<ref>{{cite web |title=Amnesty International has toxic working culture, report finds |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/06/amnesty-international-has-toxic-working-culture-report-finds}}</ref> Multiple governments including the United States has criticized Amnesty for one-sided reporting<ref>{{cite web |title=Press Briefing by Scott McClellan |url=https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2005/05/20050525-3.html#l}}</ref> I understand this has nothing to do with their claims about the comfort women and i am not using these criticism to counter those, i think its fine to include their view in the article if properly attributed but they are not focused on historical research, the work of historians should be preferred.
:::The first sentence in Gabriel Jonsson's paper you linked is already incorrect "About 80 percent of the estimated 70.000-200.000 comfort women Japan took by coercion from 1932-1945 were Korean", the majority of women were not Korean to state this as an absolute fact puts the entire paper into question. The man further states "Japan has given no official apology to the victims" this is an outright lie.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/q_a/faq16.html}}</ref>. Numerous apologies have been made, nothing in this paper should be taken seriously imo. I've only read the abstract of Hirofumi Hayashi paper but it seems to be about whether the Japanese military at the time held culpability for the women who were coerced or if it fell to individual brokers and recruiters. He takes the position that the military was responsible, the abstract makes no mention of how many women were coerced and how many were prostitutes, the word "slavery" is also not used at all I dont think the paper affirms what you used it as a source for. I dont have access to any of those papers outside of Gabriel Jonsson's so i cannot comment on them at all in depth, im not qualified to dispute them either and all i can do is point to other historians and academics that have published research saying otherwise. To be clear im not attempting to remove the "sex slavery" wording im fine with the article retaining that even if i disagree with it. To continue to comment on what you've said though, the kono statement states two things i want to point out
:::"The recruitment of the comfort women was conducted mainly by private recruiters who acted in response to the request of the military." this seems to contradict Hirofumis's paper, you are presenting alot of sources and claiming a historical consensus however there is not even consensus between your sources, admittedly this issue is very complex and i dont believe this level of disagreement can be avoided but that only pokes holes at any claim of true historical consensus.
:::"In many cases they were recruited against their own will, through coaxing, coercion, etc." again no claim is made on the number of coerced women
:::This paper published by Ramseyer goes quite in depth and is not a "simple assertion" https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0144818820301848, removing his view because it contradicts some of the article is the wrong move, i think ive illustrated why your claim at a historical consensus against Ramseyer is incorrect. I do think the article can be improved by properly stating Ramseyers view and explaining why he came to that conclusion which would fix your criticism that it makes no significant contribution to the article outside of stating his view. ] (]) 19:57, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
::::*Forbes pretty clearly states "The party's newspaper, Akahata (赤旗), has over 1.12 million readers and one weekly magazine predicts they may eclipse Japan's ''far right'' newspaper, Sankei Shimbun in the near future". Nippon also says "Sankei Shimbun, which takes pride in its position at the ''far right'' of the spectrum", which extends "Japan Forward" because it publishes it.
:::::As for your claims, I'd like to avoid any further general discussion on the topic if possible, especially as Misplaced Pages talk pages aren't for that. I'll respond briefly to your points though. On your overall comments on the UN, US and Amnesty International, I brought these up to show that the broader consensus, at least in the international community, which has undertaken its own discussions on this subject, is that comfort women were largely coerced. You can't limit the issue to the "work of historians" when this issue has strong political implications.
:::::Specifically, for the UN, I wanted to show that the international community has already undertook its own research and concluded that the vast majority of comfort women were coerced; the lack of any subsequent UN reports and their thorough research makes it so that the 1990s UN reports are still good and reliable. As for the US House Resolution, I can't find anything to support the "retracted memoirs" or "letter". In any case, I only highlighted it to show that the US's official position is that comfort women were largely coerced. You can't say that it can't be taken seriously when House resolutions express the collective sentiment of the House on a particular issue, which in this case is comfort women. I also don't think the House Resolution has been reversed by the US government. It's been endorsed by countries including the ], ], ] and the ] (see )), which demonstrates the larger consensus around this issue. As for Amnesty International, I'm not sure what relevance the 'toxic working culture' claim has here. For the US link, your source doesn't seem to critize Amnesty International, but only the claims that the "US is a top offender of human rights". In any case previous Misplaced Pages notability discussion came to the consensus that it is a largely reliable source (see and .
:::::As for the criticisms you make against the sources, I'm not going to go into each of your claims to avoid a general discussion, except to note that I can't find any sources that dispute Jonsson's claim (nor have any been linked here, except for the Japanese government's view). In any case, the claim that "because one thing is wrong, it means everything must be wrong" would be dangerous, and would probably leave this page, if not the majority of Misplaced Pages, source-less. The historical and broad consensus I'm trying to show is that "the vast majority of comfort women" were forced, which each of these sources state and provide evidence for. This by around 150 academics also support this. As the vast majority of academic literature supports this broader consensus, adding Ramseyer's view doesn't help advance this article as a whole. The only sources that I can find which possibly dispute this either come from the Japanese government (whose views are already in the article and are relevant to the article as a whole as they are a stakeholder) or right-to-far-right newspapers/blogs, which by Misplaced Pages notability guidelines should not be included.
::::: I'll conclude by saying that the Japanese government had acknowledged that the vast majority of comfort women were forced and changed its stance changed post-1990s (). Most of the dispute that the Japanese government has had is whether the ''Japanese government'' itself is responsible for compensation, not whether most comfort women were forced. In any case, I fail to find any sources or statements by other countries which support Japan's position. Ramseyer's view should not be included in this article, as it adds little to it as a whole while going against the broader academic and international consensus.
::::: In any case, we need to reach a consensus on how to deal with the reference to Ramseyer sooner or later. ] (]) 03:16, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
::::::We must remove the Ramseyer piece from ''Japan Forward'' as it is a far-right, politically motivated misrepresentation of the issue. Ramseyer is much more careful to remain fact-based in his scholarly journal article , from the ''International Review of Law and Economics'', scheduled for print publication in March 2021. In the latter piece, Ramseyer restrains himself from claiming that all or most comfort women were voluntary. He discusses the voluntary aspect in depth, describing the economics of the program, but he does not deny the forced sex slavery. ] (]) 06:48, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 30 September 2023

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I request for the Category:Crimes against humanity to be added to the External Links. 95.147.63.116 (talk) 12:36, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

Already in 'see also', which is the correct place for such links. AndyTheGrump (talk) 12:40, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 1 December 2023

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Change "World war 2" to "World War II". Change "World War 2" to "World War II". Shuntaro Kawasaki (talk) 00:26, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

 Done Thank you, - FlightTime (open channel) 00:40, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Misquotation of source

Only doing this because I do not have an account valid to edit semi-protected pages. The 95th source is misreferenced, in quotes it says "public restrooms", yet the cited source says "public toilets". KillYourLandlord (talk) 07:28, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

done Meters (talk) 07:40, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 20 June 2024

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"Only in the 1990s did the Japanese government begin to officially apologize and offer compensation. However, apologies from Japanese officials have been criticized as insincere."

This quote is highly dishonest and written from a Pro-Korean and Anti-Japanese view point.

Japan has paid reparations for comfort woman multiple times under various treaties. However, if that is not direct enough due the treaties never stating comfort woman, then look at the fact that Japan offered to pay comfort woman's directly but were rejected by the Korean government.

The Korean government asked Japan to give the payments to the Korean government directly and they'll redistribute the funds. Japan agreed to this. However, Korea took the money to fund their businesses and roads and then continued to claim Japan never paid. TheHistorian8 (talk) 23:59, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Aoidh (talk) 00:32, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
 Partly done: Unsourced statement removed. ABG (Talk/Report any mistakes here) 00:35, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 23 July 2024

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I request in the See Also section where it says "Rape of Nanking" to be changed to "Rape of Nanjing". 81.137.207.239 (talk) 13:23, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done Charliehdb (talk) 14:02, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

Apply quotation marks to euphemisms

"Comfort women" is a euphemism for sexual slavery, according to sources here and at Statue of Peace. As such, the euphemism needs to be written in quotation marks, at minimum.

To repeatedly use the euphemism without quotation marks normalizes the euphemism, and in this case normalizes a redefinition of sexual slavery that was promoted originally by Japan in defence of the Japanese Army, who imprisoned and enslaved the Koreans "in brothels" (according to sources).

After the lede, the words 'sexual slaves' should be used instead of "comfort women". Another possibility in the lede is to use 'so-called "comfort women" '. Metokpema (talk) 16:57, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

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