Child Trafficking in Georgia

Abstract

According to the Center for Public Policy Studies, each month 12,400 men in Georgia pay for sex with a young woman, and 7,200 of them end up exploiting an adolescent female. The people, “pimps” or “johns”, who engage in these heinous acts tend to focus on more vulnerable targets: children between the ages of 11 and 16. The child trafficking ring is second largest criminal enterprise behind the drug trade, according to the FBI. Many victims of the industry, both women and men, go through nights unable to fall asleep due to the fear of being found by their previous captors. PTSD is a serious problem with the victims of child trafficking. The industry pulls the victim out of his or her daily, healthy life and thrusts them into a life of danger, crime, and in some cases, drug use. Once out, they find it hard to find work to support their families. However, they can turn to writing as a sort of outlet for their feelings or to simply warn others of the industry, which can be considered a modern day slave narrative. The purpose of this research is to focus on the psychological impact of the industry on the victim as well as analyzing victim’s artistic expression as a modern-day slave narrative. This research is relevant because the victim has no voice and their basic human rights are taken away from them as they are treated as less than human.