Rethink Resources

First the encouraging news, that Joe Francis, creator of Girls Gone Wild, is facing serious, on-going legal trouble resulting in an arrest and another court appearance on tax evasion charges.

Also a report on the Ruth Ellis Center for LGBTQ youth in Michigan doing amazing community building work and concrete services.

In case you missed it from last week, a federally funded study on abstinence based sexual health programs found they don’t reduce sexual activity. And youth are no more or less likely to use condoms when they do have sex. Which in one way is encouraging because students hear so much mythology and disparaging comments about condom effectiveness; some were concerned that youth would use them less as a result. Sounds like youth are just tuning out of the program’s message entirely.

I’m always intrigued to see how the media portrays youth and the sex trade. This week two news items caught my eye as representations of what’s considered to be usual or unusual. The first I saw talked about how teens were lured to having sex for money through need from being homeless on the street or through deception by adults posing as modeling agents. This is considered usual for teens, in the sense that it’s a common way for teens to get involved - a narrative that has become routine.

And while it’s true that some youth do get involved this way, it never addresses all the youth who live at home while having sex for money or who never have to leave their own block to get involved. I think sometimes it’s more about where people chose to look and it’s safer to think of it as not something that people outside your family or home neighborhood would be involved in.

The second news item talks about a mom who prostituted her teen daughter to pay for drugs. If you look quickly to some of the past news links, you’ll see that in just a matter of a couple months I’ve already posted reports of parents pimping out their kids. It’s actually one of the consistent ways that law enforcement trips up on youth involvement in the sex trade. And yet, the story is always portrayed as more shocking, more unusual. Journalists or law enforcement (when interviewed) are not linking together the evidence to show that it’s not so completely out of the ordinary in the world of the sex trade. Just hearing about it is.

Prostitution lures the desperate (Boston) Sunday, April 15, 2007 Experts believe that within 48 hours of leaving home, a teen runaway will be in danger of being lured into prostitution, either in exchange for necessities or by pimps posing as modeling scouts.

Mother admits abuse of teen (Mississippi) Saturday, April 14, 2007 After being arrested on a drug charge, a Silver Creek woman admitted that she had been prostituting her teen daughter in exchange for crack cocaine, an investigator with the Lawrence County Sheriff’s Department said Friday.

Study: Abstinence classes don’t stop sex (National) Friday, April 13, 2007 Students who participated in programs to discourage sex before marriage didn’t hold off any longer than peers who didn’t participate in such programs, finds a long term study authorized by Congress.

Helping LGBT homeless youth find their way (Michigan) Friday, April 13, 2007 For Redd, the Ruth Ellis Center was a rainbow in a window beckoning, and his life hasn’t been the same since. Redd’s family wouldn’t accept her as a boy, it was a difficult coming out. “They wouldn’t really say anything, it was just their attitude,” he said. “They would prefer not to have me around so they won’t have to say nothing. (The Ruth Ellis Center) is something I can do that I can’t do with family.”

‘Girls Gone Wild’ Guy Indicted for Tax Evasion (Nevada) Thursday April 12, 2007 Joe Francis, the creator of the video series “Girls Gone Wild,” has been indicted for federal tax evasion for deducting more than $20 million in false business expenses….(in addition) Francis was arrested on a federal arrest warrant executed by U.S. marshals as he arrived in Panama City, Fla….on criminal contempt of court charges.