In the United States, sex trafficking is the second largest form of organized crime, falling in place only behind the drug trade. Previously, it had been third, but has very recently surpassed the illegal trade of firearms. Most people have the perception that the issue only exists in the third world, in countries like India, Burma, etc., but it’s a very real and complex problem in every city of the United States.
The average age for girls to be brought into a lifestyle of abuse and degradation is between 12—15 years old. Most girls are lured in after either running away from home or other events that leave them lacking parental figures. Once under the control of her new “owner”, almost all victims develop a bond with their captor—a manipulation carefully constructed by the pimp through various forms of deprivation—and the child becomes completely dependent on the pimp. The girls never see a penny of what they “earn”, rather the pimp uses this tax-free money to keep the girls drugged up and teetering on the verge of a breakdown.
It is too easy to have a “that can’t happen here” mentality, but it couldn’t be farther from the truth. It happens in New York, it happens in Los Angeles, and it happens in Springfield. Estimates weigh in that anywhere between 100,000—300,000 children are trafficked in the United States every year, but it’s hard to nail that down due to lack of funding, and the nasty habit that victims are nearly impossible to get on a witness stand out of fear of being beaten or worse for speaking up.
It doesn’t help that the US is almost complicit in cracking down on trafficking. About ten years ago, we mandated that countries submit reports to be categorized into tiers for compliance with anti-human trafficking guidelines, but for some reason unbeknownst to me, the United States has just now been required to submit our own reports. Worse yet, much of our punishments set up to deal with trafficking penalize prostitutes—they’re much easier to catch red-handed, after all—which is infuriating. I cannot think of another crime where the victim is prosecuted, and in all likelihood bound to return to her tormentors after finishing their sentence.
The United States sure is one of the greatest places in the world to live, but we sure have our work cut out for us in a number of ways.
Materials/Sources:
Sex+Money (http://sexandmoneyfilm.com/)
This documentary is showing February 4th at the Moxie. Please go see it, it’s eye-opening.
Women’s Funding Network (http://www.womensfundingnetwork.org/resource/past-articles/enslaved-in-america-sex-trafficking-in-the-united-states)
ABC (http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1596778&page=1#.TueoxnOle3s)
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_trafficking_in_the_United_States)