Rethink Resources

Early on when I first got involved working with organizations about prostitution some 17 years ago I was taught that one of the roles of someone who cared about youth involved in the sex trade was to uncover when someone was lying about their experience.

Mostly this meant not that I would doubt that they had been involved but that I would question their explanation of it. The idea was that youth routinely minimized their experience, didn’t really understand what was happening to them and that they would always protect an abuser.

I think this philosophy stems from a lot of places. Social workers learn about key narratives and either expect youth to fall into one of those categories or need youth to fit into their sense of the world. And through adult privilege, adults are used to speaking and deciding for youth. If youth appear to have different opinions about their well being, that can be erased through psychiatric labels, criminal labels or just not listening at all.

Even when held with the kindest intentions I believe it’s one of the most harmful messages that youth workers receive: that youth in the sex trade are likely to lie about their lives out of a lack of understanding about their own experience or to protect an exploitative or abusive person.

Youth are the experts of their own lives. If a youth is telling you something that is quantifiably untrue, it might be a lot more about what you can hear or what they think you can hear than what they actually believe about the situation. Or what’s even possible to say at that time.

Any effective youth worker who works with youth in the sex trade needs to be willing to sit with complexity, live with more questions than answers, and hear the unthinkable. And I don’t necessarily mean the horrific with the idea of the unthinkable. And you can hear without words or clear explanations because people tell us plenty without speaking.

But start with this idea. Youth tell the truth about their lives. Be open, listen and make that clear to youth with every part of you and youth will tell you far more than you ever imagined.