The Olympic's Dirty Secret

The 2010 Winter Games are on at the moment in Vancouver and are a bit of fun to watch. I particularly enjoy the double men’s luge which is a minute and a half of adrenaline and intimacy that takes on a new twist in spandex.. The Olympics are usually a time when countries compete in friendly bouts of athletic tests and citizens cheer them on. Even when countries might bicker politically (or militarily), the Olympics is a place for peaceful coexistence through sport. Believe it or not, the Olympics is actually a hot-bed for human rights violations. Here are some highlights from article in Relevant.

Recently groups have begun to highlight a dark side to the Olympic Games. Sex trafficking rises exponentially at international sporting events like the Olympics. The number of human trafficking victims almost doubled in Greece the year of the 2004 Athens Games, and still hasn’t returned to pre-2004 levels.

International sporting events are particularly insidious in the sex trade industry, as it makes it easier to bring visitors into the country who may be unwilling victims of the sex trade. This coincides with an increase in demand for prostitution and “other forms of sexual exploitation” by attendees. Though a disturbing truth, it is inescapable in a year that will see both the Winter Olympics and the World Cup. (Already, a couple in Wales was arrested for running an expansive prostitution ring of young Nigerian girls, an operation they intended to move to South Africa in time for the World Cup.)

Roughly 800 are enslaved in Canada’s sex industry at any given time, the majority of which are young women between 12 and 25 years of age. An estimated total of 8,000 females become victims of this inhumane system every year in Canada alone, a number that is expected to grow in 2010."

There are some organizations that are combatting this mentioned in the article.

Here is another article that mentions for the last Football World Cup in Germany an estimated 40,000 prostitues brought in for the sporting festival! While prostitution is legal in Germany, many women (and girls) do not choose this as a prfession.Every year some 500,000 people are smuggled illegally into the European Union (EU). Nearly 90 percent of them are trapped into sexual exploitation agaisnt their will.