During Pacific wars in the early 1930s, women were targeted victims of military sexual slavery when the Japanese army was allowed to establish "comfort stations" -- public prostitution units. These stations were organized by the military to reduce massive violence and rape incidents in the Asian countryside, and supposedly contribute to effective military activities by relieving the male sexual urge. Women, as a result, were forcibly taken to Japanese military stations and were subjected to repeated sexual violence. These incidents were in no way limited to the Japanese military or to wars fought in Asia for decades in the mid-20th Century. However, for women native to South Korea, the Philippines, China, and other nations of the region, their unethical treatment for several years at the hands of a hypocritical military edict felt unending.
Kidnapped, coerced, or abducted, women were taken under the guise of statutes of Japanese colonial rule demanding conquered territories turn over raw materials, crops, and other useful items. In the case of women, they too, were referred to as a "unit of persons who voluntarily devote their bodies for a purpose." Although some women were offered farm work, medical work, or war reporting jobs, many women were mobilized through schools or public offices (under the pretense of a job opportunity), only to later be turned over to the military. As war in the Pacific dragged on, through to the mid-1940s, official edicts were passed, and colonial military and police squads forcibly abducted women termed wianbu (comfort women), and sent them to military stations.
As of October 2006, more than 120 women abused by this system are alive, providing their testimony, and remaining active in supporting regional and international legislation regarding sexual abuse during military occupation, as well as legislation providing medical and social backing for families of the afflicted. Per one of the key goals of the Ministry, another significant effort of these former "comfort women" is to correct historical understandings of military sexual slavery victims.
The animated films are commissioned by the Ministry and published to the e-museum for the victims of Japanese military sexual slavery. The films are animated in flash, and sport very minimal motion and kinetics, relying largely upon the voice-over narrative/testimony. The website was launched by the Ministry of Gender Equality & Family back in 2001. Accordingly, there are three short films: (1) testimony and reflections of comfort women, (2) the importance of telling their history, and (3) the outcome of the Women's International War Crimes Tribunal on Japanese Military Sexual Slavery, held in 2000. Through testimony, period photography, news articles, and additional research, these stories are reaching new audiences, from a photo exhibition in the Netherlands which wrapped in July 2010, to these very animated films being broadcast in classrooms, which the Ministry has planned for the near future.
Additional Information:
e-Museum at www.HerMuseum.go.kr/
Military Sexual Slavery: Life After Liberation
Recorded Testimony: text / video / animation
Recent Korea Animation News:
"The 2010 Seoul International Cartoon & Animation Fest" at AnimationInsider.net (07/2010)
"Animation at the 12th Int'l Women's Film Fest in Seoul" at AnimationInsider.net (04/2010)