victims could mean more political will to do something about it and insofar as this problem will surely get worse
I don't see either of those statements as true.
Yep. I've done some work on helping draft anti-trafficking legislation in New York, and it's horrible stuff. Good post.
(I don't know how 'sympathetic' the victims are, though. I think it's awfully easy for people interested in minimizing the problem to paint trafficked prostitutes as complicit. After all, they are often illegal aliens, which means they deserve whatever they get, right?)
I see it getting worse: all part of the grand progress of globalization.
Nice post, Ogged.
Prostitution and trafficking are already illegal, so are you advocating legalization? Somehow more whores in jail doesn't seem to answer the problem, and the sex trade isn't going to go away through feminist conscience raising.
I wish I didn't fear that puritanism would make it difficult if not impossible to act rationally on this issue.
At least in NY State, the laws currently on the books don't handle trafficking well, and need to be changed.
4: Better immigration controls help. They tightened up a loophole on fiance visas where someone could apply for many women at once in response to a number of assholes applying for six or seven women at once, bringing them here, and then ditching them.
4: Not consciousness raising per se, no. But providing actual economic opportunities for women would make a hell of a difference. As would criminalizing pimps and johns rather than the women themselves.
Nice post, but you got the title screwed up. The correct title is two posts down for some reason.
someone could apply for many women at once
That is a truly bizarre loophole. Imagine trying to explain why you applied for finance visas for six different women.
Right. One of the features of the law we're trying to get passed in NY is making having been trafficked into prostitution a defense against criminal charges of prostitution, so that the traffickers can't use the law as a threat against their victims.
re: 10 finance should be fiance, but I suppose finance was more like it.
But providing actual economic opportunities for women would make a hell of a difference.
What, in their home countries? Good luck.
You do get American citizens being trafficked as well; think runaway teenage girls.
11 seems difficult to show. How about simply better education for the prosecutors and police? Duress already exists as a defense in criminal law.
I fail to see how passing a law will provide much help.
Or even better, use a deferred prosecution like some jurisdictions do with drug charges. The case is continued for a while and the defendant has to do certain things. If they are successful, charges are dropped.
As would criminalizing pimps and johns
Both soliciting and compelling prostitution are illegal, aren't they?
I was amazed when I saw my first prostitution/sting cases in court. These women were charging $25 for sex and $10-$20 for blowjobs.
9 may be a comment from which my tarnished soul may never recover its innocent gleam, but let me link to the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking, who provide direct services to the victims of trafficking.
Lilya 4-Ever persuaded me to donate to UNICEF's Trafficking section. Regarding 4 and 5 -- I think making it very clear that there are SLAVES in the United States is "feminist consciousness raising" that makes a difference, and that the prurient nature has as much an opportunity to excite mainstream middle-America outrage a la Uncle Tom's Cabin as it does to befuddle the issue.
$25 for sex and $10-$20 for blowjobs
Oh my god.
But those slaves are foreigners. Most of them are not exactly white. And practically illegal.
Haven't those people been demonized so severely that they are considered subhuman?
How is it difficult to show? Like any other defense, you prove by a preponderance of the evidence (that's right for defenses, isn't it? I don't do criminal work) that you were coerced into the sex trade. Duress is a lot narrower than coercion. Ideally, of course, police and prosecutors would recognize the existence of the defence, and wouldn't prosecute women who they knew to have been trafficked.
The sort of situation where, say, a woman is brought into the US, her passport is taken from her, and she's told that she has no way of getting her papers back or earning money to pay off her debts other than by cooperating as a prostitute, is not the sort of thing that would support a defense of duress under current law, and it's not necessarily a terribly interesting crime to the police under current law. Sure, it's pimping, but it doesn't have to involve significant violence or physical restraint. The debt bondage aspect of it isn't well covered under current law.
You do get American citizens being trafficked as well; think runaway teenage girls.
Hard to believe that the solution to the abuse of runaway teenage girls is the provision of better economic opportunities for runaway teenage girls.
And why don't I believe that political will for change will increase?
"When I'm at a strip club," says a customer at Archibalds one night, "I don't think about how sad these girls' lives might be. I feel horny. That's the reality of it."
20
Shocked by the big money you could have been earning?
Sounds like a quick and easy way to make practically no money at all.
Lizardbreath:
A change like that does nothing.
Defendant:
"They forced me to do it."
Prosecutor:
"Prove it."
Defendant:
"Certainly, my pimp will gladly come to court for me."
$25 for sex is just shockingly little. I mean, damn.
Damned right it is. I'm paying three times that.
19. Don't get me wrong, I think that the sex trade is a pernicous institution, but there are already laws on the books against these vices. Without disparaging the hard work being done by law enforcement, they are more likely to deport the girls than jail the pimp, if only because it is easier to do so. And legalization is not the answer either, if the sex trade in Europe or Asia is any guide.
It's fairly easy to prove that one's in the country illegally, isn't it -- details of how one entered the country, if on a visa, are also provable. Presumably there are other prostitutes in captivity along with you, who can testify. It's doable.
"Certainly, my pimp will gladly come to court for me."
Again, the idea is for the pimp to also be under arrest.
Many of these women are not exactly beauty queens. But, they, mostly, have the correct female parts.
"I am illegal" is supposed to prove something? And make them more sympathetic?
And the other prostitutes in captivity testifying for them? Right.
You clearly have not spent any time doing criminal law.
Imagine yourself getting busted for pot. Now imagine your friends coming to court to say that it was actually their pot. Not. Going. To. Happen.
And legalization is not the answer either, if the sex trade in Europe or Asia is any guide.
Are the two situations comparable? I thought I saw something about unionized sex workers in European countries, for example. That is, not a great job, but not slavery or near slavery.
33. Formerly eastern bloc country girls are in much the same situation as the Koreans in the article.
Dude, tone down the attitude a little. For one thing, the worst such a change in the law could be is useless, so there's no need to get pissy about it.
Second, being in the country illegally supports a facet of the story. Testimony from other trafficked prostitutes supports other facets. Coercion isn't unprovable, and I'm not sure why you're claiming it is.
33, 34: My impression is that it's very different country by country. In at least some Scandinavian countries, they've got a model where being a prostitute is legal, but patronizing one, or being a pimp, is not. IIRC, that works fairly well.
I think in Europe there are a couple of different tiers of prostitution. A legalised, perhaps even unionised tier, and then a dark backalley world of trafficked immigrants and children.
Since this form of the sex trade is basically a subcategory of the globalization of coerced labour, it provides a useful opportunity to put antislavery forcefully on the American political agenda (and hopefully, the international agenda, since any steps toward a solution would have to be internationalized).
I'm not sold on the idea of further criminalization as a solution, though. B is alluding, I think, to the Swedish solution in 8, but the real impact of that is unclear (cf. the seventh and eighth paragraphs under "Decriminalization").
I'm not sold on the idea of further criminalization as a solution, though.
The goal is to increase the penalties and accurately recognize the conduct that makes a criminal a slave-trader rather than a simple pimp; I think it has potential.
LB:
I am not trying to be pissy with you at all. I apologize if it came across that way. You are to be commended for working to make things better.
But, you simply are not going to get other witnesses in cases like this.
As far as coercion, it just doesn't get proven in criminal cases.
The system will get overwhelmed with people claiming coercion. Do a lexis search right now and see how many coercion cases were proven in the last year in your jurisdiction. I'll take the under at 5.
40: Again, the point is to change the freaking law. Duress is a brutally high standard to meet. The idea is to draft a law that sets a defense for trafficked prostitutes at a level that will be possible for them to prove.
Why do you think the law needs to be changed?
Is it not more effective to work on the people who are dealing with them? Why wait until after the arrest? The police and victim witness groups should be more effective.
10: There just wasn't a check. It hadn't been necessary, but with internet matchmaking, basically, you'd get some sleazy guys file for many 'girlfriends' at once, and whoever got through the red tape first got to come to the U.S. The sleazier guys would bring them all here for auditions. You can see how this could lead to a loophole for the sex trade.
40: So, current immigration law has a provision for an immigrant spouse whose partner is abusing them to file for their green card (if the guy is being an asshole and holding them hostage) or for lifting conditions (so someone doesn't have to stay in an abusive marriage just to avoid deportation.) It is really, really hard to prove duress and abuse, but the option is there, at least, and allows the immigrant time to petition and appeal their case.
It wouldn't be an automatic way into the U.S., and it's not a whole solution. Really, you need to get these guys before the women get into the U.S. But surely making it so that if someone is being forced into prostitution, and she comes forward, she has the right to petition to stay here on the grounds that her overstay (or EWI) was coerced. It won't be a fix, but it's a start.
Because at least in New York State, at the current time, coercing a woman into prostitution by, say, withholding her passport, is not a different or more severely punished crime than simply taking the earnings of an uncoerced prostitute. There's no distinction on the books between them, and so where one is winked at, so is the other.
The idea is to write a law that specifically addresses the techniques traffickers use to hold women in slavery; fraud, threats, theft of identification documents; debt bondage, and to punish that conduct harshly enough to deter it.
Is it not more effective to work on the people who are dealing with them? Why wait until after the arrest? The police and victim witness groups should be more effective.
I don't have any specific understanding of what you mean here.
My point is that changing the law is a wasted effort that distracts from reducing the problem.
Sex crime units were set up because of the difficulties with having untrained people deal with these issues.
Sex slaves are the same way. They shouldn't have to defend themselves in court. They should be treated as victims. So, trained professionals should screen at an intake process.
Once you arrest them, the battle is lost.
to punish that conduct harshly enough to deter it.
The rewards would have to be sufficiently small in order for the risk of punishment to be effective. Since most of the cash earned is profit to the pimp, the rewards will almost always outweigh these risks.
Sex slaves are the same way. They shouldn't have to defend themselves in court. They should be treated as victims. So, trained professionals should screen at an intake process.
Right, but you need to have the legal apparatus in place to be able to have the trained professionals screen them, don't you?
The point is that with the law as it is now, trafficked prostitutes are criminals, and it's within the cops' discretion whether or not to arrest and prosecute them. With a change in the law, while the police could still make trouble for them, the police would be less likely to because they would know that the women involved had valid legal defenses to the charge of prostitution.
It's not an either or, it's support and education for the cops in treating trafficked prostitutes like crime victims rather than criminals.
46: That is compelling. Quick, let's shut down the criminal justice system.
I think that prosecution prosecution is distorted by the fact that a lot of influential guys are clients.
50: Because Sifu's pimp just showed up in the parking lot.
"the police would be less likely to because they would know that the women involved had valid legal defenses to the charge of prostitution."
First, cops don't spend a lot of time arresting prostitutes. When they do stings, they typically target the customers.
Second, you are missing the jaded, biased outlook of the people in the criminal justice system. Every single prostitute that is arrested is going to say that she was coerced/trafficed. Every single one of them. Go spend a couple of days in your local criminal court. Or better yet, talk with your local vice squad.
51: Yeah, I'd like to see this addressed on the demand side as well. Patronizing the sex industry is winked at -- it would be nice to have some way to put the onus on the customers to figure out whether they're having sex with a prostitute who decided it was in her economic best interest to work as one, or whether they're raping a slave.
54: Kind of like a presumption of guilt?
Most jurisdictions do not do anything about these issues because they do not care. Passing new laws isnt going to do a single thing.
You need to convince your local government to fund officiers and victim witness offices and have them allocated toward this problem. It isnt the laws that are the problem. It is the lack of concern.
53: But if changing the law is hopeless because of the "jaded, biased outlook of the people in the criminal justice system", then why are you saying that a better way of approaching it is having the same criminal justice system start treating trafficked prostitutes differently without a change in the law, as you suggest in 45?
54: Seems like that'd be hard to do without at least partially legalizing prostitution, and seems like there's no chance in hell that'll ever happen in this country.
The difference between a defendant and a victim is dramatic. Surely you know that?
the police could still make trouble for them, the police would be less likely to because they would know that the women involved had valid legal defenses to the charge of prostitution.
I wonder if you might not run into a significant unintended effect here. To the extent what you want is simply to make it so the prostitutes cannot be prosecuted, it means that they are undeterred AND I would think it makes it harder to catch the people running the operation and the trafficers. If you can't prosecute the prostitute, she has very little incentive to identify or testify against other people in the organization.
I'm not saying that this is an insurmountable problem or that the idea of focusing less on the lower level, often victimizedwomen at the bottom of the food chain instead of the trafficers is not a good one, but one might want to think hard about unintended consequences.
And by the way, I hope this does not relate to the pro bono work you were doing where one of the shareholders thought there might be a conflict between clients. I am having a hard time imagining who those clients might be. Now, we have had clients who might have to worry about this, but at small law, we sometimes serve a different clientele.
54: Kind of like a presumption of guilt?
You'd have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the guy had sex with a trafficked prostitute. Not really a presumption of guilt.
seems like there's no chance in hell that'll ever happen in this country
Uh, Nevada?
61:
Why don't you just make having sex for money a felony?
I take will to be saying that some discretion in prosecution of prostitution is necessary, and that the best place to locate that discretion is with the various parts of the law enforcement community that actually have the most contact with the prostitutes. A new law may not be harmful, but it will be overrun by attempts--I assume on both sides--to misuse it, and will in the end become null because of those attempts.
To the extent what you want is simply to make it so the prostitutes cannot be prosecuted, it means that they are undeterred AND I would think it makes it harder to catch the people running the operation and the trafficers.
I'm not following why it would. Again, we're talking about women who are being held under compulsion -- offering them freedom from prosecution and practical assistance, while arresting and punishing the people enslaving them, would seem to make them more, rather than less, inclined to cooperate.
I hope this does not relate to the pro bono work you were doing where one of the shareholders thought there might be a conflict between clients.
It actually does, but not in the way you're thinking.
Patronizing the sex industry is winked at
I know only one person who has admitted to having had sex with a prostitute, and everyone he told was shocked and appalled. It's a pretty bright moral line for me, and, I think, for a lot of people.
63: Anywhere other than Nevada. Even there it's becoming somewhat harder to maintain, as the towns with brothels grow and more people object to their neighbor.
The difference between a defendant and a victim is dramatic. Surely you know that?
Yes. I do. Which is why I'm arguing for a change in the law that would recognize trafficked prostitutes as crime victims rather than criminals.
I have the impression that there's a body of scholarship, going back years, on the issue of prostitution generally and how to reduce its damage and incidence. As always, what would be and may have proven to be a constructive approach in country X is not as relevant as we might wish. Anybody have an acquaintance with that scholarship?
Why does a crime victim need a defense?
I think it would be curious to find out the following statistics:
How many arrests were made for prostitution?
How many convictions?
I suspect that you will find that the problem is that nobody really cares about the prostitutes. They get ignored and abused more that they get arrested.
Again, my sense is that the [Swedish?] model of making pimping and patronizing a prostitute illegal, while decriminalizing engaging in prostitution, has worked well for them.
Slightly OT, but why is it called "white slavery"? I get that it's not "black" slavery, as slavery is often presumed to be in the good old US of A, but is this not inapt when the slaves are not actually white? What if the slaves were black? Would they still be victims of white slavery?
Also, is anyone else annoyed by the sexified photos of the women in the article? They're victims of horrible sex crimes, for chrissakes -- do we really need to know how pretty their bare necks and shoulders are?
Why does a crime victim need a defense?
Because they have committed an act which would have been criminal if they had not been coerced into it. That's exactly like saying "Why do you need a 'self-defense' defence to a manslaughter charge? If the guy was being attacked, he's a crime victim, not a criminal, and doesn't need a defense." If he killed someone, he needs a defense, crime victim or not.
Likewise, if prostitution is going to remain illegal, so long as trafficked prostitutes are engaging in prostitution, they either need to have a legal defense to charges of prostitution or they are criminals as well as crime victims.
49. My mistake, LB. Harsh punishment always deters criminal behaviour. That's why we have the death penalty, and there are never any murders.
Does that strike you as a reason to take the laws against murder off the books?
Haven't had a chance to read the thread but this article from New York magazine contrasting the way a 13 YO American prostitute is treated by the US judicial system vs. a 13 YO girl brought over to the US from another country to be a sex slave is very interesting.
I think that the term "white slavery" comes from the Nineteenth century, when the anti-Ottoman propaganda spread the stories of Christian women sold into the harems of the Turk. I've seen anti-Saudi propaganda like that from fairly recently. (Sometimes true stories, I'd imagine.)
There was also an unmistakably pornographic art genre showing ethereal, scantily-clad blonde girls being brought into the presence of the mustache-twisting sheikh.
Also, is anyone else annoyed by the sexified photos of the women in the article? They're victims of horrible sex crimes, for chrissakes -- do we really need to know how pretty their bare necks and shoulders are?
Yep. That's the PR problem. The coverage has a nasty tendency to drift from coercion and rape to 'Traffickers are importing hot sex kittens to your town!!!'
77: Oh, man, that's awful. And again, a kid like that shouldn't be treated as a criminal.
It may be true that no new laws are needed if prosecutors used their discretionary powers appropriately. But a fair proportion of people at all levels of the justice system have conflicts of interest, as I suggested in #51. There's a similiar problem with domestic-abuse cases, since a pretty high proportion of cops are abusers.
76. I think you misunderstand me, LB. I agree with you that changing the law to make prosecuting these crimes easier will lead to more prosecutions, especially if the body politic is behind it. Where I disagree is that harsher punishments deter criminal behaviour. It's not like someone says 5-10, ok I'll chance it, 15-20, no thanks.
Emerson, 82 sounds more less pulled out of your ass. What are the stats on cops as abusers, and how many high-rollers are patronizing seedy massage parlors instead of high-priced escorts?
Maybe someone can explain to me in little words why LB isn't obviously right. Because I'm seeing her argue that the law should recognize debt bondage (suitably construed) and passport-stealing as counting as 'duress', which would allow, theoretically, a girl like one in the article, to escape criminal conviction and deportation (and a permanent ban from the U.S.)
I am not seeing LB argue that this would solve the problem of prostitution completely. I'm not seeing her argue that prostitutes should be arrested and treated like criminals. I'm not seeing her argue that this would replace the need for trained sex crimes investigators.
I'm seeing a very narrow move: given that prostitution is currently illegal, there's a need for a legal out for women coerced into prostitution by non-violent means. It's not automatic, and it's not so easy that 'all you would have to do is claim duress' and get it. (And certainly, that carrot's already there with the T-1 visa. The law change LB proposes won't make lying more attractive.)
So what am I missing?
On that you're right -- that increasing the likelihood of prosecution is going to be a much better deterrent than increasing the severity of punishment. But there's still something to be said for maintaining a hierarchy of criminality -- this sort of conduct should be recognized as significantly worse than pimping an adult, uncoerced, prostitute.
79. The sexual angle was certainly propaganda, but European and American sailors were enslaved when captured by the Barbary pirates. We even fought a war over it.
My concern is that even if these women have some kind of safe harbor in the law, they won't have any language or work skills or a support network here. Even if we manage to get them out of slavery...then what? Then, if by a political miracle we get some kind of support service for these women to help them transition into a normal life, I'd guess that we'd see many more women coming her deliberately, planning on becoming prostitutes and gaining residency that way. At least they wouldn't technically be slaves.
I'd guess that we'd see many more women coming her deliberately, planning on becoming prostitutes and gaining residency that way.
This really seems like a fantasy concern to me -- you think there's a pent up stream of millions of Third World women plotting to pose as sex slaves so they can get green cards? The coercion would be an element of the defense -- not just being in the country illegally.
Cala:
I simply think it will be ineffective. The danger is that people spend the effort passing a law and then say "look what we did!" when they didn't do much.
Once again, the problem isn't the law. The problem is that nobody cares.
"The coercion would be an element of the defense -- not just being in the country illegally."
Please tell me how a virtual indigent prostitute proves this coercion. What does this evidence look like?
to escape criminal conviction and deportation
For one, you just aren't going to get the second half of that permanently, for political reasons. It also seems like a law seeking abuse. Second, from the article Becks linked, that's already the law, it looks like.
I thought the article was confusing, at best. She might have been run through the criminal courts, but they wanted to put her in juvie. I take it that juvie is intended primarily for reform, whether or not that's how it functions. It looks like the problem is one of misdiagnosing what is going on and of misallocated resources, not bad intent on the part of the legislators and cops.
Prostitution is an enormous business, and a fair proportion of the clients are prosperous and respectable, including people in the justice system. Most people in the justice system aren't able to pay Palfrey's $300 / hr. prices. I don't have statistics, but I'd guess that men in law and justice have a somewhat higher engagement in prostitution than the average -- they tend to be pretty cynical, hard-driving guys.
As far as policemen go, retraining police to suppress their sympathy for abuser is a pretty common theme in the biz. I've seen it said that the level of abuse in police families is high, but I can't remember where.
Please tell me how a virtual indigent prostitute proves this coercion. What does this evidence look like?
The same way anyone proves anything -- testimony. If she can tell a convincing story not rebutted by the prosecution's evidence, and supported by facts such as having been accompanied into the country by someone who independent evidence establishes is a pimp, then she can prove that she was coerced.
you think there's a pent up stream of millions of Third World women plotting to pose as sex slaves so they can get green cards?
Isn't this the basis of the whole mail order bride phenomenon?
So basically, your evidence is only her testimony?
I am just not convinced that she is going to have any evidence other than her testimony.
This "independent evidence" isnt going to exist. Sounds like a nice law school ideal, but not a real world idea.
The prostitute in question was probably arrested in a brothel, with a group of other prostitutes capable of giving testimony, and a pimp/manager of some sort. She probably entered the country on a visa, and it would be possible to find out who she was travelling with. It would further be possible to find out if whoever brought her into the country made regular trips out of the country and returned accompanied by women who were later arrested as prostitutes.
Sure, this sort of evidence is hard to collect -- evidence of crime is, because criminals lie and conceal their crimes. That's not a reason to give it up as impossible.
And this:
Sounds like a nice law school ideal, but not a real world idea.
I could again, really do without.
85: So what am I missing?
will's various arguments that it would be hard for such a narrow move to make much of a practicable difference seem pretty convincing to me.
89: You know, I've heard that logic before. I think it's bad, and I will say why. I've heard it before by men who are bringing over [insert poor, desperate country adjective] brides complaining about the fact that the Violence Against Women Act means that their bride could technically file a domestic violence charge against them, and then they could run off with their green card.
And you know what? I'm sure there are some cases where the foreign bride does scheme to get a green card (surprisingly, a 19-year-old isn't into a 55-year-old because she's in love with his mind.) Claims of abuse are up slightly, though it's hard to say whether they're all fake, or women are now coming forward because the guy can't say "If you tell I'll have you sent back'. But even with that, the average VAWA petition takes months to years to wind its way through the system. Surprisingly, it hasn't lead to thousands of women coming over just to claim abuse and get a green card automatically.
And that's a pretty easy visa. A number for a green card automatically comes up for you as a spouse of a citizen. You don't have to sneak in across a border. And if allowing women (or any abused spouse, but let's be real, they're not worried about abused men here) an out for spousal abuse hasn't lead to an abundance of fake abuse reports, why would a path where you have to get yourself smuggled into the U.S. and serve as a prostitute be so much more appealing so you *might* have a chance, three or four years down the line, to get a visa? It'd be easier to put up a profile on CandleForLove.
IMO, this is about as farfetched as worrying that if the goverment legalizes gay marriage, frat boys will marry each other for health insurance, ruining the economy.
100: will's various arguments that it would be hard for such a narrow move to make much of a practicable difference seem pretty convincing to me.
From what I've read on the issue, fear of prosecution is one of the tools traffickers use to keep prostitutes in line -- they know they can't go to the police for help because they're criminals themselves. Changing that wouldn't fix everything, and I never began to imply that it would, but it would be one helpful thing.
LB:
If you want a law to be passed, then you have to think about whether it will be useful.
These are indigent people charged with very small crimes. The public defender's offices do not have the time or money to investigate these cases. They barely have the money for death penalty cases.
In my area, they pay a court appointed lawyer $240 for a misdemeanor. They will not appointed an investigator.
The evidence that you are talking about is never going to make it to court.
Additionally, fear of deportation or violence is probably a much bigger tool to keep women in line than getting a fine and suspended jail time for a low level misdemeanor.
Right. But the traffickers are wealthy people and if we change the law, they can be charged with important crimes, worth investigating at some cost. And if the trafficked prostitutes aren't treated as criminals, then they're more willing to participate in the prosecution of the traffickers.
There's not a federal law against trafficking that comes into play anyways?
Dude, this defense isn't the entire change in the law that the client I'm working for is trying to get passed. You seem to think that I'm under the delusion that making having been trafficked a defense to a charge of prostitution is alone going to make a huge difference in the situation of these women. It's not, by itself. It's a facet in a law intended to focus prosecution on the traffickers, rather than the victims. Do you have any reason to think that making having been coerced a defense to a charge of prostitution would be an actively harmful change in the law? Because if not, I'm not understanding why you need to say more than that you don't think it'll do all that much good.
106: There is, but the feds don't prosecute everyone. A lot of these crimes are prosecuted locally.
Because he's a lawyer, LB. Surely you understand.
104: I don't know, will. Fear of deportation and fear of police probably go hand in hand.
I don't know the details of a T-1, but in order to be eligible for a visa to the U.S., you have to have a pretty clear record. A prostitution conviction is one of the big no-no's (as many mail-order bride seekers find out.)
I don't know how the visa's drawn to get around it, but keeping a prostitution conviction off of her record does give the woman more options.
The NYTimes Magazine had an article on this subject a year or two ago, and I seem to recall that the largest number of trafficked women, at least from Mexico, were ending up in brothels where they were literally imprisoned, and prostituted to a fairly poor clientele, not the influential customers of whom Emerson speaks. These aren't streetwalkers who are picked up individually. They are only found if someone takes the trouble to bust the house, where there may be ample evidence that the inmates are under duress.
The traffickers can continue to do business because they are buying protection from corrupt police.
111: and because the women are threatened with violence not only to themselves but to their families back home.
It seems like LB (and mcmc) are right in that trafficked women are much more likely than your average domestic prostitute to be in actual brothels where everything going on is completely illegal in every way if someone bothers to investigate.
I'm wondering if some of you have even read the articles in question. The women who are brought into this aren't told up front that they're going to the US to be prostitutes; they're told they're going to be hostesses or restaurant workers and then gradually have all their options taken away. Their families back home are threatened, with violence, financial coercion and with the shame of having a prostitute as a daughter. The women are housed in disgusting apartments, taken to the brothel in taxis that are in the service of the pimps and have zero freedom. And even if they got out, what could they do in a country where they have no money and speak little or none of the language, even with a green card? Who in hell would knowingly choose that if they had any other options?
One of the places that was busted in the raids that prompted the SFGate articles was right down the street from my old workplace. Everyone in the neighborhood knew that it was "that kind" of a massage parlor. We all saw the women being dropped off by taxis for work (and not that it's relevant to anything, 30, but these women were in fact quite attractive). One of my coworkers even found a website that had reviews of the "girls," which implies a certain economic status among the johns. In other words, there were an awful lot of people turning a blind eye to the situation. There is no way in hell that the police didn't know what was going on, so either there wasn't political will to prosecute or the legal tools weren't available. Fortunately, the mayor of SF has made this a higher priority and things seem to be changing.
On a slightly different topic, I have a classified-ad related mystery. I picked up a copy of the Village Voice (which I hardly read any more) a couple of weeks ago, and noticed there were two sections of classified ads at the back. One was 'Adult Bodywork', and it had ads for things like sensual massage, illustrated with pictures of tits and ass. No mystery what's going on there. But immediately before it was a section called just "Bodywork". In context, I'd assume the sex businesses would be in "Adult Bodywork" and plain "Bodywork" would be real massage therapists, Pilates instructors, whatever.
In fact, "Bodywork" also all looked like sex businesses, just less tackily advertised. The ads were for massages and were ambiguous, but were all illustrated with pretty Asian women, and the written copy focused on the attractions of the masseuses, rather than, say, the medical benefits of a massage. If they weren't all ads for sex businesses, they were awfully confusing.
I don't understand why the advertising would work that way. I could see thinking that a tasteful ad would pull a clientele that a more brazen ad wouldn't, but why have two neighboring classified sections separated only by the luridness of the advertising?
Perhaps the voice would have liked to separate out the two sections, but the market for non-adult non-prostitution-advertising "bodywork" ads is vanishingly smalll?
But the non-"Adult" ones were still prostitution-advertising, just in a more class way.
why have two neighboring classified sections separated only by the luridness of the advertising?
The price and positioning of the ads. I am not sure how to link to it, but, I looked and, for example, on their website information for print ads, ads for miscellaneous personal services cost half of what ads for adult bodywork cost. I did not see a plain "bodywork" category, but maybe there is someplace, and it is cheaper.
But why wouldn't all the sex business want to make what they're selling unambiguous? At least one of the 'tasteful' ads in the 'Bodywork' section had some absolutely obvious language -- 'release', maybe? But some of them might have been actual places to get a massage. I'd think the potential for confusion would be bad for everyone.
(And I'd think the Voice's clientele could support a whole bunch of non-sex body work. Don't lots of people get actual massages?)
Right, because nobody wants to advertise anything but prostitution in the back of the Village Voice, whether the Voice tries to create an advertising section for them, or not.
119 crossed with 118. I suppose that might explain it, but I'm surprised the Voice doesn't eliminate the price differential if that's the effect.
I'm surprised the Voice doesn't eliminate the price differential if that's the effect.
I see your point. Maybe they do not want to admit that the ads are for what they really are for and start new section: "Back Rubs--No Handjobs Allowed"
119: Ah, that potential for confusion. You could make a whole sitcom out of my attempts to make sure that the massage I wanted to get in Thailand would, in fact, just be a massage.
122: I imagine they're making money off of it. Now "massage" services have to figure out if it's worth the extra bucks to show some T&A, or if they're confident they can phrase their ad such that it will (a) get past the Voice, and (b) make it absolutely clear what's going on.
Hmm... aren't price differentials usually viewed as a useful way to capture consumer surplus or something like that? Based on my work experience, I'd also not be surprised if the demand for sex services outweighs the demand for normal massage by so much that the latter gets ignored.
Not that this hasn't bugged me at times when I was looking for a therapeutic massage and realized I had no idea where to go...
124: I've had a friend run into exactly this category of confusion.
"So she made an appointment, guessing the best she could, and a woman came up, and went into the boss's office. A while later, she left, and the boss came out. 'You know, turned out she was a hooker, after all. So I took the hand job.'"
I debated whether I would make a fuss or just lie back and feel like a shithead later. I was dealing with language differences, too. Never did learn how to say "no blowjob, thanks anyways," in Thai. Happily it was not only a regular massage, but clothed, so I didn't have to cross that particular Rubicon.
Convincing various friends back in the states that it was just a massage? More difficult.
I'm fairly sure there's no erotic subtext to most Nanny agencies.
Whenever I call nanny agencies, it's hard for me to get across the point that I want a nanny who WON'T give my kids a hand job.
Nevermind the kids; worry about the dog.
The English Courtesan's new rates are as follows:
2 hours - £400
4 hours - £700
6 hours - £900
8 hours - £1000
12 hours - £1200
24 hours - £1800
48 hours - £2400
The rates exclude flights and hotels and travel outside the UK is subject to a minimum 12 hour period. A 45% deposit is required.
So there you have it! The English Courtesan believes that after many months of minor tweaking, she has now found her equilibrium price, with a pricing strategy that is premium enough to place her as a Giffen good in the rockonomics league, equitable enough to encourage the like-minded and reasonable enough to encourage regular bookings where both parties are agreeable. Your comments are invited as always, wise readers, but this change feels right for the English Courtesan at this point.
IMO, this is about as farfetched as worrying that if the goverment legalizes gay marriage, frat boys will marry each other for health insurance, ruining the economy.
Cala, I love you.
And yes, unintended consequences -- but really, folks, in my somewhat limited experience the T-1 visa is very, very far from being a draw to come to the U.S.
132: Forget the dog, what about the duck?
36 72
Via Brad Plumer here is a dissenting view of the Swedish law. Of course this depends to some extent on what you are trying to accomplish. Decreasing the amount of prostitution and helping women currently working as prostitutes are in my opinion incompatible goals.
85
"Maybe someone can explain to me in little words why LB isn't obviously right. Because I'm seeing her argue that the law should recognize debt bondage (suitably construed) and passport-stealing as counting as 'duress', which would allow, theoretically, a girl like one in the article, to escape criminal conviction and deportation (and a permanent ban from the U.S.)"
I don't see it. Are you going to allow a similiar duress defense for identity theft, shoplifting, drug dealing and the like? Such people seem like undesirable immigrants to me.
How many people are brought to the US and then forced to engage in drug dealing lest they be turned into the authorities and deported?
I admit to not having a good idea about what the consequences of LB's change would be - pimpin', as they say, ain't easy - and living in SF I think that I get more exposure to well meaning social measures gone horribly wrong than most. So I'm skeptical. I mean, I think it sounds like a good idea, but if it's going to end up causing more harm than good...
If people are enslaved and forced to commit acts of identity theft, shoplifting, and drug dealing, duress may be acceptable.
I feel an impulse to link to this right now. If only punching were a cure for stupidity.
To pick one example - if people running these brothels replace threats of reports to the INS / police with threats of physical violence and murder againts either the women or their families at home (possibly selecting women based on having such families), has the situation improved or deteriorated?
141: The people running these brothels aready routinely supplement threats of reports to the INS / police with threats of physical violence and murder againts either the women or their families at home (possibly selecting women based on having such families), so it would be a net gain.
13: Don't be knee-jerkily dismissive. One of the major problems that leads young women into prostitution in developing countries is that they're supporting their families, and that factory jobs pay shit. Pushing for better wages in factories that Americans do business with would help, and so (for that matter) would things like microcredit, paying families to keep children in school, and raising the prices for rural crops would all help.
I dunno. One of my acquaintances is in a meth treatment plan that consists solely of getting tested three times a week, no negative consequences if he fails, and a nice, crisp $20 bill if he's clean. I read about this completely independently on Mark Kleiman's blog several months prior to finding out that someone I knew was in it. There was a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth about how without counselling people were doomed to relapse, how this was just encouraging people to take drugs by giving them money when they quit, etc, etc.
All I know is that this guy has a steady job for the first time in three years, no longer occasionally spends the rent money on drugs, and is generally becoming functional.
The lesson I take away from this is that intuition is pretty poor at judging the effects of socio-criminal policy changes. While I laugh at the concern that this will cause more women to come to the US and pretend to be prostitutes so that they can get a visa, making sure that law enforcement changes don't harm the people they are trying to protect seems important to me.
143: And after we've helped those eight women, what are we going to do with the other million in Country X (not to say anything about Country Y and Z).
145: They already can get a visa. Hard to tell whether the numbers are up or not. But I suspect not, as similar measures on other visas haven't lead to more fraud.
145: I can't see how LB's proposal is supposed to have much of an affect --an environment in which escapees from trafficking can wind up landing in a detention facility would seem to call for a different kind of remedy -- but arguing it might cause actual harm compared to the current situation seems like a stretch.
146: And after we've helped those eight women
Come on. Seriously?
147: Yeah. The fraudulent visa concern seems just off-the-wall to me, even in the wacky world of immigration politics. I'm not sure about dramatic changes in the legal environment surrounding prostitution, especially when a big problem with current law enforcement policy seems to be in how prosecutorial/police discretion get exercised within the current legal environment.
Ok, maybe this wouldn't be much of an avenue for cheats seeking residency. FINE. But someone would do it, dammit.
They'll even fake the pimp taking away their passport!
Come on. Seriously?
If you genuinely think a significant percentage of the women in the "potentially enslaved" population has sufficient exposure to American work for changes in our companies' behavior to make a substantial difference, I suspect you have an unbelievable misunderstanding of how poor and how desperate some parts of the world really are, as well as how bad the conditions are for women in such parts. It's entirely possible I'm wrong, but I'm going to need a fair number of cites before I believe otherwise.
The root of the problem will always be that the demand exists for sex workers and people simply do not care enough about the conditions under which they work.
The only way to get much attention about the problem is to convince Bush that Al Queda is sneaking women into the country to first infect Our Boys with disease and then to blow up targets.
Until then, people will turn a blind eye. Police departments will not spend any money or time to shut these places down. And newspapers will continue to take their money for advertising.
Perhaps one day, some little blonde Christian girl will escape from the sex trade and people will finally become outraged.
154: The point was made about "factories that Americans do business with." Is what you're suggesting is that American money is an infinitesimally small part of what's driving phenomena like sweatshops in the developing world? Does Kathie Lee Gifford and Honduras ring a bell?
Honduras, apparently the second poorest country in Central America with massive unemployment, appears to have a population of about 7.5 million people. So let's say 3.5 million women (there are, apparently, more men than women) and a median population age of about 20. How many people do you think were working for Kathie Lee Gifford?
157: No more than two and a half million, including the private army and the pyramid building crews.
157: Industry comprises about 20% of the Honduran workforce. Since maquiladoras driven by the American garment industry account for the bulk of their manufacturing sector, that's around a half million people in Honduras alone.
Industry comprises about 20% of the Honduran workforce.
And unemployment is 28%, so for every woman that you help by improving conditions in the maquiladoras, there is nearly a woman and a quarter standing next to her who is unaffected and unemployed. None of which is to say that working conditions shouldn't be improved.
There's been several large and fairly high profile police raids of brothels using traffic'd women here in the UK.
It's my understanding that the policy is to treat these women as victims, not as criminals. This is helped by the fact that selling sex is not illegal in the UK, but running a brothel, soliciting and pimping are.
I understand, however, that the UK still deports a fairly high percentage of sex trafficked women, which obviously leads to i) them sometimes being retrafficked, and ii) a reluctance to come forward by some victims.
for every woman that you help by improving conditions in the maquiladoras, there is nearly a woman and a quarter standing next to her who is unaffected and unemployed.
Which is why improving the rural situation--rural poverty being a large part of what drives women into cities and factory work, not to mention prostitution--would help. So you help one woman by improving conditions in the factories, and another by a serious wealth-creation program in the countryside. That's a pretty big impact.
And hell, even if you completely ignore the countryside, a 40% improvement in poverty is a hell of an improvement, Tim.
Interesting that the "sex slave" in the Chronicle series was sending home $10,000 a month, in cash. I've never had a job that would let me send 10 grand a month back to my relatives.
MQ, obviously you need to go become a prostitute. G'wan. It's a great job, and the pay's fabulous. What are you waiting for?
even if you completely ignore the countryside, a 40% improvement in poverty is a hell of an improvement, Tim.
But that's not what he's saying. 6 billion people on the planet, and what, 80 percent of them in poverty? You could make every factory doing business with America pay 15 bucks an hour, but you'll still have no shortage of desperate women to be exploited.
How many people are brought to the US and then forced to engage in drug dealing lest they be turned into the authorities and deported?
You'd be surprised. Something like half the cannabis smoked in London is grown in hydroponic farms in terrace houses, staffed by trafficked Vietnamese guys. The police make a bunch of raids on them every winter, walking down the street and looking for the houses with no snow on the roof.
165: Tim's original point was that no "significant percentage" of women in the developing world could be affected by policy changes on the part of the US. That's pretty clearly wrong even if we limit the discussion to factories (and I rather doubt the US is entirely powerless to affect the rural poverty situation either, though the extent to which it can affect it isn't clear). I don't remember anyone saying this would make all poverty and exploitation disappear from the planet.
166: In similar vein, Honduran street children are reportedly trafficked to Canada for use as drug mules.
167: Actually, I thought Tim's original point was that the women working in developing world factories are already in a good enough economic situation that prostitution seems like a bad move. This seem particularly sensible when one considers that factory employment of women has lead to much lower child labor rates, showing that the women are becoming more capable of supporting their families just fine.
This means that American businesses will not help reduce prostitution and improve opportunities by improving the pay and conditions of overseas factory jobs. They will only help more people escape poverty (as opposed to making the few current employees richer and richer) by expanding the factories, which is not what you or B had in mind by the sounds of things.
If 3rd factory workers were paid above subsistence level, they'd have something to put into the local economy, thereby creating jobs for the large percentage of women who don't have factory jobs, and are not supporting their families "just fine."
And B also mentioned such things as microcredit, raising prices of agricultural commodities, and so on.
Those of us in the 1st factory have no obligation to those in the 3rd factory.
Tim's point was the same as gswift's in #165.
If 3rd factory workers were paid above subsistence level, they'd have something to put into the local economy, thereby creating jobs for the large percentage of women who don't have factory jobs, and are not supporting their families "just fine."
Trickle down economics! Maybe we just need to convince third world countries to slash their tax rates.
There's a big difference between trickle down and trickle sideways. The latter tends to work better.
174 is just wrong when talking about prostitutes.
unless you were referring to money trickling down.
There's a big difference between trickle down and trickle sideways.
While it probably looks "sideways" to us, I'm betting that when the unemployed woman looks at the employed woman, it seems more "down."
177 - the distinction is more meaningful than just a matter of perspective. "Employed" is not equal to "top of the food chain", even if "unemployed" looks upwards to both.
177: You're right Tim. Really, factory owners should slash the wages of those factory-working rich-bitches, because they are just going to invest in imported caviar and Hermes bags. And American investors can keep that money. That will be much more fair.
And I thought I was an economic naif.
168: Actually, I thought Tim's original point was that the women working in developing world factories are already in a good enough economic situation that prostitution seems like a bad move.
They're commonly in a better situation than rural poverty, but still at high risk of horrific abuses by employers who also form the destination for the remaining child labour force. And I don't know of any legions of women out there to whom prostitution seems like a great move, no matter how poor they are; reports of the sex trade part of trafficking overwhelmingly consist of luring women with promises of menial or service work. The problem we are talking about here is coerced labour, not just prostitution as such.
The notion that economic growth and labour standards are an either/or choice is facile and unconvincing. If increased income frees up children in rural areas to attend schools, I don't see why factories compliant with decent labour standards shouldn't be able to contribute to a better-educated workforce that has more options for income earning and can thus contribute to further development. Not to mention the positive dividends for social stability, which is kind of key to any kind of long-term wealth generation.