Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children
The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC) is a sexual activity involving a minor under the age of 18 in exchange for something of value, or a promise thereof, to the minor or another person or persons. The minor is treated as a commercial and sexual object. CSEC involves 3 categories of people:
Boys, girls, or transgender youth who are victimized
Those who buy sex
Those who exploit youth
Street prostitution
Forms of internet-based exploitation
Pornography
Gang-based prostitution
Stripping
Erotic/nude massage
Escort services
Phone sex lines
Private parties
Interfamilial pimping
Child sex tourism
Prevalence
Per the FBI, 3 of the 13 major hubs in the United States are located in California. These hubs are located in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego.
According to the District Attorney’s Victim Witness Program (2018), California has the highest number of human trafficking cases in the US. While Santa Barbara is not recognized among the top 10, its geographical location makes it a hub for sex trafficking.
So many children have been identified as survivors of CSEC in our county that a safe house has been created for local survivors. This is a place where children can go that is safe and that will lessen exposure to re-traumatization.
Human Trafficking
The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 defined sex trafficking as the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, soliciting, or patronizing of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act, in which the commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, coercion OR in which the person induced to perform such act has not attained 18 years of age.
Sexual exploitation is when a vulnerable person is preyed upon for sexual favors in exchange for economic, political, or social advantages (The UN Refugee Agency, n.d.). A few examples of sexual exploitation include human trafficking and prostitution.
There are various types of human trafficking and child sex trafficking. Some examples are the following:
Forced labor. When individuals are held in conditions of slavery. Such servitude includes a variety of work.
Two such examples of forced labor include:
Domestic servitude is when one performs work in a private residence.
Forced child labor is when children are compelled to work.
Forced criminal activities. When individuals are forced to carry out a range of illegal activities that generate income.
Sex trafficking of women and children is when women and children are lured into sex trafficking under false pretenses.
Often, when there is sex trafficking of women and children, there is also:
Debt bondage/bonded labor is when someone uses a slave’s debt to manipulate the slave.
Unlawful recruitment and use of child soldiers is when children are recruited as soldiers, are recruited for labor, or are recruited for services in conflict situations.
Trafficking for the removal of organs occurs when slave operations are carried out in secretive conditions with no medical follow-up.
People who are smuggled into other countries are often forced to work in inhumane conditions.
Between 2020 and 2021 there were 10,583 human trafficking cases reported to the National Human Trafficking hotline and 1,334 of the reports were from California.
Gangs
The California Attorney General’s State of Human Trafficking (2020) stated that “Human trafficking is an insidious crime. Traffickers exploit and endanger some of the most vulnerable members of our society and cause their victim’s unimaginable harm” . In 2012, the California Attorney General’s Office indicated that, “Local and transnational gangs are increasingly trafficking human beings because it is a low-risk and high, renewable profit crime”.
California has the largest intersection of gangs and sex trafficking in the US; nearly 1 in 5 arrested for exploitation in California were gang affiliated.
Human trafficking generates an estimated $810 million in annual revenue.
The number of female recruiters and exploiters is growing.
Age of Entry
Ranges from 7 years old – 22 years old
The average age for females is 14 years old – 16 years old
The average age for males is 15 years old- 17 years old
The average age for transgender youth is 16 years old – 17 years old
Recruitment occurs in various settings such as:
Schools
Neighborhoods
The mall
Outside County buildings
Group homes
Foster homes
Bus stops
The internet
Social medial
Digital Apps
Some children are courted using deception or are harmed and punished into submission until they become willing participants. These intersubjective experiences can foster trauma bonds with the exploiters. Trauma bonding is a psychological response to abuse and is formed by cyclical cycles of abuse. The survivor develops feelings of sympathy or affection for the person abusing them resulting in an unhealthy bond with the abuser. It is believed trauma bonds stem from unhealthy attachment.
The sexual abuse and exploitation of our nation’s children results in adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). ACEs impede a child’s social, emotional, and psychological development. Preventing and protecting all children from sexual trauma and the sequela of trauma is a societal issue and requires a collective effort to ensure children have safe, stable, and nurturing relationships and environments.
Due to the transgressive behavior and the nature of the interpersonal violation, many survivors experience a heightened sense of pre-existing vulnerabilities to the traumatic sequelae. In other words, most have experienced prior abuse or neglect with some estimates as high as 93%. Most survivors are diagnosed with Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), but this diagnosis does not adequately depict the full extent of impediments and impairments that are experienced due to the nature of these ongoing traumatic experiences. These individuals face the ramifications of ongoing complex trauma. Complex trauma is defined as traumas that are of “an invasive, interpersonal nature” (The National Child Traumatic Stress Network, n.d.). Due to their complex trauma, exploited children experience a fundamental shift in self-concept and normal development, experience a disruption in achieving healthy emotional regulation, and they engage in high-risk behaviors including self-harm, dissociation, physical health problems, detachment or enmeshment, and hold distorted perceptions of their perpetrator. At times, these components promote extreme fear, loyalty conflicts, shame, guilt, helplessness, and hopelessness. Naturally, these individuals engage in more impulsive and reckless behaviors, substance use, sexualized behavior, absconding, and truancy. These experiences have a profound negative impact on the person’s sense of self, sense of value and worth, and level of competence leading to the development of Complex Post-traumatic Stress Disorder.
References
The National Child Traumatic Stress Network. (n.d.). Complex trauma
The UN Refugee Agency. (n.d.). What is sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment?