Transportation Industry’s Tentative Steps to Fight Trafficking Must Go Further
May 25, 2017
(WOMENSENEWS)—For those who are part of illegal industries such as human trafficking, living in the shadows and being on the move is a way of life. Whether participating by choice (as perpetrators) or by force (as victims), these people spend much of their time on highways, in airports and hotels and on trains and buses actively evading attention from others.
The victims of human trafficking, who have been lured, abducted or tricked and then forced to sell sex or labor for no pay in abusive and coercive situations, are transported city to city by their pimps or abductors, who seek out paying customers while also trying to evade suspicious observers.
In the U.S., often young girls with low self-confidence and low self-esteem are at the highest risk of becoming victims of sex trafficking. Traffickers are masters at manipulating and exploiting at-risk girls. These traffickers, or pimps, prey upon girls’ vulnerabilities, often showering them with praise or even gifts in order to gain their trust and loyalty. However, traffickers are in it for the massive amount of money that these girls can make for them.
