Introduction
Man is a social creature, he does not live as an isolated being. He always connected, united, grouped himself into groups that provided him with protection, ensured cohesion, stability and thus a better chance for survival and satisfaction of needs.
Violence against women and children is as old as humanity itself. This violence is universal in all areas of the world. It mainly affects women of all ages, all social classes, cultures, ethnic groups, religious affiliations, political and economic systems. The level of education is not decisive either. Nevertheless, targeted education aimed at the right target group can also change a lot in this area and eliminate the risks of developing the pathological phenomena themselves.
Crime and globalization
The Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic divides crime according to the nature of criminal activity into violent, property, economic, other, remaining and moral. Moral crime includes sexual abuse, rape, and human trafficking.
The share of moral crime in total crime is less than one percent of all detected crime, and its clarification has the largest share. In 2009, during the first 9 months, 636 moral crimes were detected, of which up to 454 were solved. However, moral crimes are among the most serious forms of violence against women and children.
However, there are not many cases falling into this category of crime in the official statistics. There is a lot of violence that remains hidden for various reasons in families. Children and women who are abused do not have enough strength to defend themselves. They don't know where to look for help, they don't know who to turn to with a problem. Fear leads them to remain silent, and this is accompanied by a feeling of guilt, shame, and the inability to define exactly what actually happened.
Globalization leads to the creation of an environment suitable for the growth of existing and also new forms of crime. The opening of borders created the conditions for the expansion of international trade, finance, communication, but also crime. Trade in drugs, weapons, people, illegal migration, money laundering, corruption, terrorism and the like are taking on an international character, penetrating areas where this type of crime was almost unknown. The inhabitants of these countries were in no way prepared for such a development. Children receive the basics of education and behavior from their parents and grandparents. Since they have not encountered the aforementioned pathological phenomena, they cannot even prepare their offspring to defend themselves against them. Thus, an important element is missing in primary prevention, for which knowledge is very necessary.
Deviant behavior is also aided by the negative influence of the mass media, especially television with a high presentation of fictitious and real brutality, which leads to a dulling of sensitivity to crime. Particularly dangerous is the covert presentation of criminals as positive heroes who possess great wealth obtained from criminal activity and who are never caught by the law.
Women in the sex industry are also represented in positive roles. They are presented almost like celebrities. The reality, which is the fact that they are actually modern-day slaves, remains hidden in the background.
White meat trade - modern slavery
The most common form of violence against women is the abuse of wives by their intimate partners. One of the most severe forms of violence against women is sexual violence. Organized crime has developed the trade in women, which is considered to be the mass, systematic and especially increasing movement of women from the poorer regions of the world to the industrial centers of the West. This trade is determined by various reasons and purposes. Mostly it is a sex business. Women are often kept in forced marriage, work up to 80 hours a week as laborers in semi-illegal factories, where they also sleep. They work as domestic helpers with unlimited workload. They cannot get out of their slavery because they are easily blackmailed by their semi-illegal existence. They mostly lack a work permit or visa. Women who fall into illegal activity find returning home as difficult as staying with their slaver. They are afraid, suffer lifelong traumas and lose a significant part of their personality.
Data on this criminal activity is often deliberately obscured. The Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic states that one of the most used sources of information is the US government's annual Trafficking in Persons Report, according to which approximately 600,000 to 800,000 men, women and children are trafficked across international borders annually. These numbers do not include persons who were traded within the territory of one state. The report estimates that about 80% of trafficking victims are women and girls, and up to 50% of victims are minors. Most of the victims are trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation in prostitution, pornography, etc., but the number of victims exploited for illegal work in industry, agriculture, households, etc. is also increasing.
Along with drug trafficking and the illegal arms trade, human trafficking has become the third most profitable type of organized crime. There is a lot of money in this business that allows other criminal activities to flourish, especially corruption, which dulls the edge of the law. The United Nations Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reports that profits from this trade can range between 7-10 billion dollars a year.
As this is a highly organized illegal activity at the international level, estimates of the exact extent and quantification of victims of human trafficking vary. It is generally estimated that the number of detected cases is only the tip of the iceberg. In addition to the fear of the victims, often due to the lack of evidence incriminating human traffickers, differences in the methodology of data collection and even differences in the very definition of human trafficking in individual countries also contribute significantly to the latency of this criminal activity.
People who sell women are estimated to earn a million dollars a month. At the same time, there is only a small probability that someone will report them, reveal them, or punish them. Young girls are the most trafficked, but there are also many trafficked children, many as young as 4 years old. Many "modeling" agencies offer a famous and rich life. Employment agencies promise great work with above-average earnings. Several thousand girls disappear this way every year, never to be found again or found dead. There is very little chance that the police will come to the white meat shop, find the girls and put the pimps in jail. According to estimates, around 800,000 people are victims of the white meat trade. Children, women... Victims often come from marginalized groups or poor areas. For many women, going to the West is the only option to provide for their children, their family, to literally save them from hunger. These potential victims cannot expect support from the state or family. Husbands are unemployed in most cases. They do not see a way out of their situation, they lose self-confidence, they fall prey to alcohol, gambling, drugs and violence.
The trade in women has the same laws as any other trade. On one side there is supply, on the other side there is demand. In between is the goods. This business works because it has sales. Buyers are wealthy, often very influential people. According to the law, they do not commit any crime, they are unimpeachable. Illegal actions are committed only by sellers, and what is especially illogical, often by women who are goods.
The whole process of the white meat trade is almost template-like. Traffickers look for suitable victims and export them abroad. There they will take away their travel documents, money, mobile phones. They will prevent free movement and any contact with relatives. Lack of knowledge of foreign languages also plays a negative role. If a woman has to be forced into prostitution by force, fighting, keeping her hungry and thirsty, rape, alcohol, drugs are used from the beginning to weaken her will. They are raped often by whole groups and so much and for so long that they feel so dirty and insignificant that they are willing to do anything just to survive. "They have severe physical damage and psychological trauma for the rest of their lives. They suffer from the most severe forms of post-traumatic conditions, the inability to establish social contacts, the loss of self-worth, the meaning of life, faith in the future. They have fear, a sense of guilt and hopelessness".(1)
Family education as part of primary prevention
The official website of the Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic states that one of the main causes of human trafficking is the exploitation of the difficult economic situation of part of the population in the source countries and the subsequent efforts of the perpetrators to lure especially young people to the prospect of quick earnings abroad. The goal of human trafficking is most often profit from prostitution, but also other forms of exploitation, such as serfdom, forced labor, slavery, organ harvesting, and the like, and that is why young people, predominantly women, become victims. This criminal activity is mainly committed against women between the ages of 15 and 24, with primary to secondary education, from weaker social strata.
"More than eighty percent of the perpetrators are men, the vast majority of whom are between 30 and 40 years old, a smaller group of perpetrators are between the ages of 18 and 30, and most often only have a basic education."(2)
It follows from the above that the attainment of a higher education creates prerequisites for prevention in the field of moral crime, for example, by the fact that educated people can more easily find a job that is financially better valued and thus they can ensure their social security.
However, not all people can have a university education. But they all have the same right to protect their personality from the violence that is the white meat trade. However, in order to be aware of the daily impending danger of which anyone can become a victim, either directly or indirectly (parents, relatives, ...), they have the right to be informed about this danger, they have the right to know the consequences, they have the right to be so secured that they are not left to take advantage of the dubious promises of the slavers of the present time.
Legislation generally includes these rights, but their implementation in practical life is not at the required and adequate level. In this direction, there is an open opportunity for the education of families, for example through mass media, assets, various associations and the like. Political candidates should also address the problem in their pre-election promises and especially in their fulfillment. However, not only potential business victims, but also consumers should be educated in this area. Because without demand, there will be no supply, so there will be no need for goods, that is, sacrifices.
Conclusion
Human trafficking in the territory of the Slovak Republic is a relatively new phenomenon. Its onset and subsequent development is associated with a specific migration situation after the relaxation of the regime at the state borders of European states in the early 1990s. In that period, especially women from Eastern and Southeastern Europe became a desirable commodity on the Western European market. This phenomenon also affected the Slovak Republic, which in the course of 90 years changed from a purely source country to a source-transit country, and at the same time, other forms of human trafficking, including labor exploitation, also developed. The reason for these changes was mainly the transition to the market system of the economy, the growing demand for cheap labor in the so-called sex business, and also the neighborhood with Austria and the Czech Republic.
Various forms of human trafficking span the entire history of mankind. Each era had its own customs, culture, legislation. Many governments tried to solve the problem with bans or even legalization. At all times, however, there have been great profits in this business that have exceeded any measures.
The violence that accompanies human trafficking is, in its essence, not only a political or social problem. It is the suffering experienced by individual, specific people who do not deserve to live in shame, pain, humiliation, without a better perspective.
In order to successfully suppress this violence, good laws, a high-quality cross-border fight against organized crime, well-conducted criminal processes, programs for risk groups and also a supportive approach to prostitution are necessary. One of the forms of primary prevention is public education, aimed at rejecting any degrading abuse of people. Greater awareness of possible victims will make the process of delivering goods more difficult. Awareness of consumers - buyers will mean lower interest. Thorough investigation of moral crimes and fair punishments for traders should be part of prevention.
The Talmud states: "Whoever destroys a single soul will be considered a man who has destroyed the whole world; and whoever saves a single soul will be considered a man who has saved the whole world."
Author: Ján Gurský Used literature:
- HRONCOVÁ, J. – EMMEROVÁ, I. 2008. Sociália 2007: Prevention of socio-pathological phenomena in children, youth and adults. Banská Bystrica: Matej Bel University, 2008. 397 p. ISBN 978-80-8083-595-8.
- SCHAVEL, M. et al. 2008. Social prevention. Prešov: VŠ ZaSP sv. Elizabeth Bratislava. 2008. 139 p. ISBN 978-80-89271-22-1.
- STIFTUNG, F. E., 2000. Perspectives on Trafficking in Women. Bratislava. 2000. ISBN 80-88935-78-4.
- Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic. Human trafficking. [cit. 2010-10-03] Available online:
(1) STIFTUNG, F. E.: Perspectives on the Traffic in Women. Bratislava: 2000, p. 14. (2) MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR OF THE SR: Human trafficking. [cit. 2010-10-03] Available on the Internet: http://www.minv.sk/?obchodovaniesludmi
The contribution was made at the 5th annual scientific conference with international participation entitled 'Social-pathological phenomena and marginalized groups', which was organized by the Queen's Peace Institute of Medžugorja Bardejov, Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies Brno, Faculty of Philosophy UPJS Kosice and was held on October 8, 2010 in Bardejov.