Sex Trafficking and Prostitution
Will 2010 Olympics and World Cup Boost Forced Prostitution?
Published July 14, 2009 @ 12:00PM PT
Next year promises to be a big one for sports fans, with the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada and the World Cup in South Africa. But will those same events make it a big year for pimps and traffickers as well? Do major sporting events boost forced prostitution?
There are competing answers, with both sides using statistics from former world-wide sporting events to support their position. The Future Group recently released a report stating that there was a significant risk of increased trafficking into prostitution in Vancouver during the upcoming Olympics. They cite the comparison of the 2004 Athens Olympics, during which the number of trafficking victims identified in Greece doubled. On the other hand, a different report from Vancouver's Sex Worker Safety Action group says that there will be no significant increase in women forced into prostitution during the Olympics. They cite the 2006 World Cup in Germany, which had no significant increase in the number of trafficking victims identified, despite the high estimates from advocacy groups. It seems very little data is available from the 2008 Beijing games, due to the Chinese government's data censorship.
The logical basis behind the argument that major sporting events pose a threat to increase trafficking of women and children into commercial sex is that these events draw massive numbers of men into one place. Sometimes these men are single, traveling without their families, or in a group of friends; sometimes they are drinking. It stands to reason that some of these men might demand commercial sex as entertainment during their trip, and traffickers will supply the women to meet that increased demand.
It's logical, yes, but does it happen? Athens saw a spike in human trafficking, but Germany did not. Was the difference the prevention campaigns which were conducted in Germany? Was the Olympics perceived as more profitable by the traffickers than the World Cup? Were men at the World Cup in Germany less interested in buying sex than the men in Greece? We may not know for sure, at least not until we have better information.
Both Vancouver and South Africa, as well as a number of international organizations, are preparing for the possible increase in human trafficking in 2010. I hope that other groups are also preparing to collect better data at these events as well, so we can continue to better understand what sorts of events motivate traffickers to force women into prostitution and how we can prevent them from doing so in the future. It would be a true celebration if 2010 were known only for excellence in athletics, and not in exploitation.
World Premier: The Killers' New Human Trafficking Music Video
Published July 13, 2009 @ 12:00PM PT
The Killers have teamed up with MTV's Exit Campaign to create a new music video focused on human trafficking. Their previous collaboration with Radiohead produced this, which focused on trafficking in manufacturing. The Killers' video instead focuses on trafficking of children into prostitution.
The world premier of this video is tonight on MTV, but you can watch it here now.
Honestly, I have some very mixed feelings about this video. On the one hand, everything MTV Exit does is brilliantly executed artistically and technically, and this video is no different. I'm also a personal fan of The Killers' music; the song they've created evokes the sort of hip melancholy that usually only happens when an American Apparel store shuts doesn in Brooklyn. On the other hand, the video reinforces some problematic stereotypes- like women and children being trafficking into the sex industry are locked in a room when they're not being raped. I also question who the audience for this music video is. It starts off seeming to be a general awareness activity, but towards the end starts to feel like it's only targeting men who buy commercial sex. I wish it had clearly focused on one group, or the public at large, instead of wavering.
The Radiohead video on human trafficking (as much as I moan about how I'm not a Radiohead fan) did an excellent job of presenting the issue of trafficking as simple and chillingly connected to you as a person. The Killers' video comes across as more sensational and more disconnected from the average MTV viewer. Still despite a few flaws, I hope that this video will help attract MTV viewers and Killers fans (especially those who may buy commercial sex or have friends who buy commercial sex) to learn more about human trafficking.
Now, if only I can download this song onto my Wii for Rockband II, then I can rock out to abolition with The Killers!
The New Market of Mobile Porn
Published July 08, 2009 @ 07:14AM PT
The porn industry has always been at the fore-front of developing new technologies. It popularized the VCR in the 1980s and quickly blanketed the Internet in the 1990s. And now, porn is going mobile. Mobile phone, that is.
Already, wireless companies in Japan are having capacity issues, as so many users are downloading more and more pornographic films and photos to their mobile devices. And those same companies estimate the amount of revenue from adult mobile downloads will double between now and 2013 to the tune of $4.9 billion. Now that's a lot of porn. In the U.S., the attitude is slightly different. After an app entitled "Hottest Girls" (decidedly soft-core, featuring scantily clad women) appeared in their app store, Apple announced they would not allow pornographic apps on their devices. However, the estimates of the market size- $3.5 billion by 2010- are similar to the Japanese.
So what's the problem with vast amounts of porn being downloaded and watched on cell phones across the country? As with most porn issues, the problem is kids. When porn is mobile, the industry is much harder to regulate. Already, there have been several cases of child pornography showing up on cell phones. It's also harder for parents to monitor what their children are looking at when porn can fit in pocket. And some of the porn that's out on the Internet these days is not of the "Hottest Girls" vein; it's hard-core, violent, and sometimes grotesque. A thriving mobile porn industry makes it much harder for parents and schools to protect children, both from child predators who would harm them and from disturbing and violent pornographic images.
The mobile porn industry is young enough that few meaningful national conversations about how to regulate and control this newest medium have happened. But if we're looking at what will be a $3.5 billion industry in a couple years, well then it's time to start talking.
Image from theiphoneblog.com
PIMPtendo: Gaming for Pimps
Published July 02, 2009 @ 07:00AM PT
Do you love video games? Do you also love glamorizing men who sell and exploit women and girls? Well then you need to purchase the PIMPtendo! The PIMPtendo is basically an old school NES system that has been covered with zebra print fabric and purple feathers. It's actually pretty cool and funky looking. So why did it's creator choose to call it a PIMPtendo instead of a RETROtendo or a FUNKtendo? Because in our society, to pimp something has come to mean "to improve it", and pimps are considered cool.
Dictonary.com defines "pimp" as:
-noun
1. a person, esp. a man, who solicits customers for a prostitute or a brothel, usually in return for a share of the earnings; pander; procurer.
2. a despicable person
3. Australia and New Zealand. an informer; stool pigeon. (Ed note: Wow.. note to self if I ever travel to that part of the world)
-verb (used without object)
4. to act as a pimp.
-verb (used with object)
5. to act as a pimp for.
6. to exploit.
Pimps are, by the definition above, exploiters of women and children in prostitution. They are criminals, not cool guys to name modified NES systems after. This cultural glamorization of pimping helps justify the actual crime of pimping, for both the perpetrators and the victims. A young girl today who has grown up playing the PIMPtendo and watching Pimp My Ride and hearing about Pimp N' Ho parties has a very different experience with the idea of a pimp than the reality of street life under pimp control. And if she meets a real pimp, will she be wary of what having a manager/controller will mean for her? Perhaps not. Our cultural obsession with the "coolness" of pimps is a dangerous reality for many teens.
The verdict? Video games are cool. Exploitation of women is not. Take that PIMPtendo.
NYC Teens Tackle Child Sex Trafficking Via Digital Film
Published July 01, 2009 @ 07:30AM PT
What do you get when you combine a group of New York City teens, digital animation, and a passion for ending child sex trafficking? You get Discovered, a machinima (digital animation created by filming video games) film on child sex trafficking, produced entirely by high school students. You also get a group of teens who know what it means to put the "act" in activism.
"We picked child sex trafficking because it wasn't as popular, people don't talk about it as much," said Megan Butcher, 17, one of the filmmakers. "We want more people to be aware of this problem and we hope it will end soon."
Discovered was created as part of the Virtual Video Project, a project of Global Kids, which works to transform urban youth into successful students and global and community leaders by engaging them in socially dynamic, content-rich learning experiences. This past weekend, the filmmakers presented their work at the first annual (o.o) Festival on digital media. The youth project fair featured a wide variety of digital media, including digital comics, serious game designs, animated movies, assistive technology projects, and do-it-yourself tech support. But it was the Global Kids Youth Leaders who innovatively used digital animation and design to educate their peers about issues of human trafficking.
"I hope when people watch this movie, they will feel that there is a problem, that this can happen to anyone easily," says Evin Cruz, 16, of his film. "Now they are aware of this, they can help. I hope people can be more aware of what goes on, and I hope the government can play a stronger role in what's happening to end the suffering."
You can watch Discovered below. It tells the story of a young girl who is lured from her home in Mexico to America, the abuses she suffers while in the U.S., and the challenges the government faces in combating human trafficking. It is eloquently written, creative, and mature; I would not have ordinarily guessed it had been created by young people. Then again, these are obviously extraordinary young people.
Taiwan Legalizes Prostitution
Published June 25, 2009 @ 12:00PM PT
Yesterday, Taiwan passed legislation which would legalize prostitution on the island, overturning a law which outlawed the practice 11 years ago. Sex workers' advocacy groups cheered, and religious groups went home and listened to Queen's "Another One Bites the Dust" on repeat.
Taiwan's legal change is slightly different than those made in places like New Zealand and Germany, however. Prior to the new law, prostitution was only criminal for the mostly-female sellers of sex; the male customers could not be prosecuted. While the Swedish model advocates criminalizing the buyer and not the seller, I've never heard of the reverse before. It seems both grossly unfair and counter-intuitive to hold women in prostitution, trafficked or not, criminally accountable while the men who buy them walk away without penalty. It's a law with the inevitable affect of driving up demand for sex while reducing the supply of women who will sell it. In other words, the old law was a recipe for trafficking.
The advocates behind this new law argued that making prostitution illegal 11 years ago has done little to reduce human trafficking or prostitution of minors in Taiwan, and that the industry is now controlled by unscrupulous gangsters. But will legalizing prostitution now really result in these gangsters relinquishing control over their brothels? Or will it just make their thuggish enforcement and abuses of women beyond prosecution?
Detractors from the law argue that legalization hasn't reduced trafficking in Amsterdam, and that if legal reform is necessary, criminalizing the buyer and decriminalizing the seller is a better way to go than flat out legalization. If brothels are legal, law enforcement has a harder time discovering trafficked persons and minors within them.
What I fear the most will happen as a result of this legal change are the following:
- The deep imbalance of gender equality in Taiwan (as evidenced by the previous law) will manifest in violence against women in the new legal commercial sex industry.
- Taiwan's proximity to and relationship with China will make it an even bigger destination for Chinese women trafficked into prostitution.
- The new law will make it impossible for police to find the estimated 100,000 children who are forced into prostitution in Taiwan.
I hope I'm wrong. I hope that Taiwan, somehow, has found that silver bullet to end human trafficking in prostitution and to stop traffickers and buyers from preying on children. I hope this new law solves the problem. But I doubt it will.
Atlanta Proposes Decriminalizing Prostitution for Teens
Published June 20, 2009 @ 09:00AM PT
In a bold move, legislation has been proposed in Atlanta this week to decriminalize the act of prostitution for children under 17 years old. And I'm sure you're all shocked to find out that legislation about teenagers, sex, and prostitution has met with.... controversy!
Atlanta has long had a serious problem with young girls being trafficked into prostitution, and has been sometimes called "the child prostitution capital of America." And anyone who's driven through downtown late at night would not disagree that there are very, very young girls out on the streets. And despite some great efforts by the Mayor's office, Atlanta remains a huge destination for young girls forced into commercial sex industries. So will decriminalizing prostitution for teens be the fix?
The article from the Atlanta Journal Constitution leaves out a lot of really important details: Will soliciting a teen prostitute still be criminal for the buyer? What about for the pimp? I can't imagine that the law would pay paying a teen for sex legal, but I haven't heard confirmation either way. If someone has more information and/or the text of the proposed legislation, please share it in the comments.
The controversy over this law is complex and (I'm sure) related to the broader discussion about the relationship between human trafficking and prostitution. On the one hand, advocates argue that these teens are stigmatized by their prostitution arrest(s) for the rest of their lives, and may be more likely to re-enter the industry as adults feeling they have no other choice. On the other hand, some groups argue that sometimes arrest is the only way to get a child off the streets (and away from her pimp) long enough for her to talk to a social worker or call her family. It's an intensely tricky issue.
I'm wondering if anyone in Atlanta has considered alternatives to wholesale decriminalization that would both allow law enforcement to pick up kids in need and prevent them from being stigmatized with a prostitution arrest? Or if decriminalization is the only way, are there other laws (curfew, loitering, etc.) that could help get a girl under pimp control off the street and to a safe place? If anyone from Atlanta with more information about this legislation and the discussion around it is reading, please share your thoughts!
Image from recover-from-grief.com
