Guest, Author at Shared Hope International

March 15, 2022 by Guest

Seeds Sown Seven Years Earlier

As Ambassadors of Hope, you and I can likely relate in that we can’t help but get on a soapbox when the topic of vulnerable children is raised. We’re passionate about protecting kids and simply want to equip others with tools to keep their kids safe from predators. Admittedly, as a mom of three little boys, I’m not as involved in trafficking prevention as I was previously, but God reminded me recently that I am to sow the seeds; He will do the tending. And occasionally, I’ll get to see Him harvest.

Last August I noticed a missed call and voicemail.

“Hello, Shelby, this is Eleanor Smith* calling and I was hoping you could give me some help. Our grandson Sam* posted some pictures on TikTok and a lady contacted him and said she sent his pictures to a model that she knows. Eventually, this model contacted him and said that he wants to fly him to L.A. for a photoshoot because he’s all wowed by the way he looks. Anyway, this smells like a trafficking scam to me. Any information you have that we could convince him that this is not a good idea, I would greatly appreciate it.”

It had been seven years since I presented on human trafficking at Eleanor’s church, a body that included many people I had known since childhood. At that time, I would have immediately labeled what Eleanor described as a trafficking scam. Now, I have my husband’s voice in my head cautioning me, “Not everything is trafficking.” I paused, prayed (because the Lord knows how out of the loop and uneducated I feel these days!), and got to work. Over the course of a few days, I learned more details from Eleanor and her son Jon*, Sam’s dad.

Sam was 17 years old, a good student who was self-motivated and seemed to have lots of friends. His parents divorced a few years ago and don’t share a common parenting approach. Remarkably, Grandma Eleanor and his dad Jon had maintained very open communication with Sam and he told them a lot, including his handles on Instagram, TikTok and other apps.

Sam had become very active on social media and had amassed over 2.3 million followers on TikTok. A brief look through Sam’s public TikTok profile raised red flags for me. His frequent posts included provocative lip syncs. The slightly more sensual videos of him lip-syncing shirtless on his bed boasted literally millions of views per video.

I cringed. While I didn’t use TikTok personally, I knew that predators frequently flag posts on social media to alert other predators to content they like. I could only assume that Sam, who was hoping to begin a modeling career, naively believed he was impressing the masses. He had been wooed by flattery and the offer of a lifetime: a photoshoot in L.A. with a big-name model.

I could never have foreseen that the seed sown seven years ago in a DMST presentation to Sam’s grandma would lead to the opportunity to intercede for Sam.

Many of the details didn’t add up, not the least of which was the fact that the modeling industry doesn’t function in the way that Sam was experiencing. Moreover, the COVID pandemic has birthed brazen scams luring young people into modeling and other lifestyles, except that traffickers, not modeling agencies, await those who take the bait. This particular model was also employing all the same “charming” techniques that traffickers are prone to, building trust, inviting Sam’s questions and saying he just wanted to give another young guy the opportunities he had been given. Sam was being lured by what Jon and I believed to be a polished, professional predator.

To make matters worse, with his mom’s blessing, Sam had already purchased his ticket to fly to L.A. two weeks later. Jon had limited time to persuade Sam and Sam’s mom of the potential dangers he might face. I had initially sent Jon links to resources from Shared Hope, but I then reached out to our Director of National Outreach for help. With lightning speed, she crafted a network of support for Sam and his father. This included expert counsel from an intervention organization in L.A., a call with a seasoned FBI victim specialist, calls with a male trafficking survivor, and most importantly, a formidable army of prayer warriors.

Against our hopes and words of caution, Sam flew to L.A. for the photoshoot. Miraculously, the model and photographer were both “unable” to meet Sam and his mom for the photoshoot. On short notice, Sam instead did a photoshoot with a reputable photographer whose sage wisdom about the legitimate modeling industry seemed to strike a chord with Sam. He actually called his dad and said, “I think I dodged a bullet with that other guy”. We all breathed a little easier that day, so very thankful that God answered our prayers and used that photographer, along with so many others, to call Sam back to safety.

Sam is still pursuing modeling and hasn’t yet heeded warnings to rein in his social media activities, but I trust that God will use the network now formed around him to guide Sam on his journey. For my part, I could never have foreseen that the seed sown seven years ago in a DMST presentation to Sam’s grandma would lead to the opportunity to intercede for Sam. Friends, I encourage you to keep sowing your seeds, and trust that God’s watering them for harvest in due time. He, more than any of us, wants to protect vulnerable children.

*All names have been changed*

Shelby, an OH Ambassador

February 28, 2022 by Guest

Toward Dignity, Respect, Equality and Equity: A Black History Month Reflection on the Trafficking and Criminalization of Black Women and Girls

Dr. Marian Hatcher
Shared Hope Policy Consultant, Ambassador-at-Large (United Nations)

Black History month focuses on the accomplishments and successes and richness of Black history, and rightly so. It also invokes underlying racial disparities in many areas of society. Poverty, education, and housing insecurity come to mind of course. Another area where this disparity is especially prevalent is in the prostitution and sex trafficking of black women and girls. According to the National Black Women’s Justice Institute, “40% of sex trafficking victims are black women, the highest percentage of any race.” Black girls are also disproportionately impacted by sex trafficking. One example of this is found in Louisiana where Black girls compromised only 19% of the state’s youth population in 2018 but they accounted for 49% of child sex trafficking survivors.

There are a host of reasons why Black women and girls are disproportionately impacted by trafficking, including socioeconomic factors, system involvement, and increased exposure to violence, sexual abuse and physical abuse. These vulnerabilities do not exist “because of racial identity but because of deeply entrenched systemic practices and structural responses to race, ethnicity, and socio-economic status.” Thus, many of the factors that increase Black girls’ risk of being trafficked also make them more likely to be criminalized as a result of their trafficking victimization and directed into the justice system. The disproportionate arrests of both exploited Black girls and women, is glaring.

In 2013 the Black population in the U.S. was 13.2 percent, not surprisingly 41.4 % of people arrested for prostitution were Black…. The demographics are even more disproportionate for minors as 61.9 % of those arrested for prostitution under the age of eighteen were Black.”

Legal and personal challenges, prejudice and ultimately injustice arise when victims are also classified as offenders. As a member of Shared Hope International’s Just Response Policy Council, we worked for over 3 years to develop a field guidance report titled Sex Trafficking Victim Offender Intersectionality: A Guide for Criminal Justice Stakeholders. As defined in the report, victim-offender intersectionality is “the phenomenon of sex trafficking victims alleged to have engaged in conduct that violates the federal definition of sex trafficking…[which] could involve a broad range of conduct, including recruitment, transportation, advertising and harboring, and could involve trafficking of adults by means of force, fraud or coercion or children without regard to whether force, fraud or coercion was involved.” This Council-informed report was jointly released by Shared Hope International and the Villanova Law Institute to Address Commercial Sexual Exploitation in January 2020 with the goal of supporting a shift in the criminal justice response to victim offender intersectionality by moving away from a narrow, retributive approach and towards a holistic approach.

Ultimately, Black women and girls could receive enormous benefits from a national implementation of this actionable, thorough, and well thought out trauma-responsive and trafficking-informed approach.

Addressing the exploitation of my demographic has been my passion and purpose since my personal victim-to-survivor journey more than twenty years ago. The catalyst was extreme trauma from domestic violence exacerbated by substance use disorder.

I was fortunate to receive trauma informed jail-based treatment at the Cook County Sheriff’s Office – Department of Women’s Justice Services, as a condition of Women’s Rehabilitative Alternative Probation, Drug Court, in lieu of a prison sentence. While I hope to see other survivors access these needed services outside the criminal justice process, to my surprise, God blessed me with a second chance through employment in the same program that saved my life, eventually leading to promotion(s) in other areas of the Sheriff’s Office addressing gender-based violence.

Those opportunities propelled me forward. It was 4 years ago this month that Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois (my home state), honored me in the Congressional record during Black History Month.

“As we near the end of this year’s Black History Month, I want to tell you about an amazing woman from the Chicago area who is making history today by helping to free women and children from modern-day slavery. Her name is Marian Hatcher, and she follows in the footsteps of two earlier “she-roes” of American history: Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman.”

He shared the rich Chicago history and accomplishments of names we know as successful changemakers facing adversity, so it was truly humbling to be compared to Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth in this abolitionist work to eradicate all forms or sexual exploitation before Congress and for posterity.

With that said, we have much work still left to do as our opponents are many, yet I stand with survivors, known and unknown. So many Black women and girls from slavery of old to modern day, treated as commodities. Many I have known, died still enslaved and even more have died that I do not know.

Just this week, Sara Goodwin was allegedly murdered and dismembered after being abducted near a track in Houston. She was believed to be involved in the sex trade and that made her a target for this monstrous act.

It is cases like this and the historical chattel slavery thread that compelled me to co-found an organization for black women and girls. The Alliance of Leadership & Innovation for Victims of Exploitation (ALIVE). ALIVE’s Mission is “dedicated to ending sex trafficking in the Black Community, by leveraging awareness and prevention through innovative solution focused events.” Our Vision is to behold a Black Community free from sex trafficking and exploitation.

Our founder, Melinda Metz poignantly states

I had an epiphany. If I’m ever to be a good sex trafficking survivor ally and advocate I desire, I need to understand as best I can the survivor world. This began a journey of meeting and building relationships with survivors and survivor leaders across the nation.

My knowledge was advanced exponentially, and my life was enriched, yet I was left with a troubling reality. The disproportionate number of sex trafficking victims being Black. It was then I went before the Lord and began to build ALIVE. There were many versions and recipes, It was when I contacted and collaborated with Dr. Marian Hatcher the soup was finally ready. The final ingredient a well-known, Black Survivor Leader at the helm!

With Black History month ending, we must continue to attack the business model of sexual exploitation fueled by an economy built on lust and greed. This is not the world I want for my children and grandchildren.

Dignity, Respect, Equality and Equity are the tenets of the society I envision and believe we can manifest and must work toward. This work is not for the faint of heart. It is for those who are willing, like Sojourner and Harriet, to slay the dragon and end the nightmare for those they know and those who will come long after they have gone.

Dr. Hatcher has worked as a civilian member of law enforcement at the Cook County Sheriffs’ Office for 15 years, a U.S. Representative of SPACE International (Survivors of Prostitution Calling for Enlightenment), a survivor organization representing 10 countries. She is a recipient of numerous awards including the 2014 Shared Hope International Path Breaker Award, the 2016 Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award from President Obama, and was honored on Congressional Record for Black History by U.S. Senator Richard Durbin of IL.

January 28, 2022 by Guest

The Debt Bondage Repair Act: Bringing Attention to the Long-Term Needs of Trafficking Survivors

Dr. Marian Hatcher
Shared Hope Policy Consultant
Ambassador-at-Large, United Nations

As National Slavery & Human Trafficking Prevention Month 2022 ends, I am filled with a myriad of emotions. This annual recognition on the surface is focused on long term protections of victims/survivors addressing labor and sex trafficking, yet economic exploitation is often overlooked. In a month dedicated to awareness, there is still a lack of awareness of the long-term financial impacts that many trafficking survivors suffer. However, this past year we had a win, the Debt Bondage Repair Act (DBRA), and this month is a great time to celebrate it.

In December 2020, I was asked to provide technical assistance to the House Committee on Financial Services and was subsequently invited to testify as a subject matter expert at a hearing on issues related to the Business of Human Trafficking.

After numerous delays due to the COVID pandemic, and many layers of internal vetting for the panel, on March 25, 2021, I was honored to testify at the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services’ hearing, Breaking the Chains: Dismantling the Business of Human Exploitation.

To explain the importance this issue holds for me, I would like to share some of the testimony I gave at that hearing:

The impact of human trafficking does not end when victims leave their trafficking situations and their exploiters are held accountable. For survivors, these are just the first steps in a long process toward achieving the interwoven goals of healing, empowerment, and financial stability. Without financial stability and resources to support educational goals and to meet basic needs, survivors who have left their trafficking situation will often struggle to stay “out of the life” and may return to exploitative situations due to lack of resources. The fact that many trafficking survivors face arrest and criminal charges as a result of their trafficking means they face even greater hurdles to accessing needed housing assistance, seeking employment, and pursuing educational goals.

We must provide avenues for credit history relief and ensure availability of consumer banking products for trafficking victims. In addition to exploiting their victims through commercial sex or forced labor, traffickers – particularly in the context of domestic trafficking – may also exploit their victims’ credit histories by using their social security numbers to take out loans and make large purchases, such as vehicles, intending not to pay, thereby destroying their victims’ credit histories in the process.

When survivors without credit histories and those having damaged credit histories leave their trafficking situations and begin working toward financial stability, they often find that they are unable to access basic consumer banking services – in particular, obtaining a credit card – which creates further barriers to establishing credit histories and achieving financial independence. Lack of a bank account or credit card may even impact a survivor’s ability to seek employment or to rent an apartment. Therefore, disrupting the long-term impacts of human trafficking should include assistance for survivors with amending damaging reports and other methods for improving their credit histories to prevent ongoing injury from trafficking victimization. Utilizing alternative means of evaluating credit for human trafficking survivors could have a dramatic impact on a survivor’s ability to attain financial stability and to heal from the wounds of trafficking victimization. We should also provide access to financial literacy education for human trafficking survivors. Survivors who have experienced sex trafficking as a child or young adult have shared that an important support that was sometimes lacking in the services they received was education on financial literacy and the skills they needed to become financially self-sufficient.

I was surprised and grateful, when Ranking Member Patrick McHenry’s office informed me, he wanted to craft a bill, inspired by my testimony. He displayed leadership at the federal level and exerted political will, courageously doing what it takes, to promote a victim-centered approach, helping survivors of sex trafficking move past economic barriers related to their exploitation.

The DBRA removes economic barriers for survivors by preventing debts incurred as a result of trafficking from ruining a survivor’s credit history and undermining their access to basic financial services needed to attain financial stability.

This past June, the Debt Bondage Repair Act (DBRA), a narrowly scoped piece of legislation with immense ability to assist the economically exploited, was passed by the House of Representatives.

With that, it brought one step closer, the sentiments of my written statement introduced on the House Floor June 15, 2021,

“Survivors spend a great deal of time trying to heal in ways you would expect; physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.

However, another critically important aspect of healing is often left unattended and impedes the path to holistic health. That aspect is financial healing.

In many cases, the lack of financial wellness causes victims to have no option but to return to exploitive situations.

In other circumstances, survivors may be held civilly or criminally liable for debt incurred during their trafficking.

Any of these scenarios prevent the life of liberty and wholeness that survivors yearn for and deserve.

The Debt Bondage Repair Act will help provide survivors with a viable chance at full wellbeing, inclusive of financial stability and security.”….

I was thankful for the momentum the bill gained when Senator Cornyn introduced the Debt Bondage Repair Act in the Senate. Excitingly, the bill was later included in the non-defense section of the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) which passed Congress and was signed into law by President Biden on December 27, 2021.

You can imagine how I felt; it seemed so quick for this important change to come about. I’m not in the best health and yet God in his magnificence used my brokenness and experience to establish a way out for my sibling survivors.

It is a bittersweet accomplishment as the devastation of the remaining mountains of long-term consequences of exploitation, weigh heavily on the backs of victims/survivors and to be frank, my mind.

It’s that same urge to build better responses for the many survivors who continue to be exploited through trafficking that motivated the development of the “Exited Prostitution Survivor Policy Platform” written by thirteen survivors, including myself. It remains the best policy for long term consequences and solutions:

“Our intention in issuing this unified declaration is to urge stakeholder groups to endorse comprehensive policies based on three Pillars of Priority: 1) Reforms to our nation’s criminal justice approach to prostitution; 2) Fair employment for survivors; and 3) Essential standards of care for people exiting the sex trade.”

As we reach the end of National Slavery & Human Trafficking Prevention Month, it is an excellent time to take stock of the challenges that lie ahead and the issues that have remained hidden but need our attention. Looking ahead, I am excited to see how the DBRA will impact survivor’s lives, even as I recognize that this is just part of the work that remains to be done to ensure the long term needs of survivors get the attention they need.

Dr. Hatcher has worked as a civilian member of law enforcement at the Cook County Sheriffs Office for 15 years, a U.S. Representative of SPACE International (Survivors of Prostitution Calling for Enlightenment), a survivor organization representing 10 countries. She is a recipient of numerous awards including the 2014 Shared Hope International Path Breaker Award, the 2016 Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award from President Obama, and was honored on Congressional Record for Black History by U.S. Senator Richard Durbin of IL.

The information and links provided in this resource are solely for educational and informational purposes and do not constitute legal advice. Additionally, Shared Hope International cannot comment on, or confirm, an individual’s victim status for purposes of accessing relief under the Debt Bondage Repair Act.

November 4, 2021 by Guest

The role of the National Defense Authorization Act in supporting victims of sex trafficking.

Dr. Marian Hatcher
Shared Hope Policy Consultant
Ambassador-at-Large, United Nations

This blog addresses two bills which recently passed the House through their incorporation into the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). If the NDAA is passed by Congress with these provisions, this would significantly increase a survivor’s quality of life by addressing credit and housing concerns for those impacted by trafficking.

The first bill is the Debt Bondage Repair Act (DBRA), which was also introduced in the Senate. The DBRA addresses the difficulties that trafficking survivors face in obtaining financial freedom due to low credit scores caused by their victimization. The terms “good credit” and “credit score” by design define and measure success or failure, determining what you can buy and where you can live. Survivors of sexual exploitation are very often not in control of what appears on their credit report due to coercion by exploiters. This leaves them with crushing debt and limited options for acquiring loans necessary for future opportunities.

The second bill is the Trafficking Survivors Housing Act (TSHA), which has been introduced in the House and Senate and would provide a roadmap for increasing trafficking survivors’ access to short- and long-term housing, both of which are critical to stabilization, increased safety and an overall sense of normalcy and wellbeing.

The key provisions of both the DBRA and the TSHA are currently in the non-defense section of the (NDAA) under sections 5104 and 5113. It is critical they remain there.

Specifically, the DBRA, initially referred to the Senate in June 2021, would prohibit consumer reporting agencies from furnishing a consumer report containing any adverse item of information about a consumer if such consumer is a victim of trafficking and the adverse report resulted from the trafficking victimization.

This legislation is close to my heart, as it was inspired by my testimony given last spring to the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services. Ranking Member Patrick McHenry understood how the impact of a vehicle purchased in my name for my exploiter, which was/is still reflected on my credit report from nearly 20 years ago, has harmed both my credit history and my emotional wellbeing.

Most importantly, the DBRA provides survivors an opportunity for financial independence and stability that can help end the cycle of exploitation.

Good credit history is essential for opening bank accounts and applying for loans, credit cards, insurance, and housing. Credit reports are also sometimes necessary when applying for student loans, and utility and cellphone service contracts. Individuals with adverse credit history and low credit scores experience higher interest rates or denial altogether.

The TSHA is equally as important as it would require the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness to coordinate with key federal stakeholders, housing advocates, service providers and survivors and others to study the availability of housing or survivors of trafficking, and those at risk of trafficking due to homelessness or housing insecurity.

When examining the consequences of exploitation, it is often the immediate needs that are addressed in a coordinated manner, and rightly so. It is however critical to look at the long-term impact on victims and survivors as these two bills will do.

In 2019, two of the top five risk factors for trafficking victimization were being a runaway or homeless youth and unstable housing.^[i] The lack of affordable and accessible housing is also a critical barrier to aiding victims in leaving their trafficking situation and providing services to trafficking survivors. However, to address this complex issue as part of a comprehensive approach to combatting trafficking, research is needed to better understand the specific housing gaps and barriers to accessing housing that trafficking survivors experience.

A 2002 study by the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, Unlocking Options For Women, that surveyed 235 women in Cook County Jail, helps to demonstrate the likely prevalence of homelessness among trafficking survivors and those at risk of sex trafficking, and the resulting need to better understand how to respond to this growing problem. When looking at prostitution and homelessness “[a] majority (58 percent) of women who stated they were homeless in the 30 days prior to entering Cook County Jail reported being regularly involved in prostitution. Of those, 26 percent regularly prostituted for a place to stay. Thirty-one percent of women who said they were regularly involved in prostitution had experienced homelessness before the age of 18.” Addressing housing is also critical from a prevention perspective, as individuals experiencing housing instability and homelessness are more likely to become trafficking victims. 64% of trafficking survivors reported being homeless or experiencing unstable housing when they were recruited.[ii] Vulnerable populations are also disproportionately impacted by the absence of accessible and affordable housing. In one study, 68% of child trafficking survivors reported they were homeless when they had been trafficked and engaged in commercial sex, including exchanging sex acts to meet basic needs such as housing.[iii] Foster youth aging out of the system are also at higher risk of homelessness and becoming trafficking victims.[iv] Additionally, LGBTQ youth experience homelessness at twice the rate of non-LGBTQ youth.[v] Evaluating the most effective methods to providing at-risk individuals with stable housing is critical to taking a proactive and preventative approach to human trafficking.

The TSHA is also crucial to establishing effective approaches for providing survivors with housing after they leave their exploitative situations. Between December 2007 and December 2017, 37% of referral and crisis assistance requests to the National Human Trafficking hotline were for housing needs.[vi] Additionally, 47% of crisis needs were emergency shelter requests, and 40% of survivors reported seeking shelter.[vii] Failure to access housing may also keep trafficking victims in their exploitative situations. In one study, 64% of survivors reported the absence of affordable housing was a barrier to leaving their trafficking situation.[viii]

For survivors searching for an apartment or house, almost every application requires a “credit check.” It is at this moment in a survivor’s life that the impact of these bills intersect. To provide survivors access to affordable housing and financially stable and independent future, there must be access to safe and stable housing and a fair credit check that is free from the impact that debt bondage had on the survivor consumer–reflecting the legitimate credit history of the survivor and not of their trafficker. To accomplish this, Congress must pass both of these critical protections for survivors.

Without bills like this, survivors will continue to be impacted by their prior exploitation and deemed not “credit worthy,” resulting in persisting economic inequity, homelessness, and barriers to financial stability. I call on Congress to take up these issues and ensure the NDAA proceeds to provide these necessary supports that survivors so greatly need to fully recover from their trafficking victimization.

[i] Runaway homeless youth and unstable housing ranked second and fourth, respectively. Polaris, 2019 Data Report, Polaris Project, https://polarisproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Polaris-2019-US-National-Human-Trafficking-Hotline-Data-Report.pdf (last visited June 11, 2021).

[ii] Polaris, Housing & Homelessness Systems, Polaris Project 16 (July 2018), https://polarisproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/A-Roadmap-for-Systems-and-Industries-to-Prevent-and-Disrupt-Human-Trafficking-Housing-and-Homelessness-Systems.pdf.

[iii] Laura T. Murphy, Labor and Sex Trafficking Among Homeless Youth, 6 (2016), https://www.covenanthouse.org/sites/default/files/inline-files/Loyola%20Multi-City%20Executive%20Summary%20FINAL.pdf.

[iv] Murphy, supra note 4, at 6.

[v] Chapin Hall, Missed Opportunities: LGBTQ Youth Homelessness in America, 7 (Apr. 2018) https://voicesofyouthcount.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/VoYC-LGBTQ-Brief-Chapin-Hall-2018.pdf.

[vi] Polaris, supra note 3, at 24.

[vii] Polaris, supra note 3, at 24.

[viii] Polaris, supra note 3, at 21.

November 1, 2021 by Guest

Pornography and Trafficking: Unpacking the Links

Written by Dr. Gail Dines, a Professor Emerita of Sociology and Women’s Studies

In the 1970s and 80s, feminists argued that prostitution could not be separated from porn, or as Andrea Dworkin so succinctly stated, “porn is prostitution with the camera going.”[i] Over the ensuing decades, however, there have been both theoretical and political attempts to disentangle porn from prostitution, leading to a truncated analysis of both porn and prostitution. In this discussion, I am using the terms “prostitution” and “trafficking” interchangeably because, as Farley writes, “More than 80% of the time, women in the sex industry are under pimp-control, that is what trafficking is.”[ii]

Moreover, “Pornography also meets the legal definition of trafficking if the pornographer recruits, entices, or obtains women for the purpose of photographing live commercial sex acts.”[iii] Beyond the legal perspective, the linkages between porn and trafficking go much deeper.

To better understand the linkages between porn and trafficking, and how they are similar in some respects (and different in others), the business concept of “value chains” is useful. Value chains refer to the whole range of activities involved in making and selling a product or service, from sourcing components to production, distribution, and consumption. The idea of the value chain is that “value” is added at each stage, though the term “harm chain” is more appropriate for porn and trafficking, because each stage causes harm to women—the sex industry’s “product.” Only the companies and pimps involved make a profit.

The first link in the harm chain is recruitment.[iv] In terms of porn and trafficking, this means grooming and enticing women into the sex industry. Studies show that the recruitment of women into both porn and trafficking relies on the same dynamics. On a macro-level, the most powerful recruiter is a hyper-sexualized porn culture that socializes girls and women to self-objectify and self-sexualize. Yes, it is the culture that grooms girls and women to be pimped into porn and prostitution. As Joanna Angel, a hardcore pornography producer and performer, told Details magazine, “the girls these days, just seem to come to the set porn-ready.”[v] In a similar vein, an incarcerated child-rapist told me in an interview that grooming his ten-year-old step-daughter, whom he later went on to rape, was not difficult because “the culture did lot of the grooming for me.”[vi]

Both the pornographer and the rapist, working from the same “playbook,” recognize and harvest the power of the pornified visual landscape to indoctrinate girls and women into a patriarchal mindset that the only way to be visible— in fact valuable— is to be sexually desired, “hot,” and pornified.

The pimps entice women and girls into the porn industry with promises of becoming a celebrity, with the attendant wealth and visibility this affords. They point to the sex-tapes of celebrities such as Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian that jump-started both women’s climb to fame.

What the pimps fail to point out is that because these women are extremely wealthy celebrities, leaking a sex tape actually amplifies their fame and fortune. If these women were poor and unknown, they’d be saddled with the term “slut” and their lives, as studies have shown, would be upended. And women of color suffer even greater social humiliation and degradation.

The promise of wealth is a powerful form of enticement because the majority of women in the sex industry are poor, and in an ever-growing world of income inequality, have few choices to move up the socio-economic ladder. Women of color are especially at risk of poverty being poor because of the systemic racism that limits access to good schools and job-training programs.

Probably one of the most powerful factors that drives women into the sex industry is, as Donevan argues, childhood sexual abuse. Donevan found this to be “the most common precursor to prostitution, with studies finding that between 60-90% of prostituted persons have been subject to sexualized abuse in childhood.”[vii] Donevan points to a study by Grudzen et al.,[viii] that found that women in porn were three times more likely to have been victims of childhood sexual abuse compared to women who were not in porn.

The “product” of both porn and prostitution is the sexual exploitation of women. The only other industry where the product is the buying and selling of human bodies is slavery, which is why survivors and their allies call the sex industry sexual slavery, not “sex work.”

Men pay for the experience of sexually degrading and debasing a woman, turning her, in their minds, into a “whore” who is deserving of sexual violence. The consumers simultaneously construct, cement, and bolster their sex-class power, as they produce and reproduce women as an oppressed class in the patriarchal relations of production. The monetization of women as “product” is different in porn compared with prostitution, because porn images and videos are mass-marketed and distributed online on an industrial scale through multinational conglomerates such as Mindgeek.[ix]

The chain of harms women suffer in pornography and prostitution have been well documented.[x] Moreover, these harms are not unfortunate “byproducts,” but are central to the value (sexual pleasure) to the user. The more brutal, cruel, and violent the “sex” act, the more the users feel as though they got their money’s worth. Reading the Adult DVD Talk forum, a website where porn users discuss their favorite scenes, makes clear just how much users are indeed on the lookout for scenes where the woman is suffering real pain. A popular thread—called Painful Anal—has numerous posts where fans list their favorite scenes and discuss at great length their enjoyment at watching the woman cry, scream, or show fear.

Once in the revolving door of the sex-industry, the women often end up even poorer than when they started. Lack of health care benefits means that women have to pay out of pocket for treating STIs, bodily injury, and PTSD. The now-shuttered Adult Industry Medical Health Care Association, which was the Los Angeles-based voluntary organization in charge of testing porn performers, had a list on their website of possible injuries and diseases to which porn performers were prone. These included HIV; rectal and throat gonorrhea; tearing of the throat, vagina, and anus; and chlamydia of the eye. Not your everyday workplace ailments, unless, of course, you are being prostituted, on or off camera.

The distribution end of the harm chain for pornography used to look very different from prostitution. The former requires an ecosystem of websites producers, directors, filmmakers, webmasters, web-based payment systems, and distribution networks. Prostitution, on the other hand, was typically a more low-tech and leaner value chain, in which production and consumption were two aspects of the same sexual act— the buying and selling of women.

However, pornography and prostitution are becoming even more inseparable today with the growing popularity of sex camming, where (mostly) women livestream sex acts for men who pay for private shows.[xi] One of the most popular sex-camming sites is Chaturbate, with an estimated 18.5 million unique visitors, just in the US, and has an Alexa rank of 21. Chaturbate, like the other sex-camming platforms, plays the role of pimp by taking 50% of the women’s earnings. It also has a “referral” system where affiliates receive $50 per “model” who signs up via the affiliate site, thus expanding the chain of pimps.

The concept of harm chains is generally used to suggest how harms from making and distributing products such as clothes and coffee can be reduced or minimized. None of these suggestions on how to reduce harm apply to the sex industry. The very nature of this industry is to create harm on the micro level–to the women’s and girls’ bodies–and on the macro level, the normalization, glorification and monetization of sexual violence. The sex industry inherently and irredeemably reinforces a culture and economy that victimizes and subordinates women and girls as a sex-class. The only way to stop the harm chain is to close down the sex industry. Only this will enable women and girls to live a full life in which their civil and human rights are fully valued.

Dr. Gail Dines, a Professor Emerita of Sociology and Women’s Studies, is President of Culture Reframed, a research-driven non-profit dedicated to building resilience and resistance in young people to porn culture. She is the author of Pornland: How porn has Hijacked our Sexuality, (Beacon Press), which has been translated into five languages, Her TEDx talk can be seen here.

[i] Speech given by Andrea Dworkin at the “Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism” Conference, NYC, April 6^th, 1987

[ii] Farley, Melissa & Donevan, Meghan (in press, 2021).

Reconnecting Pornography, Prostitution, and Trafficking: ‘The experience of being in porn was like being destroyed, run over, again and again’

Atlánticas, an International Journal of Feminist Studies, 6 (2)

[iii] Ibid.

[iv] For a more extended discussion of recruitment into the sex industry see Donevan, M. (2021). “In This Industry, You’re No Longer Human”: An Exploratory Study of Women’s Experiences in Pornography Production in Sweden. Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence, 6(3), 1.

[v] Details Magazine, February, 2010.

[vi] For a more detailed discussion, see Dines, G. (2010). Pornland: How porn has hijacked our sexuality. Beacon Press. Chapter Six: Visible or Invisible: Growing up Female in a Porn Culture

[vii] Donevan, ibid.

[viii] Grudzen, C. R., Meeker, D., Torres, J. M., Du, Q., Morrison, R. S., Andersen, R. M., & Gelberg, L. (2011). Comparison of the mental health of female adult film performers and other young women in California. Psychiatric Services, 62(6), 639-645.

[ix] For further discussion of MindGeek see Dines, G, “There is no such thing as IT”: Toward a Critical Understanding of the Porn Industry. In Brunskell-Evans, H. (Ed.). (2017). The Sexualized Body and the Medical Authority of Pornography: Performing Sexual Liberation. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

[x] See, for example, Moran, R. (2015). Paid for: My journey through prostitution. WW Norton & Company.

[xi] https://nordicmodelnow.org/2020/10/24/3-dangerous-myths-about-webcamming-debunked/