The Sex Myth: Why Everything We're Told Is Wrong (26 page)

In the US as well, huge amounts of effort and money are being spent to attack a problem that may not exist. In Portland, with fewer than twenty under-eighteen prostitutes in a year and no idea
how many (if any) were trafficked, local government used the publicity to net $500,000 in federal grants to fight commercial sexual exploitation, including a computer system to track cases.

Politicians claimed the area was ‘particularly attractive to traffickers’, leading to a ‘particularly high prevalence of sexual exploitation of children. In spite of assurances
from the FBI that Portland’s
problem is no greater than other cities’, and no evidence that the teenagers were in sex work by force. Meanwhile, commissioners
allocated $7 million to local governments to fight the ‘problem’ and $900,000 for a Portland shelter. On the basis of eleven girls – none of whom were confirmed as trafficked
– about $8 million will be allocated to fight the ‘epidemic’.

Unfortunately, the disproportionate waste of time and money has not dissuaded the perpetrators of moral panic. Operation Monaco, a crackdown on sexual services advertised in phone boxes, was
launched in London in March 2009. The raids resulted in, as the
News of the World
tittered, an ‘array of sex toys (in addition to the array of bankers): nipple clamps, handcuffs and
patent leather stiletto boots, as well as a wardrobe full of rubber uniforms – including nurse outfits.’
¹³³
It also resulted in only one
charge of controlling a prostitute for gain, and photos of sex workers who were never charged with any crime splashed across the Sunday tabloids.
¹³⁴
Whether the failure of these operations and the inaccuracy of the trafficking estimates will have any effect on those who profit from them remains to be seen.

Even Antislavery International has gone so far as to say, ‘Evidence shows that current measures have not improved the rate of trafficking convictions in the UK, and in some cases they
actively undermine prosecutions.’
¹³⁵

Any person – especially a young person – trafficked for any reason is a cause for concern. But overstating the problem can actually harm victims rather than help them. It also does a
disservice to the victims of other types of trafficking to concentrate only on sex. There are real traffickers operating in the EU, probably secure in the knowledge that the main focus is not on
them.

The way these investigations are carried out is also unlikely to win any allies from within the sex industry. Meenu Seshu, founder of SANGRAM, a peer education organisation for sex workers in
India, summarises the situation: ‘The community is never, ever going to respond to anybody who is bringing in the police to rescue them, because they do not view that as a rescue . They view
that as another oppressive thing that’s done to them.’
¹³⁶

In other countries, trafficking crackdowns have not only failed, they have put non-trafficked sex workers at risk.

In Cambodia, the government began targeting the sex industry with its 2008 Law on Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation. A survey last year found that
less than 1 per cent of sex workers in Cambodia were sold into prostitution.
¹³⁷
The trafficking panic has nonetheless overshadowed the health and human
rights of the other 99 per cent of Cambodian sex workers – with potentially deadly results.

The unintended consequences are massive. Organisations battling the high rate of HIV in Cambodia say it is driving sex workers underground, limiting access to sexual health services. Women who
previously worked in brothels avoid the raids by using ‘indirect’ venues like karaoke bars, where clients take them off-site. This opens the door to heightened abuse and health risks
for all involved. According to Tony Lisle, from UNAIDS, ‘The crackdowns create significant difficulties for organizations working in HIV prevention to reach those who are most at risk from
HIV infection effectively, particularly sex workers.’
¹³⁸

While the Cambodian drive is supposedly part of an anti-trafficking campaign, so far no traffickers have been arrested – only sex workers. Reports from Human Rights Watch confirm that the
arrests do not locate trafficked women, and that non-trafficked women rounded up can be abused, raped, and thrown in prison. Some police and government officials use the law to commit crimes
against the women.
¹³⁹

A US government diplomatic cable from 2006 confirms this is the case. It also shows that the situation has been known for some time. ‘Targeting sex workers alone is not a viable solution
to ridding Cambodia of prostitution nor is it particularly effective in addressing trafficking in persons. The fact that no pimps or brothel owners have been held responsible after the raids on
nine brothels raises questions as to the government’s motivations.’
¹⁴⁰

It is unlikely the government’s actions will either catch traffickers or end consensual sex work, not least because an estimated one in three Cambodian men pays for sex. But they are
driving sex workers underground and away from the healthcare they and their clients need. It seems likely continuing the crackdown will result in a higher rate of sexually transmitted
infections.

There is a lot about human trafficking in the rest of the world that we don’t know. Loads about trafficking in Europe and North America is misreported and
misrepresented. What is clear is that anti-trafficking efforts that take a zero-tolerance approach to sex work do not catch traffickers and do not stop demand for sex work. Such schemes are rife
with abuse and corruption, and put the health and safety of the public at risk. If we want to end trafficking of all kinds – a goal everyone agrees on – it’s important to
challenge assumptions about where and how it’s happening.

Agenda Setters come in all shapes and guises. Some are clear about their intentions, others less so.

In Ireland, reports hyping the trafficking scare are also produced. For example, the Immigrant Council of Ireland (ICI), in 2009, released
Globalisation, Sex Trafficking and Prostitution: The
Experiences of Migrant Women in Ireland.
It contains many of the same problems as its UK counterparts. But what is even more questionable than the content are the people producing it.

The Immigrant Council of Ireland promotes itself as an organisation giving support and advice to migrants and nothing immediately shouts ‘religious agenda’. But, as it happens, there
is a strong Catholic connection – with a controversial history.

The ICI was established by Sister Stanislaus Kennedy of the Religious Sisters of Charity, a Catholic order. The Catholic Church’s position on prostitution is that it is a mortal sin and
organisations with strong Catholic associations are at the forefront of attempts to criminalise prostitution in Ireland.

As it turns out, the Religious Sisters of Charity have been involved with ‘rehabilitating’ women in prostitution for a long time. They (along with three other orders) helped run the
asylums for ‘fallen women known as Magdalene Laundries in Ireland, the last of which closed only in 1996.

The asylums were first established as short-term centres by evangelical Christians. After being appropriated by Catholic groups, the Magdalene movement transformed. It became a system of
long-term institutions for unacceptable women. Their remit expanded to include not only former prostitutes, but also unwed mothers, developmentally
challenged women, and
abused girls. The tens of thousands of inmates were made to do hard physical labour, and endured a daily regime of enforced prayer and silence.

This came to a head in 1993 when one of the orders sold land to a developer. The remains of 155 inmates of the Magdalene Laundry were exhumed from an unmarked grave. Many former inmates of
laundries have testified to sexual, psychological, and physical abuse that occurred within the asylums.

The Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse published the Ryan report in 2009. In the report, survivor accounts of Magdalene Laundries describe abuse that under most definitions amounted to
slavery. Considering how recently the scandal broke, it’s interesting to explore the background of some of the groups involved in government discourse on sex work and trafficking. What
remains to be seen is what measures, exactly, they have in mind for trafficked women and sex workers.

There is evidence that trafficking and sex tourism are possibly more frequent in other parts of the world, and yet much time and attention is spent on a problem that can hardly
be shown to even exist in Britain or the United States. The rights and self-determination of sex workers in the UK put them in a privileged position over many sex workers in the rest of the world,
and yet the patronising concern that is expended on them would imply otherwise.

Does it matter? Yes, absolutely – when women’s issues in the rest of the world lose out to the paranoid imaginations of the far right and the far left in this country.

Now, more than ever, people are questioning the ability of government and NGOs to address these issues. Money and time wasted on wild goose chases. Laws that prosecute the very people
they’re meant to help. Resources directed at a minority of victims, with more and more trafficked workers entering the non-sex labour market every day.

When asked directly, most people would acknowledge that the current approach to stopping trafficking has gone wrong. It rewards groups who pursue an extreme agenda. It embraces sloppy evidence
and bad statistics. And a lot of people would recognise that lobbying
by NGOs and charities is what makes it this way.

Enforcement of current laws should come before creation of new laws. Trafficking is already illegal. Breaking immigration laws is already illegal. Exploiting another person sexually for
one’s own gain is already illegal. The public, when asked, tends to agree that ensuring current laws are enforced is better than adding another layer of agencies, laws, and potential problems
on top of the ones we already have. Victims of trafficking don’t need more debates in Parliament or disorganised Keystone Kops schemes. They need the laws that already exist to protect them
to be used the
right
way.

What is needed? Effective, efficient crime detection and policing of any abuses. What isn’t? Special interest groups that claim all of the money to help only some of the victims. What we
don’t need is biased Constellation Makers turning out dodgy numbers to keep the focus on preconceptions rather than reality.

We also need greater understanding of the experiences of people who are trafficked, or are labelled as trafficked. Not all see themselves in that way, and as a result, a lot of the proposed
solutions on offer are not relevant to their experiences. As someone who, by the way trafficking is counted, is supposedly ‘trafficked’, it feels like the diverse voices of people in
migration and migratory labour (sex work or other wise) are being ignored. Instead, others elect to speak for them. Who does this benefit?

There’s a not-so-subtle undercurrent of sexism in the forced sex trafficking discussion. Time and again, women who say they in fact entered sex work knowingly have their experiences
written off. This patronises women in ways that, frankly, would not happen to men. As researcher Laura Agustín comments, ‘[S]o entrenched is the idea of women as forming an essential
part of home if not actually being it themselves that they are routinely denied the agency to undertake a migration.’
¹⁴¹
Women going to often
underpaid, perhaps exploitative, work are painted universally as victims, regardless of their choices or options. Men going into often underpaid, perhaps exploitative work? Doing what society
expects of them.

It’s a funny kind of double standard, in which both sexes are subject to damaging assumptions. But it especially infantilises women, for whom low-paid domestic labour and sex work are
frequently the
only options if they have few skills and little education. Somehow, I doubt wed ever be too up in arms about the welfare of men in the day-rate unskilled
labour economy. This is an argument that is about the numbers, which is most of what this chapter addresses. But it also an argument that raises questions of how we define work, how we think about
consent, and how exploitative all paid labour has the potential to be.

8

T
he first time I heard Michaela Hague’s name was the day after she died.

It was my second year in Sheffield. I moved there in 2000 to start doctoral studies in the Forensic Pathology Department. During the first year, I lived in a converted church in the city centre,
close to the department. The church had recently been renovated into a combination lecture hall and student flats. It was clean, modern, and comfortable.

St Georges Church was also right in the middle of the red-light area.

The university literature had failed to mention that its Grade-II listed showpiece of student accommodation was also a popular landmark with Sheffield’s streetwalkers and kerb crawlers. I
figured it out quickly enough, though. I had no inkling at the time that, just four years later, I too would be working in the sex industry.

All things considered, it was not a bad place to live. For one thing, the furtive clients who came looking for sex rarely bothered us residents. The CCTV cameras, streetlights, and regular
police cars cruising through the area added to a feeling of safety. And during the day, St George’s looked respectable and sedate. As one of the very few people living in that area of the
city, the sex trade didn’t affect me; late-night student bars and noisy trams were more of a nuisance. I’ve lived in worse places, the sorts of places where drug deals happened in broad
daylight and the sound of police – or worse, ambulance –
sirens was almost constant. St George’s was nothing like that.