Parents As Pimps: Survivor Accounts of Trafficking of Children in the United States

Abstract

This article discusses four survivor accounts of survivors being sold for sexual exploitation by their parents for monetary gain. These narratives, supplemented by other accounts from 100 newspaper stories between 2012 and 2018, reveal the fact that many survivors were sold as very young children, and the abuse continued through their teen years, blurring distinctions between pedophilia and the sex trade industry. In their accounts, survivors described the motivations of their parents as well as the buyers, who used excessive force and violence. Some researchers are beginning to document the existence of parental pimping and its prevalence, which ranges from 3% to 44% among survivors. Some researchers continue to resist labeling parents as pimps and refuse to view the phenomenon as part of the sex trade industry. The findings from this study raise important questions about what cultural factors encourage parents to believe that this activity is acceptable.