In regards to Governor Elliot Spitzer’s involvement with a prostitution ring and the ensuing media frenzy, very little attention is being paid to the fact that there are victims involved.  Details of the woman he solicited from Emperor’s VIP Club have made mention of her “troubled childhood,” of abuse and leaving home at age 17 only to wind up homeless, broke and abusing drugs.  

These background characteristics are entirely too common among women and girls involved in the sex trade.  When they are lured into what may appear as a glamorous or lucrative lifestyle of prostitution, the abuse, homelessness, drug abuse, and trauma often only get worse.

Even for those who are sympathetic to those involved in street prostitution, there is a misconception that women who work for escort services or other “high class” establishments somehow fare better, make a lot of money, and are there purely by choice.  The fact of the matter is that they are physically and sexually assaulted just as often, most of their earnings go to a 3rd party, and they are often maintained in the business through coercion, manipulation, and intimidation.

Elliot Spitzer has become a very visible face for why prostitution exists and why so many women are trafficked and exploited in the U.S. and worldwide.  He represents the demand side of the sex trade.  He represents the many johns who request or force women and girls to engage in “unsafe” sexual acts for money.  He represents the many johns who know, as he did, that women in prostitution are abused, often homeless, often trying to survive by any means necessary, mostly pimped out for another person’s profit.  Yet he continued to solicit escort services to buy unsafe sex with previously harmed women.

In the wake of the investigation that has uncovered his involvement with prostitution, the media has succeeded in alternately sensationalizing or trivializing his consumption of prostitution.  His actions are not only hypocritical and illegal.  He has caused harm.  This fact should collectively wake us all up to the inherent harm caused by those who create the demand for the sex trade.