Download What is CSEC? - Southwest Crisis Center

Module 1:
What is the
Commercial Sexual
Exploitation of Children
(CSEC)?
“It’s not a choice, no one just wakes up
and wants to do this. You can’t just walk away…”
- CSEC Survivor
What is CSEC?
Objectives…
• Dispel commonly held beliefs and stereotypes that promote CSEC
• Define terms needed to discuss and understand issues of CSEC
• Understand the forms and prevalence of CSEC within the U.S.
• Frame issues of CSEC in a regional context and understand the
scope and forms of CSEC in your community
• Increase awareness and sensitivity to CSEC issues to promote victim
centered programming, investigation, prosecution, and medical
treatment
What are some myths and
stereotypes about CSEC or
sexually exploited youth?
Terminology Exercise
• What terms are used or have you seen used when
talking about sexual exploitation and trafficking?
• Talk about…
• Who is included?
• Who is left out?
• What is gained by using this term?
• What is lost by using this term?
Sexually Exploited
Trafficked
Abuse
Trauma
Violence
Disease
Rape
PTSD
Worthy of compassion
Prostituted
Choice??
VS.
Abuse
Trauma
Violence
Disease
Rape
PTSD
Not worthy of compassion
These situations contradict our
expectations and assumptions.
They are some of the most difficult
that we deal with.
There are ways we can
disrupt this cycle if we understand
how it operates.
Tough Questions for
Service Providers
Tough Questions for Service Providers:
1. How do you engage with a child who doesn’t want to engage?
2. How do you get CSEC victims to understand exploitation when they don’t
think they are being exploited?
3. How do you deal with a child who you have been working with long term,
who is making positive progress in his/her life, who understands the
dynamics of exploitation, who goes back to the life?
4. How do you work with a girl who has a “boyfriend” and says she is in love
with him?
5. How do you engage with sexually exploited kids on the street?
6. How do you deal with a child who is actively recruiting other youth from
your agency?
7. When recruiters and pimps know the location of your agency what should
you do?
CSEC is….
The commercial sexual exploitation of
children (CSEC) is:
• Sexual acts involving youth in exchange for
something of value, or promise thereof, to the child
or another person or persons.
• Treating a child as a commercial and sexual
object.
• A form of violence against children.
CSEC includes:
• street prostitution
• pornography
• stripping
• erotic/nude massage
• escort services
• phone sex lines
• private parties
• gang and organized crime-based prostitution
• familial pimping
• forms of Internet-based exploitation
Intersections of Abuse
Child Sexual Abuse
Sexual Exploitation of Children
Commercial Sexual
violence Exploitation of Children
• Domestic
• Intimate partner
violence
• Sexual violence
Domestic
Minor Sex
Trafficking
UNDER 18 INVOLVED IN
SEX INDUSTRY
THIRD PARTY PROFITS
FROM EXPLOITATION OF
YOUTH IN SEX INDUSTRY
Sex act for something
of value ($, food,
shelter, drugs)
Survival sex
Sexual
Exploitation
Stripping or
pornography
Prostitution and sex
trafficking
CSEC in the United States
• At least 100,000 to 300,000 youth are at risk
for commercial sexual exploitation annually
in the U.S. (Estes and Wiener, 2001)
• “At least 100,000 children are used in
prostitution every year in the U.S.” (The National
Report on DMST: America’s Prostituted Children, 2010, Shared Hope.)
• The most common age of entry into the
commercial sex industry in the U.S. is 12-14
years old. (US Department of Justice, Child Exploitation and
Obscenity Section)
CSEC in the United States
The National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted,
Runaway, and Throwaway (NISMART) children estimate that
1.6 million children run away from home each year in the
U.S.
Advocates estimate that 1 in 3 teens approached by an
exploiter within 2-3 days of becoming homeless will enter the
commercial sex industry via this route.
CSEC in Rural MN
• Factors that contribute in many rural communities
• Close knit, small town personality, friendly yet closed
• Traditional values, hard working and self reliance
• Rural areas face higher poverty rates
• Higher demand for low skill labors
• Rapid change for transient male population
• Top sex trafficking cases in rural areas
– Commercial front brothels (strip clubs, message parlors)
– Truck stop based sex workers
– Hotel, motel
– Internet
– Escort delivery services (especially to hunting shacks)
Addressing Demand
If at least 300,000 children are
estimated to be at risk for CSEC in
the U.S….
who do you think is buying
children for sex?
Buyers – who are they?
• Men
•
•
•
•
Old / young
All races and cultures
Single / married
Daughters, sons
• Employed
• Men with money
Ten Buyers Arrested in Prostitution Sting
A look at Southwest Minnesota…
Addressing Demand
Reflection Questions:
• Why do you think there is such a huge demand?
• What factors in our society contribute to demand?
Handout 1.5
Factors Influencing Demand
Presence of Adult Sex Industry
“Without equivocation….the presence of pre-existing
adult prostitution markets contributes measurably to
the creation of secondary sexual markets in which
children are sexually exploited. [We] find no support
for the legalization of prostitution in the U.S.,
especially given the relationship that we can confirm
to exist between adult and juvenile sexual
exploitation”.
The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children, Estes & Weiner (2001)
Factors Influencing Demand
Acceptance of Violence Towards Individuals in
Sex Industry
A Canadian commission found that prostituted women
are 40 times more likely to be murdered than their nonprostituted counterparts.
Special Committee on Prostitution and Pornography, Pornography and Prostitution in Canada, 350,(1985).
Factors Influencing Demand
Dehumanization of Prostituted Women
“They were objects. In my mind, they never had
families or anything."
Joel Rifkin, in a statement to the police in admitting to the murders of 17 prostituted women, many of
whose names he could not remember, 1994.
Factors Influencing Demand
Dehumanization of Prostituted Women
"I picked prostitutes as my victims because I hate
most prostitutes and I did not want to pay them for
sex. I also picked prostitutes as victims because they
were easy to pick up, without being noticed. I knew
they would not be reported missing right away, and
might never be reported missing. I picked prostitutes
because I thought I could kill as many of them as I
wanted without getting caught.”
Gary Ridgway, (The ‘Green River Killer’) in a statement to the Court in which he pled guilty to murdering 48
women and girls, 2003.
Factors Influencing Demand
Dehumanization of CSEC Victims
Of Gary Ridgway’s 48 admitted victims, 27 of those
victims were between the ages of 15-18 years old.
The Green River Killer was therefore one of the largest
child serial killers in the US ever, and the largest
known killer of CSEC victims, yet the fact that many
of his victims were children/youth is never mentioned
because they were viewed as ‘prostitutes’.
Dehumanization of CSEC Victims
excerpts from online “reviews”
Factors Influencing Demand
Internet Pornography
There are over 100,000 sites offering illegal child
pornography and hundreds of thousands more offering
legal ‘teen’ or ‘ barely legal’ pornography. In 2006, there
were over 20 million searches using the words ‘teen porn’
or ‘teen sex’.
http://internet-filter-review.toptenreviews.com/internet-pornography-statistics.html
25% of total search engine requests are porn-related.
http://www.healthymind.com/s-porn-stats.html
Reflection Questions:
Why do you think that our society doesn’t address demand
more?
St. Cloud – Behind the Blinds
Nightline – Hidden America
Activity:
Who? What? Where? Why?
Handout 1.7
Activity: Who? What? Where? Why?
Directions for groups:
• Based on your knowledge and experience, choose
one of four sets of questions: Who? What? Where? or
Why?
• In your group, review the set of questions you
selected. Be as specific, detailed, and reflective in
your responses as possible. Record your answers on
a piece of easel paper.
• Choose one group member to present your
responses to the whole group.