The child prostitution is a modern version of slavery where children are sexually exploited for economic purposes. Prostitution is prohibited in the vast majority of countries, but this has not prevented the problem from growing until it becomes a global social problem, which has as a consequence a setback in society and in the development of infants.
Definition of child prostitution
Child prostitution refers to the use of children in sexual activities in exchange for remuneration or any other type of remuneration (for example, gifts, food or clothing). This activity is also registered under the term sexual exploitation . These children work on the streets or in establishments such as brothels, discos, massage centers, bars, hotels or restaurants.
Forms of Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children
There are three forms that have been defined by the United Nations as follows:
1) Child prostitution: “The act of hiring or offering the services of a child to perform sexual acts in exchange for money or other consideration with the same person or another”
2) Trafficking and sale of children for sexual purposes within the same country or between countries: the 1956 Supplementary Convention on Slavery, the Slave Trade and Similar Institutions and Practices of Slavery defines the sale of children as the transfer of a child from one party to the other for any purpose in exchange for financial or other compensation.
3) Child pornography: “the visual representation of a person under 18 years of age in an explicit, real or simulated sexual act, or in the obscene display of the genital organs, for the sexual pleasure of a user”.
Causes of child prostitution
Poverty
Poverty is the main cause of prostitution. Parents often feel compelled to sell their children to pimps because their low income is not enough to meet their family’s needs. Poverty also leads to abandonment. Because of this rejection, the children are forced to leave the family environment and live on the streets. Being vulnerable and having shortcomings and needs, they become the perfect target for manipulators, who promise them work and remuneration.
Money
Compared to the level of local wages, prostitution is a very lucrative activity.
Orphans
Wars, natural disasters and HIV / AIDS epidemics contribute to the increase in the number of orphans in the world each year. Because they are so vulnerable, these children accept any type of work. Thus, prostitution becomes a form of survival, since it is a highly lucrative activity compared to other degrading or dangerous work.
Child trafficking
Constantly, and around the world, large numbers of children are abducted and integrated into prostitution networks against their will.
The growth of the sex market
During the last forty years, the sex industry has been systematized and spread through new forms of communication, contributing to the development of prostitution and, above all, to the increase and normalization of pornography.
Profits from prostitution
Sex tourism
Sex tourism, which involves children, is the sexual exploitation of minors for commercial purposes, carried out by one or more people who travel to other provinces, geographical regions or countries. For many years, tour guides have provided the addresses of places where child sexual services can be obtained. It is also possible to obtain the information on the internet .
Pimps and organized crime
In most cases, prostituted children are controlled by pimps who keep a portion of the income they generate. Decreasing these actions is a very difficult task. Sometimes the pimps are children previously prostituted in the same place; other times, in larger cases, they belong to a global network of organized crime.
Intermediaries
Recruiters, transporters, brothel owners, and taxi drivers are considered middlemen. Even the policemen too, who very frequently close their eyes to this problem.
Consequences in children
Child prostitution has negative effects on the future well-being and mental health of the child, as they often become pimps themselves.
Access to services
Children subjected to sexual exploitation do not receive an education. Their families reject them and society marginalizes them, for which reason they do not enjoy almost any type of medical service and must endure absolutely deplorable hygiene conditions.
The spread of AIDS
Prostitution contributes to the spread of AIDS , as many clients refuse to use protection during the sexual encounter with the child. Consequently, they are exposed to contracting sexually transmitted infections .
Physical and psychological illnesses
Regarding physical damage, children can have vaginal tears, physical sequelae (product of torture), pain, infections or unwanted pregnancies. Regarding psychological damage , minors can present several symptoms; for example depression , confusion of personality or sexual orientation, behavior problems (aggressiveness or anger), trouble sleeping, loss of self-confidence, distrust or hatred of adults.
The role of the family in the face of child sexual exploitation
Families are the first caregivers, educators and protectors of children and their rights. Family values are essential for the child’s perception of himself and the world around him. When, for whatever reason, the family cannot fulfill these obligations, the first line of defense of the boy and the girl against an insecure and incomprehensible world begins to break.
The extensive evidence of family involvement in the direct sexual exploitation of children is disturbing but perhaps not surprising given the heavy burdens and severe inequities and hardships that many families experience. They are carriers of poverty and hopelessness, and of inherited and recent values that consider children as property and therefore as a source of economic support; families transmit these values and their consequences to their children.
Very often, parents who sell their children in the sex trade do so without full knowledge. They tell them, and they believe it, that their children are going to do domestic services or any other form of work or are going to get married. Others consciously sell their children to the sex trade, although they do not always recognize the consequences of such activity. Some families in Asia who traditionally wanted to have boys to work with the family now hope to have girls to sell as their potential income is higher.
But not all poor families sell their children; what drives a poor family to sell a child is what has been called ‘poverty plus lack of options’. Often this means that the poor family has to cope with unemployment, forced emigration, stigmatization by the community, dependence on narcotics, or rising expectations for contact with consumerism.
Sometimes the child is sold in the sex trade by parents who have abused their own children in sexual or other ways. The boy or girl is then considered as ‘available’ for the sex trade and capable of earning money for the family. The payment or “loan” of money to the parents by a third party places the child in a situation of ‘debtor slavery’ in which they are forced to have commercial sexual relations to return the family debt to the exploiter