Sex trafficking isn’t what you think: 4 myths debunked, and 1 way to prevent exploitation

The idea that sex trafficking is an urgent social problem is woven into American media stories, from reports of alleged trafficking in teenage girls by Republican MP Matt Gaetz to debunked QAnon conspiracy theories about a sexual slavery ring going on about the Online retailer Wayfair is run.

The general perception of sex trafficking involves a young, passive woman being captured by an aggressive human trafficker. The woman is in hiding, waiting to be rescued by law enforcement. Presumably it is white, because as the legal scholar Jayashri Srikantiah writes, the “iconic victim” of human trafficking is usually portrayed that way.

This is essentially the plot of the “Taken” films, in which American teenagers are kidnapped overseas and sold into sexual slavery. Such concerns fuel viral posts and TikTok videos of alleged but unproven human trafficking in IKEA parking lots, shopping malls and pizzerias.

This is not usually how sex trafficking takes place.

I have been researching human trafficking in the Midwest since 2013. In interviews with law enforcement agencies, medical providers, case managers, victim attorneys, and immigration lawyers, I found that even these frontline workers inconsistently define and use the label “victim of human trafficking” – especially when it comes to sex trafficking. This makes it more difficult for these professionals to provide those trafficked with the help they seek.

So here are the facts and the law.

March 2021, protesters gather outside the statehouse in Columbus, Ohio to protest pedophilia and sex trafficking. (Scott Olson / Getty Images)

What is sex trafficking?

The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 provides the official legal definition of sex and labor trafficking in the United States.

It makes “trafficking that involves a commercial sexual act through violence, fraud, coercion, or where the person who was induced to do so is under 18” a federal crime.

In short, to be legally considered a sex trafficking, any sexual act involving an adult must involve “coercion, cheating, and coercion.” This could appear as if someone – a family member, romantic partner, or market broker known colloquially as a “pimp” or “woman” – is physically abusing another adult or threatening them with sex for money or resources.

Any sexual exchange with minors – that is, exchanging sex for something valuable such as cash or food – is considered sex trafficking.

How common is sex trafficking?

Human trafficking data is known to be confusing and difficult to measure. Survivors may be reluctant to disclose their exploitation for fear of deportation, undocumented or arrest. This leads to underreporting.

One way to get roughly how many people are trafficked in the United States is to consult reports on federal grants proposed by the nonprofit Freedom Network USA to Combat Trafficking in Human Beings.

For example, the Federal Office for Victims of Crime served a total of 9,854 customers between July 2019 and June 2020 – some of whom were identified as victims of human trafficking, others showed “strong signs of victimization through human trafficking”. The Department of Health and Human Services Office on Trafficking in Persons served 2,398 human trafficking survivors in fiscal 2019.

Data from the same bureau also shows that 25,597 “potential victims” of sex and labor trafficking were identified by calling the National Human Trafficking Hotline.

Again, this data is incomplete – if survivors have not accessed these special resources or called these special hotlines, they will not be shown here.

What about sex trafficking?

As with other sex crimes, such as rape, sex trafficking survivors often experience violence from someone they know, not a total stranger.

A study by Covenant House New York, a nonprofit focused on homeless youth, found that 36% of the 22 human trafficking survivors in their survey were trafficked by an immediate family member such as a parent. Only four reported being “kidnapped and detained against his will”.

Often the victims of human trafficking are younger transgender people or homeless youth who exchange sex with others in order to meet their basic needs: housing, economic stability, food and health care. Human trafficking often looks like vulnerable people are struggling to survive in a violent, exploitative world.

“They create sexual solutions to non-sexual problems,” says San Francisco-based researcher Alexandra Lutnick.

Under US law, these young people are the victims of human trafficking because of their age. But they may oppose the label, preferring terms like “survival sex work” or “prostitution” to describe their experience.

Victims of human trafficking who engage in survival sex may well be arrested instead of offering them help such as housing or health care. If they fail to demonstrate “coercion, fraud or coercion” or refuse to comply with a criminal investigation, they risk going from victim to criminal in the eyes of law enforcement agencies. This can mean allegations of prostitution, criminal offenses or deportation.

Such penalties are most common against black, indigenous, queer, transgender, and undocumented survivors of sex trafficking. For example, black youths are arrested disproportionately for prostitution offenses, although legally all commercial sex with minors is sex trafficking.

What is the difference between sex work and sex trafficking?

Sex work and sex trafficking differ legally and in other meaningful ways.

Sex work means that adults consent to have transactional sex. In almost all US states, it is a criminal offense that can be punished with fines and even prison terms.

Sex trafficking is not consensual and is generally treated as a more serious crime.

Most groups of sex workers recognize that sex work is not inherently sex trafficking, but that sex workers can be exposed to violence, fraud and coercion because they work in a criminalized, stigmatized profession. Sex workers whose experience meets the legal standards of human trafficking could still fear exposing this to the police and risking arrest for prostitution.

Conversely, sex workers can be falsely labeled as “traded” by the police and lawyers and are in the care of law enforcement agencies or social services.

What can be done

According to my research, reducing sex trafficking requires changes that may not let it happen in the first place. That means rebuilding a stronger, supportive social safety net in the US to alleviate poverty and housing insecurity.

Meanwhile, trafficking victims would benefit from the efforts of frontline workers to fight racism, sexism and transphobia, stigmatizing and criminalizing victims who don’t look what people expect – and who are struggling to survive.

This article was republished by The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.