ELIMINATE HUMAN TRAFFICKING

It’s all about choice. In prostitution, a man or woman chooses to sell themselves for sex. They are not being controlled by another person. They keep all the money they make. They are happy with their lifestyle and can leave whenever they want.

In human trafficking, although it may appear that a person is selling themselves freely, in fact they are being controlled by another person. That person may have made false promises and tricked them into their current situation. They may have made threats and used violence to get the person to do what they want. The “seller” keeps little to none of the money s/he earns. S/he is forced to “appear” happy by her controller (pimp, trafficker). Although there may not be physical chains preventing this victim from leaving, psychological trauma bonds hold him/her in place as effectively as any chains. The person has been emotionally broken, so that fear, shame, guilt, and despair keep them in place.

Human trafficking often appears to be prostitution because this benefits the trafficker. As long as the community thinks the “seller” is operating of his/her free will and is able to come and go freely, the trafficker gets shielded in anonymity. It is very advantageous for the trafficker that the community be unaware of the exploitation inherent in the sex industry. The intersection of prostitution and human trafficking is complex and difficult to unravel, as the exploitation of the victim is not always readily apparent. Although technically, there are differences, in the words of a detective working on the streets of a major city in the USA, “It’s the same thing.”