Child Prostitution
Definition:
the sexual exploitation of a child for renumeration in cash or kind, usually but not always organized by an intermediary (parent, family member, procurer or teacher).
Statistics:
- 10 million children worldwide are engaged in some facet of the sex industry. Each year at least one million children, mostly girls, become prostitutes
- In Thailand, 10-12 year old girls service men in the sex industry. They typically have sex with men 10-15 times daily and sometimes as many as 20-30
- In South Africa, there are 40,000 child prostitutes
- Children are more susceptible to HIV and other STDs
Personal Impact Story
Her family needed to eat food again and Prema’s father had few other options. She was the eldest daughter, beautiful, and, at eleven years old, more useful to the family away in the city of Bombay. One less mouth to feed. One less body to clothe. One less heart to break over. Prema’s mother, with tears in her eyes, promised they would see her again. Promised they would buy her back with the money Prema made every month – money her new guardian would send to the family. A promise made to Prema two and a half years ago.
In the city, Prema is not chained to a desk or forced to hunch over menial work for hours each day like thousands of other children throughout Asia and the continents. Prema dances at a pole, batters her eyelashes at men who have come from all over the world to watch her. She spreads her legs and moves her body to music, the way the women showed her. Women kidnapped from their homes when they were younger, or, sold by their parents to the brothel.
As Prema waits to return to her family, other promises are kept. Her guardian makes good on the promise he made to her parents that she would be well looked after. Men, some older than her father, foreigners with unusual accents, take great delight in watching her dance on the stage. Then they pay to suffocate her under their heavy, careless bodies. And, the guardian fulfills his promise that Prema would not be denied an education. He, along with his clients, tutor her in a whole new language with it’s own, intricate vocabulary. Along with the other girls in the brothel, Prema has learned to say once-foreign words: HIV, unwanted pregnancy, rape.
Prema dances at her pole, learning a new language. Day after day she tries to remember the sound of her mother’s voice, and waits to see if her parents will make good on their promise .
*the above story is based on facts but is fictional, for actual statistics order 30 Days of Prayer for the Voiceless today
