The author of the June 12 article "San Francisco spurned Hashimoto amid sex slave outrage" might want to reconsider his choice of words in the last paragraph. One might "round up" cattle to be inspected or branded; one does not "round up" terrified young women to "serve as sex slaves in brothels serving the Imperial Japanese forces."

Isn't it insulting and degrading enough that Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto thought it was "necessary" for this misfortune to have befallen poor girls who were forcibly taken from their homes and families (or lied to about where they were going)? Do they also have to be compared to livestock?

david chester

tokyo

The opinions expressed in this letter to the editor are the writer's own and do not necessarily reflect the policies of The Japan Times.