A spokeswoman for one of the NGOs promoting a new campaign lobbying for the introduction of legislation to end prostitution, sex-trafficking and the exploitation of those trapped in the sex industry, has said Ireland’s religious have a role to play in awareness-raising.
Gerardine Rowley told ciNews that religious, and specifically, returned missionaries, have a role to play in the provision of education and skills to help provide women trapped in prostitution with an exit strategy.
Turn Off The Red Light is an initiative of a number of civil society organisations as well as NGOs including Ruhama, which was founded in 1989 by the Good Shepherd Sisters and Our Lady of Charity Sisters.
Ruhama CEO, Gerardine Rowley told ciNews that one of the central aims of the new campaign is to combat sex trafficking and prostitution through the criminalisation of the purchase of sex, modelled on legislation introduced in recent years in Sweden.
She said the campaign is also calling for the criminalising of pimping, procuring and trafficking of people for sexual exploitation.
“Most of the women are involved in off-street prostitution and the majority are being controlled by a third party. It is a very lucrative, sophisticated, highly organised business.
The majority of the sex trade is being run by organised criminal gangs,” she explained.
She said Ruhama and other organisations involved in the Turn Off The Red Light alliance are seeking the legislation because “over the last decade we have seen an increasing normalisation of the sex trade here and there is peer pressure on young men to use brothels for stag parties and other entertainment.”
She cautioned, “The reality is that most women involved in prostitution would not be there today if they had other alternatives or choices.”
The Ruhama spokeswoman explained, “We know from our experience of working with women in prostitution that there is no point in criminalising those who are selling because most women in prostitution are already quite stigmatised and marginalised and it only further stigmatises them.”
She added that what Sweden did, and what they are seeking for Ireland, is an investment of resources in services that help those who want to exit the sex industry and find an alternatives.
“When Sweden introduced the law they did a lot of awareness-raising around the issue. The law isn’t just used to prosecute and criminalise people; it is also used to educate people. Now 70 per cent of the population in Sweden back the legislation. It changed people’s perceptions and beliefs and instead of seeing it as an entertainment or a social outlet for men, they see it as a violence to another person and harmful to treat another person as a commodity,” Gerardine Rowley said.
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