I am privileged to present a guest post by Dr Belinda Brooks Gordon, whom I had the pleasure of sharing a panel with about a month ago. She had done incredible work doing research and studies on the sex industry, and is here exposing the Government’s figures on Trafficking for what they are.
While Harriet Harman was sneering in her Labour Conference speech at women who model topless, some of us were quietly going through the statistics used to back up her more disproportionate and dangerous policies1, and now her latest whim: the termination of Punternet.
Trafficking figures are used by Harriet, the Home Office, and prohibitionist groups like Eaves/POPPY or OBJECT to support the criminalisation of punters:
“In 2003 a Home Office study on organized crime markets estimated that there were 4,000 women in the UK who had been trafficked for the purposes for exploitation” (Equalities Office Press Release)
The same figure of 4,000 trafficked women is now popping up everywhere, being used to support prohibitionist arguments, even in the recent Joint Committee on Home Affairs.
This seemed a suspiciously large figure given the evidence from the majority of academic, medical, health outreach sources. Given the vested interests in ramping up the trafficking figures, by organisations on the government’s trafficking payroll, by the government itself to hide poor immigration housekeeping, and most insidiously for the seizure of sex workers’ hard-earned assets, I was sceptical.
After 9 months and 2 FoI requests the Home Office finally sent this report ‘The impact of organised crime in the UK: revenues and economic and social costs, and criminal assets available for seizure’. It relies on three sources. The first is a 7yr old article in The Times, a report by Eaves/POPPY called ‘Sex in the City’. The third is Punternet’s British cousin McCoys British Massage Parlour Guide.
The Home Office report is based on such flawed methods as to be worse than useless, most of the figures are fabricated. While the authors use an apologetic tone and many caveats to excuse the poor data and high margins of error, Ministers, MPs and prohibitionists have seized upon figures as if they’re based on reality.
It makes me wonder if Harriet can read and write. It is beyond parody. It is like “Carry on Criminology”. If it wasn’t so tragic that women’s lives and savings are raided as a result of it, the poor methods would be funny. Now Nick Davies has taken up the cause, with his excellent piece on Prostitution and trafficking.
Why is it so bad?
1. The Home Office report states The Times article “reported an estimated 70 walk-up establishments” (p16). The article doesn’t mention walk-up establishments at all, let alone 70 of them. Rather, it states that: “Albanian gangs control about 75% of prostitution in Soho”. The Home Office report then takes its fictitious 70 and multiplies it by 6 on some wild assumption that 6 people are working in every walk-up. (The most I have ever seen in 15 years researching the sex industry is 2 – with one working, one maiding).
2. The report makes wild guesses:
“where reliable reporting not available it was necessary to use ‘best judgement’ to form assumptions” (pii).
No mention of how the judgement made.
3. It takes the flawed document Sex in the City, which relies on hoax calls to parlours, to be the most reliable evidence it could find! Yet a similar report by the same organisation had already been discredited by academics and practitioners in an Academic Critique of Big Brothel (one that had Ms Harman’s office telephoning in panic for authors to remove The Equalities Office from the critique).
4. Not only are hoax calls ethically problematic, they do not give brothels a chance to clarify misunderstandings so are likely to yield inaccurate information.
4. Wholly unrepresentative estimates are based on London before being ‘scaled up’ by the Home Office to rest of the UK. London is markedly different to small towns like Worthing. Scaling down would make more sense.
5. The Home Office uses patently untrue statements and then bases figures them. For example, it assumes that everyone foreign working in a walk-up flat is trafficked:
“Assumptions concerning flats, saunas and massage parlours are based with CO14, and researchers assume that all foreign workers in walk-ups are trafficked”.
This is not only racist but, if that were the case, why didn’t the police at Charing Cross (where CO14 is based) remove every foreign worker from every walk-up in Soho like they did in Pentameter operations?
6. Using McCoy’s Sex Guides and the Punternet website is a poor method of counting – it is the equivalent of trying to count the number of books in circulation using publisher’s adverts and literary reviews. But even their methods are more sensible than Eaves or the Home Office. (see also Anthology of English Pros http://stephenpaterson.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/exposed-the-home-office-dodgy-dossier-on-sex-slaves/#more-321)
7. Sex in the City claimed that 25% of women were from Eastern Europe and 31% from the UK and Western Europe yet coded women from Italy and Greece as coming from Eastern Europe. This would artificially boost the Eastern European percentage. Gross errors in data entry meant that some ‘ethnicities’ were coded as ‘mixed race’ or better still ‘exotic’. It admits that: “erroneous nationalities/ethnicities were identified across 33 London boroughs.” (p17). The funniest bits in the Eaves’ study is a graph on ethnicity spikes at ‘International’ as the commonest ethnicity!
As one campaigning sex worker put it when she read the Home Office report:
“Let’s face it, the only hard data in the entire discussion about trafficking EVER are the Pentameter figures of 255 trafficked people (TOTAL including domestic labour) and some cases aren’t through court yet, AND the revenue streams recorded in Eaves’ online accounts”
Ordinary sex workers are equivocal about punter sites, some think the sites useful so punters know the business is genuine and they are as far from trafficking as things can get. Others are not so keen, one sex worker put it.
“I get a great deal of business from Punternet… and buying into the Harman theory that the provision and exchange of punting information must be intrinsically bad is simplistic and blinkered in the extreme. But I don’t agree that so long as you good business from Punter sites, then telling the world what whores get up to sexually is ok and simply marketing. I don’t like reviews simply because I don’t like men who think it’s ok to brag about how good/bad their shags were for all to know. It’s tacky, degrading, and most often a breach of trust. After all, we whores don’t write ‘reviews’ on clients. What we offer is confidential – so why not expect and demand same confidentiality back? That’s what we did 10 – 15 years ago. Before PunterNet. And somewhat we survived and did good business then too.”
Rather different reasons from Harman’s.
My own view, in the Price of Sex is that criminalising clients is wrong in principle and dangerous in practice. For all her frothing at the mouth over ordinary punters, Harman will not listen to ordinary (ie active) sex working women and to my knowledge has refused to meet with any of the real sex worker organisations so far, preferring second hand information from those who have received money from her department.
While I respect Harriet Harman in other ways, it is well known by academics and grassroots organisations IUSW and ECP that she is pursuing the criminalisation of punters with a missionary zeal unrivalled by Tony Blair in the rush to invade Iraq, and making ordinary sex working women’s lives a misery.
1Try clauses 13 to 20 of the Policing and Crime Bill, for starters
Dick Puddlecote said...
21 Oct 09 at 9:45 am
Great article Belinda.
And as I’ve written at my pad, Labour have quite a few shameless types like Harman who value dogma above the safety and well-being of working women.
Alix said...
21 Oct 09 at 10:59 am
That missionary zeal is being passed right down the chain. Not long ago I was arguing with someone about Punternet, and I found her obvious hatred of the punters quite alarming – she really did seem to see them all as nasty pieces of work who *wanted* trafficking to continue. And this convinction seemed to rush in to fill the gaps where she didn’t have a good argument to hand.
Unity has just done a very good related piece on Illiberal Conspiracy, unpicking some of the government numbers you refer to. Someone in the comments has referred obliquely to “interest groups” seeking to “silence” people who question the numbers by means of legal threats – any background to that that you know of or just well-placed paranoia?
See also this comment from someone on CiF wot I copied onto my blog.
Belinda BG said...
21 Oct 09 at 11:38 am
Absolutely. After I published this on CiF about vested interests on trafficking figures
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/apr/03/prostitution-humantrafficking
The Guardian received legal letters from Poppy/Eaves after I wrote a CiF piece
I am not allowed to publish the letters but I have shown them to other academics. To my knowledge, one academic and one journalist have also had threat letters from Eaves/Poppy. The letters sent to Guardian were from Withers a big-name solicitor. It was eventually settled with short disclaimer piece at the top of the article but they were sabre-rattling big time.
Belinda BG said...
21 Oct 09 at 11:51 am
Great piece here by Elizabeth Pisani
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/oct/21/policing-bill-sex-workers
Alix if you send me your email (or via Facebook is fine) then I can tell you more about the letters. It is very difficult to talk with duck-tape over my mouth.
Matt Wardman said...
21 Oct 09 at 12:30 pm
Belinda
I’d be interested in hearing more about the global gag clause you mentioned in your March article:
“Owing to a “global gag clause” only research that situated prostitution as exploitation”
Rgds
Scott said...
21 Oct 09 at 12:46 pm
I somewhat agree with the article.
While I would prefer to have prostitution etc illegal, I cannot justify it unless I revert to my christianity and so I cannot contemplate how the government has decided to keep it illegal.
Surely the easiest way to reduce trafficked people would be to license the practice (however much I disagree with it).
As for information on trafficked people, I would recommend “Stop the Traffik” here – http://www.stopthetraffik.org/about/who/ I know people in the organisation and I certainly doubt that they would deliberately mislead people in regards to the information they give.
Belinda BG said...
21 Oct 09 at 12:53 pm
Global gag clause took place in USA under Bush regime. Obama repealed it within 5 wks of taking office taking goodness. Only research that explored sexual education received no state funding UNLESS it was abstinence based. Likewise research on prostitution received no state funding unless it was exploitation-based (ideologicaly speaking). Research that explored sex work as work would never get state funding. I cheered on my facebook page when it was repealed so some people can search back to that date.
Re: Christian groups, some of them have had a really difficult time with this because they want to give help without strings but were being asked to join forces with organisations which would only give help with strings attached (giving evidence so men could be prosecuted).
Alix said...
21 Oct 09 at 12:53 pm
I’m sure they wouldn’t knowingly mislead, Scott – the question is more whether they are being mislead by “official” statistics themselves. Really do read Unity’s LibCon piece (and note the apparently wilful conflation by one “expert” between sex trafficking and labour trafficking). I also see that Stop the Traffik deal with both types and have a world-wide remit, so they are concerned with a bigger picture than the incidence of sex trafficking in the UK.
Roger Thornhill said...
21 Oct 09 at 1:25 pm
Shameless conflation between labour and sex trafficking is Harman’s habit, as is the conflation of trafficked and enslaved. A trafficked sex worker may be willingly here as opposed to being tricked and then imprisoned physically or psychologically.
Voter said...
21 Oct 09 at 2:07 pm
I would note, however, that Labour does not exist in a vacuum.
Going back to last year, the act CJIA 2008 was not opposed in the Commons by the Lib Dems. To remind people, this dealt with offensive pictures.
To quote Dire Straits, “when you point your finger because your plan fell through, you get three more fingers pointing back at you”
Alix said...
21 Oct 09 at 2:45 pm
Voter, I’m really not sure anyone here is in a particularly party political flag-waving mood.
Belinda B-G said...
21 Oct 09 at 3:01 pm
It depends which clauses you mean. A combination of the Safety First Coalition, cross party MPs and academics & medical practitioners worked hard to get prostitution causes pulled. They were. On extreme porn clauses Sue Miller worked her socks off in the Lords over these. She won an Erotic Award for her work on this. But as Alix says this is a cross party issue.
Voter said...
21 Oct 09 at 3:37 pm
Okay, Alix, but ideally it should not be a cross-party problem. There is an opportunity for the Lib Dems to shine by taking a more pro-evidence approach. I hope that happens and Ms Harmon finds it harder to make her case.
Belinda, I was aware that the act was opposed in the Lords which is why I mentioned the Commons. Such a serious act deserves opposition in both houses.
Now I know that you want to be elected but would opposing CJIA 2008 in the Commons really have cost you much support in the country?
I am undecided as to whether I will vote in the next general election.
Cath Elliott said...
21 Oct 09 at 3:57 pm
While we’re on the subject of ethics, and vested interests in the sex industry debate, could Belinda Brooks-Gordon clarify whether or not it’s just pure coincidence that she was employed by political lobbyists Foresight Consultancy during the precise same period – Sep 2008 to Feb 2009, that Stringfellow Restaurants commissioned the firm to
And if it was just coincidence, does Belinda not agree that working as a “Public Policy Consultant” for a lobbying firm which represents high-profile figures in the so-called “adult entertainment” industry somewhat undermines her credibility in this debate?
Alix said...
21 Oct 09 at 4:05 pm
I’m sorry, Voter, I was making a somewhat jaundiced assumption about what the point you were trying to make. Need more coffee.
Alix said...
21 Oct 09 at 4:38 pm
Cath, I saw this when you put it under BBG’s April CiF piece. Isn’t the problem with it that, at best, it just means she’s a hypocrite? Criticising another dodgy vested-interest relationship (that between Poppy and the govt) if you’re in one yourself (hypothetically, a link between BBG and Stringfellows) is hypocritical. It doesn’t make the former vested-interest relationship go away if you can prove to third parties that it exists, and it doesn’t undermine any observable hard facts, such as evidence for govt and lobbyists massaging misleading figures from one document/report/press release to the next.
BBG is not the only person arguing either (a) that the govt is playing fast and loose with trafficking statistics and (b) that Poppy Project research standards are abysmal. Unity has just written a LibCon piece about the former, and while it is just about possible that Unity is Peter Stringfellow, it’s not terribly likely. On the latter, BBG was one of thirty-odd signatories various from universities and institutions to a response document to the Poppy Project’s Big Brothel report.
That response comprehensively demolished the methodology and claims of the study (which, to be honest, given a few weeks, a crash course in sociology and a good library, wouldn’t have been beyond me). Unless you can prove that (a) all the other signatories were in some way in the pay of the sex industry and that (b) all the authorities they cite in the course of their argument are also discreditable in some way, I’m afraid you’ve got an evidence problem. If you’ve got a proper rebuttal, and can show that government stats on sex trafficking are and always have been based on hard evidence and that all Poppy’s research work is beyond reproach, then let’s hear it.
Heresiarch said...
21 Oct 09 at 6:18 pm
May I suggest the term “Sex Trafigura” to describe these legal threats to Dr Belinda and others?
randy said...
21 Oct 09 at 8:03 pm
Something you should read …
http://www.harrietharmansucks.com
Amongst other things, it shows how 700 rapes are turned into 70,000 by people like Harriet Harman in order to pursue their own ambitions.
Best
Henry North London said...
21 Oct 09 at 10:38 pm
Did you see the skit on Newsnight with Paxman and the others about this I couldn’t stop laughing Paxo at his comedy best.
Henry North London said...
21 Oct 09 at 10:42 pm
PS Contempt is total is now http://www.mrcivillibertarian.com
Henry North London said...
21 Oct 09 at 10:44 pm
I mean http://www.mrcivillibertarian.co.uk Its late and Im tired… These students really do wear you out.
I was at the Sheffield ( Non political) Libertarians meeting tonight…
Dick Puddlecote said...
21 Oct 09 at 11:53 pm
Cath Elliott – another in the long line of ‘righteous’ who perform the ’shoot the messenger’ trick without even a glancing attempt at tackling the evidence presented.
{sigh} Surely we have all seen these methods before by now?
Cath, love, do us a favour. Point out exactly where you believe Dr BBG is wrong in her article, or just trap it, OK?
Martin said...
22 Oct 09 at 12:57 am
I’m somewhat aware that I’m going against the grain with this one in this debate but I’m interested to find out what people think of the following points.
I also should say that I find it strange that emotions get so overheated on the topic, on both sides. After all we are discussing a very complicated subject which in actual fact has no black and white answer,
But…
From my point of view, all Belinda has shown in this article is that it’s difficult to compile evidence on the issue. I’d definitely agree with that and would say much more work has to be done by both sides. However, academically speaking, those with Belinda’s point of view are still very much in the minority in this debate.
I would also argue that all that the Operation Pentameter stats show is that it’s difficult to secure the specific charge of trafficking, we get no follow up with how many of the same people who weren’t convicted for trafficking were convicted of other, just as ghastly crimes. And given that those of us who are more convinced by Poppy’s trafficking stats believe 1) organised crime is heavily involved in trafficking and 2) many of the women who are trafficked face exploitation and abuse, we’re not particularly surprised that it’s been difficult to secure convictions. Particularly as the government’s sympathy for the victims has not extended to protecting them in any meaningful or consistant way.
Belinda BG said...
22 Oct 09 at 4:48 am
I have just returned from speaking at the Josephine Butler Society.
First up was Rt Hon. Alan Campbell MP who spoke about the Policing and Crime Bill. He said the they would tackle demand by criminalising clients, so clients cannot have sex with women who have been subject to fear, force, or fraud at any time in their lives, whether he knew or not. He said that it had been suggested they (the government) would put in jeopardy the likelihood of clients coming forward but the Poppy Project gave 22 examples where men came forward to report trafficking but that they had always had sex.
Mr Campbell said that the new Bill would end the revolving door system whereby sex working women just go back on the street to pay fines. This is true, it will do this with criminalization and forced rehabilitation. Not just any old rehabilitation but ‘meaningful’ meetings with a supervisor. I then asked ‘Minister, are you telling us that the criminalisation of clients based on a Poppy report on 22 cases?’ Mr Cambpell seemed unclear and spoke about the Review of Demand which came out after the gov. announced its intentions to criminalise.
I asked: ‘Is it not the case that the soliciting clause (c.18) based on the old Shelton Bill which was Ken Livingstone filibustered out of parliament because he recognized that that removing persistence from kerbcrawling law would make things much less safe for workers?’ Mr Campbell blustered and clearly did not know about the Shelton Bill, nor the reasons behind its demise. Livingstone had recognized that removing persistence would herald the introduction of a ‘sus’ law which would allow the police to stop black or Irish men with no reason. This is something that gets lost in the contemporary debate.
I also questioned Mr Campbell further on the inadequacy of the Home Office evidence for these laws when there is ample evidence that the laws will make things worse for the very people everyone wants to protect.
A Trustee of Women at the Well asked him about revolving door of ASBOs
He went on to say that the public may be uncertain about giving resources to women they see as having got themselves into that situation that’s why it’s important to have the support and rehabilitation. Most of what he said was doublespeak. Then he disappeared, as they (ministers at these things) always do when it is someone else’s turn to speak.
There followed a set piece by the Clubs and Vice Unit. It was nice to see Det. Con Carlo Narboni, who I first met over a decade ago at CO14 (Clubs and Vice when I was doing research there) but I was sad how this squad has been used as a political pawn, both by the government and other police officers. In my book I show how officers get frustrated by having to police adults who are having consenting sex lowers the legitimacy of the law for many police officers when they could be dealing with vulnerable groups such as JARS (juveniles at risk).
One person asked if there was an increase in the number of trafficking cases? Det. Ch. Supt. Richard Martin said that ‘we prioritise trafficking so that’s what we deal with, can’t say if there’s been a growth’, he doesn’t have figures and doesn’t tend to give figures. A representative from the Soho Society referred to quotes from Carlo Narboni of victims of trafficking in Greek Street, Peter Street and asserted that these women are migrant, not trafficked. Mr Martin answered that they do see off street trafficking but didn’t respond to the specifics of question. Sara from the ECP spoke about working women in Soho and said that trafficking figures have been grossly distorted, she protested against PC Bill and said that we need to prioritise safety and that means decriminalization. Mr Martin replied: ‘I’m a public servant, I enforce the law not make it. This year they have had 6 convictions from several cases.
Then Lee Brooker from Terence Higgins Trust spoke. Lee spoke about the damaging impact the Bill would have in the area he works, with male and trans sex workers. How the Bill could re-introduce many of the bad things that Wolfenden eradicated (such as breakdown of trust, blackmail by some sex workers who see main chance with naive punters), and given that vast majority of male sex workers work in flats in pairs, and in brothels, there are dangers from brothel closure orders. Sex work support projects, many of which are NHS based public health focused organisations are one of the few sectors of society that actively seeks to engage with sex workers on their own terms, developing services that meet their needs. If we seek to change behaviours within a community, we must develop project interventions that work with the community. Brothel closure orders: there was a natural transition in male sex work from outdoor to indoor, and recently London projects have seen an decrease in women working on street. Indoor work is safer, less associated with nuisance, but clause 20, together with incentive to prosecute under Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 is very dangerous. The passage of this Bill will, he said, cause homelessness, increase hardship, less take up of services, and likely increase in work onstreet. He said that we need redefinition of brothel to allow people to work together – and this is supported by JBS ‘Our experience is that most people want to work together for safety, companionship and to save money’. The Government briefly considered allowing joint working and brothel closure orders are a retrograde step. SW5 will continue to work to reduce harm but the Policing and Crime Bill will make life of all sex workers harder and more dangerous. This is one of my concerns too, that clause 20 goes back to criminalising same sex activity on private premises just because money changes hands.
(I knew from a previous conversation with Terence Higgins that one male brothel keeps winning the best window box prize from its local council. So I’m afraid I kept thinking of the poor chaps on the streets unable to afford so much as a pack of seeds.)
Questions asked after included one from Chris Higgins, CLASH who said ‘ we come into contact with 100-150 women and the first two presentations (ie the minister and police) just don’t match up with what we see. We see a lot of disrespectful treatment of women by police officers.’ Det Con. Carlo Narboni replied that a lot of the victims they see do go to CLASH, and he wanted to talk about a few of the cases he’d seen in Soho and he mentioned two trafficking cases both in Soho; that one woman working with a maid is legal unless there’s shift working, that women are often frightened to speak to project workers, that women that have been trafficked or do want to exit. He said ‘we have the NGOs lined up, we have the laws in place, but trafficking is still happening.’
I suggested that this does not make the case for more laws, but could equally make the case for decriminalisation, so that these cases are easier to identify, and for outreach in languages the women and men can understand. I also said that asset seizure should not be funding police work, police work should be properly funded and assets should go to a victim fund.
Representative from the Soho Society made various complaints to the police regarding the behaviour of CO14 officers during raids and comments made to sex workers such as ‘Aren’t you a bit old for this?’ and ‘Aren’t you a bit fat to be doing this?’ Also, they said that the presence of TV crew on recent raid in Soho was humiliating.
I was last up. I spoke about the evidence base, how I also do systematic reviews, and hierarchy of evidence and meta-analysis stuff and why it matters. I focused on consenting adults in sex work because we already have laws about the other groups. I spoke about demographics of clients, stats, and reasons for sex workers’ migration from accession states. I spoke on the quality of the reports used to back up the premise that prostitution is inherently exploitative.
None of the studies I have so far seen on PTSD on sex workers use validated instruments or people qualified to carry out and interpret psychological tests. And how in the main study cited two sample groups (of sex workers and people in domestic labour who had been abused) were added together. The British Psychological Society has pointed this out officially. As a chartered psychologist I stated that our code of conduct is to protect the public from unwarranted, unvalidated, tests and treatments. Then I spoke at length about Home Office figures and how they were arrived at so I mentioned Popp/Eaves research.
I went onto to describe how assets seizure distorts police practice and due process under POCA 2002 and SOCA 2005, and how expensive it is for the state when many of these cases are thrown out on Abuse of Process grounds (eg R v. Green and others). We as society could do better than these dangerous laws in cc.13-20 of the Policing and Crime Bill. The Bill is at the Report stage in House of Lords there is about a month left to right this before the end of this parliamentary session.
There was a question to me from someone (whose name I think was Shannon or Sharon Harvey(?) from Eaves/Poppy whose main points were to state that ALL of the £5.8 of public money they received from government has gone on service provision over 6 years. And that ALL their research work is funded through other avenues, and that not a penny of public money had gone on their research.
I questioned whether Equalities Office money had been given to carry out research, and she conceded that this might be the case. However, I said that it would be useful to have it clarified which organisations fund their research section. It would also be useful to know how much is spent on lobbying, how much on service provision, and how much is spent on legal costs (instructions, emails and letters) to complain/threaten when things are written about Poppy/Eaves.
A question from Sara Walker of the ECP asked a question to the police and Poppy. She said ‘when will you say the figures are distorted and that the trafficking furore has been used as excuse to raid premises?’ She gave a case of a woman who pleaded guilty to trafficking because she helped two friends come from Spain – as law requires no force or coercion. Sara said that Poppy has been hand in glove in blurring line between violence and consenting sex, and that the money devoted to trafficking is at a cost from other services to women.
Det. Ch. Supt Richard Martin replied ‘we don’t produce figures so we’re not the people to complain to, we focus on trafficking’.
I thank Valerie Gore and all the JBS for inviting me. It was a useful event and even if the minister cocked a deaf ear for the brief time he was there, it was an otherwise worthwhile exchange of information.
Sonny Beam said...
22 Oct 09 at 7:36 am
Excellent taking apart of reports/stats. Much appreciated.
Charlotte Gore said...
22 Oct 09 at 8:41 am
Belinda, thanks for that
I’m of half a mind to set you up with a blog of your own.
Roger Thornhill said...
22 Oct 09 at 12:11 pm
@martin
“it’s difficult to compile evidence on the issue.”
if so, new laws are the last thing we need.
Martin said...
22 Oct 09 at 2:49 pm
No, it means you need better research.
But in addition, I would also say we need to accept there will never be research on such a subject like this that is 100% conclusive. (Although it’s understandable and fair enough that people who spend a whole lot of time and effort on a piece of work, like those at the Poppy Project have, like Belinda has, feel their work is a good 96-97% of the way there).
But when it comes down to it, it’s a judgement call on which evidence is better. People only talk about ‘evidence based legislation’ when it’s not their evidence the other side is using.
Unity said...
22 Oct 09 at 4:17 pm
But when it comes down to it, it’s a judgement call on which evidence is better. People only talk about ‘evidence based legislation’ when it’s not their evidence the other side is using.
No, no, no, no, no… NO!
When faced with any kind of evidence those of us who espouse evidence-based policy making rely on the scientific method, formal logic, methodological integrity, statistical validity, etc. in order to assess exactly how reliable and/or relevant the evidence is and how much weight to assign it when drawing conclusions from it.
Science is about the best evidence, not the evidence you like best.
Alix said...
22 Oct 09 at 5:24 pm
I really do suggest you try reading some Poppy Project “research”, Martin. Even without training in critical review of sociological research, its shortcomings do leap out at one rather.
Martin said...
23 Oct 09 at 12:37 pm
I’ve read it and while some jumps have been made, it still has me convinced that trafficking is a big problem in London. I’m somewhat prejudice though in that I’ve done some community work on the issue and what the Poppy Project found tallies with my experiences, I’m aware this is totally anecdotal evidence though so I wouldn’t expect anyone else to change their mind because of it.
Unity, what you just done is described, in a very formal way how one makes a judgement call. Both sides of the debate do this.
Belinda BG said...
23 Oct 09 at 1:39 pm
Gosh, I should clear this up for you Cath as you seem quite exercised by it.
Mark Adams and I were both at the same College (Churchill). I asked him if he would do some pro bono work for some of the grass roots groups I knew through my research and campaigning. Many small groups (refuges, women’s shelters for example) do not have the capacity to campaign . This is not surprising. Some groups are so busy delivering services and ‘putting out fires’ on the ground that this sort of thing comes last, and this impacts on them.
Mark could not do the pro bono but did ask me to consult about the evidence base on sex work and the sex industry. I am always prepared to disseminate my research findings and accumulated knowledge, it is pretty much part of an academic’s job spec. I have no idea what his contractual arrangement is or has been with any of his corporate clients, but I know that he had no clients in any area related to my research at the time I approached him. What do I know about Mr Stringfellow? Well, prior to the Select Committee on lap dancing (which took no evidence from dancers actively working in the industry, tsk) I asked lapdancers union rep what they thought about various high profile club owners. I heard only good things about Mr Stringfellow. One dancer told me that he is the person for whom they all want to work because he has a reputation as a good employer. Lap dancers, plenty of whom are also members of Equity, to my understanding want to work in clubs with decent private changing rooms, clean showers, secure large lockers, and some form of agreement from management on the number of dancers working on any given day. I am happy to meet with any club owner to discuss that and I would be happy to do research at any club subject to all the proper ethical and scrutiny criteria . And whatever you think of lobbying companies Mr Adams has been transparent in publishing his client lists for scrutiny on the web.
One important fact is that I have never published work on lap dancing. I have, however, read most of what has been written , and since you want my opinion on this issue I can say that there are conceptual leaps made in the more risible reports that deserve more scrutiny than they are getting. It is argued in some reports (Poppy are not the only culprits here. Fawcett, of which I am still a member, have written some rubbish here) which argued that because sexual discrimination occurs in the City, and because male traders go to lap dancing clubs, that clubs should be closed down. Well, no one denies that there is discrimination in the City (I published on this a decade ago, and in one article went on to show coping strategies for how the minor discrimination can be dealt with. Major discrimination needs policy change like pay audits etc.), but to argue that because some well-paid women face discrimination the solution is to remove other women’s jobs from them is just wrong. For the record, I later asked Mark Adams if he would meet with Prisoners Abroad to see if he could do some pro bono work for them and he has done some pro bono for them.
So vested interests ? No. Because the most important fact is that I have nothing to gain one way or another whichever way the law goes, I will still have something to explore and to write about. Academic jobs hinge on research and teaching, the quality of which gets measured by the Quality Assurance Agency and in the Research Assessment Exercise. My interest, therefore, is in doing high quality work.
If I do any research for any body or corporation, or for a specific grant tendered, then it gets put on every article I publish or report produced from that data. This is not only for transparency but is also a courtesy in research to thank one’s research funders. If I was to do a large amount of consultation or research for any single body or a private or public corporation that would go through the University funding office. In my books I mention every grant single source by name and grants by provider (and by grant number where applicable which is actually a bit more detail than is strictly necessary).
Poppy/Eaves have said that their research and funding arm is separate, but how separate is separate? And which organisations funded which report? We still don’t know. The other important thing to mention is when state money is used for research, there is usually a transparent tendering process, and then ethical approval committees, scrutiny panels and peer review panels to ensure the integrity of the research. This helps guard against (not only state research money being used to further political ends but) abuse in all forms. I have had state money before (eg ESRC grants for research, and grants from NHS R&D in forensic mental health ), and not only could I see the list of scrutiny and peer review panel members, but the public could too – it was displayed on the websites. There is little evidence of any of these with Poppy/Eaves reports.
The point about vested interests is a good one, and it is why the academe should not be left totally to the vagaries of the market. We need to be free to examine unpopular subjects, or popular subjects from an unpopular angle. It is why I will defend academic freedom till the day I die.
Julie Bindel said...
23 Oct 09 at 4:54 pm
Dear Belinda
I am sure you are keen to know that John Davies is no longer a visiting research fellow at the University of Sussex, and nor was he when he signed your letter as such which appeared in the paper on Tuesday. I know how important accuracy is to you. I wonder how that mistake could have been made?
Belinda B-G said...
23 Oct 09 at 6:07 pm
Thank you. No I didn’t know, I emailed everyone and asked for their affiliation. For those I do not know well I checked, and because I have never met John (although know his work well), I checked.
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/migration/profile228118.html
I checked again after reading your post just now and it is on their website still. So you may know something that the website manager does not know. Wherever he is, it does not undermine the quality of his published work.
Julie Bindel said...
23 Oct 09 at 6:28 pm
Yes Belinda I do know something that the website manager obviously did not know, but I have emailed to inform him.
As far as I know Davies is not affiliated to any academic institution, but I could be wrong.
Did Davies confirm to you that he was still affiliated, or was it your mistake?
Belinda B-G said...
23 Oct 09 at 7:39 pm
As far as I knew, John was still at Sussex, and when I fact-checked, he was what on the University of Sussex site, Julie. If you are Julie. But how do I know you are Julie? You don’t have to answer that, but it does sound as though you are on some sort of witchhunt.
Alix said...
23 Oct 09 at 7:43 pm
Martin: “what the Poppy Project found tallies with my experiences, I’m aware this is totally anecdotal evidence though so I wouldn’t expect anyone else to change their mind because of it.”
Aha, I wondered if this might be the case. What you’re describing is a form of cognitive bias, in this case a selectivity/familiarity bias. You are familiar with the problem of sex trafficking personally, therefore you already believe it to be a “major problem”. That’s completely natural – you’ve been right up close to it, and it certainly is a major problem for the women involved! You have personally perceived evidence for sex trafficking, and therefore your brain has acquired certain in-built assumptions about how common it is. By perceptions I mean both what you see with your own eyes and also evidence you hear about.
You will therefore be subconsciously selective about the information you take in. We tend to be receptive to information that confirms our pre-conceived beliefs, and screen out information that contradicts it. (Chris Dillow’s blog is very good on bias, if you’re interested.) So it’s no wonder, when you come across someone else suggesting that trafficking is a major problem, you agree with them.
However, by the same token, I could argue that aphids are wiping out all the world’s vegetation. They’ve certainly seen off my herbs good and proper. That’s all the evidence I have immediately to hand, and I perceive it every day. But we know that’s not true, because wider experience shows that aphids are not capable of wiping out the world’s vegetation – they’re actually just a pest and can be controlled. I wish my herbs knew.
So we do studies on social problems because we can’t perceive social problems correctly ourselves as individuals. We have to have some broader method of analysing them, and, critically, that method has to be used universally, otherwise you can’t compare like with like. All studies have to adhere to the same standards.
Which brings us to the Poppy Project work. You are factually wrong in your reply to Unity. Whether or not a study has adhered to agreed research practices is a matter of fact. It is not a matter of “judgement”. To take one example from Unity’s list, methodological validity: it is (I am told – I’m not an academic) agreed within the sociological research field that subjects in a study should be aware and consenting – they should at minimum know they are taking part in a study. If they do not, the study’s validity is dubious. The subjects who were cold-called in the Poppy Project’s Big Brothel report did not know they were taking part in a study. They did not have a chance to give their consent. The report therefore lacks methodological validity.
All that said (phew) we should probably remind ourselves of two things. 1. No-one is trying to argue that sex trafficking doesn’t exist at all. 2. No-one is trying to argue that, where it does exist, it is not imperative on any decent society to throw all resources necessary into stopping it.
The only argument here is over numbers, and hence what resources are “necessary”. You’re not, I notice, arguing about numbers, but they are absolutely key to this whole thing. There is no contradiction between, on the one hand (a) you thinking trafficking is a “major” problem and on the other (b) the actual numbers involved nonetheless being different to what the Poppy Project has claimed.
Martin said...
23 Oct 09 at 8:20 pm
Alix, great post and I definitely don’t disagree, we all have our stuff and I’m comfortable with trafficking to be one of mine. The interest came before the personal experience though so I’d like the think that the weight of evidence that trafficking is a major problem is part of what convinced me to start that particular ball of self-confirmation rolling… But I would say that
Quick point on the Poppy Project research. I agree that the Poppy Project isn’t a perfect bit of academic work, particularly due to the lack of consent. But I would contend that getting this type of consent would be totally impractical in an industry where organised crime is the prime mover. The idea of organised crime being the prime mover is the crux of mine and POPPY’s argument, so if research and evidence could prove to me that the link between gangs and prostitution isn’t there, that would be the point where I’d be on the look out for a new thing.
Can I also just quickly say that all this ‘Belinda is part of a massive sex-industry conspiracy’ thing is silly. And really not cool.
Gregory Carlin said...
23 Oct 09 at 9:36 pm
“Poppy/Eaves have said that their research and funding arm is separate, but how separate is separate? And which organisations funded which report? We still don’t know.”
And when we have other stakeholders ( UKHTC etc.) involved in highly leveraged prosecutions, taking Chinese women from the ‘rescued’ pile and later charging them with sex trafficking, to make up the numbers, surely Poppy should be helping me clear those charges, I did ask.
Abuse of prostituted women, addressing it, that’s the mission. If the police do it, the police are my opponents.
People are also being convicted by ‘clerical error’ according to the CPS/PPS – that is a fact. And to stay in tune with the propaganda script, the police and prosecutrors are sitting in court watching it happen.
Gregory Carlin
I am an abolitionist, paid by conservative groupings in the USA, and I have never hidden that aspect. I believe even a pimp deserves a fair trial.
The P1 and P2 campaigns were a dog’s breakfast of error, mistreatment, reality TV policing and prosecutorial misconduct.
Fakecharitybuster said...
24 Oct 09 at 11:28 am
Belinda BG wrote……
Poppy/Eaves have said that their research and funding arm is separate
I am delighted to hear this. Perhaps Poppy can present its accounts to the Charities Commission so that labour and material cost on (i) rehousing prostitutes, and (ii) research and lobbying can be clearly identified separated? Perhaps thay can also say how much has been spent on legal fees, and for what, as there are rumours, perhaps scurrilous, about their litiginousness that need to be addressed.
These are serious matters as (i) over 95% of their income derives directly or indirectly from the taxpayer and (ii) it is clear that their research has been disingenuous, not least in conflating ‘foreign’ with ‘trafficked’. This country is broke, spending 15% more than it takes in in tax, and we are entering an age when every little saving will count.
Julie Bindel said...
25 Oct 09 at 10:13 am
Belinda
Thank you for your reply. I have to sat though that you accusing anyone of conducting a ‘witch hunt’ is quite unbelievable considering your behaviour towards those who do not share your political perspective on the sex industry.
Can you please simply clarify this for me? Did Davies sign the letter as being from the University of Sussex or did you assume he was (still) because it said so on a website?
Best, Julie
randy said...
25 Oct 09 at 10:14 pm
What seems to be forgotten round here, and everywhere else, is the fact that MEN have been horribly demonised by all these lies about sex-trafficking.
If the government had made wildly exaggerated false claims about crimes committed by gays, blacks, Jews, Muslims or women, there would have been an outcry and heads would have rolled. The politicians and officials who had perpetrated these lies would have been seen as racist or disgustingly bigoted.
But because it is MEN who have been demonised by these fraudulent statistics, there is not even a mention of this demonisation.
As for Julie Bindell’s pathetic attempt to claw back the idea that thousands women are being sex-trafficked to the UK, we all know about her deeply misandric articles and her apparent hate for men.
I recall the completely bogus figure of 40,000 women expected to be trafficked into Germany for the 2006 World Cup being touted in the press by Bindel’s chums.
In the event, it turns out that, maybe, 5 women had been ‘trafficked’.
Lies. Lies. Lies. By the usual man-haters.
Gregory Carlin said...
25 Oct 09 at 10:18 pm
“I recall the completely bogus figure of 40,000 women expected to be trafficked into Germany for the 2006 World Cup being touted in the press by Bindel’s chums.”
Germany is bad, flat rate brothels, pimps having access to personal data etc.
Ms Bindel’s logic followed a pattern established by the 3rd Fleet returning to San Diego,
Stats go up, they don’t go down.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
randy said...
25 Oct 09 at 10:49 pm
@Gregory
The demonisation of men in this country has reached disgusting levels. There is not a man who has not been affected by the perpetual deluge of lies emanating from the feminists and various wimmin’s victims groups.
Why does no-one talk about this?
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 2:01 am
Randy
My opposition to Harriet Harman dates to the 1970s.
that German thing, Ms Bindel had a valid issue, it didn’t turn out too good.
Those pesky statistics fooled everybody, I don”t think it is fair to single people out,
Amnesty, BBC, US Dept of State, the UKHTC had a curved ball flying there.
Gregory
randy said...
26 Oct 09 at 2:38 am
@Gregory
It’s not just these sex-trafficking statistics that are phony. The same is true for the statistics concerning rape, domestic violence, immigration, sex-assault.
We are subjected to an endless stream of lies and distortions from the wimmin’s groups, the feminists and a host of government workers whose jobs depend on there being the impression that there is widespread abuse going on somewhere.
For how long are men going to have to endure this onslaught?
No other groups would put up with it.
As for Julie Bindell, she knows precious little about the relationships between men and women, in my view.
Belinda BG said...
26 Oct 09 at 4:37 am
It is not personal, nor should it be. My analysis may be spoddy, geeky, nerdy it may be, but personal it ain’t. It can however feel personal when one’s work is criticized. That is the same for actors, writers, and singers. Researchers are no different. It may hurt but it is the work that is being criticized, not the person. It is not intended to be personal, science progresses by critique, change, critique. I hope all the other comments/ criticisms on this blog stay with the work/ policy/ government practice rather than making ad hominem attacks which might get in the way of finding out what happened. We need to know how such methods came to be repeatedly used and how the government allowed it to happen.
a) The nature of scientific progress is about rationality. Without proper research methods there is no research, there is only anecdote and opinion. If a group of researchers state that ‘All sex workers are forced and exploited’, it would only take one sex worker who has not been forced or exploited (according to Popperian hypothetico-deductive reasoning*), to prove that statement wrong. At that stage most researchers would go back to their original statement and change it to ‘most’ or ‘some’. Through further counting of a sample of sex workers, it might change to ‘some of the most vulnerable’. Most researchers might then look at the factors that make sex workers vulnerable and start drawing up some comparison variables to work out what might predict vulnerability and exploitation and so on. Or they might use qualitative methods and interview sex workers to find out what might contribute to or protect against ‘exploitation’ in specific contexts or understand the subjective experience of being ‘exploited’ or not ‘exploited’. The same could be done for, say, ‘trafficked’. If the researchers on the other hand keep using the same type of sample and generalising that to all sex workers, or they make a few hoax calls and apply what they found on the first sample to a different sample. And then, instead of using the findings (assuming enough competence to interpret the findings) to get a more nuanced statement just keep shouting the same statement a bit louder, and then a bit LOUDER, then some questions are bound to be asked by other people who think that there might be a more scientific way of getting this information.
This is the point of peer review, and research scrutiny panels, and advisory panels, and ethics committees. It is the point of systematic reviews. So that the same question is not asked time after time. And it is when the questions are so important that science matters most.
b) None of the reports upon which the government have relied, to my knowledge, use inferential statistics to test causal relationships, or even correlational ones. Few ministers are scientifically literate but scientific literacy was not required to work these reports out, as Alix points out. The lack of logic should be as evident to a layperson as a lawyer.
One individual or even a group cannot change government’s minds and policies without ministers and civil servants being involved. The Home Office has produced a risible report on a controversial topic; a topic on which it spent vast amount of public money and produced days and days of parliamentary debate, screeds of legislation, published numerous reports and press releases. We have to ask ‘What happened?’ ‘Why?’ and ‘How did it happen?’
*(leaving the null out of this for now)
james said...
26 Oct 09 at 5:36 am
@Belinda
“We have to ask ‘What happened?’ ‘Why?’ and ‘How did it happen?’”
I can tell you why, …
http://www.angryharry.com/esWhyGovernmentsLoveFeminism.htm
Julie Bindel said...
26 Oct 09 at 10:44 am
• Among the signatories of a letter questioning the soundness of some statistics on sex trafficking, John Davies should have been listed as formerly, rather than currently, associated with the Sussex Centre for Migration Research as a research fellow (Sex trafficking is more than a numbers game, Letters, 22 October, page 39).
randy said...
26 Oct 09 at 11:55 am
@Julie Bindel
“Sex trafficking is more than a numbers game, Letters, 22 October, page 39).”
So the numbers don’t count for very much then?
Let’s face it Ms Bindel, the numbers you were touting were phony.
Perhaps you need to wake up to the fact the women are not quite as helpless as you consistently portray them to be.
randy said...
26 Oct 09 at 12:02 pm
@Martin
“so if research and evidence could prove to me that the link between gangs and prostitution isn’t there, that would be the point where I’d be on the look out for a new thing.”
How on Earth could any research prove such a thing?
Besides which, we know that when ‘abuse’ cannot be found anywhere, people like Ms Bindel simply say that more and more resources are needed to find it – which is what the police did in the case of trafficking.
Same for the alleged bones at the Jersey home.
We were lied to about this too.
No bones were found; but the officer wanted more and more resources to find some.
Same for the Satanic Abuse scare.
On and on it goes.
Always demonising men. Always wanting more funding to find what isn’t there.
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 12:13 pm
“Let’s face it Ms Bindel, the numbers you were touting were phony”
The misinformation campaign was coordinated by the UKHTC, and the exercise was knowingly fraudulent. They set out to lie, we have dozens of official documents establishing it was a conscious program of deception.
I was surprised Nick Davies’ article was not appreciated by Julie Bindel for gaining publicity, for a deception, very damaging to the cause and interests of prostituted women.
P1 was not intended to close any brothels and P II was designed at the outset as a deception.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 12:42 pm
“We need to know how such methods came to be repeatedly used and how the government allowed it to happen.”
With the Brits, they do spin doctoring, and then they appear, (going by their hurt faces), to believe it. There are numerous examples, and there is the irony,
for example Harriet Harman was recently asking the Gov. of California to eradicate a web-site hosted in Ohio, which had been a key part of Fiona MacTaggart’s strategy re: the white knight phenomena.
Crimestoppers even produced a soft porn style video for the Puntenet strategy, which was suitably applauded by regional and national policing etc. The police officer in charge of P1, he was opposed to criminalization, and still is I think.
Julie did ( part of) a four person piece 20 Sep 2009, when one of the Pentameter 1 policing leaders reiterated his views. O
“We don’t need more legislation – there are plenty of existing laws on everything from brothel-keeping to soliciting, kerb crawling …”
“Criminalisation is not the answer – either for those who buy or sell sex, and I wouldn’t support the Swedish model. Instead, society has to recognise that there is a sex industry that needs to be regulated.”
However, witha different wind….
“SIX THOUSAND women are being used as sex slaves in Scotland, police said yesterday.”
http://www.informationliberation.com/index.php?id=6879
He was also happy to do that, when required as a good political policeman.
The creation of the UKHTC encouraged force area policing to abrogate their responsibilities, and as we know, the UKHTC, are a failure, using their own criteria to define a lack of success.
I opposed the UKHTC from the beginning, because it had all the hallmarks of a fake exercise of a type we have seen before, CEOP for example.
Eaves/Poppy should be thankful to Nick Davies for helping to expose the UKHTC, because the agency was a malefactor re: the human rights of prostituted women and therefore not a friendly co-stakeholder.
Being in the same room as Jacqui Smith, Vera Baird, Harriet Harman, or Fiona MacTaggart, is only something one should do, if on the hunt for a gimmick, or a publicity stunt.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Julie Bindel said...
26 Oct 09 at 1:40 pm
Belinda
I accept that you are not going to answer the question about Davies, so I will assume that you are uncomfortable with it.
Regarding your comment on how your criticism of other people’s work is ‘nothing personal’, do you mean to imply that you are not in the habit of making personal comments about women who take a different view to yours on prostitution?
james said...
26 Oct 09 at 2:20 pm
@Bindel
“Regarding your comment on how your criticism of other people’s work is ‘nothing personal’, do you mean to imply that you are not in the habit of making personal comments about women who take a different view to yours on prostitution?”
You’ve got a nerve given the stuff you write.
Besides which, what do you know about sex between men and women?
There’s a bit about you here I think, …
http://tinyurl.com/yfp4zgl
Charlotte Gore said...
26 Oct 09 at 3:14 pm
Julie, can you actually prove there’s something wrong with Belinda’s research specifically?
Belinda BG said...
26 Oct 09 at 5:28 pm
Julie, two points: a) I thought I had answered it. John Davies has not made any claim that could not be checked on two sources, either by looking on a recent publication of his, or the departmental website. If the University of Sussex had not got its website up to date that is hardly his fault. Had these two sources not been verified then no affiliation would have gone on the letter. It has hardly cost the state millions of pounds or worse. There is little sinister about this. I have told you what checking was done. Academics would not usually check that sort of thing about each other, I did because I am a bit like that.
b) It is safe to assume that if I have not responded to a substantive point in the blogpost then it is because I am lecturing, supervising, or walking between buildings on route to do one or the other (or sometimes in a hospital waiting room), rather than because I am uncomfortable about anything. Keep in mind it is the middle of term, and teaching is not something done while reading emails. If there is anything I feel is not advancing discussion in a constructive way (ie such as individual attacks that do not get progress the debate, I will address it and ask people to desist).
Mark Cowling said...
26 Oct 09 at 8:51 pm
Reverting to Belinda’s critique of government policy… I think that this is fully warranted because of the weight of evidence on her side. What bothered me about the Big Brothel report, on which government thinking seems to be based, was not so much the source of the funding or the covert research, but the conflation of voluntary migration and trafficking based on force and fraud. It isn’t difficult to find reports on the Internet of prostitution in a wide variety of countries. The amount paid for a sexual encounter is typically well below the average paid in London. It therefore stands to reason that there is a strong motive for voluntary migration, and it would surely be easier to facilitate this than to engage in force and fraud. The bias of the report is also evident in its quotes, interspersed at frequent intervals, from punters who are definitely not typical of those who post comments on Punternet, and who definitely do not fit the general profile of punters as described in academic research. The report also is obviously determined to look at prostitution through spectacles which make the glass look virtually empty rather than half full.
It is a shame that the Labour feminists are discrediting themselves in this way. I spent a long time looking at research on rape. It is difficult to pin down the exact extent of rape from surveys for reasons discussed at length in my book Date Rape and Consent, but it is pretty clear that there is considerably more rape than is reported to the police, and only 6% of reported rape ends up in a conviction for rape. I therefore think that their efforts to increase the rate of convictions are legitimate and praiseworthy. I don’t know as much about domestic violence, but I’m pretty sure that the situation was similar and has been improved by measures they have sponsored.
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 9:05 pm
“Then there was the 18-year-old “lap dancer” recently jailed for six months for perverting the course of justice.”
That was indeed a travesty,
‘In 1982, a fly-on-the-wall documentary, Police: A Complaint of Rape, showed a rape complainant being interviewed by Thames Valley police. The police officers were shown bullying a woman into discontinuing her complaint against three men, with one saying to her: “This is the biggest load of bollocks I’ve ever heard.”‘
I remember that as if it were yesterday.
‘A police officer I spoke to, who asked not to be named, said that officers dealing with rape have recently been told to be “rigorous” in their pursuit of false allegations, “and root them out early on”.’
I’ve researched false and malacious at allegations re: US prisons and British schools. In the former, I would say non-existent as a practical discovery. Schools tend to be more complex, however ‘malacious’ is reasonably rare, though 2.8 percent would be a third higher than ( educator abuse) sexual complaints re: USA.
‘In your email you ask for “the dept’s authenticated statistics, notes or records of false and malicious allegations as described by Mr Sheerman MP”. The only data we hold which we think falls into this description was collected in 2007 as part of a review of the implementation of guidance on handling allegations of abuse. In order to produce this review, a voluntary data collection was carried out relating to allegations dealt with between 1 April 2007 and 30 September 2007. 128 LAs provided usable responses, with data on 3099 concluded allegations
Responses to the data collection show that 2.8% of concluded allegations were recorded as malicious.’
The ‘lap-dancer’ thing Ms Bindel reported upon, that was certainly a milestone.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, N. Ireland
Julie Bindel said...
26 Oct 09 at 9:12 pm
No Belinda, you did not answer me.
The reason I assumed you were free to answer is because you were on line AFTER I posted the question about Davies, and indeed you answered/commented on another point NOT because I expect you to be online during working hours.
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 9:15 pm
“It isn’t difficult to find reports on the Internet of prostitution in a wide variety of countries. The amount paid for a sexual encounter is typically well below the average paid in London. It therefore stands to reason that there is a strong motive for voluntary migration, and it would surely be easier to facilitate this than to engage in force and fraud.”
Passport retention by the Irish lap-dancing industry was 100 percent, it was not 99 it was 100.
If I recall the UKIS ( also security services) dealt with (circa 2002) more criminal premises linked to Ireland, (albeit in the UK), than all the other prosecutions combined for England and Wales.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, BT11 8NX
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 9:31 pm
“There is little sinister about this. I have told you what checking was done. Academics would not usually check that sort of thing about each other, I did because I am a bit like that.”
He is a fascinating fellow, I will say that for him.
I was talking about him the other day in relation to the collapse of the white armies in Russia.
His submission – Policing and Crime Bill 2009 was mentioned in passing. Davies doesn’t know anything about white slavery.
If one is in the myth biz, find a real ‘originating’ myth as the anchor point, would be my advice.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, BT11 8NX
Belinda BG said...
26 Oct 09 at 9:32 pm
Charlotte: to add to you good point: ‘..or prove there is anything not wrong with the Home Office report on Assets Seizure, or indeed the Sex in the City report’
Gregory: these stats are perturbing. What is the primary source? Can you send a link to them please?
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 10:17 pm
Ireland
The comparison base was cautions and convictions for brothel keeping offences at magistrates’ courts in England and Wales 1985–2002
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/cons-paying-the-price/paying_the_price.pdf?view=Binary
And if such official figures are true, then the Irish aspects I mention would be greater than the combined domestic total etc.
one is talking about 2001/2002 and perhaps 2003, by 2004 the govt. would be involved in operations in Britain ‘researched’ by US actors. So at that point, I would be in Leeds, Sheffield, in person.
Prisons
Michigan DOC, Arizona DOC didn’t have any false or malacious allegations by female inmates, just the most extraordinary levels of sexual abuse, essentially state sanctioned.
Michigan Owes Millions to Sexually Abused Female Inmates
http://www.findingdulcinea.com/news/politics/2009/jan/Michigan-Owes-Millions-to-Sexually-Abused-Female-Inmates.html
One of the people sent to Abu Ghraib, I encountered in Arizona, he also worked in Haiti ( there you go). The Governor of Arizona ( Symington) had to rely on Clinton for a pardon.
There were CRIPA civil rights actions by USDOJ against both Arizona and Michigan. So false simply didn’t come into it, all true.
Ireland – Lap dancing
“Passport retention by the Irish lap-dancing industry was 100 percent, it was not 99 it was 100.”
We produced tables etc. many lap dancing agencies used our research re: Ireland, & also Dominican Republic, Cyprus, Malta etc. There was a basic model from the top, to the bottom, none of the ( Irishj) clubs were legitimate, they were all criminal or unlawfully operated.
The school thing, about 2 percent of sexual abuse issues could be expected to be malacious in the USA, for NYC, or Washington State. The UK may be a little higher.
Schools have far more misunderstandings than any other type etc.
Gregory
In your email you ask for “the dept’s authenticated statistics, notes or records of false and malicious allegations as described by Mr Sheerman MP”. The only data we hold which we think falls into this description was collected in 2007 as part of a review of the implementation of guidance on handling allegations of abuse. In order to produce this review, a voluntary data collection was carried out relating to allegations dealt with between 1 April 2007 and 30 September 2007. 128 LAs provided usable responses, with data on 3099 concluded allegations
Responses to the data collection show that 2.8% of concluded allegations were recorded as malicious.
http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/_download/?id=5798
Gregory Carlin said...
26 Oct 09 at 10:38 pm
Belinda
Professionally, what the Brit police were doing with Pentameter II was a disgrace.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00089/_ark_89286t.jpg
His sex trafficking conviction didn’t get cleared by me and my friends because he was a nice person, we were desperately working to keep as many elements of P II as legitimate as possible
When they started prosecuting ‘rescued’ Chinese females as sex traffickers, to make up the numbers, that was the point, the price became unacceptable, or too bilious for our conscience.
‘Only 22 people were finally prosecuted for trafficking, including two women who had originally been “rescued” as supposed victims.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/oct/20/government-trafficking-enquiry-fails
Nick painted a flattering picture. It is worse than he imagined.
So, interesting times.
Gregory
Ewan Hoyle said...
26 Oct 09 at 11:10 pm
I wrote a letter to the Guardian on this after Nick Davies’ article. If you’re sitting comfortably…
I’d like to thank Nick Davies for clearing up the over-hyped numbers describing the sex-trafficking problem in this country. It is however undoubtedly true that many women and girls whether foreign or local are routinely enduring horrific experiences on Britain’s streets and in our brothels. While freeing women and girls controlled by pimps or traffickers would be a worthwhile, but resource-intensive endeavour, it is important to realise that a huge proportion of prostitutes are controlled by their addiction to drugs, not by men. If the government really wants to improve the lives of those in prostitution in this country, It should first expand heroin and cocaine prescription to all those who currently prostitute or commit crime to fund their habit. If the government then wishes to crack down on sex-trafficking or brothels, it will have many thousands of police newly freed from investigating drug-related crimes with which to carry out their plans.
Ewan Hoyle
Liberal Democrats for Drug Policy Reform http://www.lddpr.org.uk
Belinda BG said...
26 Oct 09 at 11:39 pm
Ewan: I don’t disagree that it happens, but nothing is ‘undoubtedly true that many’ anything until we have seen the data and scrutinised it etc., etc.,
I agree that no one should have to sell sex who does not want to, nor should have to (in order to feed a drug habit). Any link between selling sex and drugs has been broken in other countries but there is too much political cowardice to do it here. Shame. It is only logical way for sensible policy to go. Now I am off to read ‘Treating Qualitative Research as Different from Journalism’ in Silverman (2nd Ed). Not that there is anything wrong with journalism. Mr Davies bless ‘im, has shown that.
Gregory Carlin said...
27 Oct 09 at 12:02 am
“Mr Davies bless ‘im, has shown that.”
He should finish it, otherwise it is half done.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast
James said...
27 Oct 09 at 1:06 am
@Ewan ” It is however undoubtedly true that many women and girls whether foreign or local are routinely enduring horrific experiences on Britain’s streets and in our brothels.”
Where’s the evidence for this wild statement? What do you mean by the word ‘many’? 20? 20,000?
Those women who work as prostitutes deny that they come across such things. So do the punters. So where is your evidence that many women endure ‘horrific’ experiences?
Fantasies in your head in seems to me.
@Belinda
“I agree that no one should have to sell sex who does not want to, nor should have to (in order to feed a drug habit). ”
We all have to work for a living – often whether we want to or not. Some people choose to sell sex.
During World War II, thousands of women (non-prostitutes) flocked to London to sell sex in order to make some money from American soldiers.
Today, thousands of young women at college sell sex to fund their lifestyle.
Heather Mills.
So please let stop trying to portray all these women as hapless victims. Mostly, they are not.
If anybody is being exploited in this business, they are mostly men – whose vulnerabilities cause them to shell out ludicrous amounts just to get some sex.
Thankfully, the internet is going to end all this nonsense, because it is quite clear that thousands of women online are already offering themselves sexually in some way to make a living and that, soon, their numbers will be huge – because it is such an easy way to make money.
James said...
27 Oct 09 at 1:25 am
@Mark
” only 6% of reported rape ends up in a conviction for rape.”
Hardly surprising – given that most allegations of rape made to the police are FALSE.
“I therefore think that their efforts to increase the rate of convictions are legitimate and praiseworthy.”
Convicting more innocent men is not praiseworthy.
Perhaps, you can explain what ‘academic researchers’ know about all these cases that the juries, the police, the lawyers and the doctors did not know?
The evidence strongly suggests that the vast majority of allegations of rape made to the police in the UK are false.
Spartan said...
27 Oct 09 at 1:26 am
When Denis MacShane was on Newsnight making himself look a complete idiot he brought up a group called ESSO to back up his ‘claims’.
l tried to find out more about ESSO on the web but could find virtually nothing about them. So, l asked Mr MacShane himself seeing as he quoted them … he must know … right? Alas, Mr MacShane ceased communicating with me. So, l asked Eaves about them and could l have details of their website etc etc.
Eaves did reply and this is what l got “I have the personal email address of one member of the group, which I’m naturally reluctant to give out. I can forward any queries you have to her.”
So l still have no idea of who ESSO are and their objectives, funding, campaigns, statistics etc but they must be really important because Denis MacShane uses their data … right?
James said...
27 Oct 09 at 1:45 am
@Mark
” I spent a long time looking at research on rape.”
I spent 10 years looking at it.
“… but it is pretty clear that there is considerably more rape than is reported to the police, and only 6% of reported rape ends up in a conviction for rape.”
The two groups are not so easily connected; and it sounds to me like you are purposely muddling the two groups together by squashing them into one sentence in order, presumably, to justify your following sentence; viz, ” I therefore think that their efforts to increase the rate of convictions are legitimate and praiseworthy.”
Bait and switch?
But the two groups are distinct.
1. Those women who are raped who do not report their rapes.
2. Those women who report rapes.
Two completely separate populations of women.
We do not know how many women are in Group 1. because most of the official research in this area is bogus.
In Group 2, the evidence suggests that the MAJORITY of rape accusations are false.
My GUESS is that we have a system that encourages false accusers to go to the police, but it discourages genuine victims from going to the police.
If this is the case, then your desire to increase prosecutions will simply result in more innocent men being convicted.
Furthermore, innocent men already have their lives significantly messed up simply following an accusation.
You want more of this too, I presume.
Gregory Carlin said...
27 Oct 09 at 2:02 am
‘So l still have no idea of who ESSO are and their objectives, funding, campaigns, statistics etc but they must be really important because Denis MacShane uses their data … right?’
That Delphi doesn’t really matter.
Mr. MacShane’s party is going to be buried at the next election and maybe he doesn’t matter either.
SOCA get reviewed, that’s a definite and I wouldn’t hold out hope for the UKHTC surving.
It’ll be no loss (to anybody).
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast N. Ireland
James said...
27 Oct 09 at 5:13 am
I should also add that there is another factor that is not being taken into account round here – the rising tide of anger amongst men; anger about the way in which they are forever being portrayed and treated, merely when accused – with a justice system that is continually being corrupted in order to convict (or harm) more and more men on the shallowest of evidence.
This tide will result in a growing backlash from men against government, politicians and, indeed, women.
In the near future, thanks to the internet, this tide will be huge – having been suppressed by the feminist-dominated media for three decades.
The way in which men are being portrayed and treated by Harriet Harman and her friends in government is absolutely disgusting.
And all the lies recently exposed about sex-trafficking is just one example from a very long list of lies that police officers and politicians have been caught perpetrating in order to buttress their man-hating agenda – from which they **PROFIT**.
But men make up half the population.
And they are gradually waking up to what is being done to them – and why.
Personally speaking, I would like to see any officials who tried to cover-up the truth about sex-trafficking criminally prosecuted in some way for engaging in such wicked deception.
Can you imagine the public outcry if blacks, gays or women were being FALSELY accused of engaging – by the MILLION – in hidden acts of horrific sexual abuse by police and government officials?
It would be seen as a hate crime of monstrous proportions.
“MILLIONS of gay men in the UK use sex slaves”
“MILLIONS of blacks use sex slaves.”
These would be seen as thoroughly despicable lies that were designed to stir up a massive amount of hatred towards blacks or gays.
But because it it MEN who are being so disgustingly demonised by these lies, no-one round here gives a damn.
And so the lie that, “MILLIONS of MEN in the UK use sex slaves” is just accepted round here as some unfortunate ‘mistake’.
But this was no mistake.
FisherKing said...
27 Oct 09 at 11:00 am
@James
Well said, Sir.
You are the only one pointing out how the laws and the rhetoric affect men. Nobody else seems concerned about this aspect of the problem.
Linda Cusick said...
27 Oct 09 at 11:02 am
My academic paper on this topic has just been published:
Cusick, L. Kinnell, H., Brooks-Gordon, B. and Campbell, R. 2009 Wild guesses and conflated meanings? Estimating the size of the sex worker population in Britain, Critical Social Policy, 29, 703 – 719.
Those with subscription to this journal will be able to view the full text of
your article at SAGE Journals Online: http://online.sagepub.com or more
directly via your article’s home page:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0261018309341906
Gregory Carlin said...
27 Oct 09 at 3:00 pm
Size and scale is always difficult, picking a number, I couldn’t understand that. In Scotland a peeler, who was in charge of P1, and who could have got a job with Helen Clark in NZ given his views,
he had no problem with 6,000 sex slaves one moment and something else at a differing time. I said it then and I say it now, what on earth were we doing being in bed with those people?
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, N. Ireland
Stephen Paterson said...
28 Oct 09 at 1:04 am
For me, the whole matter comes down to one simple statement: The Government has failed for nine years to put the wording of Article 3 of the Palermo Protocol [1] into legislation, that being the international definition of all forms of human trafficking. Insofar as trafficking for sexual exploitation is concerned, its section of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 entitled Trafficking [2] specifically infringes the Protocol by defining sex trafficking as something completely different, ie something sex trafficking cannot possibly be because the Protocol we have ratified defines it as being something else.
The latest case of this has arisen in the very Ipswich of Steve Wright renown where a Chinese woman known as Yan Yang has been incarcerated for “trafficking” for arranging a taxi for two sex workers who willingly came from London to work for her. That case, I have highlighted in a post in my my blog [3], another entry from which Belinda has so kindly referred to in her post here.
The revelations concerning Pentameter 2 – that virtually no sex trafficking cases were found – must be put beside the results of the first Pentameter exercise[4], which seem to have been forgotten.
Both constitute inquisitions, the net result of which left far more victims in their wake than numbers “rescued.”
Persons were convicted of “a variety of offences,” for example. Taking two sex workers in from the street – where they are in great danger of both assault and arrest for street soliciting – and providing them with a far safer place to continue their activity can, even without any form of income from it at all and no motivation other than charity – get a person imprisoned in this country for up to seven years for brothel ownership or management.[5] Even the Victorians only adopted a maximum sentence of three months in 1885, when they passed the same law that outlawed sodomy [6], creating ideal conditions for Jack the Ripper’s Whitechapel murders three years later by vastly increasing street prostitution.
Let us not deny trafficking. At the same time, let us not confuse it with migrating people’s utilisation of trafficking networks to aid their migration when their social networks are too weak. And let us also note the great celebration when football players are sold from club to club – only possibly with their consent, given the nature of their contracts with their agents, the payment of whom goes unquestioned.
The Pentameter Inquisitions deprived innumerable persons, almost certainly predominantly female, of both their workplaces and their incomes. Whilst minimal provision was created eventually to aid the negligible number of possible trafficking cases actually found, the vast bulk of sex workers were left on the streets following their release from ‘helping police with their inquiries.’
The appalling failure of the British media, criminal justice system, and NGOs such as Amnesty International and Liberty to intervene in the situation (indeed, the media largely egged the situation on) will not go unnoticed by historians.
It is a sad fact that there is such a thing as the human condition. The sexes and genders are not “equal” and attempts to legislate them into “equality” utilising the laws of the land as some form of club hammer are not only doomed to failure but extraordinarily destructive.
This is not to say one sex is superior to the other or to adopt any notion of gender hierarchy. But the phrase “men and women are as bad as one another” would perhaps be closer to reality.
Meanwhile, there is no defence in a British court in the Palermo Protocol for someone who has not interfered in any way with the volition of persons of sound mind taking their own decisions at an age of 18 or over, and who has not been duped at any stage of the process, because, unlike opther signatories such as Eire or the United States, Olde Puritanical has not seen fit to pass the definition of trafficking into law.
Once it does so, and cleared the debris from the SOA 2003 (which is far more than the Trafficking section), perhaps we can, at last, progress.
[1]:
http://untreaty.un.org/English/TreatyEvent2003/Texts/treaty2E.pdf
[2]:
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/Acts/acts2003/ukpga_20030042_en_5#pt1-pb15
[3]:
http://stephenpaterson.wordpress.com/2009/10/01/ipswich-is-this-a-real-sex-slave-driver/
[4]:
http://library.npia.police.uk/docs/horr/horr07a.pdf
[5]:
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/Acts/acts2003/ukpga_20030042_en_4#pt1-pb14
[6]:
http://www.swarb.co.uk/acts/1885Criminal_Law_AmendmentAct.shtml
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 1:49 am
“The appalling failure of the British media, criminal justice system, and NGOs such as Amnesty International and Liberty to intervene in the situation (indeed, the media largely egged the situation on) will not go unnoticed by historians.”
Abolitionists asked Amnesty ( 07 July 2008 ) to desist from promoting Pentamer II in exaggerated terms.
We also raised Yan Yang’s predictament with the NIHRC here in Belfast.
We have made some progress in clearing individuals convicted during Pentameter II.
P II was a fraud, of that, there is no doubt.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
james said...
28 Oct 09 at 4:13 am
@ALL
Harman and her cronies want to break down as much as possible any close relationships between men and women and, also, between adults and children – even their own – hence their determination to break down marriages and long-term relationships.
In this particular case, they want to damage the relationships between men and women sex workers; prostitutes, lap dancers etc.
Women are victims. Men are demons. Women are victims. Men are demons.
The chanting never ends.
But the *overall* idea behind this relationship-busting programme is to stir up hatred towards men and to encourage both men and women to avoid getting, or remaining, too close to each other.
It’s the old tactic of ‘divide and rule’.
Continually breaking down intimate relationships (e.g. as in families) also ensures that the country needs ‘more government’ – to pick up the pieces – which is why the politicians and so many government workers love it.
(Jobs. Overtime Pay. Pensions. Empires.)
The same goes with regard to Labour’s immigration policies and their biasing of the educational system against boys. Both designed to inhibit the formation of close relationships – in the former case by disrupting communities and nations, in the latter case by making men less attractive to women. (Women prefer men to be at least as, if not better, educated than themselves.)
We have police officers generating unfounded hysteria over rape drugs – demonising men in pubs – prosecuting a postman for “sexual assault and battery” for a kissing a woman on the cheek in the street – calling consensual sex with youngsters ‘rape’, categorising the writing of hostile letters to your ex partner as ‘violence’, and calling all ALLEGATIONS of rape, ‘rape’ – even though 95% of these allegations are unconfirmed.
In other words, whip up the abuse hysteria, and demonise men as much as possible.
Basically, you have a bundle of various victim groups and feminists forever trying to stir up hatred towards men in order to justify their funding and maintain their empires, while hordes of government workers – such as police officers – and politicians get in on the action. Aided and abetted by the tabloids.
Men are now so hated that even Bobbit jokes and jokes about male prison rape are acceptable on the BBC!
And yet what we see going on here in this thread is that nobody – not even the men – seem concerned about this blatant attempt by government officials to demonise men via the issue of sex-trafficking by, essentially, spreading lies.
These were not ‘mistakes’. These were lies.
And they have been lying about such issues for at least two decades.
And, typically, what they do when they cannot find enough ‘victims of abuse’ to justify their salaries, they either lie about the numbers and/or redefine ‘abuse’.
And, as ever, men are demonised in the process; though increasingly they are also going after women.
And as Stephen Paterson and others round here point out, genuine victims as well as genuinely innocent people, often get treated appallingly as a result.
But what you need to understand is that politicans like Harriet Harman do not actually CARE about this.
And if you look at the appropriate history books, you will see that breaking apart people’s relationships is a specific tactic that has been used by governments the world over in order to gain power.
But you people round here are mostly academics. And you think, “My goodness. Something has gone wrong here. The figures for sex-trafficking don’t add up. The politicians have made a mistake.”
No. They haven’t.
The only mistake they made was being caught out.
Their aim is to justify more laws, more intrusions, more control, more power and more money for themselves.
And if you open your eyes a little more, you will see that they have been achieving these aims on many, many fronts over the past 12 years.
Not all politicians are crooked and self-serving.
But those politicians at the top of the Labour tree are very decidedly both.
Well, thank you Charlotte for putting up with me round here.
Much appreciated.
I leave you with two more pieces, …
http://tinyurl.com/ylcfph9
http://tinyurl.com/yjsfcl4
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 12:58 pm
“Harman and her cronies want to break down as much as possible any close relationships between men and women and, also, between adults and children”
Harman is an extraordinary person,
the kindest thing that can be said is ( over the decades) of a self-serving, opportunistic person. When Judith Reisman was going to meet the feminists at the Princeton conference, I asked Judith to make sure that nobody belonging to us, purchased into the theory of Harman as a useful ally.
Abolition is going to win without compromise, and without climbing into coalitioning with anybody who was previously associated with PIE/PAL or the GLF who has yet to recant, and even then, with the denuciation of previously publicized views, my personal preference is one of zero-contact.
( With Harman, that isn’t remotely on the cards, her office is still lying about her role in our campaigns of the 1970s, to be a friend of Harriet Harman, is to be beyond the pale of acceptance)
“Continually breaking down intimate relationships (e.g. as in families) also ensures that the country needs ‘more government’ – to pick up the pieces – which is why the politicians and so many government workers love it.”
I lived next door to a brothel once, and we had dozens of men harassing kids & women in the street and therefore I don’t really see family being mixed into it. The ladies selling sex were nice enough, their customers were gobshites, and there is a reason men pay for it.
One of the reasons I am opposed to the arrest and mistreatment of prostituted women as a factor of P II, because as an abolitionist, I am insulted by being paid in counterfeit money.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, N. Ireland
Emma Boyd - Autograph ABP said...
28 Oct 09 at 1:12 pm
I’ve tried long and hard to stay away from this futile and ridiculous debate but after reading Amanda Hoer’s good article ‘Why Human Trafficking is not a hoax piece at http://humantrafficking.change.org/blog/category/human_trafficking_in_europe_and_the_middle_east I thought I would comment.
See article below but first I would like to say that Randy….I find your comment ‘It’s not just these sex-trafficking statistics that are phony. The same is true for the statistics concerning rape, domestic violence, immigration, sex-assault.’ You should be ashamed of yourself….only a complete idiot would make a statement like this and Belinda as an academic you should be ashamed also for clearly engaging with what he has to say.
When are you people going to realise that not everything in life is black and white and that trafficking is part of organised crime in most cases which is secretive, highly specialised and powerful.
Instead of focusing on Soho and the lack of evidence from government and NGO statistics why is no one acknowledging that sex trafficking exists behind closed doors, in rural areas, in suburbia, next door to you…..this is why its also called sexual slavery. Of course we need solid, sound research but that is not the only issue here it is difficult and all the issue need to be considered.
Many victims do not disclose their status because they are too afraid – Randy this is the case for many women who are beaten by their partners and raped….they don’t come forward because of fear.
‘Every few years, some big study tries to find instances of human trafficking and fails to find them in any significant number. And every time this happens, fiscal conservatives and others come out of the woodwork and claim that the failed study is proof that human trafficking exists only in the imaginations of liberals, evangelicals, federal agents, social service providers, feminists, police officers, organized criminals, immigration officials, parents… you get the idea. Human trafficking was not a hoax before the recent failed study in the UK, and it won’t be a hoax after the failure blows over.
The Pentameter study in the UK sought to root out human trafficking in the commercial sex industry by assigning 55 units of police officers to investigate human trafficking. And despite the fact that author Nick Davies begins his article in The Guardian claiming they found not a single trafficker, they actually found several, five of whom were eventaully convicted. But they didn’t find the broad and sweeping numbers of victims that they originally thought they would. Is it because there really were only five traffickers on all the UK? Probably not. There are a multitude of reasons this particular study might have failed: the police didn’t know what to look for, the victims lied, the traffickers moved the victims before getting caught, the police looked in the wrong places, etc. and so forth.
But the reasons why this study may have failed are not nearly as important as the many, many other studies that have shown human trafficking does exist and in significant numbers. The UN just estimated that 270,000 victims live in the EU right now. The U.S. State Department ballparks the number of individuals trafficked globally at 800,000 each year, with 17,000 of those being brought to the U.S. The International Labor Organization has also weighed in, claiming 2.4 million trafficking victims around the world. I could go on, but that would be quite boring to read. The point is, sometimes studies fail, but that doesn’t mean the problem doesn’t exist. Many issues, like global warming, that were once denounced as liberal conspiracy based a some flawed or failed studies have been proven to be real and dangerous phenomenon.
The field of human trafficking desperately needs more studies, sounder methodologies, and better statistics so we can appropriately address what’s actually happening. I don’t know anyone who works in this area who disagrees that we need to know more. But we need most is an actual field of academic literature on this subject. Right now we have one study that says human trafficking is real and one that calls it a hoax. We have one estimate that there are 27 million moder-day slaves in the world and one that says 500,000. When the information is so different, it’s almost impossible to make policy decisions based on it.
For the time being, here are my answers. If you are person who loves math, statistics, and research methodologies, please go into this field. If you already in this field, do more and better research. And if you are an activist for this cause, please don’t give up on the very real victims out there while the academics get their act together.’
Get down from the clouds and start thinking out of the box. Just out of curiosity have any of you actually met a trafficking victim?
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 1:53 pm
“Get down from the clouds and start thinking out of the box. Just out of curiosity have any of you actually met a trafficking victim?”
I have met hundreds, many referred to me by adult sector agencies.
At times, one will stumble upon large numbers in one place, for example, in the Dominican Republic entire hotel establishments can be taken over.
In fact one British lap-dance agency boss, trafficked himself to the Dominican Republic!
I do a lot of Islands.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast Northern Ireland
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 2:12 pm
“The U.S. State Department ballparks the number of individuals trafficked globally at 800,000 each year, with 17,000 of those being brought to the U.S.”
In respect of Britain, one liar giving another liar an alibi which filters its way to the US Dept of State, makes a fool out of the American taxpayer.
The UKHTC thing, is disrupting legitimate policing in other countries. Potentially more harm is caused, than good is done being the output.
http://blogs.wsj.com/numbersguy/another-exaggerated-sex-trade-stat-823/
Does anybody thinks the Wall Street Journal ‘numbers guy’ style of reporting is helping the cause of abolition?
The sheer arrogance of some of the English stakehoders is breathtaking.
Anybody who thinks Vera Baird, Jacqui Smith or Fiona MacTaggart have been a help, are misguided.
In fact, Fiona MacTaggart had a practical role in obfuscating investigations into an Irish child sex trafficker who eventually victimized children in Britain.
She was the last person to send a blow-off letter to Irish politicians on the topic.
We try, but we are up against a wall of incompetence, deceptions, and not fit for purpose British structures.
If Scotland had 6,000 sex slaves, why did Poppy only have a dozen or so beds? The logic being that the UK could have 25K/60K in total.
So as we worked with hundreds over periods in Ireland, and if we believed the P1 and P2 people, ( which we didn’t), it would make sense to ty to get the Irish discoveries closer to Scotland, because deomgraphics reasonable similar.
We didn’t look for more, because the UKHTC were fraudsters.
The people who put themselves forward as spokespersons, it was their duty to cry ‘fraud’ instead of leaving it to Nick Davies.
It was not a ‘mistake’ or an ‘exaggeration’ it was an intentional fraud.
We need to deal with it.
Gregory Carlin
IATC, Belfast, BT11 8NX
Emma Boyd - Autograph ABP said...
28 Oct 09 at 4:55 pm
It appears the ‘futile and ridiculous debate’ of hardly a solution in sight but lots of conspiracy theories continues……………
I think some of you need to get away from your calculators and over to some source countries where you’ll find lots of missing, disappeared, stolen women….with hundreds of children left behind. Now those would make some interesting statistics.
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 5:35 pm
“I think some of you need to get away from your calculators and over to some source countries where you’ll find lots of missing, disappeared, stolen women….with hundreds of children left behind. Now those would make some interesting statistics.”
Emma
What happened to the girls from the Movie Star Cafe?
Next time, or if you do meet her, you ask Fiona MacTaggart that.
I give simple advice about anything, “is it true?” and in the case of UK strategic policing, the simple answer is no.
We were doing just fine in Ireland until the British malady of fraud and dishonesty infected us. I don’t need or want the kind of help that is or was on offer in Sheffield or from Jacqui Smith.
With more than 500 aboriginal women missing, action is overdue …3 Sep 2009 … More than one third of aboriginal people in Canada have, in government jargon … the stories of many murdered and missing aboriginal women. …
http://www.theglobeandmail.com
Do you the labour govt. would have picked Al Hutchinson (ex-RCMP) as Police Ombudsman if he was going to help me track down missing females?
Emma, if it isn’t kosher, we don’t need it. The truth has to be good enough.
As for slaving over a red hot calculator, I think we need look no further than the 6,000 sex slaves in Scotland, or the 25,000 etc.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Emma Boyd - Autograph ABP said...
28 Oct 09 at 5:58 pm
Sorry Gregory but the points you are trying to make are all over the place that I can’t keep up. Must be because I’m not an academic!
In the case of Canada however I do know a thing or two seeing as I am Canadian and worked with many First Nation (not aboriginal that is derogatory in fact as a term) people and know quite a bit about the social deprivation they face and why women go missing but that is not the debate we are having here. Happy to discuss on a more appropriate blog one day though.
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 6:19 pm
Emma
I co-lead the HRSDC campaign in Canada with Ben Perrin, I was also asked to look into the death of permit recipients by their next of kin.
At times, the exotic dancer industry and abolitionists co-released publicity material.
at the time that was simply unheard of, and to this day, is remains without precedent. Canada was about ‘the truth’ and it was in the interests of fair people to pursue it.
The strategic policing agency connected to Uk govt. policy, the UKHTC, is up to its roof (or post office box), in fraud, misconduct and improbity.
I am surprised, why Eaves/Poppy have as yet to go on record accusing the UKHTC of fraud. The issue we have is about legitimacy, Poppy/Eaves set themselves up as spokespeople – & so they should speak.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, Ireland
Randy said...
28 Oct 09 at 8:15 pm
@Emma
” first I would like to say that Randy….I find your comment ‘It’s not just these sex-trafficking statistics that are phony. The same is true for the statistics concerning rape, domestic violence, immigration, sex-assault.’ You should be ashamed of yourself!”
I’m not ashamed at all. I’ve looked at the evidence. Do you accept *all* the statistics coming out of government and government funded victim groups? It sounds like you do.
“When are you people going to realise that not everything in life is black and white and that trafficking is part of organised crime in most cases which is secretive, highly specialised and powerful.”
I suppose you’ll be telling us next that the UK is infested with devil-worshipping Statanic abusers.
“Instead of focusing on Soho and the lack of evidence from government and NGO statistics why is no one acknowledging that sex trafficking exists behind closed doors, in rural areas, in suburbia, next door to you…..this is why its also called sexual slavery.”
Well, that might be true.
But where’s YOUR evidence?
Oh look, you answered your own question …
“‘Every few years, some big study tries to find instances of human trafficking and fails to find them in any significant number.”
But this *EVIDENCE* did not satisfy you, did it? So maybe I should say to you, “You should be ashamed of yourself.”
It seems like the only evidence you want to hear is the evidence that supports your own *unfounded* beliefs
Anyway. For the record, since you obviously did not understand what I was saying, I’ll make it easy for you, by giving you an example.
I have no idea how many women are raped in the UK every year. There might be ten million for all I know. But,
1. The government research is bogus and highly prejudiced.
2. The evidence suggests very strongly that the vast majority of rape allegations made to the police are false.
Same goes for domestic violence.
As for the UN’s statistics, you must be joking, surely.
You probably do not appreciate that the UN is just a supra-government dept that is just as dependent on creating hysteria in order to generate funding as is, say, the NSPCC.
However, I cannot claim to know much about trafficking across the world. And I never made any comment on it.
But I know what the UN’s agenda appears to be … expansion and more power for itself.
Gregory Carlin said...
28 Oct 09 at 9:06 pm
“You probably do not appreciate that the UN is just a supra-government dept that is just as dependent on creating hysteria in order to generate funding as is, say, the NSPCC.”
That is a big ‘as is’.
Within a few years it could be half a billion dollars, and what do they do?
It is Britain, and so they’re not going to tell anybody. The Victoria Climbié school of fundraising.
‘NSPCC accused of cover-up after Climbie murder – Telegraph 26 Jan 2002 … THE NSPCC doctored files on Victoria Climbie’
The truth has to be good enough.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, N. Ireland
‘The NSPCC works hard every day to raise funds to help stop cruelty to children. Last year alone, the NSPCC raised £128 million through fundraising activities across the country. In order to achieve this, we sometimes need to talk to people on a one-to-one basis’
Gregory Carlin said...
29 Oct 09 at 3:14 am
Dear Blog
I have just asked Poppy to help us with a perverting the course of justice issue. We have another dubious trial, to rectify.
Best wishes
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Gregory Carlin said...
29 Oct 09 at 4:58 am
“Since 2003, the FBI has rescued 886 child victims of sex traffickers and secured 510 convictions. According to the Bureau of Justice Assistance, the US is a trafficking destination for victims from other countries but “many US citizens are trafficked, usually run-away teenage girls, who are preyed on by pimps and trafficked for prostitution”. ”
CEOP is closer to the ‘not a single’ category.
“Just about everything went wrong with this operation, which is hardly surprising given that it was conducted under intense media scrutiny.”
It was a reality Tv product, of course there were media problems,
the police invited them to make a film, and the raid (and rescue) delayed etc. It was ‘a media product’.
The ‘actresses’ were taken to the cells. That’s the world of spin over substance.
The Brits if they can’t find a celebrity expert, will make a reality Tv show.
Maybe, there’s a job for Jordan at the Ministry of Justice, sort of a model Minister.
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, BT118NX
Gregory Carlin said...
29 Oct 09 at 5:28 am
“Why are Poppy working with people making soft porn reality TV rescue films?”
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/joan-smith/joan-smith-make-no-mistake-sex-trafficking-is-real-1810939.html
I want that Poppy/UKHTC thing to stay out of my country. .
By the way, the European convention has a privacy clause, and it is illegal to film the alleged victims of sexual offences.
Keep it in Sheffield or Leeds, disgrace your own country do not disgrace any part of Ireland.
Speaking as an abolitionist
Gregory Carlin, IATC, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Julie Bindel said...
30 Oct 09 at 1:59 am
Dear Pro-prostitution people
You must be delighted to have the wild misogynists AND Gregory as your new (ish) friends.
Enjoy,
Julie
Emma Boyd said...
30 Oct 09 at 2:20 am
Thanks Julie – I had left this blog…but you just brought me back ( for this time only)
For all you misogynists out there oh and Gregory and Randy of course – while this deviates from the trafficking discussion some what (clearly that has already happened here) read this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/oct/28/prostitution-rehabilitation-social-exclusion
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 2:31 am
Julie Bindel said…
30 Oct 09 at 1:59 am
“Dear Pro-prostitution people
You must be delighted to have the wild misogynists AND Gregory as your new (ish) friends.
Enjoy,
Julie”
Dear Julie
I am an abolitionist, I organized and lead the first real sex trafficking raids in the UK.
I have nothing to prove.
Gregory
Julie Bindel said...
30 Oct 09 at 2:37 am
Hi Emma, can you contact me please? [Email removed by Blog Owner]
I am not inviting anyone else to do the same, for the record.
Gregory, my advice to you would be to leave it. You absolutely did not lead any anti-trafficking raids.
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 2:45 am
“For all you misogynists out there oh and Gregory and Randy of course”
Emma
I am not a group thinker, though I am a conservative.
Eaves/Poppy are up to their ears in unhelpful things, the UKHTC are useless and a waste of money. It is about honesty, isn’t it? I am trying to project candour, and that is what we need.
Eaves/Poppy are not the Ministry of Abolition, and their corrupt labour friends are going to be buried at the next election.
There will be changes.
Gregory
Charlotte Gore said...
30 Oct 09 at 2:46 am
Julie, are you happy for that email address to remain here indefinitely? I can edit it out once Emma’s in touch with you if you’d prefer.
Emma Boyd said...
30 Oct 09 at 2:58 am
Happy to contact you Julie –
Gregory get some sleep. Conservative…no way really!
Good night folks
Emma
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 3:20 am
“Gregory, my advice to you would be to leave it. You absolutely did not lead any anti-trafficking raids.”
Julie
Why did you phone me for help with your lap-dancing project? The only thing I was doing was police raids, I simply didn’t do anything else.
As far as I am aware I helped to organize the first major raids in Europe.
That not withstanding, I definitely organized the first raids in the UK and I was invited to assist by the Home Office.
( you may be able to get the intel files or emails via FOI, go ask Fiona MacTaggart, she was trying to block investigations into a major sex trafficking network, the one connected to Le Chic syndicate, le Chic were a global problem)
Sent: Wednesday, October 29, 2003 5:32 PM
Subject: RE: Re:HUGHES PRESS REL.
Garda say Le Chic raid breaks down as
follows:
5 Es tonian Nationals
3 Lithuanian
Nationals 1 Russian National 1 Hungarian National and
1 Nigerian National
TOTAL = 11
The first pro-feminist press statements by the UUP were also issued at my request, on behalf of Janice Raymond.
The UUP founded the state of Northern Ireland, the Reverend Martin Smyth MP playing a leading role in endorsing the CATW, & lobbying at Westminster.
In fact the UUP were the only political party to respond to the Paying the Price consultation, Esmond Birnie MLa and the Reverend Martin Smyth MP.
Then ( post-CATW positioning) we organized raids in Ireland. Janice also asked me to link Glasgow to Belfast on the back of the Andrea Dworkin article that was published in the Herald I think. A sister city campaign etc.
The labour party is getting buried at the next election, and hopefully things will improve.
Gregory
June 9, 2003
Lap Dancing Raids in the Republic of Ireland
PRESS RELEASE
Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW)
“Finally, we have some movement from the police and justice officials against the lap dancing clubs in the Republic of Ireland. These raids have implications for Northern Ireland, Scotland, the UK, other countries in Europe and countries across the globe.
We learn that most of the women in these clubs are from eastern Europe, Russia and the Ukraine. This is not surprising since the clubs are a front for prostitution, and the women are trafficked from countries in financial and political crisis.
Unfortunately, when police raid the clubs, it’s mostly the women who are visible and thus targeted. This unfortunate reality should give governments the incentive to pass anti-trafficking legislation, modeled on the new UN Protocol against trafficking, that provides assistance to trafficked women who have been exploited.
Raids are a good beginning, but much more needs to be done. The police and justice department must go after the real criminals, the traffickers, pimps and so-called entrepreneurs who make a business out of sexual exploitation. If women are to help the police in prosecuting these perpetrators, they must be given protection, resources and the ability to live lives free of prostitution. Organizations, such as the Ruhama Project in Dublin, who provide model services to women in prostitution should be funded also to expand their assistance to women trafficked from out of the country.
Ireland has a golden opportunity not just to initiate raids but to ensure that the traffickers will not be back in business next month or the month after. First, go after the real criminals. Do not punish the victims. No woman should be punished for her own exploitation.
Second, pass legislation outlawing lap dancing clubs. Don’t give licensing applications to these clubs. Lap dancing are brothels by another name. Lap dancing is sexual foreplay leading to the main event, which is sexual contact. This means that lap dancing is a part of the act of prostitution. Although clubs may plead that they do not engage in prostitution, they couldn’t survive financially if they were providing stage or tabletop dancing alone. Neither could the women!
Third, pass legislation in Ireland modeled on Sweden’s law penalizing the buyers of “sexual services.” Invite police, justice and gender equality spokespersons from Sweden to brief Irish officials. Legislation must get real and address the men who buy the women. Unless countries address the demand for prostitution, nothing will really change. There’s no supply without demand. The male demand for the sex of prostitution has been the most invisible aspect of the trafficking and prostitution chain.
Certain clubs emphasize that men watching women strip and gyrate is good “harmless fun” – a boy’s night out. Men don’t go the clubs simply to watch. They go to get as near to the women as possible. These clubs are about pushing the envelope of sexual exploitation. When will countries have the courage to do something about the demand?
We are seeing that the sex industry in many parts of the world is trafficking foreign women into all parts of the sex industry, including the strip clubs. Supply follows demand. The clubs have to provide the kind of “exotic” women men demand.
Fourth, stop issuing work permits for “exotic dancing.” Many strip clubs import women from abroad through “employment networks and contacts.” Foreign women are being trafficked into Ireland as part of this system of organized sexual exploitation and crime.
Finally, resist the call from self-interested parties to regulate these clubs. Regulation is toleration and legitimation. Where lap dancing is legally tolerated and accepted, this is state-sponsored prostitution. Just how is any city or country going to evaluate which clubs are “best practice” clubs? Will the Garda Siochana stand watch over the lap of the customer to see if he pulls down her g-string, or pulls his penis out? Will a monitor accompany every woman who is paid to grind her body over a paying customer? Not on your life, and not on his! What a chilling effect on the clientele that action would have!
The Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW) favors not the regulation of “best practice” strip and lap dancing clubs but the closing down of these establishments. Such activities are not and should not be legal. But let’s do it right, and implement anti-sex industry policy, legislation and programs to insure that the same and other forms of sexual exploitation will not rise from these ashes.
Commercial sexual entertainment is commercial sexual exploitation. Lap dancing clubs are an unacceptable form of entertainment that depends upon women’s inequality and the sexual objectification of women, where women are viewed and treated as sexual commodities for men’s pleasure. The international human rights community is watching what Ireland will do. Will Ireland officially promote sexual equality or sexual exploitation?”
Contact:
Dr. Janice Raymond
Co-Executive Director
Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW)
PO Box 9338
N. Amherst, MA 01059 USA
e-mail: jraymond@wost.umass.edu
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 3:23 am
> “Janice G. Raymond” wrote:
>
> Gregory,
>
> Here’s the press release. Please get it out through your various
> contacts.
>
> Janice G. Raymond, Ph.D
> Professor Emerita
> University of Massachusetts, Amherst (USA)
>
> Co-Executive Director
> Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW)
> PO Box 9338, N. Amherst, MA 01059 USA
> Fax: 413-367-9262
> E-mail: jraymond@wost.umass.edu
>
> Name: Lap dancing.doc
> Lap dancing.doc Type: Microsoft Word (application/msword)
> Encoding: BASE64
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 3:31 am
“Gregory, my advice to you would be to leave it.”
Julie
I am not leaving it, Eaves/Poppy are in cahoots with people who are abusing prostituted women.
Brothel raid sees 58 arrests | UK news | The Observer18 Apr 2004 … David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, yesterday defied criticism that the … Road in Sheffield and Winston’s Health Club in Dewsbury Road in Leeds. … Brothel raid sees 58 arrests. This article appeared on p3 of the News …
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2004/apr/18/immigration.ukcrime2 – Cached – Similar
BTW Susan Talbott worked considerable, for months on the intelligence re: the above brothels.
Primary Document on Czech Republic & Prostitution on National …13 May 2004 … For more information, contact Donna Hughes (University of Rhode Island), Lisa Thompson (Salvation Army ….. Susan Talbott, Redmond, WA, USA …
http://www.nationalreview.com/…/document200405131057.asp – Cached – Similar
The usual suspects.
Gregory
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 4:09 am
“Gregory get some sleep. Conservative…no way really! ”
By the standards of the parish, quite conservative.
We tried to be helpful. The UUP are in official alliance with the Tory party.
The UKHTC didn’t raid a single lap-dancing club in either P1 or P2, don’t you think that is strange?
Given the Canadian, Irish, Cypriot, Maltese precedents etc. What do you think Fiona MacTaggart was doing there?
I am not pigging at the public purse, I am not cheerleading for the UKHTC.
I have the same message today, as when I was doing publicity for the CATW, exactly the same.
Gregory
June 11, 2003
Issues of Lap Dancing and Trafficking Require Vigilance and Action from UK and European Partner
Press Statement from Rev Martin Smyth MP
Rev Martin Smyth MP has today given his reaction to a statement from Dr Janice Raymond, Co-Executive Director of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, which she has released in the wake of last week’s raids on lap-dancing clubs in the Republic. The South Belfast MP said:
“I welcome Janice Raymond’s statement. She and the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women have been tracking these issues involving lap-dancing, trafficking, and the exploitation of women internationally and therefore have a good grasp on not only the problems, but also on solutions. Dr Raymond’s suggestions on what can be done through legislation to impact upon this issue and tighten up on loopholes should be given the most serious consideration by government.”
“I particularly endorse Dr Raymond’s assertion that last week’s raids in the Republic also have implications for Northern Ireland, and the whole of the UK as well as the rest of Europe and the globe. While concerns may locally be highlighted by an individual lap-dancing club in a specific vicinity, the issue must be placed in a much wider context.”
“If girls have been brought in illegally for lap-dancing clubs in the Republic, there is no reason to believe that the UK is not similarly affected. Northern Ireland, with a border which is weak in the way of immigration control, is particularly vulnerable. The issue must therefore be tackled through a strong and proactive common approach across countries. Raids in one individual country on one particular day, welcome though they are, are not enough on their own to halt a problem which is driven by networks of organised criminal groups.”
“At its core this is a human rights issue which is about protecting those who have been exploited for the profit of others. I strongly believe that we in the West have a particular responsibility to those from less well off and developed countries, such as eastern Europe, to ensure that we do not stand back and allow those from our more wealthy society to take advantage of them.”
Gregory Carlin said...
30 Oct 09 at 6:50 pm
“Dear Joan
I have always admired your writing and appreciated and been provoked by your ideas. However I feel this article, like that about MPs expenses, is not worthy of you and any reputation you may want to have as a trusted source and commentator.”
Dear Pro-prostitution people
I think that contribution hit the nail on the head.
“The willlingness of women commentators to use their position to only promote the interest of their group of friends has been a terrible dis-serive to the wider community of women working on women’s issues and unlimately harmed their work because this limited and censoring focus on a small group has weakened women’s groups and networks from having a voice and their work recognised.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/joan-smith/joan-smith-make-no-mistake-sex-trafficking-is-real-1810939.html
The Eaves/Poppy is unquestionably the reverse image of pro-prostitution funding by PM Helen Clark in New Zealand
Eaves/Poppy’s as sole favored recipient is ( in my opinion) also comparable to the MPs expenses phenomena
The truth has to be good enough
Gregory Carlin
Irish Anti-Trafficking Coalition
Randy said...
31 Oct 09 at 4:53 am
@Bindel
“Dear Pro-prostitution people
You must be delighted to have the wild misogynists AND Gregory as your new (ish) friends.”
1. I do not approve of prostitution or lap dancing. Both of these things degrade and exploit men.
But I believe that men and women have the right to choose to do whatever they wish to do sexually speaking.
So, as usual, you got it wrong.
2. As for accusing those who disagree with your views of being misogynists; how truly pathetic you are.
3. Being a lesbian, you know precious little about the sexual relationships that men and women have with each other. Indeed, every active heterosexual man in the country will likely know far more about how women relate to men in the sexual sense than you will ever know.
You will NEVER be a man having a sexual relationship with a woman.
Get over it.
Julie Bindel said...
31 Oct 09 at 7:01 pm
Charlotte
Apologies for not replying to your message regarding my email address – I have only just noticed it. Would you mind removing it? Thanks and best wishes, Julie
Charlotte Gore said...
31 Oct 09 at 7:03 pm
No problem, done.
Gregory Carlin said...
31 Oct 09 at 7:08 pm
(For Poppy/Eaves & UKHTC watchers – we maintain an archive re: privacy violations, the prostituted women were targeted by outraged citizens in the 2003 incident)
(Leeds/PSNI) R v Dempsey and Chen
11. All such measures should respect the dignity and privacy of the trafficked person.
Esmond
A direction from Leeds re: PSNI. Trafficked and prostituted women are being used by NGOs and state agencies (PSNI, UKHTC, SOCA etc.) in the same way as PETA or PLAYBOY develops content. It was suggested we go back to July 2003 and prepare exhibits for the House of Lords re: the PSNI dragging prostituted women out in Derry for the Belfast Telegraph to photograph them. Local residents threatened the prostituted women in the same PSNI orchestrated incident. It was on the front page.
Gregory
and in the meantime …
21/07/2005
Amnesty International – feedback
AI have shown us a draft of their ’stop the trafficking’ of women campaign and want feedback. It involves images of women representing pieces of meat. Thank you everyone for comments so far
Please contact us to comment ido@object.org.uk
Gregory Carlin said...
31 Oct 09 at 7:24 pm
The ‘rescue’ associated with R v Dempsey and Chen was planned six weeks earlier (15 th April) in Paul Goggins MP office at the NIO,
Goggins proceeded to issue a prejudical press statement 28th May as if the PSNI had dashed to the rescue as soon as they heard about the sex slaves,
For the record, I regularly urged Poppy/Eaves to distance their org from state actors involved in privacy violations & reality TV policing events.
Best wishes
Gregory Carlin
Irish Anti-Trafficking Coaltion
From: Gregory Carlin
To: info@policeombudsman.org ; dhughes@uri.edu
Cc: lisa_thompson@usn.salvationarmy.org ; poppy@eaveshousing.co.uk ; info.poppy@eaveshousing.co.uk ; sasha ; londonfeminist@yahoo.co.uk ; Birnie, Esmond; rebecca.dudley@nihrc.org ; info@womensaid.org.uk
Sent: Thu May 28 20:40:31 2009
Subject: Urgent Complaint – Brothel Raid – Newry and Lisburn Road Belfast.
Mr. Al Hutchinson
Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland
New Cathedral Buildings
St Anne’s Square,
11 Church Street, Belfast
BT1 1PG
Complaint – Brothel Raid – Newry and Lisburn Road Belfast.
28th May 2009
Dear Mr. Hutchinson
I would like to lodge a complaint in relation to misconduct by the PSNI.
It is a violation of CEDAW, ICCPR and the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, and the United Nations Minimum Rules for the Administration of Juvenile Justice to exploit prostituted women via photography for public relations etc.
*********************
Media Centre
Goggins welcomes success against human traffickers
Thursday 28 May 2009
Security Minister and Chair of the Organised Crime Task Force, Paul Goggins MP, has congratulated those involved in today’s operation which has dismantled a Chinese organised crime gang involved in human trafficking.
The PSNI led Operation Sleek resulted in a number of properties searched and arrests made, with six victims of human trafficking rescued.
Paul Goggins said: “Human trafficking is a vile and wicked crime and I would like to congratulate all those officers involved in the PSNI led multi agency operation today. This has dismantled a Chinese organised crime gang involved in Human Trafficking in Northern Ireland.
“Six victims of human trafficking were rescued today in Northern Ireland and three people have been arrested. This is an encouraging result.”
“The victims will receive care and support to help them recover from their horrific ordeal and I am delighted that the arrangements we made earlier this year with Women’s Aid and the Migrant Helpline are now available for victims of human trafficking.”
Notes to editors
The Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking of Human Beings was ratified by the UK on 17 December 2008 and came into force on 1 April 2009.
The Convention requirements include the provision of safe and secure accommodation and services for victims of human trafficking during a minimum period of recovery and reflection of 30 days. In the UK this period of recovery and reflection will be 45 days.
Under a new package of support for victims of human trafficking announced in March by Paul Goggins, Women’s Aid Federation Northern Ireland will look after adult female victims of sexual trafficking recovered in Northern Ireland. Migrant Helpline will look after adult male victims of sexual trafficking and all victims of labour trafficking recovered in Northern Ireland. Any children recovered will be cared for under the requirements of the Children (NI) Order 1995.
maebella james said...
27 Nov 09 at 12:13 am
The goverment should tell the general public the truth about them pimping off working woman. I know full well through personal experiance about one of their busts in a well established Sheffield Sauna where they threatend the staff with prosecution if they didnt all declare the earnings made and go on the books and pay tax on the earnings for sex sales/massage ect. But the job discription had to be one of number of therapist type of lable eg aromatherapist beautician hair stylist ect. One lady there refused to be labled with such a lie and said fine if the goverment want to pimp off me then let my job discription say so i want to be listed honestly as a prostitute. Needless to say the said working lady was made to leave the establishment. The sauna is still open and is still using the cover as listed to get a percentage of these working girls earning to this day. Ask Harmen about that little cover up them
02: Nick Griffin, Sex Trafficking and All Women Shortlists « House of Comments said...
9 Dec 09 at 12:52 am
[...] number of blog posts this week, including Unity’s at Liberal Conspiracy and Dr Belinda Brooks Gordon’s guest post on Charlotte Gore’s blog, have taken the Home Office to task about their statistics on sex trafficking. Do the figures add [...]