Holocaust vs. comfort women

By Oh Young-jin

In a no-holds-barred battle of replies on Facebook, a foreign friend of mine pointed out that Koreans are not taught about the Holocaust in school. I don't remember what the subject was but he rested his case, when I pointed out White House spokesman Sean Spicer's controversial Syrian vs. Nazi comments. My rationale was that education is important but it doesn't always have the intended effect.

That got me thinking about why Westerners and Middle Easterners are sensitive in different ways about Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Holocaust and other atrocities committed by Nazi Germany, but less so about the comfort women, the corps of sex slaves under Japanese colonial rule here, and Unit 731, which specialized in barbarous experiments on living people.

Other Asians also suffered from Japan's invasion so they often commiserate with Koreans.

True, it goes the other way as well, as Koreans are still at pains about the misdeeds committed against their ancestors, but less so about Jewish victims.

One can assume that it is natural because people tend to pay more attention to what happens in their neck of woods. Would education make a difference?

May be, but it appears to be not as simple as adding one additional chapter about the extermination of the Jews or introducing one about the plight of comfort women.

First, there is a kaleidoscope of views Koreans hold about Jews and Israelis.

One of them is stuck in the Shakespearean era ― ruthless and shrewd Shylock in the Merchant of Venice. Another is about the Israelis' denial of the Palestine state ― cruel systematic oppression and settlements encroaching into the livelihood of the ruled. Also Koreans' collective mind negatively sees alleged Jewish control of global finances and undue influence in U.S. politics. On the positive side are Israel's start-up industries, pilgrimages to biblical sites and the country's war victories over bigger Arab coalitions.

Koreans may resemble a white American, who would cry watching "Roots" but recoil from an approaching African American on the street. Koreans would sympathize with the Jews' travails but not see them as victims. They appear not convinced by Kristallnacht, Anne Frank, "Schindler's List" and "Life is Beautiful."

They may see a David beating a Goliath one too many times and lose their sympathy for Jews.

Still, it can't be denied that at the bottom of their hearts, Koreans have a visceral envy of the Jews who they think can rule the world through regents, chase their enemies to the end and take revenge without any statute of limitations.

This feeling of envy is related to Koreans' failure to get even with Japan for its colonial misdeeds.

One Arab friend told me sincerely, "Why can't Korea make peace with Japan?" I told him, "We will make peace with Japan, when you make your peace with Israel."

The American view and by extension that of Western countries, is well captured when Wendy Sherman, U.S. undersecretary of state in the Obama administration, said that Korea was constrained by its politically exploited nationalism in its future possibilities, the same view as my Arab friend.

If Sherman had known more about the plight of hundreds of thousands of women enslaved as sex toys for Japanese soldiers, would she say the same thing? Those women had to deal with tens or hundreds of soldiers per day, undergoing the dehumanizing process of being turned into human cesspools or portable toilets.

Sherman was quite adamant that Korea should turn the page and cooperate with Japan in what is emerging to be a trilateral alliance led by the U.S. against expansionist China. Japan rejoiced to see the world's superpower take sides with it, feeling that its shameful history would be pigeonholed and forgotten forever.

Japan has gone further declaring that it no longer has an interest in the past and wants to foster future-oriented relationships with its victim nations. What an imposition!

It would be absurd to tell which pain would be worse when it is inflicted on a mass scale but by no means would the suffering of the comfort women be less painful than that of those killed en masse in the Nazi gas chambers.

Obviously what Korea lacks is education for people like Sherman, who are ignorant of Korea's painful history and still get away with it at their convenience. As in the Spicer case, it goes only so far. What is needed is a way of making them see Korea's misery as compelling as they see the Jewish Holocaust.

Therein lies a challenge to make the Koreans out like the Jews through a persistent, insistent fight to demand the world see their tragedy at its worst and commiserate with them.

They would do so only in the fear that not doing so may bring a tragedy of the same magnitude to bear upon those who fail to share the Korean pain.

Oh Young-jin is The Korea Times' chief editorial writer. Contact foolsdie5@ktimes.com and foolsdie@gmail.com.

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