Sometimes the biggest discussions surrounding the Super Bowl are unrelated to football.
When Texas hosted the game in 2011, Greg Abbott, Texas’ attorney general, told USA Today that the Super Bowl is “commonly known as the single largest human trafficking incident in the United States.”
There were 10,000 sex workers who came to Miami for the Super Bowl in 2010, according to the National Center for Missing or Exploited Children.
But increasingly, advocates working to stop sex trafficking say these numbers are bogus.
Snopes.com, a site that looks into rumors and urban legends, says the claim about sex workers flocking to the Super Bowl is a myth. Sex workers attend the Super Bowl, but the areas that host the Super Bowl deal with the issue at other times.
“The hype around large sporting events and increases in trafficking for prostitution is often based on misinformation, poor data, and a tendency to sensationalize,” said a 2011 study from the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women. There is no data supporting the link, the study concludes.
Talking about the link between sex trafficking and sporting events has become rhetoric for politicians in host cities, who promise to crack down on trafficking. It’s good that the subject is being talked about, but the emphasis placed on the Super Bowl needs to stop.
The reality is, sex trafficking is more common in the U.S. than most know.
Sex trafficking is forcing people to commit sexual acts against their will for commercial gain. The Polaris Project calls sex trafficking a “form of modern slavery.” Not all cases of prostitution are sex trafficking. But in every case where the victim is under 18, it is considered sex trafficking.
In 2013, 3,609 cases of sex trafficking in the U.S. were reported to the National Human Trafficking Resource Center. Victims are often forced to make hundreds of dollars each night through a variety of methods. Sometimes brothels are disguised as legitimate businesses, such as massage parlors. Other times, victims are sent to truck stops and forced to knock on truck doors and offer sex.
It’s not just a U.S. problem. Worldwide, 4.5 million people are sex-trafficking victims, according to an International Labor Organization estimate.
So let’s recognize the problem for what it is. Let’s view it not only as a Super Bowl problem, but also as a worldwide, everyday concern. And let’s get involved in efforts to stop it.
Football fans, you can sleep a little easier.
The U.S. Department of State offers many ideas on how to get involved in stopping human trafficking on their website, http://www.state.gov/j/tip/id/help/.
To report a tip on potential sex trafficking, contact the National Human Trafficking Resource Center at 1-888-373-7888.
