Human Trafficking Awareness month

In the Booth with Ruth – Nicole Rowe, Feminist, Anti Sex-Trade Activist and Co-Founder of Nordic Model Advocates (NorMAs)

“A woman that is under psychological pressure from a pimp, boyfriend or other coercer to continue selling sex needs to hear that there is another way and have someone believe in her that she can make it happen,” says Nicole Rowe, a UK feminist and co-founder of Nordic Model Advocates (NorMAs), an organisation that tackles “the foundation that holds trafficking up – prostitution.”

Ruth Jacobs's avatarRuth Jacobs

Nicole Rowe

How did you become involved in supporting the abolition of prostitution?

As a feminist activist, you have to be wilfully blind to ignore the sex trade. I was planning a one-off activist stunt around sex trafficking at a UK activist training event, and was fortunate that those I met were passionate and dedicated enough to want to form an organisation with me to tackle the foundation that holds trafficking up – prostitution. If we lived in a world where women’s bodies were not for sale, then sex traffickers would not be able to operate. So, the best place to start alleviating the problem of trafficking is with prostitution.

What draws you to support and advocate for people in prostitution?

Largely, the lack of people doing so, and my outrage at that. Put simply, we live under a capitalist, patriarchal system, which means profit comes before people. For those at the receiving end…

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Michelle Carmela, Child Trafficking Survivor, Anti-Human Trafficking Activist and Advocate, Founder and CEO of Once Upon An Eden

Born into a Mafia family and enduring a childhood of extreme abuse, child trafficking survivor, Michelle Carmela, shares her story. Now an anti-human trafficking activist and advocate, and the founder and CEO of Once Upon An Eden, she dedicates her life to helping others who have suffered as she did.

Ruth Jacobs's avatarRuth Jacobs

Michelle Carmela

How did you become involved in the movement against human trafficking? 

I am a survivor of incest, child rape, child labor and child prostitution, as well as extreme child abuse. I was also born and raised in a Mafia family. I grew up in the United States. America, like every other country, is a great country, and like every other country, also has citizens that suffer greatly at the whims of others, thus having their rights violated.

After a forty-one year history with human exploitation and sharing my story with the public for the past twenty-six years, I am thankful people are listening and the awareness is greater than ever before, but honestly, as ungrateful as this may seem, the terms ‘human trafficking’ and the other terms that have become politically correct, irk me to no end. I have said it for many years and will continue to say…

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In the Booth with Ruth – Winnie Small, Radical Feminist/Abolitionist and Ally to Victims of Sex Trafficking & Sexual Exploitation

Winnie Small, a radical feminist, abolitionist, and ally to victims of sex trafficking and sexual exploitation gives an in depth interview for Human Trafficking Awareness Month. In it, she explains how pornography plays into other forms of prostitution, the affect the internet has had on this, how, within a capitalist patriarchy, ‘choice’ and ‘freedom’ don’t always mean choice and freedom for women, particularly indigenous women and women of colour, and she discusses the Nordic model, and the current law, which she describes as offering no reasonable assurance of protection “where money and men’s boners collide.”

Ruth Jacobs's avatarRuth Jacobs

Winnie SmallHow did you become involved in supporting the abolition of prostitution?

I must admit my opposition to pornstitution was largely academic at first, not felt in my gut to be wrong until I read anti-pornography/anti-prostitution feminist books, especially radical feminist books, like Gloria Steinem’s Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics, Joan Smith’s Misogynies – I read all these at twelve years old. Another book I read at the same age, Patrick Roscoe’s Birthmarks, is a collection of semi-autobiographical stories about prostitution, child sexual abuse, homelessness, trauma re-enactment, and so on – that is what really hit me in the gut/tear ducts. Before that, I was pro-porn, from about eight to twelve, consuming romance novels (from garage sales and the library) and porn – first sneaking looks at my dad’s friends’ porn, then seeking out mostly televised pornography on pay per view channels (we had a descrambler). I…

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