Redefining "Girl"

I sat on the porch of a flat in Plettenberg Bay on the coast of South Africa. The ocean petered in and out, the mountains rose above the clouds and the curve of coast wrapped around and hugged the waters in the distance. The view was stunning, the sun blinding, but my mind lingered elsewhere. The weight of Rachel Lloyd’s Girls Like Us sat heavy in my hands. 

A foreign backpacker wandered onto the porch to share a good morning. He asked me what I was reading and I began to recite the title until I was cut off. The word “girl” signaled to him a story about nail painting and shopping sprees and he proceeded to make a joke I honestly didn’t catch. I chuckled to be courteous but was determined to shock him with the truth that this book in no way invoked laughter. I hit him hard with the words “human trafficking” and I didn’t need to say much more before he corrected himself of his previous assumption.

I guess the intensity of the book had gotten to me and for people to see the word “girl” and associate it with something futile was irritating. The term “girl” should evoke strength, resilience, the ability to excel on the world stage and exceed gendered expectations. But I guess I am biased, only because the girls I have read about for the past few weeks embody all of these characteristics. They are everything but what this backpacker associated with the word “girl”.

However, at the same time, his reaction speaks to the innocence lost on victims of sexual slavery. We hear the world girl and associate it with dress up and barbies. Yet when we hear about girls in the sex industry, working on the streets since they were 12 years old, we don’t think of them in this light and gentle way. We don’t view them as “girls” because they are forced to act in ways that contradict the behavior we associate with children.

Rachel Lloyd highlights in her book how a "memo" written in opposition to the Safe Harbor for Exploited Youth Act referred to the girls in the bill as "young adults". The legal document had referred to them as children, yet the write up insisted in changing the wording. Why? Perhaps it was to make it easier to lay blame on the girls, to make them more responsible by making them seem more adult-like. Perhaps it was because a “girl” as we know one, would never choose a life on the streets. Whatever the case, the issue of seeing girls as girls no matter what circumstances they are in is real and complicates solutions for human trafficking. This discrepancy is partly responsible for the treatment of child victims of sexual exploitation as adult criminals. Law enforcement has neglected to see girls as “girls” and sometimes knowingly chooses not to to make their jobs easier (it is easier to lock girls up as adults rather than deal with social services).

When I was younger, I attempted to run away from home to make a statement. I walked out my front door and down the driveway until I realized no one noticed I had left and my plan had failed before it even took off. I returned home because I was honestly afraid to leave. I knew I had a family that loved and supported me and my cry for attention was an act of selfishness. But what about the girls leaving their homes out of desperation? What about those living in poverty, those who are abused, those for who home is not an option? Can we blame girls for their vulnerability, for believing some “john” is really going to save her life and not enslave her? Beneath the make-up, the short skirts, the seductive smiles are girls—girls who need help, girls manipulated and tricked into the life.

The world needs to look beyond race and socioeconomic status and realize that our ignorance towards sex trafficking is hurting children. By opening our eyes to this reality we can make changes and save girls.