Should we rejoice that Google is giving money to non-profits to fight sex-trafficking, even though there is sex-trafficking on Google itself?
To the multitudes of anti-human trafficking charities in America, the news out of Google’s executive offices on Wednesday seemed like an enormous triumph. Even as they continue to push each other aside in a desperate effort to acquire ever decreasing donations, many of the self-proclaimed “abolitionist” non-profits cheered at Google’s $11.5 million gift to “fight modern day slavery.”
It is, no doubt, a lovely gesture from one of America’s strongest and richest corporations. And though most anti-trafficking organizations won’t be getting a dime from Google, many expressed gratitude on their endless, blogs, Tweets, and Facebook pages. “Thanks to Google for Giving $11.5 Million to Fight Human Trafficking!” was typical of the reports flooding social media.
And certainly, the giddiness did not end with these charities. Forbes Magazine instantly reported the news saying, “Google donated over $11 million to fight modern-day slavery, continuing its ‘don’t be evil’ mantra by helping people in need.” Echoing the claims made by Google themselves, Forbes further stated that “The Mountain View, Calif.-based company said its gift will ‘free more than 12,000 people from modern-day slavery’ and prevent ’millions more from being victimized.’”
♦◊♦
No one, anywhere, is able to substantiate those numbers. But, that’s not the point. Certainly the money will do some good. But, is this where Google should be starting their efforts against human trafficking? It doesn’t take long to discover that they have important work to do much closer to home, closer than any of those who are congratulating them are aware.
A search for English language “Escort Services” on Google +, Google’s social networking platform, reveals a total of 345 thinly veiled prostitution sites actively seeking clients. Many of the 345 Google+ pages link to thousands of other pages blatantly advertising prostitution services, which often belong to the human trafficking category of commercial sexual exploitation. This crime is frequently referred to more sensationally by the media and donation hungry charities as “Sex Trafficking.”
Yes, there is Sex Trafficking on Google.
♦◊♦
Need proof? Take a look at these examples, but be cautious if you are around children or at work:
Further searches in English, conducted on the same day as Google’s donation announcement, reveal far more. And many of the results harshly contradict Google’s aforementioned “mantra.” For instance, a search of Google’s “Blogspot” blog engine for “Escort Services” found 291,000 results:
Google’s anti-slavery grants will support the good works of International Justice Mission, Not For Sale and the BBC World Service Trust among others, with a large part going to ActionAid India. The money given to ActionAid is meant to fight human trafficking in the world’s second most populated country. Yet, here are some of the 17,000 India based “Escort Service” Google Blogs:
♦◊♦
Not one of the charities that patted Google on the back when the multi-million dollar donation announcement was made will agree with the contradictions revealed in this article – even the ones who won’t get any cash. And this creates another glaring hypocrisy. Just over one year ago, many of these same charities derided Craigslist for their “Escort/Adult” ads and refused to take donations from them. Today, the same bandwagon is launching missiles at Village Voice Media for their Backpage.com “Escort” ads. So why not criticize Google for doing the very same thing? Why not refuse their donations the way the Minneapolis-based group, The Advocates for Human Rights did when Craigslist tried to give them $25,000? (Their courageous Board politely turned it down, stating they “cannot accept the funds because Craigslist generates a high percentage of its profits from adult ads. This market fuels the human sex trafficking industry. It is the exploitive behavior resulting from these ads that makes our efforts necessary.”)
Why? Because they literally can’t afford to. Google’s checkbook is just too big for them to criticize the company. And few, if any, of the charities are bothering to look at the evidence that puts Google in the same category – a category the charities themselves established – as Craigslist and Backpage. The most disturbing explanation is that the charities claiming to be on the “frontlines in the battle against human trafficking” have no idea that Google is still fighting on the wrong side.
But they will try to explain their adoration of Google. The typical excuses include, but are in no way limited to: “We were aware of the problem and are working on it.” “We are in discussions with them about this.” “Google is taking steps to . . .” If any of these were true, why did the examples listed above take less than four minutes to locate?
Someday, an organization will come along that will have the courage to fight human trafficking on all fronts, no matter who it offends. Someday, the victims of human trafficking will have an ally that is brave enough to stand up to the criminals perpetrating these crimes and the corporations who are deeply complicit in them.
Charities willing to take money tainted with the very crime they fight is proof that day has not yet arrived.
—
photo: WeNews / Flickr
There is a lot of controversy over the numbers of adult woman who are forced sex slaves. The real factual answer is that no one knows. There is hard evidence that the sex slavery/sex trafficking issue continues to report false information and is greatly exaggerated by politicians, the media, and aid groups, feminist and religious organizations that receive funds from the government, The estimate of adult women who become new sex slaves ranges anywhere from 40 million a year to 5,000 per year all of which appear to be much too high. They have no evidence to back up these… Read more »
I believe this article is predicated on a misunderstanding of Google’s search engine technology.
Plenty of confusion in this article. 1. It clearly conflates “Escort Services” with “Human Trafficking.” The motives behind that conflation seem to be both well-meaning but also rigidly ideological. Whatever anyone’s personal opinions on prostitution, surely we can all agree, just by reading these comments, that equating the two is not uncontroversial. 2. If an alien from space read this post, she would think that “Google” was a Web site, at the very least, actively pursuing the advertising dollars of escort services and thereby promoting human trafficking. Maybe that’s what the author thinks, I don’t know. It’s a leap in… Read more »
Hello – I was involved in setting up the craigslist protests – our focus was, and is, to stop the selling and buying of HUMANS AGAINST THEIR WILL, We are not religious, political, anti-sex-workers or anything of that nature. Take a look at any of your arguments above – and please tell me how anyone can justify the selling of a HUMAN BEING AGAINST THEIR WILL. Specifically, underage children who were, and are, sold thru the internet services of craigslist, backpage, google and others. More info on what we do at stopslavery2012.com We are not government funded, not religious-based, not… Read more »
Well, I think *everybody* in this debate is against any kind of slavery or forced labor, and any kind of forced sex. That’s not the point of the debate. But what, pray tell, does driving all sex work advertising off of the internet have to do with ending forced prostitution? Which seems to be the goal here, since people like you scream “human trafficking” and “child prostitution” when sex workers in any capacity use the internet to ply their trade. Now you people are demanding Google actively censor any blog that’s connected to an “escort agency”, which, I might add,… Read more »
“good works of International Justice Mission” Good works? You mean like pressuring the Cambodian government to have a harsh police crackdown on sex workers, where many ended up jailed and in some cases *raped*. How about forcing sex workers into prison-like “rehabilitation” where they’re trained to be sweatshop labor and often treated to coercive Christian evangelization? Can you call these “good works” with a straight face? More here: http://www.swaay.org/action/google.html. Key point: “Google should not be backing those that support human rights for some at the cost of violating the human rights of others.” Its a damn shame GMP ran this… Read more »
The latest on Not For Sale: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F20sBCs1qLs
WHOA….nice work.
OUR MISSION:
“Stir society’s conscience to ACTION against human trafficking and provide material support to first-responders, victim-advocates and survivors.”
http://www.stopslavery2012.com
“Someday, an organization will come along that will have the courage to fight human trafficking on all fronts, no matter who it offends. Someday, the victims of human trafficking will have an ally that is brave enough to stand up to the criminals perpetrating these crimes and the corporations who are deeply complicit in them.” “Charities willing to take money tainted with the very crime they fight is proof that day has not yet arrived.” Well put. Instead of high fiving one another over some donated blood money. Modern day slavery seems to be the new “cause” to rake in… Read more »
Well said, Molly!
I love people who are either trying to confuse me or successful at it as then they are simply culpable deceptive misleading idiots rather than ordinary idiots. I also love corporate tax write off contributions to all these worthless corporate groups for they all are worthless.
There’s some criticism of Google’s donation from a very different perspective:
http://www.swaay.org/action/google.html
Their argument is that some of the “anti-slavery” organisations funded by Google are actually “fighting to imprison and further criminalize vulnerable sex workers in the developing world”, and are doing more harm than good by cracking down on all prostitution, rather than just genuine sex slavery.
Of course they’d say that!! Are you a prostitute or something??? Why do you seem to me to be defending this?
If Kendall was a prostitute, by your logic a slave regardless of personal decision (and I personally know someone who was a sex slave at age ten, so I have a significantly deeper understanding of this than a great deal of people) then he or she would be a mental prisoner, and should not be attacked for defending the system, after all, it would be tantamount to Stockholm Syndrome. Or if Kendall is a prostitute, defending the idea on its own merits, the he/she is not a slave as he or she has the freedom to develop his/her own views… Read more »
“Of course they’d say that!! Are you a prostitute or something???”
Um….well stated, Ms. McCarthy.
As I remember, the beef with Craiglist was running paid adds for escort service – hence “tainted money”, as part of the money comes from selling services to the very thing these charities fight.
Do you have examples of Google selling services (such as banner adds) to escort service operators – as opposed to having their free services used by them?
“As I remember, the beef with Craiglist was running paid adds for escort service – hence “tainted money”, as part of the money comes from selling services to the very thing these charities fight” If that was the beef, it was one made entirely in bad faith. CL initially ran “adult services” ads for free, just like other ads, before pressure from the SAME GROUPS to charge a fee for the ads on the reasoning that this would create a credit card paper trail. After this, the groups turned around and blasted CL for “profiting” off of prostitution. And apparently… Read more »
Maybe Google’s 11.5 million is supposed to be the credit to non-profits in place of the debit of being the search engine that gives you access to sex trafficking. The world operates in ironic ways – aiming to “break even” rather solving problems for good.
So, you are using the specter of sex trafficking as a proxy to attack prostitution between consenting adults.
This scam is old. Stop insulting our intelligence.
Where I live prostitution, of ANY sort, is illegal!!! It’s not a scam!
Where you live it may be. Note that it is not illegal on a global scale. And illegal does not mean unethical or wrong. IT was once illegal from blacks and whites to share facilities…did it mean segregation was unethical? What about women and voting?? Aside from the fact that there ARE fully consenting women and men in the profession of prostitution. Ever sat on a dicsussion panel with sex-workers? Just because your set of values wouldn’t allow you to engage in specific activities, does not make them out-and-out wrong. You are devaluing sex-workers as people when you do that.… Read more »
I think that you have confused Google (A search engine) with:
1. A company/organization that is offering the sex trafficking.
2. Craigslist, which is an ad-posting community site.
While I do agree that Google should create a better filter for “escort services” searches and the like, I am also very aware of the fact that they do not advertise, promote or offer sex trafficking unlike Craigslist or the sites that show up on the google search.
So…. this entire article is based on fraudulently confusing “sex trafficking” meaning any sort of prostitution and “sex trafficking” meaning “slavery”? It’s perfectly reasonable for Google, or anyone else for that matter, deciding they are against slavery but for prostitution.
Good grief. Even many feminists think there’s nothing wrong with prostitution.
Look if you’re against ALL forms of prostitution then make your case, but do it with honesty.
He did do it honestly…you got out of the article exactly what was intended. SEX trafficking IS prostitution, IS escort services IS slavery….all are part of the sex trafficking “industry”. Great article, Raymond. Lead the way…what do we do next?
This is pure nonsense. You may as well say that because some people are forced to be farm labourers, agricultural work and slavery are the same thing. There was a story recently about immigrants being forced to work in restaurant kitchens. Should Google stop listing restaurants because some of them might be using slaves? Words like “trafficking” and “slavery” conjure up images of people being held prisoner, with the use of violence to force them to do things against their will. It’s nothing but a scaremongering lie to say that everyone in the sex industry is in that position. In… Read more »
Prostitution is illegal. Period. End of sentence. It’s horrible that women and children are trafficked into it. It is illegal. No one should have ANY websites advertising it. Google should not allow searches on the subject. What is so hard to understand here???
What is legal should be determined FROM what is ethical, not the other way around. I don’t see where you get the idea that something being illegal is justifiable reason to compare it with slavery. Please think about what you’re saying to people who consent to being sex workers: “your profession is tantamount to slavery; you are too dumb to see that and too incompetent to consent to it.”
It’s illegal!! Would it be ok for google to allow websites for obtaining crack?? Prostitution is illegal– it does not matter if you say they’re consenting or not. However, a good portion of them are NOT consenting!! I don’t understand what you think you’re arguing here. Ethically speaking– prostitution is wrong, slavery is wrong– AND yes!!! your “profession” is tantamount to slavery!
America isn’t the world and Google provides search results worldwide. There are plenty of places (including my homeland) where prostitution isn’t illegal. Even in America there are legal brothels in Nevada, and escort agencies often exist in a legal grey area. Of course “it’s illegal therefore is wrong” is a laughably poor argument anyway. Nobody is saying that sex trafficking isn’t a problem. What’s being disputed here is the silly claim that prostitution = sex slavery, regardless of whether there’s consent or not. What’s also questionable is whether cracking down on prostitutes, raiding and shutting down brothels and escort agencies,… Read more »