Thailand: Girls, Girls, Girls (NOT!)

I have not really written about sex work in Thailand. I think it is because it is so evident and so depresses me. I am almost finished with SEX SLAVES, an interesting book on the topic. It discusses facts about many different countries in Asia, including Thailand. Some of the areas it discusses include:

--Asian men frequent different places than foreigners, ofen higher end places to have sex with women. This activity is simply overlooked by wives who find themselves in cultural contexts that allow for this behavior by men. New diseases are entering Asian families this way.

--Families are now starting to consider daughters valuable since they can make money in the sex market. At at a young age (7-8) girls are already promised, for an advance fee, to brothels. When they turn 11 or so they are sent away to make money for the family. In a majority of cases the family is actually in need of basic food and shelter, but more and more with the influence of capitalist values families have started to send girls away in order to buy televisions, cars, and kitchen appliances. The need to keep up with the Asian-Joneses has become so huge that families are making decision based on a revised value system. Let's be clear, Asian women have historically not been given a lot of value compared to men. But, now the value they are given is actually to their ongoing detriment.

---Girls themselves are seeing sex work as an opportunity to make more money than working at stores, waitressing, etc. The need for a higher paying jobs may be due to family responsibilities, paying for schooling, or buying the latest gucci sunglasses. Unfortunately, while many of these girls end up being workers in the sex industry, (a choice i have complex views on, but ultimately i respect the woman's choice) many actually become enslaved thinking they were simply agreeing to do this work for a certain period of time.

---Westerners have changed needs. In the past American and European men were mainly interested in sex. They would go to a brothel, have sex, and be done. Today men are looking for the "experience of love." They are renting girls for days or weeks when they come on holiday. These women are expected to be with them 24-7 and provide companionship (as prescribed by the men) and sex on demand. Of course, taking the women out of the brothel often puts the women at risk of violence or sexual practices that are harmful to them. Still, the experience of having a girlfriend, even if men are paying for it, is coming up and more and more common.

At the same time that I read this I pass by bars and dance clubs with young girls overly made up sitting and waiting for the patrons to arrive every night. It's a awakening experience, and it is also a tough one. It is augmented by sightings of older men with really, really young girls at restaurants, bars, shopping malls, etc. I go to a hotel pool for a few hours every day and there are three such couples there. I try to think that may be they are a couple, may be it is ok. But, my intuition and my intelligence are too aware of the frequency with which the pressures for sex work for money (enslaved or not) have done to Thailand and other countries.

I am also saddened that I have tried to meet with a few NGOs here but have been totally unsuccessful. Between my moving schedule and the travel plans of key people whom I was in contact with for over a month it just did not work out. Still, I am trying to learn as I go.

So, that's the news today. Not so cheery, but I thought you should know.

"Into the Woods to Find the Giant..."
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