Willing sex slaves

JC Helary helary at eskimo.com
Sun Mar 4 00:00:39 PST 2001


Le Sat, Mar 03, 2001 a 11:35:10PM -0500, Diane Monaco a ecrit:
> At 08:09 AM 3/3/2001 +0900, you wrote:
> >are the policies to tighten the grip on the borders solely to stop human
> >trafficking on 'human rights' grounds ? or are human rights only an excuse to
> >fight immigrants attempting to get their piece of the cake ?
>
> What policies? The increasingly global economy only makes it easier to
> trade in women's bodies.

policies like the schengen agreement that is supposed to make tighter borders. according to the guardian article about which i wrote, this kind of policies are in the interests of immigrants, to stop human trafficking. of course it is not the case. tightening the borders only satisfies voters who are convinced by the political establishment that foreigners are the reason why (insert whatever you want here that sound bad for the economy/social cohesion). plus it only makes trafficking worse/more expensive. plus it reduces human beings to usable parts (a brain, a sex, etc).


> >not all trafficked humans are slaves and some regular immigrants know they
> >are going abroad for prostitution
>
> The typical scenario of a trafficked woman is not a 28 year old single mom
> with an engineering degree, but rather a young peasant "girl" from a
> feudalist rural area of a developing country. For example, a scenario
> might begin with a highly mobile multinational corporation that makes a
> production switch away from domestic high wage labor toward foreign low
> wage labor in a developing country where the low wage poor are often
> unsuspectingly lured into bonded labor practices. Families are often lured
> from their rural homes with small income advances, promises of good future
> wages, and better living conditions. But then unforeseeable events, such
> as an illness, results in borrowing from the employer and/or local
> feudalist power broker. As the family accumulates debt sums they could
> never pay, they become the victims of these brokers. The daughters in
> these peasant families are lured by these brokers of organized crime to pay
> the parent's accumulated debt. They typically offer the hope of employing
> the young daughters in a rich second country, and there may even be a
> promise of marriage for the daughters. But once in the second country, the
> daughter's immigration papers are confiscated, if they ever had any, and
> they are ultimately "employed" as prostitutes. What can a little peasant
> girl do now?

aggree 100%. my comment was about the gardian's journalist (and all the images it conveys). human trafficking is the word used when trafficked persons are victims. when they are seen as parasiting an economy they are not trafficked any more they are illegal workers. whatever background they have. the status of sex workers seem to me to be different. in most buying societies prostitution is not morally approved and so the women you describe are seen not only as trafficked but also as illegal and as immoral. there are as many scenarii as one wants. in the recent cases of caught trafficked personnes at the french border it was chinese workers (who in fact died before they were caught) same here in japan. but i suppose most trafficking occurs between close countries (or within regions of the same country, i've seen child trafficking in cambodia between provinces etc...) so it is mostly things that this journalist will never (care to) see. ultimately all trafficked persons are victims of economic conditions, among them some are _also_ victims of traffickers.


> But it does take the guilt pressure off the demanders if one can imagine
> that the trafficked supply are not poor little peasant girls but rather 28
> year old willing engineers, doesn't it?

sure, that is what the paper was about. if the victims look like victims (or what we imagine a victim looks like) they we can have a sad face when we kick them out of the country. when they don't look like victims then they stay for a while in prison as overstayers and then they are kicked out of the country.


> >(and are encouraged by both countries, see the
> >overseas contract workers in the philipines and the visa aggreements with
> >japan : most philipina have an entertainer visa which allows them to work in
> >red light districts where japanese women don't work any more).
>
> Do these girls even know what kind of visa "uncle" (as the brokers are
> often called) is getting for them?

well yes. the ocw have short terms contract and when they come back they say what experiences they had. so a lot of people actually chose to be maids/prostitutes etc knowing the conditions and being encouraged by the philipino gvt.


> >why do we have to be surprised that some people know their body has more
> >value on the other side of the border ?


> Who knows it? Uncle? The pimps? The brothel owner?

and a lot of ocw. but the ocw are not considered 'trafficked' probably because the state is the organiser. they have legal contracts and visas but in the end they are used as cheap meat, just a little more expensive than 'trafficked' meat but comming with a certificate & some legal guaranties for the user.


> There is much more to read out there on the realities of sex trafficking.

i am sure you can enlight me personaly with a list of references.


> Diane

jc helary



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