Resource List for Sex Work & Sex Trafficking Situational Awareness – In Your Own Backyard
The web has no shortage of statistics, interviews, research, videos, stories, & documentaries about awareness for sex trafficking and prostitution. Whether coerced, forced, or by their own free, you can read, hear and see more information than you mentally know what to do with. You don’t need that much information. It causes overstimulation, you become desensitized and it’s not an effective way to inform you or your family about the risks you might face or where your awareness should be when it comes to sex trafficking . If you want that kind of information, it’s not hard to find it. And while those stories deserve awareness and attention, that is not what this list is for.
This is a short list of information I would put high on my list if I was an average family living an average life in the United States of America – the movies, books, and articles reflect modern situations about sex trafficking awareness. All demographics have different risks. What you use to inform and educate yourself should reflect your risks. This list is about those who grew up like me, in an average middle class American family in an average town in a developed country with loving parents and minimal, if any, outliers growing up.
In Your Own Backyard
If you have a daughter, it would be prudent to watch these. They are accurate, unsettling and closer to home than one might realize.
Videos
Angie: Lost Girls (2020)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9242768/
The biggest concern parents should pay attention to is who their children are talking to, on social media, instagram, snapchat, tik tok. Do unusual or expensive gifts show up, like purses, nail extensions, new hair styles, expensive shoes, an iPhone, or even flowers or clothes that come from someone older. Do they get rides home from someone new? In this movie a normal teenager is lured by an older ‘boyfriend’. This happens to about 32% of sex trafficked victims. This isn’t the mafia-type, gangster-type, kidnap a victim off the streets kind of kidnapping. It’s real. It happens, and it happens to normal daughters from normal families.
Young & Beautiful (2013)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2752200/
This movie brings the viewer inside the mind of a young girl who comes from a seemingly normal family and background who willingly travels down the path of becoming a call girl then gets sucked into the lifestyle. This is very realistic and probably one of the most realistic rendition of ‘normal’ young women entering the sex industry.
Articles about sex trafficking awareness
Moore, L. (2020, Jan 16). Police, survivors debunk human trafficking kidnapping myths. Kalamazoo. https://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/2020/01/police-survivors-debunk-human-trafficking-kidnapping-myths.html
This article by author, advocate and survivor Theresa Flores is a narrative that everyone with children should read. Flores explains the red flags of human trafficking and prostitution and the risks that different types of vulnerabilities create, what to look for, and how to address them.
Additionally, this blog has several articles about situational awareness with the different facets of the sex industry what to watch out for with trafficking.
3 ways modern pimps and sex traffickers’ prey on women
Coerced – different types of pimps & how they operate
Books and Audiobooks
In Pursuit of Love (2020)
A small town girl, a varsity athlete with honors-roll and many promising accolades finds her way into the lifestyle and gets sucked in deeper by a boyfriend pimp. Her experiences are eye opening as she traverses through the many levels and risks of prostitution in Las Vegas.
The Las Vegas Madam (2015)
Yes, this is my book. And no, it’s not a sales pitch. It’s real and it happened and it could easily happen to many. I saw it happen over and over as young women came to Las Vegas and found their way into the sex industry by happenstance. Others became attracted by the attention of pimps on instagram, by friends, at clubs, in high school. If someone is going to enter the industry, there are safe ways to go about it. There are also signs to watch out for if your daughter does get involved.
Watch, read and share because knowledge is the best prevention. If you face this personally, you don’t have to deal with it alone. There are many who have been down this road, and most are willing to help.
