There are six year old girls who are left in cages when they aren't being gang raped. There are children this young dying as a result of these tortures, dying of HIV and trauma.
Why are we not outraged?
Where are the pro-life people now? Doesn't this human life mean anything?
Thursday, January 25, 2007
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I think if you do a google search on the relevant terms you will find that various religious organizations have been at this for years.
I think a better question would be to ask yourself about your hatred of people with a viewpoint other than your own. How can you point the finger at the pro-life movement for sex slavery in Africa and Asia? Where are you on this issue? The Catholics have people on the ground over there actually doing something about it.
Where is the pro-choice movement?
The pro-choice movement is there and in VAST numbers: Promoting condom use, an end to violence against women and trying to get the facts out about HIV.
Catholics are there but they are preaching abstinence-- yeah, a lot of good that does a six year old who is sold into sexual slavery.
Pro-choice people, like myself are often asked to give money to other countries to end human trafficking of women etc. Planned Parenthood asks for money to eliminate the global gag rule (put in place by Dubya) so they can give women in these countries REAL information.
Telling people to wait for marriage isn't really that helpful in these situations. So I repeat – when is the pro-life movement going to wake up and do something really helpful. I predict it never will because it’s real goal is controlling people (mostly women) and their sex lives.
This young girl didn’t need a speech about purity, she needed advocates and she needed a country where women and children were valued more than sexual objects to be sold. She also needed a country where people understood HIV and how to prevent it.
I'm so sorry you feel that sex slaves need to have access to condoms and HIV information. They don't need this.
They need freedom.
They need a thriving economy so that young girls parents can afford to feed and care for their children. They need a responsible government that actually does what is in the best interest for the citizens.
The Catholics don't go preach abstinence to the people who traffic in human sex slaves. That is possibly the most inane thing I have ever seen in print.
I thought it went without saying that sex slaves needed freedom.
Obviously people there need HIV education and condom education so that if there are women being used as sex slaves (which there are... by the millions) these women and girls have a hope that they won't be infected.
You're right the Catholic Pro-lifers don't preach abstinence to sex slaves. They don't preach to them at all.
The global gag rule (which conservatives and pro-lifers tout as a great thing since it doesn't let advocates talk to women about abortion etc) means that "undesirable women" like sex workers don't get any help:
"The global gag rule says that any organization receiving USAID funds to help prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS must explicitly and officially decry prostitution, sex trafficking, and so on. Sound good?
It's not.
An organization that wants to reach out to sex workers, minister to their health, and encourage them to use condoms--can't afford to alienate their potential patients by insisting that their jobs are evil.
It means the organization can't put up signs that say, for instance, "sex workers' clinic"--an implied endorsement of the trade.
Its nurses can't treat prostitutes like people who are facing complicated choices between one kind of death (starvation, say, or beatings) and another (AIDS); they have to rescue them from prostitution first, and not enable them to continue their work by, say, handing out condoms and teaching sex workers how to persuade clients to wear them."
Don't talk to me about inane.
PS: Yeah a family that has no problem selling their daughter as a sex slave... clearly their ONLY problem is a tough economy. If only the economy was better they'd value their daughters and send them to school and love them and take them to the Girl Power events!
Please! People that sell women into sex trade have no respect for women as human beings
I read the article you linked to and your opinions about encouraging condom use and HIV education sound noble but I daresay a little naive.
I would like to point out that these girls are slaves. From the article some actually are caged. They don't have any say in what they are doing or how. Educating them is a futile waste of time. They don't have any control.
Another point, I don't think you understand the economics of the situation. I looked up the price of condoms in bulk. The best price I could find was $0.15 ea bought in quantities of 1000. From the article it says that millions of Cambodians live on less than $0.50 per day. If a slave is forced to have sex 15 times per day then the condoms would cost $2.25, this assumes that they would be used each and every time. That would be an average Cambodians weekly pay for one days worth of condoms.
Again from the article, they estimate between 50,000 to 100,000 women and children involved in the sex trade. Take the middle ground of 75,000 and multiply by say 5 condoms per day average use and you have a $14 Million dollar annual expenditure to protect these women if you were to give the condoms away for free. This includes Zero cost for shipping and distribution. And this is just one of many countries with the same problem.
The article mentions that the sex workers are often gang raped and the rapist do not use condoms, they instead share a plastic bag. This seems to imply that the rapists understand the danger of HIV, but don't have the money for condoms?
Really the issue is the criminals that enslave women and the corrupt government that allows this type of activity (or profits from it).
Let us hypothetically provide unlimited free condoms, birth control medication, morning after pills, education as to the dangers of HIV etc. and Planned Parenthood offices on every street corner. What would the net result be? Very informed and possibly HIV free 6 year old sex slaves. Did you really accomplish anything?
I commend you for actually doing some research here. Lots of people would just hurtle around a lot of bullshit.
It's true I guess what you say that helping the economy but that is a long and complicated process.
In the meantime, giving out free condoms would mean that six year old girls would be protected from HIV because instead of paperbags they'd get real protection.
Now, I think we're just splitting hairs because I've also explicitly stated that this country needs a vast improvement in women's rights and also in police arresting brothel owners and parents who sell children to the sex trade.
Since this cannot be accomplished overnight, in the meantime we need to do what "quick fixes" we can. Provide counseling, safe houses, abortion services, HIV testing, prevention etc.
Hopefully we can end the sex slave trade but that is a billion dollar industry and that may take awhile to tackle.
Tobes, do you know of any organizations that provide condoms/sex education to countries in this situation that we could make contributions too? I know the Peace Corps can't do it because of the global gag rule... is there some other way we could help?
You know I've looked and haven't found much yet. When I do, I'll write a post. Your best bet so far is Planned Parenthood or NARAL.
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