Resources

1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will be sexually abused by the time they’re 18-years-old, and 1 in 3 American women will be sexually abused during their lifetime. Just look around. That’s at least several people you know. Maybe that is you!

68% of rapes go unreported, and even when a rape is reported, only 3 out of 100 rapists will ever serve a day in prison. Immediately after a sexual assault, the first thing many of us can think to do is get to safety. You’re in survival mode. 

1 in 6 boys are sexually abused before the age of 18, and this is probably underestimating. Men are much less likely to disclose sexual abuse than are females, plus only 16% of men with documented histories of sexual abuse (by social service agencies, which means it was very serious) considered themselves to have been sexually abused, compared to 64% of women with documented histories in the same study.

• There are approximately 1 million prostituted women in North America, or 1% of women in North America are involved in prostitution.(1)
• An estimated 600,000 children under 18 are involved in prostitution or pornography.(2)
• 12 is the average age of entry into pornography and prostitution.(3)
• As many as 2.8 million children live on the streets. 1 out of every three will be lured into prostitution within 48 hours of leaving home.(4)
• A national study shows that 75% of all women used in prostitution were victims of incest and/or physical abuse as children.(5)
• Most of those involved in prostitution ran away from home at an early age to escape their abuse…then turn to prostitution as a way of survival.(6)
• Most prostitutes became drug or alcohol addicted on the streets and became more trapped in prostitution to earn money to support their habits.(7)
• Up to 90% of prostitutes are under the control of a pimp.(8)
• Average arrest, court, and incarceration costs amounted to nearly $2,000 per arrest in 1987. Cities spend an average of $7.5 million on prostitution control each year, ranging from $1 million (Memphis) to $23 million (New York).(9)
• A high percentage of prostituted women have considered suicide.(10)
• Every year a prostituted woman is raped 19 times, kidnapped 10 times, and beaten repeatedly. And we still consider her the criminal?(11)
• Prostituted women getting out of jail have no resources, they feel their only choice is to return to a life they know or where they are accepted.(12)
• In 1998, the United States was the world’s largest consumer of child pornography.(13)
• Trafficking in women plagues the United States as much as it does underdeveloped nations. Organized prostitution networks have migrated from metropolitan areas to small cities and suburbs.(14)
• Girls involved in prostitution are increasingly getting younger, dropping from 14, to 13 and 12 years of age. Child prostitution in the United States began to escalate in the late 1980’s after new laws made it more difficult for officials to detain runaway children.(15)
• Females in prostitution have a mortality rate 40 times higher than the national average.(16)
• The demand for prostituted children is increasing, as men feel safer from AIDS with younger girls. 75 to 95% of all prostitutes were sexually abused as children. Many prostitutes are high school dropouts, come from poor and abusive homes, move from place to place and are alcoholics or drug addicts.(17)
• 14 years is the average age of entry into prostitution for boys, 25 years of age is the average age that men leave prostitution. Male prostitutes usually do not have pimps.(18)
• Over the last decade the street price for oral sex has dropped from $20-$30 to $2-$3. There are an estimated 500 male prostitutes in Philadelphia. (Police and anonymous prostitutes, Alfred Lubrano, “Eleven o’clock is feeding time in Center City,” Philadelphia Inquirer, 26 May 1998)(19)
• Pimps have strong ownership rights over the women and girls they control. Girls who belong to one pimp are not permitted to even look at another.(20)
• Women who become street prostitutes do so because of a drug problem, or because the streets are a less violent home than where they come from. “They turn to drugs to make life tolerable.”(21)
• The process of recovery for a woman leaving prostitution takes two years of very supportive intervention. Women who are trying to leave the sex industry have the same needs that traditionally battered women have. Many are fleeing with the clothes on their backs with no money and no place to go. This is compounded by the isolation known to all battered women and the stigma that is unique to prostitutes.(22)
• Pimps have a strong emotional hold over young women they sexually exploit, which makes it difficult to build a legal case against them. A 17-year-old who was sold by a pimp on the street, refused to testify against him and visits him in prison. Even teenagers covered with bruises and cigarette burns remain loyal to pimps. A typical pimp has six girls and refers to them as “family.” The girls are instructed to call the pimp “Daddy.” Each girl earns approximately $500 per night for the pimp. Although selling a child for sex is a felony that carries a maximum jail term of 15 years, that sentence is never imposed.(23)
• Women in prostitution in Arizona are routinely subjected to repeated beatings from their pimp, and have likely been coerced into pornography, topless dancing and/or prostitution in order to support him or his drug habit.(24)
• Every woman who has been in the Dignity House jail program stated she has been raped, robbed, kicked and beaten with fists, knives, guns, coat hangers, baseball bats, and boards – either by a trick or her pimp. Each girl knew someone who had been murdered while working in prostitution.(25)
• Almost all of 30 prostitutes (interviewed for a story) said that she has been physically and verbally abused by her pimp. More than half the women said that their pimps got them hooked on drugs. And all of them said that their pimps order them to commit other crimes.(26)
• The police in Phoenix, Arizona are not trained to work with women used in prostitution. Just as with abused women, police assume women “must like it” to stay. Some police officers are abusers themselves, or at least side with the abusers. When a prostituted woman is treated like a criminal, she become further isolated.(27)

Sources

1. WHISPER, National Task Force on Prostitution
2. U.S. Department of Justice, Department of Health and Human Services, United Nations
3. http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/ceos/prostitution.html
4. http://www.nrscrisisline.org/about_nrs/faq.html 
5. WHISPER, National Task Force
6. Genesis House
7. WHISPER Oral History Project, PROMISE internal statistics
8. S.B. Satterfield. Clinical Aspects of Juvenile Prostitution. M. Silbert and A.M. Pines. Entrance info Prostitution. L. Lee “The Pimp and His Game.”
9. Hastings Law Journal
10. A Psychological Profile of Prostitutes in California and Nevada, PhD. Thesis, United States International University, March 1986
11. The Council for Prostitution Alternatives, SOS Sisters Offering Support
12. WHISPER, National Task Force on Prostitution
13. U.S. Department of Justice, Department of Health and Human Services, United Nations
14. http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/ceos/prostitution.html
    
15. http://www.nrscrisisline.org/about_nrs/faq.html 
16. WHISPER, National Task Force, (Debra Boyer, University of Washington, “Danger for prostitutes increasing, most starting younger” Beacon Journal, 21 September 1997)
17. Genesis House
18. WHISPER Oral History Project, PROMISE internal statistics
19. S.B. Satterfield. Clinical Aspects of Juvenile Prostitution. M. Silbert and A.M. Pines. Entrance info Prostitution. L. Lee “The Pimp and His Game.”
20. Hastings Law Journal
21. A Psychological Profile of Prostitutes in California and Nevada, PhD. Thesis, United States International University, March 1986
22. The Council for Prostitution Alternatives, SOS Sisters Offering Support
23. (“Developing Individual Growth & New Independence Through Yourself” DIGNITY HOUSE)
24. (End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes, Poona Antaseeda, “Expert urges global law to end child pornography on the Internet,” Bangkok Post, 3 June 1998)
25. (CATW Fact Book, citing Brad Knickerbocker, “Prostitution’s Pernicious Reach Grows in the US”, Christian Science Monitor, 23 October 1996, citing Avita Ramdas of Global Fund for Women)
26. (CATW Fact Book, citing Lois Lee, Children of the Night, Brad Knickerbocker, “Prostitution’s Pernicious Reach Grows in the US”, Christian Science Monitor, 23 October 1996)
27. (Chris Grussendorf, “No Humans Involved, Part One”)

RESOURCE LINKS

Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network Sexual Assault Hotline
1.800.656.4673
www.rainn.org

National Child Abuse Hotline
1.800.422.4453
www.childhelp.org

National Domestic Violence Hotline
1.800.799.7233
www.ndvh.org

National Suicide Prevention Hotline
1.800.273.8255
www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

Somaly Mam
https://www.somaly.org/whoweare/somaly
Nonprofit organization dedicated to the eradication of slavery and the empowerment of its survivors

WAR International (Women at Risk International)
https://warinternational.org
While Women At Risk, International addresses a variety of risk issues—poverty, inequality, violence, abuse, and more,  are most known for their persistent fight against human trafficking.

Veronica’s Voice a mission against sex trafficking
https://www.veronicasvoice.org

A Safe Place
https://asafeplacetogo.com
Non-profit organization in Wilmington, NC assists victims of commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking.