Country Report: Thailand

Thai girls are forced to serve up to twenty men per night.

A Victim's Story

Sold by her parents when she was fourteen, Siri finds herself enslaved in a Bangkok brothel. On a normal day she rises at noon, eats a simple meal, and sits in the brothel waiting for potential afternoon clients. She must stay in the brothel or face beatings if caught leaving. By five o'clock, she is dressed for a night of forced sex - serving as many as twenty men in one night. Hours later, when all the men have left, she steps into her small bed, aching from the abuse. Fearing AIDS, she prays to Buddha that he will prevent the disease from taking her. If she becomes ill, the brothel owner will simply discard her - for there are thousands more who can replace her.

Approximately 35,000 individuals live as sex slaves in Thailand today. Sold or lured to big cities, these girls (and sometimes boys) are forced - under the threat of violence and with no freedom to leave the brothel - to provide sex for any and all paying customers. Sex tourism in Thailand is a growing industry, perpetuating the demand for sex slaves.

Country Background

Located in Southeast Asia, Thailand is roughly the size of Great Britain with 62 million people. A recent economic boom benefited Bangkok, the capital, and the surrounding southern region - while government regulation of rice prices impoverished northern farmers and caused great economic disparity. Thailand's dominant religion is Buddhism.

Causes of Slavery

Extreme poverty in northern Thailand prompts some families to sell their daughters to "job brokers" for employment in southern cities. Simultaneously, the new economic success experienced by many men who previously could not afford a prostitute enables them to now purchase women for sex. The demand for sex slaves has increased in the thriving south and just over the border in Burma (Myanmar), fueling a growing regional sex slave market. Unbeknownst to most clients - who may even pay the young women directly - many prostitutes are slaves and all payments go to brothel owners.

Religious and cultural norms that characterize women as objects further perpetuate sex slavery. Some strains of Buddhism in Thailand - for instance, the traditional teaching that women cannot attain "enlightenment" - are used to justify sexism and the objectification of women.

The Process of Enslavement

The most prevalent form of slavery in Thailand is a form of debt bondage, in which families become reliant upon their daughters' work to repay interest-accumulating debt. Teenage girls (in rare cases, boys as well) are sold by their families or lured away from their villages by recruiters, convincing the girls that they will have respectable, well-paying jobs in Bangkok as maids or factory workers. Although families receive payment for their daughters - between $200 and $2,000 - the contractual agreement they sign specifies that this amount is a loan that must then be paid back with labor.

Upon leaving their villages, girls soon realize that the glamorous modern lifestyle they envisioned is instead inaccessible to them. Thrown into brothels, they are held captive and forced to work off family debts. Yet because brothel owners keep the books - often adding extraneous living expenses and daily interest - sex slaves rarely succeed in freeing themselves from their ostensible debt. Pimps hired by brothel owners beat girls at will and force them to serve clients. They also bribe the police, ensuring that potential escapees are returned when caught.

Sex slaves are most often released after three to five years of work in the brothel. At this point, their bodies are so mutilated that they are no longer profitable for brothel owners. Many have HIV or AIDS. Because it is relatively easy to purchase more slaves, most girls are simply discarded. Some return to their home villages, though even here many are spurned as "unclean."

Products

Sex tourism has helped ensure the profitability of slavery, globalizing an industry in which some workers are actually enslaved. Tour companies advertise prostitute "vacations" to audiences around the world. Yet some of the young girls spotlighted in these commercials are sex slaves - not the paid prostitutes.

Response on the Ground

Public Awareness of sex slavery in Thailand has increased due to the work of groups like the Center for the Protection of Children's Rights and End Child Prostitution in Asian Tourism.

More Information

Slave narrative: Ying Chen »

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