Quote Originally Posted by Cilia View Post
The problem isn't really the prostitution itself, but the human trafficking that tends to fuel it, such as Yotsuyu's case. It's one thing to go into the profession either because you have no other options or of your own free will; it's another to be forced into it, either through being abducted or sold to a brothel. We do fight against human traffickers, and that practice does seem to be illegal and rejected by society, regardless of whether or not people get away with it.
There's a slight cultural/historical dissonance going on here in that prostitution didn't carry the same stigma in Historical Japan that it did in Historical Europe and a daughter going into the sex trade to pay a family's debts was seen as a filial sacrifice and actually somewhat respectable. If she managed to pay off the debt she could transition into the "normal" life of a wife and mother without much issue.

Her family selling Yotsuyu to a brothel wasn't that much worse than their earlier act of selling her into a very young marriage to an abusive spouse.