Chain of Tears: Selling Our Daughters

Introduction

Prostitution is widely recognized as one of the oldest professions in human history, going back to the 24th century BCE. During that period, the ancient Near East was home to numerous houses of heaven where sacred prostitution was practiced. Over the course of history, the practice of sacred prostitution gradually spread to other parts of the world, including Greece, Italy, India, China, and Japan.

In Japan, numerous shrines and temples that employed miko (shrine maidens) fell on hard times during the Kamakura period (1185–1333) ―a time of significant conflict and the rise of feudalism in the country. Some of the miko who were compelled to live as vagrants turned to prostitution as means of survival.

Prostitution as a profession has endured throughout the course of Japan’s history. Liberal interpretations, loose enforcement, and loopholes in the Prostitution Prevention Law of 1956, which prohibits both involvement in prostitution and patronage thereof, have enabled the Japanese sex industry to flourish and generate an estimated 2.3 trillion yen ($24 billion) annually in revenue. This places the sex industry in Japan as the third largest globally, following China ($73 billion) and Spain ($26.5 billion).

While doing research for my third book, Nickname Flower of Evil (呼び名は悪の花): The Abe Sada Story (2019), I was shocked to discover that Sada and her older sister were sold to brothel owners by their father as a form of punishment. During the Edo period (1603-1868), prostitution in Japan was licensed and subsequently legalized. It was not uncommon for destitute families to sell their daughters into indentured servitude within the sex industry to obtain the cash advances that were essential for the family’s survival. Samurai families also engaged in the practice of selling their wayward daughters as a means of punishment.

Girls were usually procured from fishing villages, impoverished rural provinces, and the residences of low-ranking samurai families. Occasionally, merchant families in financial trouble sold their daughters in order to repay their debts. Every now and then, a young girl was duped by an unscrupulous man and sold to a zegen (someone who makes their living selling women into prostitution).

Parents were provided with a lump sum of cash in consideration of their daughters' future earning potential. The sum of money given to the parents differed in accordance with the girl's lineage. Typically, three to five ryo (equivalent to 300,000 to 500,000 yen today or $2,400 to $3,400) were paid for a girl from a rural family. If the girl came from a low- ranking samurai family, she would usually command eighteen ryo (equivalent to 1.8 million yen or $12,000).

Following the legalization of prostitution by the shogunate (the military government of Japan during the Edo period), designated red-light districts were established near major cities such as Edo (present-day Tokyo), Kyoto, Osaka, and Nagasaki. In time, the government sanctioned illicit brothels, arresting the women employed there and selling them at auctions to brothels operating within the authorized pleasure quarters. Due to the prohibition of human trafficking by the shogunate, the women involved in prostitution within the approved quarters were commonly referred to as "servants" rather than prostitutes.

Despite the negative societal perception of prostitutes, the practice of selling daughters was not condemned in Japanese society on the grounds that the girls were merely performing their filial obligation.

A significant number of female workers in the sex industry were indentured to brothels when they were young, typically between seven and nine years old. Brothel purveyors would commonly crisscross impoverished rural communities and fishing villages during the spring, when food rations were scarce, and the summer, when taxes were due. While the girls were generally enslaved for a duration of ten years, the indebtedness they incurred as prostitutes relegated them to that lifestyle indefinitely.

Japan also has a comparably extensive history involving indentured labor. A significant slave trade had existed since the Portuguese arrived in the 16th century. During this time, Japanese women were either purchased or abducted and transported back to Portugal to serve as sex slaves. A number of these women were retained as concubines by the crewmembers of the vessels engaged in trade with Japan.

The Tokugawa shogunate's decision to legalize prostitution and confine sex work by women and girls to specific areas was primarily driven by the objective of streamlining tax collection, rather than moral concerns. A tax was levied on both the owners of the brothels and the prostitutes themselves. The presence of these quarters also contributed to the legitimization of prostitution, and the sale of women and girls for sexual purposes accelerated at an alarming rate.

It is worth noting that not all prostitutes were coerced into sex work; some did so voluntarily, typically for financial reasons. While alternative routes to economic independence and social advancement for women existed throughout the Edo period, prostitution remained an ever-present source of income for women of all social classes. As a result, the female body evolved into a practical commodity that benefitted a broad spectrum of individuals in Japanese society.

However, while males were preoccupied with indulging in pleasure-seeking activities and forgetting the difficulties arising from living in a highly regulated social structure, the emotions and thoughts of the women remain unknown to us. No true records of the Edo period prostitutes’ personal thoughts and experiences exist, so we do not have their firsthand accounts. Art, literature, and certain historical accounts authored by men romanticize the pleasure quarters, but when viewed through the lens of a woman, it must have been an extremely miserable existence.

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Chain of Tears: Selling Our Daughters

ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 979-8869219473

Language ‏ : ‎ English

Paperback ‏ : ‎ 224 pages

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