This one statement, as Nanyang Technological University professor Kevin Blackburn writes in his new book, The Comfort Women of Singapore in History and Memory , was not only inaccurate but further cemented an unwelcoming environment for former Singapore comfort women to break their silence about the trauma they experienced during WW2.
As Blackburn shows throughout his book, there is good reason for this. It was this news that Lee was responding to in his statement. Blackburn also spends considerable time showing that in Singapore, as in many Asian countries, women who were victims of the Japanese military in WW2 have traditionally been viewed as the ones at fault and therefore a disgrace to their friends and family.
No wonder so few former comfort women ever came forward. As Blackburn writes, the increase in prostitution after WW2 was so noticeable that the Singapore government started blaming the women and felt that the best way to reform them was to send them to the Poh Leung Kuk, a home for girls that originally taught homemaking skills but by the s had become more of a punitive detention center.
Rather than detaining women who have turned to prostitution, Lee recommended opening factory jobs to women and providing them with leisurely activities that would bring joy to their lives. By the s, most of the former comfort women in Singapore had fully integrated back into society, but happiness remained elusive. They knew they would fare better if they never spoke about their experiences during the war.
Even when these stories started to emerge again after so many decades, the Singapore government still distanced itself from the issue compared to a country like South Korea. But when the same group that funded that statue wanted to place one in Singapore, the government hemmed and hawed and eventually the statue did not go up, presumably to avoid the risk of offending Japan. Given its history with Japan, the Korean government could take more risks with such a bold statue, but the Singapore government is not in the practice of making political statements.
