What’s Happening?

We are facing the largest and most widespread global and systematic violation of human rights: sexual exploitation.

Sexual exploitation means any actual or attempted abuse of a position of vulnerability, differential power, or trust, for sexual purposes, including, but not limited to, profiting monetarily, socially, or politically from the sexual exploitation of another. It includes but is not limited to exchanging money, employment, goods or services for sex.

(United Nations Refugee Agency, UNHCR).

An extreme form of sexual exploitation is human trafficking. Trafficking involves the recruitment of a person, often through force, abuse of power, or exploitation of vulnerability, with the intent to exploit the person for profit (Palermo Protocol, 2000).

The primary setting for sexual exploitation and trafficking is prostitution. Human trafficking, sexual exploitation, and prostitution are inseparable phenomena.

Transactional sex is considered a form of sexual exploitation, regardless of what a country’s legal framework says about it (UNHCR).

Commercial sexual exploitation is one of the most widespread and lucrative criminal businesses of our time. While a weapon or narcotic can only be sold once, a woman’s body can be sold thousands of times.

In Spain, the situation is DIRE. We are the top destination country for trafficking in Europe and rank third in the world in prostitution consumption (UNODC, 2018).

Sexual exploitation is a crime that quickly adapts to the times, and today in Spain, it is hidden in clandestine prostitution flats, messaging apps, fake “empowerment” websites, flyers stuck to our windshields, and more. It is hidden in plain sight.

Prostitution is sexual exploitation. It is the ultimate degradation of women and an act of violence against them, with money changing hands. It is a horrific and criminal business sustained by the demand for sex and women’s bodies in exchange for money.

Without demand, there is no prostitution and no trafficking.

Due to the governments, businesses and our society turning a blind eye, men can continue to sexually exploit women unchecked and without legal consequences.

It’s time to open our eyes and raise our voices for those who cannot. It’s time for the government, businesses, men, and women to unite to eradicate the demand and protect the victims of the sex industry in all its forms.

This is how hope and freedom are born.