This initiative should have been taken long time ago...
Sex tourism crackdown targets brothels and underage prostitutes
Kirrily Schwarz
August 4, 2016
SEX TOURISM is more prolific than you think.
And although prostitution is technically illegal in Thailand, the nation has more than 123,000 sex workers, who contribute up to 10 per cent of the country’s GDP.
Hundreds of thousands of Australians crowd into the steamy streets each year, and while some prefer the beach or the buzzing nightclubs, others make a beeline for Thailand’s dark underbelly. They seek out the neighbourhoods where women are bought and sold like meat, where even their most sordid sexual desires can be satisfied if the price is right.
However, that could all be about to change.
‘SEX CAPITAL OF THE WORLD’
Damien May has been living in Thailand for five years. Originally a plumber from central Queensland, he now spends his days rescuing underage sex workers.
“There’s no text book for a rescue, and a lot of it’s trial and error,” he said. “We found posing as a customer, as a paedophile, was the best way to get in and start building a relationship with the girls.”
He says it’s critical to earn their trust before offering them a way out.
He works as the International Rescue Manager at Destiny Rescue, an Australian charity that specialises in saving children from human trafficking and sexual exploitation. It operates in five countries across Asia, and has rescued an estimated 1400 children since 2011.
Based in Chiang Mai, most of his work is done in southeast Asia’s Golden Triangle.
“A lot of the kids come from hill tribes,” he said. “Most of them have no identification. They’re stateless. They have no way of making an income.”
He says a lot of them go to cities looking for work, and have no idea what they’re getting into.
“They’re told they’ll work at a restaurant, and serve drinks, but a lot of them get raped,” he said, adding that most feel compelled to stay so they can send money home.
“They take a bullet, so to speak, for the family.”
Once Damien and his team establish a connection, they offer a rehabilitation program — teaching children skills, and helping them find legitimate jobs. They also work with a range of authorities, including the Australian Federal Police, to help put the paedophiles behind bars.
“We’ve done a lot in five years,” he said.
Destiny Rescue is also making progress in other parts of the country.
“Pattaya is the sex capital of the world,” he said. “But we’re seeing a huge drop in underage workers because of what we do. People don’t want to hire them, and we actually struggle to find them now, in Bangkok and Pattaya. That’s good, that’s really good.”
‘WE WANT THE SEX INDUSTRY GONE’
It’s not just underage workers who are being removed. A recent government crackdown, led by Thailand’s first female tourism minister, has seen late-night raids and mass arrests across a large number of brothels and clubs in the resort city of Pattaya — and she’s not stopping there. She wants to shut it down all together, meaning ladyboys, go-go dancers and Thailand’s infamous ping-pong shows could become relics of the past.
“We want Thailand to be about quality tourism,” she said recently. “We want the sex industry gone.”
Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul was educated in the United States, and she’s a successful businesswoman in her own right. She wants rich holiday-makers to visit Thailand for its culture and beauty, not its seedy red light districts.
With that in mind, she declared August to be “women traveller’s month”. Ostensibly, it’s about splashing the airports in pink, adding female-only immigration queues and parking spaces. Realistically, it’s about diversifying the pool of tourists, and attracting travellers more likely to hit the beach or sample the local food than indulge in sex tourism.
‘THE MILITARY SEXUAL COMPLEX’
However, a clampdown could devastate the economy, which is still reeling from a massive recession in 2014. Some prostitutes make 5000 Baht (A$189) in a single night, which is sixteen times the minimum wage, and many send their income to relatives in rural parts of the country. If the industry is dissolved, thousands could find themselves out of work.
However, some researchers suggest sex tourism is an entrenched part of Thai society, and that it links all the way back to the Korean and Vietnam wars. Manpavan Kaur, a research analyst at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, calls it the “military sexual complex”.
“Military personnel stationed in Korea and Vietnam frequented the cities of the Philippines and Thailand,” she wrote for the charity Safe World For Women. “Impoverished local women migrated to these cities to offer sexual services to these servicemen.”
She said although military presence decreased with the end of the wars, sex businesses continued to grow. They capitalised on the tourist boom of the 1970s, which continues today.
Therefore, try as it might to shut down brothels, end ping-pong shows and lock up ladyboys, Thailand’s government could be fighting an impossible battle.
“The sex industry will always be there, it will just go further underground,” said Damien. “But the laws are there. It’s just a matter of getting the right people to uphold them.”
Sex tourism crackdown targets brothels and underage prostitutes
Kirrily Schwarz
SEX TOURISM is more prolific than you think.
And although prostitution is technically illegal in Thailand, the nation has more than 123,000 sex workers, who contribute up to 10 per cent of the country’s GDP.
Hundreds of thousands of Australians crowd into the steamy streets each year, and while some prefer the beach or the buzzing nightclubs, others make a beeline for Thailand’s dark underbelly. They seek out the neighbourhoods where women are bought and sold like meat, where even their most sordid sexual desires can be satisfied if the price is right.
However, that could all be about to change.
‘SEX CAPITAL OF THE WORLD’
Damien May has been living in Thailand for five years. Originally a plumber from central Queensland, he now spends his days rescuing underage sex workers.
“There’s no text book for a rescue, and a lot of it’s trial and error,” he said. “We found posing as a customer, as a paedophile, was the best way to get in and start building a relationship with the girls.”
He says it’s critical to earn their trust before offering them a way out.
He works as the International Rescue Manager at Destiny Rescue, an Australian charity that specialises in saving children from human trafficking and sexual exploitation. It operates in five countries across Asia, and has rescued an estimated 1400 children since 2011.
Based in Chiang Mai, most of his work is done in southeast Asia’s Golden Triangle.
“A lot of the kids come from hill tribes,” he said. “Most of them have no identification. They’re stateless. They have no way of making an income.”
He says a lot of them go to cities looking for work, and have no idea what they’re getting into.
“They’re told they’ll work at a restaurant, and serve drinks, but a lot of them get raped,” he said, adding that most feel compelled to stay so they can send money home.
“They take a bullet, so to speak, for the family.”
Once Damien and his team establish a connection, they offer a rehabilitation program — teaching children skills, and helping them find legitimate jobs. They also work with a range of authorities, including the Australian Federal Police, to help put the paedophiles behind bars.
“We’ve done a lot in five years,” he said.
Destiny Rescue is also making progress in other parts of the country.
“Pattaya is the sex capital of the world,” he said. “But we’re seeing a huge drop in underage workers because of what we do. People don’t want to hire them, and we actually struggle to find them now, in Bangkok and Pattaya. That’s good, that’s really good.”
‘WE WANT THE SEX INDUSTRY GONE’
It’s not just underage workers who are being removed. A recent government crackdown, led by Thailand’s first female tourism minister, has seen late-night raids and mass arrests across a large number of brothels and clubs in the resort city of Pattaya — and she’s not stopping there. She wants to shut it down all together, meaning ladyboys, go-go dancers and Thailand’s infamous ping-pong shows could become relics of the past.
“We want Thailand to be about quality tourism,” she said recently. “We want the sex industry gone.”
Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul was educated in the United States, and she’s a successful businesswoman in her own right. She wants rich holiday-makers to visit Thailand for its culture and beauty, not its seedy red light districts.
With that in mind, she declared August to be “women traveller’s month”. Ostensibly, it’s about splashing the airports in pink, adding female-only immigration queues and parking spaces. Realistically, it’s about diversifying the pool of tourists, and attracting travellers more likely to hit the beach or sample the local food than indulge in sex tourism.
‘THE MILITARY SEXUAL COMPLEX’
However, a clampdown could devastate the economy, which is still reeling from a massive recession in 2014. Some prostitutes make 5000 Baht (A$189) in a single night, which is sixteen times the minimum wage, and many send their income to relatives in rural parts of the country. If the industry is dissolved, thousands could find themselves out of work.
However, some researchers suggest sex tourism is an entrenched part of Thai society, and that it links all the way back to the Korean and Vietnam wars. Manpavan Kaur, a research analyst at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, calls it the “military sexual complex”.
“Military personnel stationed in Korea and Vietnam frequented the cities of the Philippines and Thailand,” she wrote for the charity Safe World For Women. “Impoverished local women migrated to these cities to offer sexual services to these servicemen.”
She said although military presence decreased with the end of the wars, sex businesses continued to grow. They capitalised on the tourist boom of the 1970s, which continues today.
Therefore, try as it might to shut down brothels, end ping-pong shows and lock up ladyboys, Thailand’s government could be fighting an impossible battle.
“The sex industry will always be there, it will just go further underground,” said Damien. “But the laws are there. It’s just a matter of getting the right people to uphold them.”
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