Sex Trafficking In U.S. Should Be 'National Scandal,' New York Times' Kristof Writes

Although "Americans tend to associate 'modern slavery' with illiterate girls in India or Cambodia," New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof writes that he recently interviewed a college graduate who emigrated from China and "says she spent three years terrorized by pimps in a brothel in Midtown Manhattan."

According to Kristof, "There's no doubt that while some women come to the United States voluntarily to seek their fortunes in the sex trade, many others are coerced -- and still others start out forced but eventually continue voluntarily." He adds that "it's not just foreign women. The worst cases of forced prostitution, especially of children, often involve home-grown teenage runaways." Although "estimates vary hugely" and "[n]o one has a clear idea of the scale of the problem" of forced prostitution, it is "clear ... that forced prostitution should be a national scandal."

There are "no silver bullets" to solve the problem, though Kristof argues that "the critical step is for the police and prosecutors to focus more on customers (to reduce demand) and, above all, on pimps," who are "far harder" to prosecute than sex workers. Pimping is "hugely profitable and carries less risk than selling drugs or stealing cars," Kristof writes, adding, "But that can change as state and federal authorities target traffickers rather than their victims." He concludes, "Nearly 150 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, it's time to wipe out the remnants of slavery in this country" (Kristof, New York Times, 11/27).


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