The Marian Miner Cook Athenaeum filled with attendees on March 7 for “Prostitution Policy: Global Perspectives on Legislating the Sex Trade,” a moderated discussion with advocates Yasmin Z. Vafa and Melanie Thompson.
Vafa is an award-winning human rights attorney and advocate as well as the executive director and co-founder of Rights4Girls, an organization that fights to end exploitation and violence against girls and young women in the U.S. She also currently serves on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ National Advisory Committee on the Sex Trafficking of Children and Youth and has successfully advocated for laws at the state and federal levels.
Thompson became an activist when she was 14 after being sex trafficked and sold into prostitution at the age of 12. She has since become an expert voice on ending prostitution and commercial sexual exploitation, speaking on the intersections of many systems of oppression both nationally and internationally. She also currently serves as the chief advocacy and outreach officer at the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women.
Thompson and Vafa were interviewed by Dahlia Locke PO ’25, a leader of the Taskforce on Commercial Sexual Exploitation at Claremont McKenna College’s Mgrublian Center for Human Rights, which co-sponsored the event.
The discussion began with addressing the four different policy models that have been introduced to legislate prostitution: criminalization, partial decriminalization, full decriminalization and legalization. According to Vafa, the most appropriate model is between partial and full decriminalization.
The decriminalization model is a repeal of prohibitions against selling sex, pimping, paying for sexual services and brothel owning.
“It’s really important for people to realize that decriminalizing sex work also decriminalizes pimps, [paying for sex] and brothels,” Vafa said. “When you delve into it, pimps are called ‘managers’ or ‘facilitators.’”
The legalization model renders these acts legal and also offers an element of government regulation and oversight. In countries such as the Netherlands and Germany, there is a heavily regulated system of prostitution.
“The problems associated with this legalization model are that we essentially have sex trafficking in all of our societies,” Vafa said. “And there are currently enough men that are perfectly content to break the law to buy sex that the demand already outpaces the supply.”
Thompson similarly spoke about her experiences researching the harmful effects of legalization in Amsterdam. She found that the effects of the legalization and decriminalization models are essentially the same.
“It was a mess, Thompson said. “Most people know that people go to Amsterdam for only two reasons: legalized marijuana and the Red Light District.”
Through her work with Rights4Girls, Vafa recently released a report that features quotes from people who explain why they pay for sexual services, referred to as “sex buyers.” Vafa explained that she collected this information from “hobby boards,” where buyers rate and review the individuals they purchase for sex. One quote that stuck out to her came from a resident of Arizona who gave advice to other sex buyers.
“And what [the sex buyer] said was, ‘For those of you who are into native girls, I highly recommend going to the Indian casino and sticking around until late night because that’s when the women run out of money and get desperate,’” Vafa said. “It really just shows the psyche of who these men are.”
Thompson ended the discussion by arguing for partial decriminalization, noting that the legalization model proved ineffective in places like Amsterdam while the full decriminalization model, as Vafa argued, is dangerous because it is unregulated.
Locke emphasized the damaging effects the sex trade can have on survivors.
“With partial decriminalization, we decrease the stigma around the people like myself who were exploited or the people that are selling sex,” Thompson said. “We recognize that we should not be criminalizing those for their victimization.”
When the floor opened for questions, one audience member asked the speakers how men could be brought into the discussion, noting the predominantly female audience. Thompson directed her response toward the handful of male students in the crowd.
“Next time you come to a talk like this, bring another male friend,” Thompson said. “Have more conversations about this but also recognize that this is not just an issue that affects women.”
As the event ended, Locke emphasized the damaging effects the sex trade can have on survivors.
“So many survivors say they have been unable to have any kind of romantic or sexual relationship since leaving the sex trade,” Locke said. “That is how detrimental it is to be bought as a product, for your sexual and reproductive organs to be bought as a product and for your identities to be fetishized and commodified and objectified like that.”
With the fight against sexual violence still ongoing, Vafa and Thompson hope for a future in which fewer people will have to endure these experiences.
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