Reflection space of the Council for Culture

MADRID, Spain.
The Council for Culture of the Teresian  Association initiates a space for reflection under the title "Question marks," written by Manuela Aguilera, its Director, who says that "one of the purposes of this Council  is to encourage reflection and the creation of thought."

"The Council for Culture is aware of the specific responsibility assigned to all the People of God by Vatican II of "listening, to discern and interpret the signs of the times" (GS, 44a) in each historical moment. Thus, the Council for Culture welcomes and implements the task of understanding and interpreting the cultures and the signs that characterize the present moment, expressing the needs and aspirations of humanity and challenging the mission of the Teresian Association. All this is done trying not only to interact, but to influence and transform reality, and recognizing that we are also transformed by it.

In this new section we will try to create a space to analyze and reflect on aspects of reality from a global perspective. This is an arduous and difficult task, although we Christians often remind ourselves of the essential need to join the local and the global, knowing that the reality in which we act and we want to transform has been "extended." It is not just in our neighborhood, our city, our country; it reaches around the globe. The local and the global meet, mingle, merge in constant motion. We also know that we are heirs of a globalized culture that legitimizes inconsequential life, weakness of thought, which is immersed in consumption, fashion, body, money, success ... driving the weaker out to the margins. Although the signs of our time also speak of great kindness, talent, creativity, genuine searches and deep values, we are part of complex societies in which identities, cultures, languages ​​and religions come together amid vertiginous changes of all kinds that at times make us live this moment with concern and confusion ... but with the certainty that, in order to understand the Gospel today, we have to understand the questions and concerns of human beings today, speak their language and provide a credible word that is supported by our life.

We undertake this journey with little luggage, with the usual awe of an uncharted territory, without walking aids. The new routes become roads as we make the journey."

Question Marks. The Council for Culture

Human trafficking: invisible victims of the XXI century

Human trafficking is the modern version of slavery. While the United Nations, in 1926, recognized the formal abolition of that which had been one of the greatest scourges of the human condition during centuries[1], slavery remains a reality in the global society of the twenty-first century.

According to the United Nations, organized crime is one of the most profitable industries in the world, with a value of over 12 billion dollars annually. As expected, drug trafficking and human trafficking are among the first in the ranking, followed by the sale of counterfeit drugs online, immigrant smuggling, organ trafficking, arms trafficking, natural resources (wood, oil, metals and precious plants...), piracy and counterfeiting (representing 7% of global trade) and cybercrime (estimated at a minimum of 1.5 million Internet users are victims each year of identity theft, fraud with credit card or bank account cleaning).

But undoubtedly human trafficking is the fastest growing in the world, at a rate of 10% each year. According to estimates by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, human trafficking  had achieved in 2005 a turnover of over 32,000 million dollars a year, whereas today this figure could have been tripled. Most victims are women and girls who fall into the hands of unscrupulous criminals; they are sexually exploited and forced to work in slave conditions. It is estimated that more than half of the victims are under 18 and there is no country that is free from this disgusting trade. Specialists are trying to see a difference between human trafficking and migrants, but the line between them is very diffuse. Human trafficking flows in a similar direction to drug trafficking: from the developing world to the developed world.

What is Human Trafficking?

The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons defines Trafficking in Persons as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.  Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs.

Although it is difficult to calculate the dimensions of the problem, the International Organization of Migration estimates the number of women and girls exploited in prostitution or forced to marry in the world is four million. Other studies on prostitution estimate that eight out of ten women in prostitution do it as victims of trafficking.

In any other illegal activity Human rights are as violated as when women and girls are transformed into consumer goods for the pleasure of a few. Women are turned into mere financial capital, objects of satisfaction of all kinds of selfishness and perversions of "customers", in victims deprived of their dignity. The term "client" is of great importance, because the client is the one who encourages the exploitation circle, "without clients there is no prostitution." It should be remembered that speaking of “costumers” (clients) as demand generators, refers not only to users of prostitution but also to slave owners and consumers of products manufactured by victims of human trafficking. Society is an accomplice in tolerating these situations, allowing the invisibility of the “client.” Thus, the focus falls on the victim, stigmatizing and making it extremely difficult the prosecution of traffickers. Either way, as a journalist, I abhor the term "client" and prefer "prostitutes" because it points to an action, a behavior. What defines those who prostitute makes the transformation of women from subject to object. Objectified, women enter the market to be used / abused, to be sold by pimps and procurers. Those who foster prostitution are decisive members of prostitution. Prostitution is not a fenomenon made by women prostitutes where the one forcing prostitution is an external agent who uses/abuses that which is already existing. The one who fosters prostitution is the one who generates demand and creates the supply.

Migration flows, the tragedy of refugees, social inequalities, wars, globalization and new communication technologies are the breeding ground of a phenomenon that has grown alarmingly in recent years. And while the business of prostitution and sexual exploitation has been a traditional business of organized crime, in recent years it has meant a transnational criminal alternative to more supervised or exploited markets, such as drug trafficking.

Profile of the victims

80% of human trafficking is done with women, 74% are under 25 years, more than 55% are single, divorced or separated and 27% have children. The studies made by responsible entities and NGOs for the protection of victims of human trafficking warn us repeatedly about this vulnerable situation: victims of threats and abuse by their captors are foreigners illegally staying in the country of operation and suffer serious physical and psychological consequences as a result of repeated sexual abuse and exploitation.

According to one of the few existing studies on the health risks of victims of trafficking, they occur at different stages of trafficking. Prior to the process of trafficking, physical violence suffered by the victims (60%) is superior to sexual violence (32%). This proportion is reversed during the transport to the country of destination, where abuse of a sexual nature (90%) is well above the physical (76%). Finally, at the stage of exploitation, sexual abuse is most severe during the first few days, but long-term consequences and physical problems are the most abundant and persistent.

In relation to the physical and psychological consequences of trafficking with a sexual porpose, studies highlight the most frequent as follows:  1) physical problems, such as injuries, broken bones, burns, cuts or wounds, eating disorders, sleep problems, fatigue or related to the deprivation of basic needs; 2) problems related to sexual or reproductive health, including rape and sex abuse, traumatic sexual practices, abortions and unwanted pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases, etc; 3) use and dependence on medications or drugs as a form of subjugation and exploitation; and 4) psychological problems such as acute stress disorder, PTSD (postraumatic stress) anxiety, phobias, panic attacks, and depression.

Forced confinement to which victims are subjected to by their exploiters prevents them from being aware of their victimization and going to the authorities for help.

As a woman and member of the Teresian Association, knowing that thousands of women are victims of this nauseating crime that denigrates us as humans beings if we do not confront it, pushes me to write and verify the great amount of misinformation about it and the need to require governments to finish all this. First, by appealing to reason and ethics; second, because all states are obliged, as established on the Principles of Reparation of the UN: the State must guarantee special care to the victims of human trafficking as part of the group of victims of violence or trauma [2]

Sweden, for example, introduced in 1999 a law criminalizing the purchase of sexual services and decriminalizing the sale of such services. In that country prostitution is considered a form of male violence against women and children. Since then, the numbers of victims have been reduced considerably. Thanks to this legislation, the sex trade in the streets has virtually disappeared from the big cities. In the United States, meanwhile, not only are sexual exploiters punished but also American tourists who have sex with minors abroad.

However, legislation alone by the estates is not enough. North America would not have ended slavery in the XIX century only by regulating the conditions that allow a person to be a slave. Slavery ended because it was considered that no human person could be regarded as a slave and from this starting point, a system that ensures the premises was established. They pursued criminally slave traffickers. They prevented social subordination of one human being to another being and protection was given to the victims of slavery, that is to say an abolitionist system was created considering slavery a crime against humanity.

Sex tourism

An important part of the question is the so-called sex tourism, which has become one more category of contemporary travel, at the same level as cultural, rural or beach tourism. Globally this type of tourism victimizes millions of humans beings and generates annual profits of more than 30,000 million dollars.

As Economist Carmen Reinhart writes, the globalization of poverty has been drawn into this new form of colonization. In this context, "poor women become the latest good (virgin resource) that can be traded unscrupulously."  In terms of roles, it suggests the following theory: poor countries are psychologically subdued to the female role of servitude against their will, while the rich countries, seeking their own satisfaction, take the male role. Studies are conclusive. From sex tourism comes the exploitation of children and human trafficking. Since it is a mass consumption, it requires massive disposal of products. Following the trail of unconcealed advertising on sex destinations, it reproduces the pattern of passive, submissive and compliant women with the offer. The tourist language is a reflection of a patriarchal ideology.

And if adult prostitution is a matter of debate and conflicting positions, children prostitution is universally condemned. More than two million boys and girls are incorporated each year into sexual exploitation. Tourist arrivals in Cambodia has increased 65% in a year causing a sharp rise in the exploitation of minors. During the World Cup held in South Africa in 2010, children prostitution increased by 30%. And in Germany, in 2006, a study linked clearly the sexual exploitation of children with increased consumption of alcohol. UNICEF claims that 30% of children between 12 and 18 years in Kenya are involved in the sex tourism industry.

In our XXI century civilized, global society in which freedom, equality and democracy seem to increase in all continents, it is bleak and morally unacceptable that millions of women and girls are exploited, abused and enslaved by nasty merchants of human misery. Slavery has always accompanied human beings revealing our more inhuman nature. From North to South, from East to West, whether primitive or modern societies ... Denouncing it today is equivalent to denouncing the atmosphere that generates it: XXI century slaves are children of war, human migrations, ruthless competitive markets, the demand for lower costs, and anguish and pain from impoverished lands.

The debate about human trafficking will be the debate of the century. The networks on human trafficking, whether for sexual exploitation, forced labor or organ trafficking, spread across the globe, with women and girls, perhaps the most vulnerable because of the low social status of women, poverty, and lack of educational and professional opportunities. In many countries, policymakers recognize the need to tackle these problems by promoting gender equality and equity. In the cases where women have better opportunities for education, shelter, food, work, access to legal and political systems, and protection against violence, their vulnerability to human trafficking is reduced. The Teresian Associationn is very concerned about this. All of us can do our part, put our grain of sand so that the exploitation and enslavement of human beings is seen as the darkest past of mankind.

Manoli Aguilera
Translation: The Council for Culture