The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls met with European politicians last week but reportedly encountered resistance over her opposition to the idea of prostitution and pornography being considered normal work. The visit to Strasbourg, France, was hosted by the European Centre for Law and Justice (ECLJ), a Christian legal rights non-governmental organization.
Reem Alsalem, from Jordan, who has served as UN Special Rapporteur since 2021, was interviewed during her visit by Grégor Puppinck, ECLJ director, about her report, “Prostitution and Violence Against Women and Girls,” published last July, as reported by Christian Daily International. [Watch the full interview here.]
In Strasbourg, she met with representatives and political groups of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), judges of the European Court of Human Rights, and diplomats of the Council of Europe.
However, Alsalem’s visit did not receive approval from everyone, according to an ECLJ statement.
“For the ECLJ, it is a great success because we could help her to meet with the very politicians who rejected or approved the motion for a resolution to liberalize prostitution across Europe that we told you about a few months ago,” the ECLJ statement read. “The rejection of that motion was a victory, and the UN Special Rapporteur could elaborate on the dangers of prostitution with the Council of Europe’s bodies and groups.
“Of course, such a visit of that specific UN Special Rapporteur displeased many officials of the Council of Europe, especially the PACE president, who objected to a side-event with her. Even with her UN passport, she had difficulties entering the Palais of the Council of Europe.
“Nevertheless, she had all the meetings she booked and that did not prevent her from spreading the word: prostitution is not work.”
In her original report, Alsalem refuted the idea that prostitution and pornography constitute normal work, asserting that such practices are tantamount to human trafficking. She argued that the term “sex worker” masks a system of exploitation affecting both girls and women.
During the interview with ECLJ, Alsalem explained how the push to normalize prostitution as “normal work” does not align with data showing a clear criminalistic trend of exploitation for women and children selling their bodies both in person and online through pornography. She believes that states need to awaken to the harsh reality suffered by victims of prostitution.
“In my report I demonstrated that prostitution is a system of exploitation and violence against women and girls. It is very gendered. It predominantly affects females and it is perpetrated by males,” she says, explaining that pornography operates in the “same modus operandi” as prostitution. Porn is essentially “filmed prostitution,” she states.
Alsalem says porn involves “the same perpetrators of violence, the same exploitation, the same consequences” as prostitution. She says women and girls are similarly exploited by pimps in porn, and pornography contradicts the notion of gender equality in society.
“We cannot ever pretend that we will achieve a society where there is equality between men and women if we normalize that men can buy women’s bodies or children,” says Alsalem, “that we commodify women and girls, that everything can be bought and sold.
“Also because it hypersexualizes the younger generation, particularly girls, and it is giving them the message that the best environment for them to thrive is an environment where they can be sexualized, and this is the best avenue for them to prosper, to make money, and be appreciated; if they sell sexual services, if they sell their bodies. It goes without saying that this is incredibly dangerous and harmful, and goes against countries’ human rights obligations and business human rights obligations towards women and girls.”
'An epidemic in global proportions'
Calling pornography an “epidemic in global proportions,” Alsalem laments the normalizing of pornography and says the average person does not understand how violence has developed in pornography.
“Of course, consumers know this but I still believe that the majority of well-meaning people in society may not understand that the violence it incites, the grotesque, degrading treatment is actually the majority of what we see. They also, I think, believe wrongly, that there are age verifications in place.”
Governments “play the card” in wanting to protect freedom of speech, thought and expression, according to Alsalem. However, they do not see such a link, despite the evidence, of pornography feeding into “violence in real life” and hence the issue does not feed back into policymaking by nation states.
Alsalem points out that these depictions of violence have affected increase rates of rape with teenagers. Younger people utilize social media channels as “gateways” to sites such as PornHub and Only Fans: “So we see the increasing violence within society, sexual violence, but we don’t always make the connection with pornography.”
Even with increased awareness, and the damning effect on children, society “is even not capable or willing to do anything” and that includes politicians who speak about regulating pornography, such as better age verification, “but they don’t do anything.”
Alsalem explains that a “huge web of people, organizations and states” benefit from the exploitation of women including countries that host the headquarters of large websites making “an enormous amount of money” and related businesses. Tourism and banking in particular can thrive “around the business of exploitation including criminal activities.”
The UN expert cites examples of this criminality as human trafficking, money laundering and drug trafficking—all criminal activities benefting from “physical and online exploitation.”
Alsalem wants the Nordic Model, which sees the client not the prostitute as needing to be subject to criminal investigation, as a solution. But challenges remain as to how this can be applied to online pornography, and how to disrupt the supply chain based on porn consumers financing the exploitation of women and children "participating actively, whether they like it or not.”
“I don’t think actually countries that have the Nordic Model even think about it this way, but I would encourage them to do that, which is to also think of the consumer of pornography as a buyer of sexual acts. So think of him as a buyer of sexual acts, that means he has to be criminalized.”
Alsalem explains further how bank credit cards boost profits via online sites such as PornHub. She says that states impose stricter age verification requirements on PornHub with a telling reaction, “and I think this is indicative of how profitable this is, PornHub actually chose to retreat from those states that enforced age verification.”
States must move to binding regulations, according to Alsalem, who has shared this message with the European Parliament. At the moment, policing of the issue depends too much on “goodwill” of the online porn providers, “enticing them to play nice.”
Alsalem has been pleased that her report for the UN was well received by most states, although “of course there were countries that weren’t happy.”
'I was overwhelmed by the evidence'
The term “pimping states,” defining those nations consciously benefiting from the exploitation of women and children, caused a particular reaction. Yet the phrase came from a prostitution victim, not Alsalem herself. She actually had no preconceived notion whatsoever of the effect of selling sex. Her conclusions about exploitation, she explains, derived solely from her analytical studies of the issue: “I was overwhelmed by the evidence.”
Alsalem warns of “certain groups, lobby groups, businesses” pushing for the normalization of prostitution because they have a hidden agenda to make a financial profit. She says that persuasive sound bites purport that setting up women as legalized prostitutes provides them with a proper salary, lowers exposure to violence and gives them benefits such as social security and health care.
However, the factual data does not support such lobbyist claims: “They sound nice but the reality is different,” says Alsalem. She agrees that prostituted women should not be criminalized but wants to develop advocacy by treating them as victims of gross human rights violations.
This does not mean a passive stance, she emphasizes, but gives a legal status because victims are afforded “assistance, protection and reparations.” A key part of this redress would be for policymakers to listen to prostitution victims and be informed by their experiences. There is a need to listen to organizations working with women and child victims too, to avoid getting a “one-sided view that everything is fine” when exploitation bubbles underneath the surface.
“The problem right now is that in many policymaking platforms, there are very selected voices that are allowed to speak, and so it doesn’t bring in the diversity of voices, particularly the victims. So those representing, I hate to say, but they could be representing pimps. They could be representing businesses that get a lot of interest and money. They have the access to these policymakers.”
Alsalem compares the financial power of lobbyists with money to enlist the help of consultants, for campaigning, “to create NGOs, to hire people”, to get ambassadors to speak at the Council of Europe — to a typical lonesome “poor victim from Afrcia, who is trafficked in Europe” with no such financial prowess or political influence to help voice her suffering and the human rights violations and realities experienced as a prostitute.
Alsalem is glad that efforts by the Council of Europe in Strasbourg to legalize prostitution as normal work failed, following a case at the European Court of Human Rights. Yet she laments that such exploitation is supported by some state actors.
'A coordinated effort to push for recognition of a human right to sex work'
“What we can see is that at every level before many institutions, there is a coordinated effort to push for recognition of a human right to sex work, to prostitution through the human rights system.”
Alsalem points out that prostitution including pornography is causing “very serious realities" on a daily basis for these women and children, who remain largely invisible in wider society.
“My purpose [in the UN report] was to make it clear that prostitution results in grave human rights consequences, particularly for the victim: economic violence, physical violence, psychological violence. I’ve listed them in detail and there needs to be more awareness of that, that it results in multiple, long lasting, devastating human rights consequences.
“Therefore by framing the consequences as harmful and as crimes against humanity, they can rise in many instances to being inhuman, degrading treatment. They can even be torture. They can amount to enslavement.”
Alsalem says that countries where religion is important actually tend to “do something harmful when it comes to prostitution” such as criminalizing prostitution victims rather than helping them: “They don’t care enough about helping the victim.” She points out that prostitutes are jailed by such nations, risking further exploitation or deportation while the sex buyers “get away with it.”
The UN Special Rapporteur is now calling for direct action by states to stop prostitution, namely “the purchase and sale of women.”
“It’s very important to show these states that these are very serious human rights violations and they go against your obligations as states and you have a duty therefore to prevent them. So it takes the conversation out from prostitution being presented as a harmless business that allows people to find a way to make ends meet to something that is actually a human rights emergency, and that requires it to be prioritized.”
