It was with interest that we read Wendy McElroy’s review of our book, Gangs and Girls: Understanding Juvenile Prostitution. Alas, our disappointment in the integrity of this review far exceeded McElroy’s disappointment.
The review frequently criticizes our “poor methodology,” although we specifically included a detailed explanation of our research methods, their motives and limitations. We interviewed 50 social workers who work with juvenile prostitutes: this was our point of departure and our primary interview sample. Many of those interviewed had had voluminous casework experience with young girls in prostitution over the course of their careers, which was invaluable in helping us map the spectrum of individuals involved in juvenile prostitution.
The accusation that “the researchers discard such ‘expert’ accounts if they do not like them” is absolutely unfounded. It was the social workers themselves who noted that many outreach workers in youth protection were unnerved by the phenomenon of juvenile prostitution. The idea that we would dismiss findings contrary to our own is equally unfounded. We simply noted that young girls tend to under-report their own sexual abuse; furthermore, we detail why this is the case: “No girl want to be known as a slut, ‘the one who did all the boys’ … Instead of using words that force them to look these experiences squarely in the face, they may think of them and describe them as survival sex … she learns to keep her status as a sex object a secret.” This is not something we invented—it was based on the testimony of the young women we interviewed. Moreover, we make no “sensational statements” about the johns who frequent juvenile prostitutes. We limited ourselves to discussing the existing research on the clients of prostitution, while citing precisely that there currently exists no research focused on the johns of underage prostitutes.
That McElroy could write “the researchers recommend the decriminalization of prostitution” is frankly astounding. Nowhere in the book do we ever take a position on this subject. Indeed, the book is not about adult prostitution, about which a discussion of criminalization would be relevant.
What is most disappointing is McElroy’s characterization of our solutions as unsatisfying. The last three chapters are dedicated to innovative methods of prevention and intervention to help both young girls and the gang members who are their pimps. McElroy thinks there “is no reason to believe their solution will work.” I would invite her to Quebec where the methods we outline have been implemented: she could meet the front-line workers who are our colleagues and who tell us that the book’s practical suggestions have significantly improved their way of doing things.
