Sex Trafficking And The Super Bowl

Human trafficking is the second largest criminal activity in the world, second to arms trafficking, and there’ll be a lot of it going on at the Super Bowl, according to an interesting post from the blog Matt by Tina Kosikowski. She writes:

Trafficking revenues range from $9 billion to $32 billion annually. Did you know that an estimated total of 10,000 prostitutes and human trafficking victims were present in Miami for the 2010 Super Bowl? The same projection is set for this year. Large sporting events are the #1 revenue generators for traffickers.

Did you know that Texas and the Southwest border continue to serve as the biggest point of illegal entry into the U.S. due to its proximity to the US-Mexico border, demographics, and a large migrant labor force? Houston’s proximity to the Mexican border and Interstate Highway 10 make it arguably the most popular point of entry for up to 30% of the nation’s international trafficking activity.

Human trafficking, sex trafficking in particular, is a story I tried to write multiple times as a reporter, but it’s a hard topic nail down. Victims are understandably hesitant to speak — if you can even find them, perpetrators may not even know how deep the operation goes and law enforcement is often stuck trying to track down people who are practically invisible.

The worst part of all of this is that we’ve all probably seen victims of human trafficking without really knowing it. It’s all around us, we just may not recognize the signs. Check out the video Matt.org posted from Dallas, Texas: