Receipts Please! Myths Don't Stand a Chance!

Swop Behind Bars
4 days ago
6 min read

Myth #2: Decriminalization Will Increase Trafficking

Reality: Evidence from New Zealand and parts of Australia shows the opposite—decriminalization can improve safety, reduce exploitation, and increase cooperation with law enforcement for actual trafficking cases.

Why This Myth Exists

This myth is a direct descendant of old moral panics about sexuality and labor. The “White Slavery” scare of the early 1900s claimed that any loosening of sexual morals would unleash a wave of trafficking, usually framed in racialized, xenophobic terms. These ideas have never gone away—they’ve just been rebranded.

Today, anti-trafficking NGOs and politicians repeat the claim that if sex work is decriminalized, “traffickers will flood in.” The logic is simple, dramatic, and misleading: remove criminal penalties, and exploitation supposedly spikes. This narrative benefits certain groups—faith-based rescue organizations, law enforcement agencies seeking funding, and politicians wanting to look “tough on crime.” Fear of trafficking becomes the catch-all excuse to maintain criminalization, even when the evidence contradicts it.

One of the most enduring misconceptions about sex work is that removing criminal penalties will somehow cause trafficking to skyrocket. This fear has deep historical roots. It can be traced back to the “White Slavery Panic” of the early 20th century, when sensationalized stories of women and girls being kidnapped into brothels were used to justify sweeping laws against sex work, migration, and even interracial relationships. Those laws were less about protecting women and more about policing morality, immigrants, and the poor. Over a century later, the same rhetoric has been repackaged for modern politics. Anti-trafficking organizations, faith-based groups, and elected officials repeat the claim that decriminalization will open the floodgates for traffickers. It’s an emotionally charged narrative that plays well in the media, but it is not supported by evidence.

The Evidence in Already In!

In fact, the data shows just the opposite. When New Zealand passed the Prostitution Reform Act in 2003, lawmakers closely monitored for any spike in trafficking. None was found. Instead, sex workers reported greater ability to refuse clients, demand safer working conditions, and report violence without fear of arrest. In New South Wales, Australia, where sex work has been largely decriminalized since the 1990s, studies similarly show no rise in trafficking.

What did increase was access to healthcare, legal protections, and the power to organize collectively for safety. Globally, countries that cling to full criminalization—or the so-called “Nordic model,” which criminalizes clients—tend to see worse outcomes. Exploitation is harder to detect because workers fear arrest if they come forward. By contrast, decriminalization fosters cooperation between workers, communities, and law enforcement when genuine trafficking occurs.

Who Gets Hurt By This Myth?

The consequences of believing this myth fall hardest on the people already most vulnerable. For sex workers, criminalization drives the industry underground, forcing them to choose between safety and survival. They lose the ability to screen clients openly, to work together indoors, or to call 911 without risking arrest themselves. For trafficking survivors, criminalization often means being charged with prostitution-related offenses for acts they were forced into. Instead of receiving support, they are branded as criminals—sometimes for life—making it harder to find housing, jobs, or stability.

Even children are not protected by these laws. Despite rhetoric about “saving kids,” minors in the sex trade are frequently handcuffed, interrogated, and placed into detention rather than offered care. This retraumatizes them and erodes trust, making it less likely they will seek help in the future.

The myth also fails the broader public. By conflating consensual sex work with trafficking, resources are wasted on stings and raids that criminalize adults while leaving actual traffickers—and entire sectors of labor trafficking in agriculture, construction, and domestic work—under-policed and underfunded. It creates a smoke screen that hides real abuse while inflating arrest statistics to make politicians and law enforcement look effective. In reality, criminalization silences victims, fuels stigma, and confuses the public about what trafficking actually is.

The truth is clear: decriminalization does not create trafficking. It creates the conditions to fight it. When people are free from the fear of arrest, they are more likely to report coercion and violence, more able to access healthcare and housing, and more empowered to stand up against abuse. Criminalization claims to protect the vulnerable, but in practice it endangers them. Decriminalization is not only a sex worker rights issue—it is an evidence-based anti-trafficking strategy and a pathway to dignity, safety, and justice for everyone.

Who Gets Hurt When This Myth Drives Policy

When lawmakers cling to the myth that decriminalization equals more trafficking, the fallout lands heaviest on those already living at the margins. Sex workers are often the first and most visible targets. Criminalization forces them into the shadows, stripping away the ability to work safely or openly. Instead of being able to screen clients, work collectively in safer indoor spaces, or call for help when threatened, they are left vulnerable to violence and coercion. The law itself becomes a weapon in the hands of abusers, who know they can silence sex workers with a single threat: you can’t go to the police, you’ll be arrested. Far from protecting people, criminalization tightens the grip of exploitation.

For survivors of trafficking, the harm is just as severe. Rather than being recognized as victims of coercion or force, many are swept up in raids and prosecuted for prostitution-related charges. Their survival strategies are criminalized, and the very system that claims to “rescue” them leaves them with records that follow them for life. A trafficking survivor who is arrested and convicted carries the double burden of trauma and a criminal history, making it nearly impossible to access housing, employment, or educational opportunities.

Decriminalization would eliminate this constant fear of arrest and open the door for survivors to connect with real support systems instead of jail cells.

Children, too, are failed by policies rooted in this myth. While politicians invoke the language of “protecting kids,” the reality is far bleaker. Minors who are found in the sex trade are often treated as delinquents rather than children in need of care. They are handcuffed, interrogated, and funneled into juvenile detention, which only deepens their trauma. Rather than building trust and offering stability, the system teaches them to fear authorities and discourages them from reaching out for help in the future. Funding that could provide safe housing, therapy, and education for young people is instead funneled into costly stings and policing operations. The result is not safety, but retraumatization and neglect.

In every case—whether we are talking about sex workers, survivors, or children—the myth that criminalization is protective does the exact opposite of what it promises. It compounds harm, strengthens exploiters, and wastes resources that should be invested in care, stability, and safety.

How This Myth Fails Everyone

The belief that decriminalization will increase trafficking doesn’t just harm sex workers, survivors, or children—it undermines the fight against exploitation for everyone. First, it misdirects resources. Year after year, billions of dollars are poured into flashy raids and stings that primarily target adult sex workers, producing headlines but not safety. Meanwhile, genuine trafficking cases in agriculture, domestic labor, and construction—the industries where the majority of forced labor actually occurs—remain chronically underfunded and overlooked. By chasing myths instead of evidence, governments spend more energy criminalizing survival than dismantling real trafficking networks.

This myth also silences victims.

When reporting violence or coercion means risking arrest, loss of housing, deportation, or even losing custody of children, most victims will simply stay silent. Survivors and sex workers alike are pushed further into isolation, leaving traffickers free to operate unchecked. The very laws that claim to protect people from harm create the conditions that allow abusers to thrive.

Another profound failure is the way this myth fuels stigma. By constantly equating sex work with trafficking, the public conversation erases the voices of consensual workers and delegitimizes their demands for labor rights. Instead of being recognized as people advocating for safety, dignity, and economic justice, sex workers are cast as passive victims with no agency—or worse, as criminals. This stigma bleeds into healthcare, housing, employment, and even parenting rights, reinforcing cycles of poverty and marginalization.

Finally, the myth confuses the public. When every aspect of sex work is framed as trafficking, the term loses its meaning. If everything is trafficking, then nothing is trafficking—and it becomes nearly impossible to see, much less stop, real cases of coercion and abuse. Public energy is misdirected, law enforcement loses credibility, and communities remain vulnerable.

In short, this myth fails everyone. It wastes resources, endangers victims, reinforces stigma, and blurs the very definitions needed to address genuine exploitation. The path forward isn’t criminalization cloaked as protection—it’s clarity, honesty, and evidence-based policy.

The Bottom Line

Decriminalization does not create trafficking—it creates the conditions where trafficking can actually be fought. By removing the threat of arrest, workers are freer to report abuse, communities can build stronger safety nets, and law enforcement can focus on actual coercion rather than consensual labor.