We’re working to create a world where no person is bought, sold, or exploited. Read more about our latest efforts here.
Amid accusations of enabling revenge porn and child sexual abuse material, the pornography industry’s exploitative nature is finally being exposed. The harms of pornography expand beyond affecting performers and victims of revenge porn as consumption of porn has also been proven to cause significant damage.
Time and time again we have talked about how men fuel the demand for paid sex, and the effects that this culture of commodification has on girls, women and marginalized communities. However, young men and boys are also impacted by the sex trade through a pornified culture where the majority of young boys’ first exposure to sex is through porn, distorting their understanding of intimacy and relationships.
Last week, the World Without Exploitation Youth Coalition debuted our “Dear Professors” video featuring college students and survivors from across the country speaking up against how the sex trade is being portrayed by their professors. We have found that in colleges around the country, professors are sharing a glamorized, one-sided narrative of the sex trade with their students. This video urges professors to provide their students with a narrative that places the lived experience of survivors at the forefront.
Thank you to everyone who joined us last week for The Revolution Starts with Conversation: The 5th Annual World Without Exploitation Youth Summit. We were blown away by the engagement and participation from the attendees. Thank you to all who attended, supported, and gave their time and expertise to make this event a reality.
Join World Without Exploitation on Wednesday, July 13th, 2022 from 9am to 4pm at Brooklyn Law School for an in-person educational youth summit. Youth advocates, experts, and survivor leaders will discuss their experiences and expertise on main-stage panels and in interactive workshops. This free event is open to youth ages 15-28 who want to learn and take action to end sex trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation.
Writer and activist Chris Stark - a longstanding World Without Exploitation (WorldWE) ally - has a new novel out. We can’t wait to celebrate it! Called “beautifully woven and gut-wrenching” by New York Times bestselling author William Kent Kruger, and “a heartbreaking wonder of gorgeous prose” by PEN/Hemingway award winner Mona Susan Power, Carnival Lights tells the story of two Ojibwe cousins who leave their reservation for a new life in Minneapolis.
All over the world, women and girls from the most discriminated communities are over-represented in prostitution and human trafficking. Poor, Indigenous, migrant, asylum-seeking, displaced women, those from the lowest castes and from ethnic, religious and racial minorities are the first victims of pimps and sex buyers. But how can we get beyond a simple analysis of the prostitution and trafficking systems in terms of sanitary risks as is typically done?
Comedian John Oliver produced a segment championing full decriminalization of the sex trade. In it, he compared prostitution to making sandwiches at Subway and made jokes at the expense of survivors. 24 survivor leaders came together to send John Oliver the clear message that he got this so very wrong.
Human trafficking and sexual exploitation aren’t just global issues. Far too often, they are a family issue. According to the US Department of State, interfamilial trafficking accounts for 31% of child sex trafficking cases in the United States. The challenge this poses for those seeking to prosecute such cases is clear. A child’s loyalty to and reliance on the family structure make familial trafficking difficult to identify. Children are rarely comfortable – and are sometimes unwilling – to testify against a family member. And economic circumstances oftentimes contribute to a set of conditions that fuel interfamilial trafficking.
