PROSTITUTION

Juvenile Delinquency: Prostitution

Juvenile Delinquency: Prostitution

Introduction

Cruelty inflicted upon adolescents, especially in the form of sexual exploitation, has the power to generate passionate public disapproval. Despite public indignation, the gender business continues to flourish: gender has become a multibillion-dollar industry and today, adolescents are bought, sold, and business like any other mass-produced article. Various inquiries and studies have been commissioned at both the federal and local levels, as social policy proponents continue to focus their attentions on the centuries-old problem of child prostitution.

But the dilemma they face in addressing the exploitation of adolescents from a causal paradigm is that the majority of approach has focused on the factors that force youth to become and stay in the gender business. What is missing, in a sensitive and complex understanding of the youth gender business, is a focus on the detrimental effects that young people's participation in such a business has on their overall well-being, not only on their prospects for escaping a life on the streets but also on their prospects for actual physical survival (Dekeseredy, and Hinch, 1991).

Discussion

Previous approach has addressed the general state of danger in which street prostitutes live; much of the focus for youth has been on violence by pimps and, for adults, on violence on the streets. Further, recent approach on adult prostitution suggests that, in some cases, prostitution is a profession of choice and that street prostitute cultures develop occupational practices which minimize the hazards of the gender business.

While those foci are important, they tend to circumvent the direct danger to well-being that the gender business poses to adolescents and youth. In cities like Saskatoon and Regina, because youth prostitution is neither routine nor is there a well-developed youth gender business culture, the conventions of protection are generally absent. The hazards for such adolescents and youth go well beyond those described in contemporary approach (Chesney-Lind, and Randa 1992).

We focus, therefore, on two dimensions of youth prostitution: first, on previously identified factors that straightaway influences youth participation in prostitution as an empirical test of the causation literature. Second, we examine the effects that being involved in the gender business has on multiple dimensions of wellbeing. It is our intention to document and test an oft forgotten reality of approach on youth prostitution (Brannigan, Knafla, and 1989): that participation in the gender business has dire consequences for an individual's physical, emotional, and social well-being.

Family Trauma

The majority of recent literature concerning the topic of youth participation in prostitution revolves around two problems: vagabond behaviour and child sexual abuse as the most significant precursors to participation in the gender-business. Although child sexual abuse is regarded by some as a direct link to youth engagement in prostitution, vagabond behaviour is believed by some theorists to be an intervening or mediating variable (Faith, 1993), In an attempt to escape a home where parents do not seem to care or where long term conflict occurs, some adolescents might view the streets as their only option for survival as they seek to obtain food, ...