
Going undercover as a sex worker - simonebrunozzi
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2015/06/magazine-undercover-sex-worker-human-trafficking-150610072623672.html
======
belorn
When reading works like this one I tend to find three stories being merged
into one. It focuses on slavery where most of the evil aspects of humans tend
to come out, as in order to reduce a human person into something that can be
traded, everything that gives that person a social context must be torn down.
This is where the "break down" period comes from and it's a common theme in
everything from the African slave trade to forced labor camps. Slaves are
broken down, displaced, and controlled in order to place them outside the
social economics shared by everyone else.

The second story is one about social stigma. We live in a society which views
sex trade to be worse than going into a life of crime. From a social
standpoint, it means that providing a sexual service in return for money is
worse than breaking the law and social order that society is built on.

The third, although one which often is used as an introduction, is one about
poverty. In order to get food on the table people will agree to many kinds of
dangerous, dirty, and unwanted lines of work. People have entered the death
sentence called a coal mine, gone into work which has a life expectancy of
months, but in contrast to prostitution those are often viewed as sacrifices
rather than something shameful. I suspect this has something to do with gender
roles, where a man who is forced by poverty to unwanted work is a hero while a
woman doing the same is a victim.

~~~
danparsonson
Many (most?) of the women involved in these situations don't go there out of
choice or with full knowledge of what they're getting involved in; they're
either lied to and subsequently trapped, sold by their families (which is
where poverty is a big factor, and certainly is not a choice made by the girls
themselves), or outright kidnapped. That's the difference in your man vs.
woman scenario - someone working in a coal mine may not feel like they have
much choice but as you say they are agreeing to the work. Of course this is
not to say that some men aren't likewise tricked or forced into such jobs but
they too are victims.

~~~
pcthrowaway
If their choice is to watch themselves or their families starve or die of
disease, or to go to a likely death in terrible work conditions where they can
at least help their families with the money they earn, it's not really much of
a choice at all.

~~~
danparsonson
Quite right but it is still a choice, they at least have some agency. I'm not
in any way attempting to downplay the awful situations we're discussing, but
there is still a significant psychological difference between "I'm doing this
to make my life and my families lives better" and "This is being done to me
against my will for other peoples' benefit", is there not?

~~~
netcan
I disagree.

The line between consensual, coerced or exploited are sometimes vague but they
_are_ real. It's like the pornography line. It's vague, some things are grey,
it's culturally contextual but it is a real line. people usually know it when
they see it.

When extremely disempowered, poor and desperate people interact with much
richer, more powerful people who see them as just a means to an end and are
completely contemptuous of their humanity (their dignity, their desires..), we
cannot call this agency. If a university teacher dates a student or a boss
dates an employee, we view it with suspicion because we know that dynamic can
be abusive, though it is not necessarily so.

Sometimes things _are_ what they seem. Sometimes a name on a dotted line or
other symbol of agency means nothing. If you find a dozen girls from rural
moldova living in an Istanbul basement, making almost no money, ostracized by
society and another group of people making the money and the decisions… I
think it's prudent to assume what seems obvious.

~~~
nostrebored
I would argue that that 'Pornography line' is a very personal distinction
you've made. Pornography still crosses the line into coerced and exploited.
Read the firsthand accounts of women who have left the porn industry. Watch
documentaries about people going into the porn industry. These are people who
are desperate and taken advantage of, hurt and abused. I've seen a few
statistics, but all of them have said that the average life expectancy of a
porn performer is under 50, due to the high rates of suicide and drug abuse. I
really don't see much grey there -- I don't think letting poor people sell
their kidneys is moral, just like I don't think pornography is moral.

Completely agree with the rest of your post though.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
There's a lot of muddy water here. Self-selection for one. Who knows whether
the folks going into the business are already selected for an mtbf of 50?

'Desperate and taken advantage of' is a big category, and those folks often
come to no great end. Its not a unique feature of this industry - heck even
WalMart employees fit there. Cause and effect might be getting confused here.

~~~
nostrebored
However, Walmart employers do not offer their potential addict employees drugs
before they go to work. They don't have them participate in labor that
frequently compromises their ability to work with no effort to support them
when this happens. The employees of Walmart have actual worker's rights and
nearly universal standards of employment in this country, while Pornography,
especially amateur pornography, has none of this.

The self-selection claim is not independent from the claim I'm making -- in
fact I find them to be very correlated. You're getting a specific subset of
people who are willing to do Pornography, most notably people who are
desperate, potentially addicted/suicidal young women. Providing them this
predatory avenue and calling it 'empowerment' is beyond unethical.

~~~
vezzy-fnord
_You 're getting a specific subset of people who are willing to do
Pornography, most notably people who are desperate, potentially
addicted/suicidal young women._

A common trope, but highly dubious. The majority of women who enter
pornography come from relatively stable or average backgrounds, and go in
there through their own volition. Quite ironically, the more underground
subcultures like S/M are disproportionate examples of this. Regular women who
have taken up modeling and promote themselves in the scene, accepting it as
their lifestyle.

It should be noted that "porn stars" and plain old "models" intersect a lot.
Many of the former also belong to the latter, and vice versa.

------
tsunamifury
I worked with the author, Mimi, at UC Berkeley and she took enormous risks in
the Middle East and Moldovia for the sake of getting her story. Several others
did as well including my two collegues who spent two years locked up in Iran
after being lured across the border while reporting in Iraq.

Funding for investigative journalism has all but completely dried up, due to
disruption for Silicon Valley and other factors. Journalists like this are
taking risks on their own now with no backing if something goes wrong.

~~~
facepalm
Maybe I overlooked something in the story, but I don't quite understand how
she did it? For example she describes three girls locked into a backroom of a
family, living on a couple of bananas a day. How did she get that story? I
don't think she posed as one of those girls, nor does it sound as if those
girls would ever go out?

~~~
bhousel
My guess is that the local police eventually shut down that brothel and she
later was able to interview someone involved - one of the prostitute, family
member, police, etc?

It is very reasonable in cases like this for her to leave out some of the
details about her sources.

~~~
facepalm
I don't expect her to reveal sources. I just had troubles following the story.
I didn't understand how the banana story came into the story out of the blue.

------
dataker
I live in a country where prostitution is legal and not taken as taboo. All I
can say is that it makes things easier for everybody.

Many use their bodies as a "small business", having their own personal
marketing, credit card processor and online clients, increasing and improving
their portfolio.

Because they have such leverage, they end up being strict on what they'd do
and even who their client is. In case something goes wrong, they can still go
to the police and report the incident.

~~~
jordigh
> All I can say is that it makes things easier for everybody.

Which country is that? The Netherlands, Austria and Germany, for example, all
have horrible trafficking problems. In Nevada, the women are ostracised and
harrassed by the police at the legal brothels. In New Zealand, the police
cannot tell the difference between legal prostitution and illegal pimping.

So which country are you in that is doing better than these with legalised
prostitution?

~~~
facepalm
Do you have some numbers+sources? I live in Germany and the official statement
from the police seems to be that it is not actually a huge problem.

~~~
Forlien
I'm just following links others have posted, but
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany#Human_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany#Human_trafficking).

Also,
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_trafficking_in_Germany](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_trafficking_in_Germany)
links to a US Trafficking in Persons Report 2010. Here are some quotes:

"Ninety percent of identified victims of trafficking for commercial sexual
exploitation came from Europe, including 28 percent from Germany ..."

"... approximately one third of identified sex trafficking victims reported
that they had agreed initially to engage in prostitution."

"Police estimate that gangs brought around 1,000 Chinese people to Germany
over the past decade and forced them to work in restaurants under exploitative
conditions."

~~~
facepalm
So about 700 victims uncovered per year? Although it would also be interesting
how it is defined.

------
hedgew
Much like with drugs, the best way to reduce human trafficking and abusive
prostitution would be to fully legalize and regulate sex work. In countries
where prostitution is accepted and legal, it's safer for both the sex workers
and the customers, with less risk of disease and abuse. Sex workers are
treated humanely and not condemned. Society in general benefits too, through
properly paid taxes, lower crime rates, and reduced healthcare costs.

~~~
Ygg2
That wasn't the case with Germany.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany)

It seems to reduce the violence against workers, but increases human
trafficking, because Germany now acts as a safe haven for traffickers. Maybe
trafficking would disappear, if all societies made prostitution illegal and
not a looked down profession, but I somehow doubt it[1].

So if your goal is to reduce human trafficking, it might not be the most
worthwhile of means.

Also there is the silly issue, of woman losing her unemployment status because
she didn't refused to work as a prostitute.

[1] Even if all countries made prostitution legal, nothing stops a gangster
from kidnapping a woman and dragging her from say Mexico to US to serve as sex
worker. She could escape and there would be less stigma; but it sounds to me
like those poor workers trapped in Dubai/Quatar and they had no reprieve. As
someone mentioned, there is a supply/demand problem that can't be solved via
prositutes.

~~~
a_bonobo
I don't agree with your points - they echo the recent campaign by Spiegel
Online; looking at your Wikipedia article, it seems more to be an issue with
open borders and no passport control, and the fact that Germany is in the
"middle" of Europe and a relatively rich country, which makes Germany a good
target for trafficking.

The numbers of yearly cases seem to be fairly low (about 700-800 cases per
year in your Wiki-article), and pimps who force people into prostitution are
arrested and jailed.

If anything, I'd say that legality makes it much better for these forced
prostitutes to escape - they don't have any fear of persecution.

>Also there is the silly issue, of woman losing her unemployment status
because she didn't refused to work as a prostitute.

That was a single mistake - the Arbeitsagentur accidentally sent along a job
offer which was from a brothel, and the media made it into a big case (see
[http://www.spiegel.de/karriere/berufsleben/arbeitsagentur-
in...](http://www.spiegel.de/karriere/berufsleben/arbeitsagentur-in-augsburg-
wollte-19-jaehrige-an-bordell-vermitteln-a-881825.html) ). Of course she
didn't have to take the job, there have been rulings that you can't force
unemployed to work as prostitutes (see same article).

~~~
Ygg2
You do make a fine point that case regarding unemployment status.

But, I think there is a difference between legalizing prostitution and
preventing what's essentially human enslavement.

I'm not saying legalizing prostitution won't help or shouldn't be done, I just
don't think it will have as big impact as people claimed, and that it will
have possible negative impact if other states don't adopt it.

IMO it's akin to legalizing drugs, just legalizing it won't make drug problem
disappear. For instance in cases where some states legalized drugs and most
didn't; a state that legalized drugs can become safe haven for criminals from
other countries, where drugs aren't legal.

------
dimitar
What makes me very uncomfortable is that are enough men that not only not care
about, but actually enjoy rape to make it a huge market.

This is not something that happens "between two consenting adults". If you
read the article you'll see that there is no way in hell that they don't know
what they are participating in. In fact many seek out the worst treated girls.

There looks to me that there are more than one type of prostitution and maybe
going after a particular type of John is very reasonable.

~~~
pluma
The sad truth is that rape (like many disturbing behaviours including murder
and child abuse) is entirely natural, it's not actually aberrant behaviour. Of
course we're capable of recognizing it as harmful behaviour we would rather
not see happen, but that's a matter of "ought" not "is".

I think the best bet at preventing rape is education and empathy (violence
becomes more difficult if you can relate to your victim). But with human
trafficking the situation is a bit more difficult than with "rape culture" at
large: the victims are in a uniquely helpless position, legal (or social)
consequences are practically absent and as a "customer" you're already
engaging in a highly illegal environment. Psychologically this is entirely
different from overpowering or drugging a free person and raping them.

Our best bet at preventing rape in human trafficking is likely just to
eliminate human trafficking -- which seems like a worthy enough (if Herculean)
task in itself.

~~~
geon
By your definition, everything that ever happens is natuaral. That makes the
word completely meaningless.

~~~
pluma
Yes, but what gave you the idea that "natural" equals "good"? I'm using the
term entirely objectively.

Of course everything that happens in nature is "natural". That's what the word
means. The distinction I'm making should be obvious: a behaviour that happens
in other, closely-related animals, especially if it happens quite frequently,
and especially if it is "beneficial" in natural selection (like lions killing
their young, chimps raiding and murdering other groups or dolphins engaging in
gang rapes), is by definition "natural" and shouldn't be surprising if it
occurs in humans. Non-consensual sex (i.e. rape in the most straightforward
sense) is one such behaviour.

That it shouldn't be surprising doesn't mean we should tolerate it or that we
can't do anything about it. We're in the quasi-uniquely privileged position
that we can reason about our collective behaviour and decide what kind of
behaviour we do or don't want to tolerate and what we can do about it.

In other words, because we're capable of sculpting our own human nature, yes,
the term "natural" is pretty arbitrary when it comes to human behaviour. But
it's entirely appropriate when looking at how other species behave without our
interference.

~~~
alphapapa
You're trying to be reasonable and logical, which is good. But I think you err
in looking to animals to define what is natural behavior for humans. Doing
that collapses the enormous gulf which lies between animals and humans. And it
also generalizes across all humans.

Instead, I think it's better to consider what is "natural" for certain
societies and cultures. For example, most people in average, relatively
prosperous Western countries (and many Eastern ones) would not "naturally"
treat another human being the way the "clients" in the article do. A few
sociopaths, but that's a very small percentage of the population.

Why? I think it's pretty simple: it's how people are raised. Children who are
raised by loving parents, taught to treat others well, disciplined when they
don't, grow up to be adults who wouldn't dream of doing such a thing. But a
child who is raised by abusive parents, who witnesses the parents treating
others like animals, may grow up and emulate that behavior. If they are taught
that it's acceptable to treat other humans like animals and property, then
that is what they will do.

Nature vs. nurture is a bit of a false dichotomy. No one grows up in a vacuum.
People are shaped by family, society, culture. People tend to emulate what
they see. Getting people to change their behavior and values by reasoning with
them is very difficult, and impossible with some people.

This is an element that seems sorely lacking in the article: there's no
mention of cultural and societal values. She mentions corruption in police and
judicial systems, and she calls for unilateral, cross-border action--which
would effectively be going to war. She doesn't recognize that you can't fix
those problems by going to war, because war doesn't rewrite societal values.
(On the other hand, one might point to Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan and
post-WWII as counter-examples, but I think that is a bit different: it was a
world war, and the nations were occupied for many years afterwards, and a
government had arose which lead the people in evil ways. The cultures weren't
necessarily innately evil in their values.)

The reason human trafficking flourishes in these places and police and
judicial corruption allow it to continue is that the societal values are
corrupt. There's an element of oppressive governments not accurately
reflecting the values of the people as well, but still, the government isn't
forcing these atrocities to occur.

And to bring it back to where we started: by defining "natural" by what seems
natural to _animals_ , you perpetuate the problem. Animals have no concept of
right and wrong. Human trafficking and slavery are wrong because they are
wrong, because they are evil. You might say that that's circular reasoning,
but if we agree on that basic morality, regardless of where it comes from,
then it stands.

And therefore, the reason these other places continue to allow it is because
of defective moral values in a large percentage of the population.

That isn't a popular thing to say, because it's "judgmental." Well, yes, I do
judge that that behavior is abhorrent, and that the people engaging in it and
permitting it are acting abhorrently.

And if you want to argue that it's not a result of defective cultural values,
you'll have to do better than an "animal nature"-based argument, because that
would logically erase cultural differences. And, no, a few outliers in
cultures that largely don't have the same problem do not wash away the
distinctions. Some cultures _do_ have better moral values than others. (If you
disagree with this, you're a moral relativist, and there's no basis for
discussing it.)

~~~
pluma
I don't think we're fundamentally in disagreement, but I object the notion
that people raised in Western countries wouldn't behave like the "clients" in
the article do. "Culture" isn't as simple as that -- social norms differ
widely within Western cultures and even at the regional or family level. Based
on older stories about human trafficking, a lot of "patrons" hail from
countries we would consider better than that, and many of them are middle-
class or even upper-class, so it's not just a matter of social status either.

Yes, it's difficult to change someone's behaviour by talking at them. The only
reliable long-term change in behaviour can be brought about during childhood.
Just consider religion: sure, there are adult converts, but a fraction of
adults converts from the religion they were raised in to another. A person's
religion (and religiosity) is mostly an artefact of how and where they grew
up.

> Human trafficking and slavery are wrong because they are wrong, because they
> are evil.

Evil is an intuitive but ultimately ineffective concept. These behaviours are
harmful both to the individual and to society at large. They unilaterally
violate the personal liberty and human rights of the victim. That's why we
consider them evil, not the other way around.

I'm defining natural in terms of animal behaviour because it's the closest we
can get in order to draw conclusions about how humans would behave in the
absence of ethics and a functioning society. Rape and murder in cold blood are
what we see in extreme situations where society has effectively collapsed
(e.g. during war, starvation or epidemics).

There's a reason we say people act like animals in these situations: it's
because they do. Starvation, anxiety, duress, etc, they all impact a person's
capability of rational thought and lead to people following their most basic
instincts. Many people still act "human" in these situations, but in general,
you're going to see far more horrific behaviour than otherwise (especially if
"one thing leads to another", e.g. because of group dynamics).

Also, if we understand that slavery is wrong not just because it is evil, but
because it is demonstrably incompatible with a notion of right and wrong based
on minimizing human suffering while maximum personal liberty, it is obvious
why it is objectionable to tolerate cultures that consider this behaviour
acceptable.

In other words, aside from the ethically neutral aspects of a culture (e.g.
creation myths, funny hats and silly rituals), one culture _can_ be
objectively better or worse than another.

Of course changing worse cultures for the better is a long and time-consuming
process. The recent failures in the Middle East and the Arab world are good
examples of why you can't just invade a place and force the inhabitants to
adopt modern values.

But teaching someone to be a good person is much easier when they're well-fed
and don't have to fear for their life, health or fortune.

(For the record, this isn't about Islam or Christianity or even any religion
at all -- any culture that perpetuates harmful values has to change, whether
those values are based on religion, tradition or mere lack of consideration;
religions just tend to get more offended when you try to tell them they are
wrong.)

~~~
alphapapa
I think you're right that we mostly agree. And you make some good points about
there being people in Western cultures who would do those things. Of course,
there are evil people in every culture and place in the world. Sociopaths are
a fact of life to a certain degree.

What I meant was, it seems to me that these evil practices are far more
culturally accepted in these places compared to an average Western culture.
And I think there are reasons for that other than mere poverty. People have
lived in poverty throughout history, throughout the world. Poverty is
essentially universal. But selling one's own children into sex slavery is not.
Plenty of people living in poverty still have strong moral values.

> Evil is an intuitive but ultimately ineffective concept. These behaviours
> are harmful both to the individual and to society at large. They
> unilaterally violate the personal liberty and human rights of the victim.
> That's why we consider them evil, not the other way around.

Respectfully, I think this is a narrow view. There are other cultures which
place much lower value on personal liberty and individual rights, but would
still consider such practices abhorrent. Now you are right that these
behaviors do violate personal liberty and rights, and so to us, that is
another reason why they are wrong. But there are groups who have little
concept of personal liberty and rights, yet would never consider such a thing
acceptable.

In fact, this is part of the problem: here we have people divided into two
groups, geographically at least. One group can exploit the other--with no cost
to its own society. These evil men get on a plane, have their fun, and return
home, thousands of miles away, leaving their wake of destruction far behind.

And the families of these exploited children do not care about their
children's personal liberty or rights. They sell them and then shut the door
in their faces when they return. To them, it's acceptable to dispose of one
family member to get a few dollars that the rest of the family can use.

> That's why we consider them evil, not the other way around.

I don't think it is a one-way function. Violating personal liberty and
individual rights _are_ innately evil. If this were not so, then whether they
were evil would only depend on whether you valued personal liberty and rights.
If you don't--and many people don't!--then they would not be considered evil.
And this is exactly what we are seeing here.

You can go to them and try to convince them that they are harming optimal
social interactions, but why should they care? To them, the people being
harmed are not even part of society. They are...no better than animals.

Maybe what I'm trying to say is that, what is considered "natural" is
irrelevant. People can "naturally" behave one way or another, depending on how
they were raised, genetic disorders, mental illnesses, brain injuries, etc.

What _matters_ is right and wrong, good and evil. These behaviors are not
merely _suboptimal_ \--they are innately wrong. They are not wrong because
they are inefficient--they are wrong because they are wrong. (Yes, circular,
unless you want to go into the sources of morality. And ultimately that is
probably required.)

The reason I want to emphasize that is that defining evil by harm to society
is completely relative. If you exclude someone from society, then whether
something harms them no longer matters, and then it would no longer be evil.
And then when you try to tell someone to stop doing it, they look at you funny
and say, "Why?"

Utilitarianism and relativism lead to tyranny. If something works, and the
victim doesn't count, then they aren't a victim, and it isn't wrong. And for
the people on the safe side of the line, without external, absolute moral
values, they have no reason to change their behavior.

~~~
pluma
I'm not arguing for moral relativism, quite the opposite.

I'm arguing for ethics based on fundamental axioms, most of which can be
broken down to the Golden Rule. This isn't Western, this is just frequently
obscured by irrelevant "morals", like those set forth by various religions.

Heck, the international human rights are a pretty good rendition of it: every
human is equal (i.e. disregard kinship bias), every human is free, personal
freedoms end where they impact the freedom of others. Yes, the hard questions
are hard, but the level of the vast majority of real world problems does not
even come close to them.

If anything, I'm arguing for Kant's Moral Imperative, but that's just me being
German.

------
nailer
> 'Going undercover as a sex worker'

This article is about human trafficking, not sex work. The title makes as much
sense as 'Going undercover as a construction worker' and then writing about a
construction worker kept as a slave in Dubai.

~~~
scott_karana
And yet, that's exactly what occurred.

The journalist had to pose as a prostitute to get close to other (unwilling)
prostitutes who had been trafficked into the country.

~~~
nailer
Well yes. The point is the journalist tried to get close to unwilling
prostitutes, not prostitutes per se.

------
s_baby
This has been going on for a thousand years in the region. The Ottoman empire
was constantly capturing slaves from the Balkans and East Europe. It was a
cornerstone of their civilization. Slavery was abolished in the 19th century
but the market just moved underground.

~~~
mason240
Even their military was based on the enslavement of children from their
conquered territories.

------
bruceb
What is the level of opportunity for these young women (and lets call them
women that is what they usually, calling them girls makes them sound like less
human and more of a commodity) in the origin countries.

Fighting pimps and such is all good but cut off supply then there is no need
to deal with pimps. Are hiring laws enforced in these countries?

~~~
geon
Cut off supply? When the women get into trafficing from kidnapping... How?

~~~
VLM
He likely means border control. The USA only has security theater for the
middle class victims and none for everyone else, the rest of the world varies
greatly in its enforcement level. Also regardless of paper laws, corruption
levels at border control vary greatly by country. If you can't get them into a
country, you cut off the supply, which cuts off the supply of money to
kidnappers and traffickers eventually, etc.

------
cryodesign
I can't really fully comprehend this. Did she actually work as a sex worker
and exposed herself to all sort of STDs? And not only that - having to deal
with all sorts of nasty people... what a brave woman.

~~~
icebraining
She posed as a prostitute, but thankfully I don't believe she actually worked
as one, or at least she doesn't talk about about it in the documentary.

I do strongly recommend watching it, though not if you're depressed - it's
very heavy for the _petite bourgeoisie_ like me, not used to seeing this kind
of misery.

------
conanbatt
Problems like this one, and other that rank as high in crimes against
humanity, make me wish we had a global citizenship and effort, that everyone
should have the right for safe passage into any place in the world.

Global rights of free passage would be a goal for all people under extreme
opression and ilegality, from North Korea, ISIS, slavery, sex trafficking,
people trafficking. If people could leave where they are and go somewhere:
maybe not everywhere, but somewhere. A place they know they can go to.

Maybe someday.

~~~
alphapapa
Global citizenship requires global government which comes with its own set of
problems. What if the majority favored a certain behavior, such as this one?
Then it would be globally legal. Maybe it's not globally favored now--that
doesn't mean it will always be this way.

Compartmentalization is better than globalization. Humans are fallible and
often evil. That is not going to change. The best thing to do is
compartmentalize people and government to prevent cancerous evil from
affecting everyone.

Anything else is wishful thinking. History shows that evil's not going
anywhere, and contemporary events do as well.

~~~
conanbatt
It doesn't work if there is no free movement from one "compartiment" to
another. Im not saying the whole world should be the same, as far as we know
we live in a bubble as much as NK does. But I cant go in there freely and
people there definitely can't go out. The guarantee of being able to flee
would have helped a lot of people in all the humanitarian crisis of the past,
and all those current. In these days, having simply global funding to move
refugees and provide safe passage into open immigration countries (to the
which there are many) would help a lot.

~~~
alphapapa
I'm not sure what you mean. Don't a lot of nations already receive refugees
and those seeking asylum?

How could anyone make a guarantee of being able to "go in" and get someone out
without infringing upon other nations' sovereignty?

~~~
conanbatt
You can't, but sovereignty isn't holy.

Today war is waged for oil, might as well be fought for actual freedom. I'd
say that providing safe exit from ISIS might be infinitely more effective than
bombing them.

An exit from extreme poverty and abuse would render vast criminal
organizations without victims or workers.

The consensus to provide "right of exit" or "passage" should overpower any
single country's decision, though in this world only what the US wants is
military relevant for the moment. Replacing one of the military planes might
be enough financial relief for thousands of refugees.

~~~
alphapapa
I still don't understand what you mean. You seem to assume that all the evil
acts in the world are motivated by poverty and injustice; that if ISIS only
had enough money, they'd stop kidnapping and torturing and killing and
destroying.

But ISIS is actually well-funded--that's part of the reason they are able to
do the things they are doing. They don't need money; they have plenty. They
are motivated by evil, not by poverty.

Also, are you comparing ISIS to mere criminal organizations, like organized
crime? If you are, I think that's ridiculous. These are two different kinds of
problems. ISIS is not committing identity theft and credit card fraud.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but you seem to think that erasing borders
would result in peace and prosperity. Again, not sure that's what you mean,
but I think that doing so would have the opposite effect. Borders and
separation help prevent tyranny from spreading. They do also permit evil to
take root here and there--but evil is never going to go away for good. Just
like it's never going to stop raining on this planet, so putting us all in one
giant bathtub would only ensure that we all drown when it floods.

What do you mean by "replacing one of the military planes"? If you mean taking
the money it costs to build one and giving it to refugees: well, sure, money
helps, but many charities are already doing that. And the U.S. military itself
spends a lot of time and money helping people. In fact, American soldiers have
died recently on pure aid missions in remote places. You don't see the Chinese
or Russian military (or ISIS) flying food to starving people free of charge
and giving their lives in the process.

So please be careful not to simply vilify the U.S. and its military. There are
serious problems in the U.S. government right now, but don't throw out the
baby with the bathwater. That's trying to take the easy way out, and it's
based on half-truths at best.

------
sleepyhead
If you want to read more about modern day slavery, human trafficking and sex
workers, I highly recommend "A Crime So Monstrous" by Benjamin Skinner.

[http://acrimesomonstrous.com](http://acrimesomonstrous.com)

------
netcan
I think the whole thing is very difficult to deal with while it is all
criminalized and taboo, in the dark and so shameful. "It" can mean sex in
general, not just prostitution.

I heard recently that prostitution in "the west" has gone off a cliff over the
last few generations. Recreational sex, including homosexuality and other
stigmatized tastes became a more normal part of our culture and demand for
prostitution declined. We stopped demonizing extramarital sex (or women,
really) and the "problem" got a lot smaller. Thousands of years and thousands
of cultures and god-knows how many gods worth of banning, ostracizing,
preaching and tut-tutting about prostitution or promiscuity and the one thing
that actually made a dent makes a difference is getting sluttier as a culture.

I think this is a metaphor for (or a specific instance of) a bigger principle.

 _an example_

I was at university when grameen bank won a nobel prize for micro-lending.
This was around the same time many governments and regulators (in a bunch of
places) were trying to pressure out "predatory lending practices." Normal
banks got out of the high risk, small loan business. They had a reputation to
maintain and $400 loans to the broke and unemployed is not particularly
lucrative anyway.

The market was left to "payday loan" shops who tended to be a lot shadier.
Then the financial crisis happened and business boomed. If payday loan shops
get banned (as some want), the market will almost certainly be reborn as loan
sharking, a traditionally criminal trade. The deeper the taboos & bans, the
worse it will get. The actual thing won't go away though. Taboos, laws or
fiery political rhetoric can't make it go away. The harder these things
squeeze, the worse it will get. Terry Pratchett would have been the person to
describe but alas…

This is all quite ironic considering that a nobel prize was won by a bank
basically doing payday loans, but with a totally different attitude. Ironic,
but informative. Grameen bank has high interest rate and uses social pressure
tactics to improve repayment rates, practices considered unethical in the
larger financial world. Practices shared with others in this "sector" of small
high risk loans to the people no "real" lender would bother with. The
practices seem to be part and parcel of the market.

But, Grameen bank is not like loan sharks or payday loan shops at all,
culturally. Their impact on their customers and their relationship with them
(and society) is far more positive. So is their impact. They won the _nobel
peace prize._! The people working at grameen bank think and act completely
different than the culture of the payday loan industry. Perception matters. It
shapes the thing. The perception of the employees, society, etc. are all
interlinked.

Criminalize an industry and it becomes more criminal (with violence, abuse and
all the other things that go with criminality). Label someone a pariah and
they will act like one.

Banning, or even stigmatizing payday loans doesn't make the industry go away,
it just makes it uglier. Give it a nobel peace prize, and they become
humanitarians. I'm simplifying, I know. But, I think this is a decent low
resolution description of the concept.

It works the same way with drugs. Same with prostitution. The public
perception of prostitutes, johns, madams and pimps. The taboos and laws, the
disdain and ostracization. I think these things are a big part of why it is
all so dark. Society tells us that it's dark. That might keep some people
away, but if it doesn't… The johns walk into it knowing they are doing
something bad and act like it. The pimps act like pimps with the
characteristic dehumanization of prostitutes and the prostitutes, knowing that
they are the lowest of the low.. they act like it. Suicide, depression, drug
abuse and general self abuse and self hate.

------
jensen123
You might want to google "rescue industry".

~~~
GFischer
I wasn't aware of those keywords, they mostly direct to a book titled "Sex at
the Margins: Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue" and the works of Dr.
Laura Agustin.

------
mmrasheed
It is not only the imbalanced lust of few men that this horrible ecosystem is
built around, the whole social structure is equally responsible for its
existence and growth. Lack of strong social bond, lack of respect to the
existence of other humans, lack of proper education on ethics and humanity,
hypocrisy in the name of freedom, idea of living in the moments, greed etc are
the reasons behind the existence of prostitution, pornography, and other sex
related abuses. No government in the world can end this until the society acts
as a whole to reject it. Perhaps the effective starting point to minimize it
is to avoid double standards.

"O faithful! Why do you say one thing and do another? It is most hateful to
God that you do not practise what you preach" (61: 2-3) -- the holy Quran

“Don't do unto others what you don't want others to do unto you.” -- Confucius

(Couldn't Quote from the Bible for the lack of knowledge in it.)

~~~
vezzy-fnord
Pornography is not a "sex related abuse".

Nor is the reason behind prostitution's existence the lack of a strong social
bond. In fact, prostitution was relatively out in the open and brothels
widespread during the medieval period, though views on it ranged variably from
reluctant acceptance in the name of compromise (by the Catholic Church) to a
more complete one, like in East Asia. Brothels often served as an attraction
for travelers, too. Some were even run by women, and ironically enough most
European countries didn't ban brothels until the 20th century. U.S. states
also mostly had them legal in the 19th century.

Prostitution is weaker now than ever, in a time when social bonds are
supposedly at an all time low according to most demagogues. Furthermore,
nothing about ethics that is intrinsically opposed to it.

Islam has always been against it, though. So it's no surprise you don't think
of it highly.

~~~
mmrasheed
The origin of girls allured to both industries (prostitution and pornography)
is probably the same. The recent documentary of Rashida Jones, "Hot girls
wanted", sheds modest light on this issue. On the other hand, prostitution is
not weaker than before, it has been outsourced far away, so the victims'
voices cannot be heard. An example- prostitution business in the East and
South East Asia are stronger than ever. There are several documentaries on how
children and teenagers in those countries are taken by the prostitution rings
to sell to pedophiles, sex abusers and addicts from all over the world.
Western European addicts go to the East in groups for orgy and sex trips. And
this article uses few cases in the middle East to clearly show the extremity
of hypocrisy. These are few documented stories I am talking about. There maybe
hundreds of different sort of incidents yet to be documented.

Sex industries have been evolving. And none of these industries treat girls as
human beings, rather as sex tools. None of these industries produce respect to
any human kind. Prostitution at least has physical boundaries, porn doesn't.
And that makes us and our future generation more vulnerable to sex related
abuses, not only the people involved in those businesses, but also sometimes
out close ones as well. And I don't see why we should not stand against both.

------
rbanffy
> I was given an award for courage at the Lincoln Center in New York. I said
> they should have given me an award for anger instead. There is nothing
> courageous about what I've done.

That _is_ courage. Not being afraid of dangerous things is not courage: it's
stupidity.

