- Colin Powell, Four-Star General & Former U.S. Secretary of State
on the subject of child sex trafficking.
“It is a sin against humanity and it is a horrendous crime”
“It is a sin against humanity and it is a horrendous crime”
GENERAL FACTS
• There are more than 27 million slaves today…more than at any other time in human history.
• 800,000 people are trafficked across International borders every year
• 80% of transnational victims are women & girls
• 70% of female victims are trafficked into the commercial sex industry
• 50% of transnational victims are children
• Over 1 million children are exploited annually by the global commercial sex trade
• Documented in 161 countries...including U.S. (Sex trafficking is now considered the United States third largest profit earner for organized crime in the U.S.)
• 14,500-17,500 foreign nationals are trafficked into the U.S. annually
• 300,000 American children are estimated to be at risk of sexual exploitation, including commercial sexual exploitation
• Average age of entry into prostitution is between 12-14
• One of the largest customers for international sex slaves are men from the U.S.
• It’s a $32 billion dollar industry
• 800,000 people are trafficked across International borders every year
• 80% of transnational victims are women & girls
• 70% of female victims are trafficked into the commercial sex industry
• 50% of transnational victims are children
• Over 1 million children are exploited annually by the global commercial sex trade
• Documented in 161 countries...including U.S. (Sex trafficking is now considered the United States third largest profit earner for organized crime in the U.S.)
• 14,500-17,500 foreign nationals are trafficked into the U.S. annually
• 300,000 American children are estimated to be at risk of sexual exploitation, including commercial sexual exploitation
• Average age of entry into prostitution is between 12-14
• One of the largest customers for international sex slaves are men from the U.S.
• It’s a $32 billion dollar industry
THE DOMESTIC ISSUE
Human Trafficking enslaves 27 million people around the world, however, many Americans are unaware that many of these victims are right here in America in urban cities, suburban neighborhoods and even Midwest farming communities. Read on to learn how this problem affects victims on U.S. soil...
THE FACTS:
The staggering truth:
Every year, approximately 300,000 American children are at risk of becoming sold, forced or coerced into prostitution within the United States. The average age is 12-14 years old. Every year, an estimated 100,000 children are victims of commercial child prostitution. Everyday, countless American men pay money to have sex with American children. Everyday, countless pimps commercially exploit American children by forcing or coercing them to sell their bodies on the street and on the Internet. Everyday, American children are bought and sold for some man’s sexual gratification.
UNDERSTANDING THE ISSUE:
The Problem:
The exact extent and seriousness to which prostitution of minors occurs are difficult to determine as this is the most overlooked form of child exploitation in the United States. Causative factors contributing to the statistical dilemma include:
✦ Macro level social issues: runaway, thrown away and neglected children; profit-seeking perpetrators who exploit children for pure financial gain; vulnerable and gullible children desperately seeking love, affection and attention; an apathetic attitude and misconception by many that minors engaged in prostitution freely choose this lifestyle and are willing participants in their own victimization; a lack of resources with which to effectively address this issue; a broken juvenile justice system that creates a revolving door for these victims
✦ Prostituted children do not self-report
✦ Underground nature of the trade
✦ Anonymity factor created by the internet which hides the truth behind what is visible
✦ The mobility of the trade
✦ False identification carried by prostituted children
✦ Early onset of puberty by females which hides their true age
The Social Mentality:
Society as a whole stigmatizes prostituted children as criminals as opposed to victims. Prostitution is an extension of sexual abuse for the vast majority of these children. No little girl wants to be a prostitute when she grows up.
Painfully lacking is a true understanding that a child who is targeted by a pimp to be recruited for his “stable” is a potential victim of child sexual exploitation, exactly as would be a mentally handicapped child/adult who is likewise targeted by the same predator. Both victims lack the capacity to understand exactly what this predator has in mind. By force, fraud or coercion, these girls are taken into an underground lifestyle. Each of these girls is vulnerable for different reasons. One due to a lifetime of sexual abuse by the young age of 12 who sees herself as everything but whole, and the second impaired by mental incapacity. Bottom line is both girls are potential victims. Likewise, a pimp predator seeking to lure girls on the street or internet for his “stable” and an internet predator seeking to lure girls on-line for his own sexual fantasies are no different. Both predators seek vulnerable girls. However, the victim of an internet predator is viewed as an innocent victim of a heinous crime by an evil perpetrator and the victim of a pimp predator is viewed as a “whore,” “bitch,” or “ho” who has freely chosen a lifestyle of prostitution.
A paradigm shift in our view of this population of prostituted children is the requisite first step to combat the sexual exploitation perpetrated against them. Until we see these children as victims, we will lack the appropriate services to meet their specialized needs.
The Perfect Storm:
The mental and emotional dynamics between the pimp and a child victim create the perfect platform for child sexual exploitation. Pimps understand a desperate child’s needs and recognize that in controlling the mind, the body follows. Pimps are astute in knowing exactly how to control their victims and use a combination of force, fraud or coercion to illicit victim compliance. Juxtapose this dynamic to the fact that most victims have experienced a lifetime of abuse and brokenness from childhood to preteen years. Between their basic survival needs as a runaway or thrownaway child on the street to their desperate need for love, attention and affection, this child becomes open game for exploitation.
The Vehicles of Child Sexual Exploitation:
The commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) occurs through child pornography, the prostitution of children, and child sex tourism. Each of these exploitive vehicles works in tandem with one another, together fueling the sexual exploitation and victimization of children. Jointly, these vehicles create and sustain the growing phenomenon of prostituted children in the 21st century.
Education:
Education is key to understanding this issue. Visit the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section of the United States Department of Justice: http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/
Federal Law Enforcement Response:
The Innocence Lost National Initiative is a strategic partnership created to combat trafficking of U.S. children into prostitution. Visit: http://www2.fbi.gov/innolost/innolost.htm
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children:
The mission of the organization is to serve as the nation’s resource on the issues of missing and sexually exploited children. Visit: www.missingkids.co
THE FACTS:
The staggering truth:
Every year, approximately 300,000 American children are at risk of becoming sold, forced or coerced into prostitution within the United States. The average age is 12-14 years old. Every year, an estimated 100,000 children are victims of commercial child prostitution. Everyday, countless American men pay money to have sex with American children. Everyday, countless pimps commercially exploit American children by forcing or coercing them to sell their bodies on the street and on the Internet. Everyday, American children are bought and sold for some man’s sexual gratification.
UNDERSTANDING THE ISSUE:
The Problem:
The exact extent and seriousness to which prostitution of minors occurs are difficult to determine as this is the most overlooked form of child exploitation in the United States. Causative factors contributing to the statistical dilemma include:
✦ Macro level social issues: runaway, thrown away and neglected children; profit-seeking perpetrators who exploit children for pure financial gain; vulnerable and gullible children desperately seeking love, affection and attention; an apathetic attitude and misconception by many that minors engaged in prostitution freely choose this lifestyle and are willing participants in their own victimization; a lack of resources with which to effectively address this issue; a broken juvenile justice system that creates a revolving door for these victims
✦ Prostituted children do not self-report
✦ Underground nature of the trade
✦ Anonymity factor created by the internet which hides the truth behind what is visible
✦ The mobility of the trade
✦ False identification carried by prostituted children
✦ Early onset of puberty by females which hides their true age
The Social Mentality:
Society as a whole stigmatizes prostituted children as criminals as opposed to victims. Prostitution is an extension of sexual abuse for the vast majority of these children. No little girl wants to be a prostitute when she grows up.
Painfully lacking is a true understanding that a child who is targeted by a pimp to be recruited for his “stable” is a potential victim of child sexual exploitation, exactly as would be a mentally handicapped child/adult who is likewise targeted by the same predator. Both victims lack the capacity to understand exactly what this predator has in mind. By force, fraud or coercion, these girls are taken into an underground lifestyle. Each of these girls is vulnerable for different reasons. One due to a lifetime of sexual abuse by the young age of 12 who sees herself as everything but whole, and the second impaired by mental incapacity. Bottom line is both girls are potential victims. Likewise, a pimp predator seeking to lure girls on the street or internet for his “stable” and an internet predator seeking to lure girls on-line for his own sexual fantasies are no different. Both predators seek vulnerable girls. However, the victim of an internet predator is viewed as an innocent victim of a heinous crime by an evil perpetrator and the victim of a pimp predator is viewed as a “whore,” “bitch,” or “ho” who has freely chosen a lifestyle of prostitution.
A paradigm shift in our view of this population of prostituted children is the requisite first step to combat the sexual exploitation perpetrated against them. Until we see these children as victims, we will lack the appropriate services to meet their specialized needs.
The Perfect Storm:
The mental and emotional dynamics between the pimp and a child victim create the perfect platform for child sexual exploitation. Pimps understand a desperate child’s needs and recognize that in controlling the mind, the body follows. Pimps are astute in knowing exactly how to control their victims and use a combination of force, fraud or coercion to illicit victim compliance. Juxtapose this dynamic to the fact that most victims have experienced a lifetime of abuse and brokenness from childhood to preteen years. Between their basic survival needs as a runaway or thrownaway child on the street to their desperate need for love, attention and affection, this child becomes open game for exploitation.
The Vehicles of Child Sexual Exploitation:
The commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) occurs through child pornography, the prostitution of children, and child sex tourism. Each of these exploitive vehicles works in tandem with one another, together fueling the sexual exploitation and victimization of children. Jointly, these vehicles create and sustain the growing phenomenon of prostituted children in the 21st century.
Education:
Education is key to understanding this issue. Visit the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section of the United States Department of Justice: http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/
Federal Law Enforcement Response:
The Innocence Lost National Initiative is a strategic partnership created to combat trafficking of U.S. children into prostitution. Visit: http://www2.fbi.gov/innolost/innolost.htm
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children:
The mission of the organization is to serve as the nation’s resource on the issues of missing and sexually exploited children. Visit: www.missingkids.co
THE INTERNATIONAL ISSUE
A Few Shocking Statistics...
✦ There are an estimated 27 million men, women & children held in slavery in the world today, MORE THAN AT ANY OTHER TIME IN HISTORY.
✦ The United Nations reports that 1,000,000 women and girls are newly trafficked every year. Of the estimated 600,000-800,000 women and children who are trafficked across international borders, 80% are female, 70% are for sex exploitation.
✦ No country is immune from human trafficking and sexual slavery, including the United States. (In August of 2006, sex slaves were freed in raids in New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Maryland, Rhode Island, and the District of Columbia.)
✦ Sexual Tourism (adults traveling to other countries to engage in sex with children) is rampant. 25% of sex tourists worldwide are U.S. Citizens.
What Is Human Trafficking?
Forced Child & Adult Prostitution
Girls as young as 5 years old are enslaved in brothels worldwide. They are sold by their families (often for less than $2,000.00), orphaned by AIDS, or kidnapped and then forced to have sex with many men each day. Adult women, looking for legitimate work, are instead kidnapped and locked in brothels. Sex traffickers use a variety of methods to “condition” their victims, including starvation, confinement, beatings, physical abuse, rape, gang rape, threats of violence to the victims and the victims’ families, forced drug use and the threat of shaming their victims by revealing their activities to their family and their families’ friends. These are not isolated events - forced prostitution affects millions of women and children worldwide. In India alone, 400,000 children have been forced into prostitution, and estimates in 1994 by the advocacy agency ECPAT were:
500,000 children in Brazil
400,000 children in India
200,000-850,000 children in Thailand
100,000 children in Taiwan
200,000 children in Nepal
100,000-300,000 children in North America
Slavery
Slavery still exists. Each year countless people are kidnapped and sold into slavery all around the world. In one recent raid 78 slaves were freed, including young children, after being forced to work in the searing heat of a brick kiln. Chinnanan, a 75 year old man who was sold to pay a debt at age 55 watched his 42 family members forced into slavery working in a quarry in South Asia. These are just two of the literally millions of stories of modern-day slavery.
Unprosecuted Rape
In places like Africa, where HIV/AIDS is prevalent, infected people are led to believe that they can cure themselves or reduce the virus by having sex with a virgin. The end result is that young girls, even as young as four years old, are brutally raped. Because of the frequency of these crimes, these rapists go unpunished and continue to live among the children they’ve victimized. When cases are brought to court, death threats against the families and bribes to the judges often lead to the rapist going free. In one small village in Peru, 20-30 young girls are reported raped each week. In the Philippines, even the local Chief of Police was caught raping 11-year old girls. While not a direct result of “Human Trafficking,” the legal advocacy required is often able to be done by the same foundations we support.
Definitions
✦ Chattel Slavery - Similar to slavery in America before Emancipation, chattel slaves are considered their masters’ property, exchanged for things like trucks or money, and are expected to perform labor and sexual favors. It’s often racially-based.
✦ Debt Bondage (or bonded labor) - Most widely practiced form of slavery around the world. Slaves are sold (often by family members) in order to pay off debts.
✦ Sex Slavery - Women and children forced into prostitution. Some are lured by false offers of work, then beaten and forced to work in brothels.
✦ Forced Labor - Often individuals are lured by the promise of work, but find themselves subjected to slave conditions (working without payment, enduring physical abuse and living in dire circumstances).
What is being done?
✦ Victim Relief - Support raids on brothels, fields and factories where slaves are being exploited to relieve the victims of the abuse currently being committed.
✦ Perpetrator Accountability - Bring accountability and just consequences under the law to the specific perpetrator(s) of abuse.
✦ Structural Prevention - Prevent the abuse from being committed against others who are also at risk by strengthening community factors that are likely to deter potential oppressors, reduce the vulnerability of at-risk populations and empower local authorities to stop such abuses.
✦ Victim Aftercare - Provide access to services to help victims transition to their new lives and to encourage long-term success. (This is the area where Let’s Respond & FACT Alliance are concentrating our efforts.)
Investigation & Legal Advocacy - By putting the appropriate legal teams in place around the world and working within the local governmental system, real changes can be and have been affected.
FOR MORE IN DEPTH INFORMATION, CLICK:
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime Global Report
or
http://www.humantrafficking.org
✦ There are an estimated 27 million men, women & children held in slavery in the world today, MORE THAN AT ANY OTHER TIME IN HISTORY.
✦ The United Nations reports that 1,000,000 women and girls are newly trafficked every year. Of the estimated 600,000-800,000 women and children who are trafficked across international borders, 80% are female, 70% are for sex exploitation.
✦ No country is immune from human trafficking and sexual slavery, including the United States. (In August of 2006, sex slaves were freed in raids in New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Maryland, Rhode Island, and the District of Columbia.)
✦ Sexual Tourism (adults traveling to other countries to engage in sex with children) is rampant. 25% of sex tourists worldwide are U.S. Citizens.
What Is Human Trafficking?
Forced Child & Adult Prostitution
Girls as young as 5 years old are enslaved in brothels worldwide. They are sold by their families (often for less than $2,000.00), orphaned by AIDS, or kidnapped and then forced to have sex with many men each day. Adult women, looking for legitimate work, are instead kidnapped and locked in brothels. Sex traffickers use a variety of methods to “condition” their victims, including starvation, confinement, beatings, physical abuse, rape, gang rape, threats of violence to the victims and the victims’ families, forced drug use and the threat of shaming their victims by revealing their activities to their family and their families’ friends. These are not isolated events - forced prostitution affects millions of women and children worldwide. In India alone, 400,000 children have been forced into prostitution, and estimates in 1994 by the advocacy agency ECPAT were:
500,000 children in Brazil
400,000 children in India
200,000-850,000 children in Thailand
100,000 children in Taiwan
200,000 children in Nepal
100,000-300,000 children in North America
Slavery
Slavery still exists. Each year countless people are kidnapped and sold into slavery all around the world. In one recent raid 78 slaves were freed, including young children, after being forced to work in the searing heat of a brick kiln. Chinnanan, a 75 year old man who was sold to pay a debt at age 55 watched his 42 family members forced into slavery working in a quarry in South Asia. These are just two of the literally millions of stories of modern-day slavery.
Unprosecuted Rape
In places like Africa, where HIV/AIDS is prevalent, infected people are led to believe that they can cure themselves or reduce the virus by having sex with a virgin. The end result is that young girls, even as young as four years old, are brutally raped. Because of the frequency of these crimes, these rapists go unpunished and continue to live among the children they’ve victimized. When cases are brought to court, death threats against the families and bribes to the judges often lead to the rapist going free. In one small village in Peru, 20-30 young girls are reported raped each week. In the Philippines, even the local Chief of Police was caught raping 11-year old girls. While not a direct result of “Human Trafficking,” the legal advocacy required is often able to be done by the same foundations we support.
Definitions
✦ Chattel Slavery - Similar to slavery in America before Emancipation, chattel slaves are considered their masters’ property, exchanged for things like trucks or money, and are expected to perform labor and sexual favors. It’s often racially-based.
✦ Debt Bondage (or bonded labor) - Most widely practiced form of slavery around the world. Slaves are sold (often by family members) in order to pay off debts.
✦ Sex Slavery - Women and children forced into prostitution. Some are lured by false offers of work, then beaten and forced to work in brothels.
✦ Forced Labor - Often individuals are lured by the promise of work, but find themselves subjected to slave conditions (working without payment, enduring physical abuse and living in dire circumstances).
What is being done?
✦ Victim Relief - Support raids on brothels, fields and factories where slaves are being exploited to relieve the victims of the abuse currently being committed.
✦ Perpetrator Accountability - Bring accountability and just consequences under the law to the specific perpetrator(s) of abuse.
✦ Structural Prevention - Prevent the abuse from being committed against others who are also at risk by strengthening community factors that are likely to deter potential oppressors, reduce the vulnerability of at-risk populations and empower local authorities to stop such abuses.
✦ Victim Aftercare - Provide access to services to help victims transition to their new lives and to encourage long-term success. (This is the area where Let’s Respond & FACT Alliance are concentrating our efforts.)
Investigation & Legal Advocacy - By putting the appropriate legal teams in place around the world and working within the local governmental system, real changes can be and have been affected.
FOR MORE IN DEPTH INFORMATION, CLICK:
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime Global Report
or
http://www.humantrafficking.org