Psychological Impacts of being Born into Brothel’s
The film Born into Brothel's was a documentary surrounding children born to prostitutes. This film allowed viewers a chance to see the impact that social and physical environment can have on a person's health. The effects that their childhood environment have on their mental health was the biggest connection that I observed in the film. The interactions with the children of the film and their home settings allowed me to realize how much a person’s environment can shape their lives and minds.
The purpose of this film was to give viewers a deeper look into the lives of children born to prostitutes. The film was meant to show the conditions that they grow up in and how their environment impacts
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Though they were never asked in-depth personal questions regarding their health mentally, it is easy to see how growing up in a brothel can negatively impact a child. Poverty in general can create a stressful environment on a person, but being raised amongst prostitutes could have a profound effect on the human mind. Just from growing up in such a setting, the children are immediately raised to believe in order to receive the basic human needs of love, they must sell their bodies. They will likely have long-standing issues surrounding loving a person and truly being loved themselves due to prostitution. Also, the ability to connect on a deeper level with another human will be challenging due to the brothel's influences. Psychologically, this destroys the child’s self-worth. They will most likely never be able to be completely vulnerable with others and will feel a constant need to protect themselves to a certain degree. In addition to being a witness to the daily prostitution their entire childhood, we saw in the film the way the women of the brothel treated the children. The kids were often cleaning for them or gathering water for their families, while the majority of the time they were being verbally abused. There was no sense of love or connection between the women and children in the film. As a child, hearing someone speak down to them and …show more content…
Upon reading research, I found that the age of exposure to prostitution does impact people psychologically. One article stated that a large majority of women involved in prostitution have a history of abuse throughout their childhood (Clarke, Clarke, Roe-Sepowitz, & Fey, 2012, p. 271). It was also found that the low economic status and poor family structure play a large role in the path to prostitution (Clarke, Clarke, Roe-Sepowitz, & Fey, 2012, p. 272). These combinations are exactly what the children in the documentary were experiencing, so from birth their outcomes don't appear to be
Anomie theory presents many key factors that we will examine and then put them in context with the actions of the sex workers, the motivations of clientele, particular problems of the sex workers, and other experiences in their professional or private lives, that can be explained by utilizing the anomie theory. First off, we know that these brothel workers turned to prostitution for a reason so we need to analyze what goals were not being met for them to turn to “deviant acts”. Deviance is defined as violations of society norms that result in negative sanctions. According to Robert Merton, there are five general responses to goal attainment, Conformist, Innovationist, Ritualists, Retreatists, along with Rebels and each one we will discuss further.
Social reproduction is the reproduction of cultural, human, and social capital in society. Therefore languages, traditions, cultural values, education, food security, and social circles are passed down from one generation to the next through Karl Mannheim’s concept of “fresh contact” and through society as a whole. Social reproduction is effective when social structures and equality within society are maintained. Inequality, poverty, and social changes that force society to adapt can impede the process of social reproduction causing what is known as a “crisis in social reproduction” (Wells, 2009). Born into Brothels demonstrates a crisis of social reproduction that negatively impacts the lives of children living in Sonagachi as a result of globalization, neoliberal policies, poverty, lack of adequate education and social structures to pass down capital, and the stigma of prostitution. Additionally, it shows the need for children to make economic contributions to their families that prevent them from leaving the brothel.
As seen on Toddlers and Tiaras the “Beautiful Dolls” episode, it is showed in adult women dressing as girls, wearing pig tails, sexy school girl outfits, and sucking a lollipop. Studies have found that 89% of women working in some form of prostitution started before the age of sixteen...
...emished that children are more commonly used for prostitution against that their adult counterparts and the average age at which boys first become victims of prostitution is 11 to 13 years’ old.
Many women became prostitutes as a result of their skills no longer being needed, and they needed a way to provide for themselves. So, women found one aspect of themselves that society told them they could sell. Unfortunately, prostitution was a bleak affair. Occasionally, a woman got lucky and bought her way out of the profession, but she was the exception. Most lived and died in poverty. Furthermore, because of the destructive nature of the profession, most prostitutes grew to be disheartened and disillusioned, many even diseased. Prostitutes were socially ostracized, victims of the gender roles that were placed upon them. Women who lived the life of a prostitute often faced harsh realities, far from the promised lure and attraction of the American
...mes, music, clothing, and television and someone can make a stand to stop the selling of these products that have normalized the behaviors of pimping and prostitution (cite). One way that increased the efforts of minimizing the demand of prostitution was the outlaw the sale of sex and criminalizing the “john,” and this was first done in Sweden and Norway (cite). “a societal message is communicated that it is inappropriate to buy and sell women and children for sexual purposes (cite).” The final possibility that is discussed by (cite) in the efforts to provide for the victims is to increase the services for children and youth coming out of commercial sexual situations. Fundraising efforts can be made to help support local shelters in knowing that a safe place to live is a major impact on the risk of being considered a repeat runaway or revictimized into the sex trade.
Sex trafficking accounts for more than 70 percent of all trafficking, or as many as 19 million people (Behnke 30). Which is a lot of people that have had to go through this traumatic experience at any age they were during that time and they don’t have no choice. There are a number of reasons why children and adolescents become prostitutes. In some cases, parents are in such extreme conditions of poverty that they see the sale of the child as the only way of ensuring its survival. (Hobbs). So most of the kids that are being forced into prostitution because they want their families to have a better life and make more money so they feel like it’s their only option. Sex trafficking and prostitution have always been a part of Thailand’s history, however, the Vietnam War contributed to an explosion of the issue between 1955 and 1975. With an influx of anxious, homesick, and bored soldiers into the country, spilling over from Vietnam, the demand for prostitution skyrocketed, resulting in the growth of the human trafficking industry which still remains today.
Barry, Kathleen. The Prostitution of Sexuality: The Global Exploitation of Women. New York: New York University Press, 1996. Print.
...Being kicked out from the home is another consequence of rejection by parents (Mallon, Wagon 83). Urban and rural Associate researchers discovered that many young male prostitutes are homosexual, and they are products of their families’ inability to accept their son’s homosexuality (Coleman 136).
When it comes to prostitution, in a way it can harm
In detail, to define the ideal age for an adolescent to consent is troubling due to reasons, such as puberty and frequency of sexual activity. For instance, in modern times, the appropriate age of consent is determined on the average age of puberty and how often adolescents engage in sexual activities (369). It is problematic to consider young prostitutes who lean more towards adolescents to be children, and view them as victims or as corrupt individuals. Both perspectives deprive young women of the ability to be sexual willingly and presume women to either be delicate and naïve or as toxic and problematic individuals. Thus, defining child prostitution is correlated to the age of consent, which is dependent on the concept of being an
They argue that it is a consensual action of sex amongst adults, therefore a victimless crime. However, they overlook the fact that it is an action that can cause psychological problems to the society by naming the society and the prostitutes themselves as the victims of the crime. In other cases, the victims of prostitution are forced to engage in the business. It is either a force created by someone else or a force created by circumstances which are unfortunate. Unfortunate circumstances that force individuals to engage in prostitution can include; lack of opportunities, poverty, drug addiction, neglect and child abuse, just to name a
Prostitution reduces rape because now men could seek for sex workers, legal instead of forcing someone to have sex with. It is proven that in legal countries such as Germany and Switzerland rape decrease sharply. The more we try to eliminate prostitution, the higher will be the occurrence of crime against innocent women. To make it clear, what is the behavior of little kids when someone tells them don’t do that, or that is bad. They will eventually not listen and continue to do the same behavior.
One of those ways was being sexually exploited and it wasn’t such a miniscule problem. Apparently in London 1848, nearly 2,700 girls aged 11 through 16 were hospitalized due to sexual diseases, mainly due to prostitution. Child prostitution and the sexual exploitation of children was so prominent that a police officer in London had reported
Willis, B. M., & Levy, B. S. (2002). Child prostitution: Global health burden, research needs,