Trigger warning (rape)

In case a reader doesn't...you know, read subject lines: warning- this post contains mention of, feelings about, concerns with rape. So if that bothers you, you probably should not read beyond this point.

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For my Introduction to Historical Study/Historiography class, our professor assigned us a book review, producing a list of books from which to choose; we drew numbers, and whoever picked the number one got to pick first, et cetera. I was number eight; I got my first choice, a book titled The Comfort Women: Japan's Brutal Regime of Enforced Prostitution in the Second World War by George Hicks. I picked it because the sexual exploitation of women in wartime is not frequently explored, at least in my experience beyond the Viking rape-and-pillage stereotype.

But I've discovered a problem that worries me.

• Empathy: 2: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner
• Sympathy: 3 a: the act or capacity of entering into or sharing the feelings or interests of another

You see, my problem lies therein the definitions of those 'states of being,' if you will.

I feel sympathy for the women who were brutally raped by the Japanese troops. The majority of women weren't even Japanese (who were reserved for the higher-ranking troops because of the more geisha-like qualities many possessed, e.g., the ability to socially 'chit-chat' more, entertainment in addition to sexual acts). Hicks lists that the preference for the ethnicity of the women went as such: Japanese, Korean, Chinese, and other areas of the Southern Asian sphere of the Japanese Empire. What astounded me most was the fact that Dutch citizens of Java were taken into enforced prostitution.

The accounts given in the book detail the women's experiences, as one would naturally expect to find in such a historical book. And yes, the acts were vile and horrible; the women's experiences psychologically added with the physical aftereffects (inability to have children being the most common I've read so far) are unimaginable. And as a woman, I feel I should have more empathy, more ability to "vicariously experience the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner," much less with the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner (which they very much are).

But I can't, and I don't.

Not for lack of trying. I've tried to picture myself in the situation of being forced into prostitution either by deception/bribery, or physical violence. And while I can picture it, I can't put my feelings into perspective. I most certainly have the utmost sympathy for the women. I can't imagine what it must be like to not be able to fully enjoy being with one's husband or significant other. I can't imagine what it must be like to have a reproductive system that fails to be reproductive because of the trauma forced upon it. I can't imagine having to live, day after day, of "servicing" up to 30, even 40, men a day.

But not for lack of trying.

Now to the question in mind. Does this make me a bad woman? Does this make me heartless? Does this make me a good historian, able to objectively step back and look at the situation without my emotions getting in the way? Does this make me a bad historian?

Honestly, this really bothers me. I wish I could feel more than just vague nausea at the acts described in the book. I don't really know why I've been desensitized, whether it's been some effect of the internet (train-wreck syndrome, if you will), movies, my obsession and love of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. I don't think it's any of that, though. Charity (my roommate) has incredible empathy, and has been exposed to many things, either over the internet or the television/movies. In many ways, she's done more research about women's rights, feminism and the acts against women throughout history, so you'd think she'd be more objective.

But she's always talked about her ability to put herself in the position of another, to feel their feelings on a profound level.

I'm a good listener (so I've been told). Yes, I do believe rape is wrong and atrocious. Yes, I do believe child molesters should have done to them what they did to others. But the fact that I can't empathize deeply with my own gender and their experiences throughout the ages of enforced prostitution and violent sexual acts leading to psychological and physical damage truly worries me.

Am I a terrible feminist?