TV Schedule

China Sex Workers



  3. embed code
  4. lauraling
  5. related topics
Laura Ling looks into China's booming sex industry, one that was virtually non-existent twenty-five years ago.
lauraling

24 responses // China Sex Workers

  • I was struck by the matter-of-fact demeanor of the women interviewed and was surprised that they were willing to talk on camera. Although attitudes are changing, anything having to do with sex is still a difficult topic to broach in Chinese society.
    joanneshen
  • Since 1994, I've gone to China 15 times to report stories, seven of them with Laura. As we were researching this trip, we focused on something that China's President Hu Jintao has been saying a lot in the past couple of years: China's greatest threat is social instability caused by widening economic inequality exacerbated by governmental corruption. In other words, China's unprecedented economic growth has lifted hundreds of millions of Chinese into the middle class, but it has left behind even more Chinese, and with the collapse of the social safety net, and large scale abandonment of fair dealing due to pervasive governmental corruption, a lot of Chinese are getting really pissed. The government has taken to tracking the number of "social disturbances," which, by its count, range from 70,000+ to 80,000+ each year... Or put yet another way, the sort of ruthless free market, uncontrolled capitalism that China has embraced seems closest to the capitalism of mid-19th Century Britain, as celebrated by those two well-known London-based authors, Charles Dickens and Karl Marx... What does this mean in terms of China's sex workers, whose numbers have been estimated by the UCLA and Johns Hopkins University schools of public health to estimate in the many millions? We hear a lot about human trafficking, even from the President George W. Bush. But, while heinous, trafficking doesn't seem able to account for the vast number of sex workers in China... But Charles Dickens does... As you see from the women with whom Laura speaks in this story, the main goal is amass some money, by any means, to have a cushion in a society where only money seems to count, and where the social network has disappeared to the point where many ordinary people begin to feel that you could fall over on the street and if governmental institutions took notice of your writhing body it would only because they wanted to harvest your organs for sale? By the horrendous, Dickensian logic of globalization in China, it can make a certain economic sense to be a sex worker, especially since endemic governmental corruption is creating widespread public cynicism and wiping out any sense of public morality... No wonder President Hu is so concerned with heading off the wrath of the Chinese people.
    MitchKoss
  • http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...
    Oldest Profession Flourishes in China
    Oldest Profession Flourishes in China
    From this months Washington Post...
    Christof
  • Everything in China happens on a massive scale--including China’s sex industry. In almost every big city and in many small towns, there is no shortage of women, and increasingly men, who are selling themselves. And since a large percentage of these sex workers are migrants who also service other migrant workers, the prospects for the spread of HIV/AIDS becomes that much more daunting and harder to contain. I was relieved when the young woman we interviewed answered emphatically that she uses a condom and is afraid of contracting STDs. It shows that awareness is increasing. Let us hope.
    recommended by  huntre
    lauraling
  • Some economic miracle, huh? Women there don't make enough money unless they choose this kind of work. This is a tragedy against humanity on a global scale. The Chinese government ought to be ashamed of themselves.
    phoenix_fire999
  • Well put, MitchKoss. Unfettered capitalism is bad for everyone.
    phoenix_fire999
  • Unfettered capitalism? China is a communist country you nit wit. Unfettered capitalism brought you the marvels of this message board and current tv. Dear god, you people with your irrational, hypocritical, and selfish hatred of the system that makes your lives so damn good.
    I watched these bits tonight. I think the "reporting" of the sex trade was sub-par at best. It seemed to me more like unethical taping of people who may or may not be in the sex trade. I think that the reporter was terrible. If you didn't have the balls to ask the questions that needed to be asked, then why did that bit of film make it past editing?
    Also, during the bit on weed, that kid with the "cannibus" plot he and his family were growing was hemp, like he said, not marijuana like you indicated. There is a big difference, that i would think you would be happy to report.
    Also, the thing at the end with the big "bust" worth 700,000 dollars or whatever exaggerated numeral that was used, was, to be intellectually honest, complete bullshit. Those weights are of the whole plant, green. the stuff that people buy to consume is just the tiny female flower, that has been dried. Its sad to see even current tv blowing the governments steamy propaganda without doing proper research prior to print.
    Sub par all around.
    Good stuff as a rule about the war though!
    boonpraiser
  • Not any more, it's not! How do you think we got the trade imbalance with China, you shit for brains?
    phoenix_fire999
  • Why are there so many men who go to prostitutes? Maybe is should be legal. It's strange though how these women are so matter-of-fact. I think I'd rather steal or starve.

    legalize marijuana then it would change things in Moracco and columbia. Hello....hemp has so many values that we could use today to help us in the fight against global warming. The governments around the world use "illegal" drugs to supply their militia. Remember Prohibition? Let's get real.
    mohitz
  • A little harsh there pheonix. Yes, in many ways the economic system of china is more free than even the old' US of A, but in just as many ways, there is a frightening amount of government control of the economy and its people. Think ebay when you think unfettered capitalism, not china. Think starbucks, not our health care system. I think people have a fundamental misunderstanding of what capitalism is, and with good reason i suppose. When you are brought up spoon fed info by the nanny state, it makes sense that the regurgitations will reek of misinformation.
    A free market is only free when it is free of the bonds of government.
    I'll stress that it is capitalism that brought you this socialist show on your fancy fast tv or computer.
    sorry about the nit with quip, it was late, though that is no excuse.
    boonpraiser
  • Hey boonpraiser - I'm not sure what you mean. no offense, but what's your point?

    I understand capitalism - both its pros and cons. like all societies, there is no utopia. Is there any "free markets"? Of course not. My point is even if we have a lot of freedoms, this administration is destroying these freedoms for their own personal gains. Do you agree with that? Or is more spoon fed rhetoric.

    peace
    mohitz
  • Laura,

    Good job on your report on China. I lived there as a student in 1993 and returned for a visit in 2004. What I noticed was a HUGE change in those 11 years. Cities have seen extraordinary construction and growth, fortunes earned on a scale that would put to shame the rise of US industrialists, and a social upheaval that can be likened to the 60's and the industrial boom of the turn of the century rolled into one.

    While there, though, I couldn’t help feel a little nostalgia for the China I experienced in the early 90’s – it seemed so much more innocent, pure and earnest in its efforts to join a global community as a peer.
    vobbie
  • Hey there, mohitz
    unless the attack is ad hominem, i dont think ill take offense.
    I have several points i guess,
    Of course there are free markets, and perfect example of an ever adjusting, self correcting market is the one in which you and I are operating right now. We are using gmail, not microsoft express or hotmail or whatever. You might be listening to an ipod even, or something better. we are using these devices to participate in an intellectual free market in ideas, basically able to say what we want about who. As you eluded to however, there is growing risk of this market becoming regulated by our overfed ever growing leviathan of a government. A pidgeon with no feet living in a cave in the hills of west virginia knows about how grossly this administration is infringing on our and the worlds freedoms. But i think another point is it is not just this administation, its all of them since lincoln. Its a ever expanding federal government which is ultimately leading to this countries horrible end. And the war in Iraq! My goodness! How incredibly horrible! Large federal governments drop atom bombs on Japanese civilians, firebomb innocent citizens of dresden germany. No, there is no utopia. But there is far better than a horrible imperialistic and tyranical government that will come to your door with lots of fast acting guns and take money from you to fund their terrible war if you choose not to pay. I would like to continue this conversation, sorry for the disconnection and rambling. hard to keep this stuff in order in the ol' brain.
    boonpraiser
  • I hear ya! We have to look at what is going on right now. right now, our country is being destroyed by the Bush Administration. The funding for the war has to stop and Bush and his cronies need to be put on trial for war crimes. I'm not looking for revenge or even justice. but, putting these crooks on trial will give us hope that those who blatanly break our laws will get punished. Also, we have to stop them before they go to Iran. We the people need to take back our country!!
    mohitz
  • Chinese sex workers are also exporting themselves throughout the Middle East. There are thousands of them flying out there on their own accord to make as much money as they can in the shortest period possible. For that matter you can find as many East European, Arabic and African women working in the trade throughout the Gulf states. They all consider themselves as independent business women, but its quite dangerous if and when they get caught by the police or get kidnapped by local or third country nationals.
    plucero
  • This was so sad to watch. But great exposure to something that not many people no about. I didn't know that prostitution in China was so huge.

    In bangladesh prostitution is legal, but it's a similar thing. Most of the women that work in hair salons are also part of the industry...

    really sad..
    Spiral9
  • Sure its sad but wat recourse do they have. It's the easy money they're after in the Middle East. Whats interesting is that the women who leave China for the Gulf states are the ones who would never work as prostitutes in China. Either because of the face issue
    some of them are middle/upper class women who've fallen on hard times for one reason or another or are the old hands in thier 40's and 50's who still look young enough to pass for 20 or 30. Most Arabs and westerners haven't a clue how old the women are they're sleeping with so the laughs on them, eh.

    There is a stigma for them to be doing this however like I said earlier what choice do they have. There's no way they can make the same amount of money in China. For those who have good language skills and pretty they make as much money as some of the foreign contractors working there. Definitely more than 10 x's more than a legal 3rd country laborer would in the Gulf.

    For any woman who goes to the Middle East to work the trade its their way of empowering themselves. No one else will.
    plucero
  • I had missed the Price of vice part, but I had seen the skit with the bud before, and I'll be checking out "Bud Business" right about now ;p
    Kidryu16
  • As an almost quarter century veteran of the broadcast and cable television news and documentary business, I'm not used to responding after something that I've worked on has aired, because in the old days, say ten years ago, you worked on a piece and had your say, and then the Los Angeles Times or whatever, had its say, and you could maybe have your wife read the review of the documentary first and decide decide whether or not you would be able to handle reading it yourself, but if you did read it, your response was entirely private, unless you made a photocopy and mailed it to your mom... The L.A. Times reviewer never knew... In this case, however, whatever you think of my work as a producer, or of Laura's work as a correspondent--I've worked with her for nearly nine years and I think she's uniquely brilliant--fair enough, but I can't resist taking advantage of this Internet thing to say that if you don't understand that China is totally the exemplar of free market capitalism, and that all the growth that you see, along with all the degradation that you see--ie, millions of sex workers--is a result of it being the capitalist's unregulated paradise is a huge misunderstanding. Sure, they are ruled by dictators who censor the press--and sometimes make it difficult for people like me to report from there. But they get along just great with Wall Street. Add that to the entire lack of a the kind of social safety net that even austerely non-socialist western societies employ, and you get what you see in this piece.
    recommended by  huntre
    MitchKoss
  • This reminds me of when I was in Shenzhen for a class I was taking on migrant workers. Our guide was taking us through an alley to show us how dense the apartment blocks are, and we saw about three or four store-fronts for "beauty salons" as we walked around. All of the women were lined up in front on folding chairs so that passers-by could pick and choose the best one. The scariest thing we saw was the back-alley plastic surgeon that was located across from these store-fronts. On the front there were ads for eye surgery, breast augmentation, and skin bleaching. I can't imagine the horrors that must take place behind those doors.
    siggie_stardust
  • Wow to this entire report, however double wow for the piece on marijuana, I never imagined that the business is at the extent that it is.
    UWAZell
  • I saw this on NakedChina...

    I enjoyed the pod, but as with Ms. Chang's pod on counterfeits, I seriously think you guys need to be blurring out faces and hiding the identities of your interviewees better. If the local authorities believe you guys are just normal tourists, I can only guess that the people being filmed in these pods believe that you guys are bored tourists (or at most, curious college students) as well. I don't think they have any guess that the footage will be shown on national TV.. and could possibly get back to the local authorities in China. I implore you guys to consider the possible consequences and to protect your sources better.

    Outside of that though, I think you guys are doing a great job and have been watching the Naked China special every night since I first discovered the program (and the Current channel) on Tuesday.
    homerless
  • They should also talk about the Sexual Revolution in China. I've heard sex is ridiculous in China. It's really sad.
    facileaaimer
  • This is so naive. China is not unlike anywhere else in the world so of course it will have prostitutes and red light districts just like everywhere else.

    I hope you weren't shocked when the heavies turned up after you were filming everyone. Seriously, what did you expect?

    I don't really see the point in this film. You didn't tell us anything we didn't already know and you almost got yourself "disappeared" because of your reckless behavior.
    jimmyriddles

Add your response

Login/Registration is required to add a response.