A young girl is told all her troubles will disappear and she will be loved forever. She is whisked away not realizing that her purpose is to be bought and sold for sex.
The Super Bowl brought national attention to the Dallas-Fort Worth area. TCU students have geared up for a weekend of cold excitement and football. The university sent even sent out a crime tips e-mail warning students about pickpockets and drunk driving.
However, there has been no mention or awareness on campus of one of the biggest problems surrounding the Super Bowl.
During Super Bowl week, tens of thousands of girls under the age of 18 are expected to be solicited for sex in the North Texas area.
Alisa Jordheim, a representative from Traffick911, said big sporting events like the Super Bowl lead to a huge demand of young girls who have been lured away from their homes to be sold for sex.
“A study done in November 2010 proved that 740 young girls under the age of eighteen are trafficked within the state of Texas a month,” Jordheim said. “While 256 a month are trafficked within the Dallas-Fort Worth area.”
These numbers do not include the influx of demand from the Super Bowl.
Newspapers, TV stations, and political figures like state attorney, General Greg Abbott, are talking about the problem, but TCU’s campus has shown no uproar for this social injustice.
“It’s just not an issue that TCU students are particularly concerned about and I don’t know why they would be because of course it doesn’t affect you directly,” Rachael Adcock, a sophomore Strategic Communication major who volunteers for Traffick911 said. “But it’s something they should be concerned about because it’s here, it’s happening, and it’s not going away.”
Jessica Anderson, a sophomore strategic communication major, said she was shocked to find out that not only is sex trafficking is happening in the U.S. and not just in foreign countries, but the life expectancy for victims of sex trafficking is estimated at seven years after being sold.
“Going to a school like TCU, it’s definitely in a bubble,” Anderson said. “We aren’t really aware of what’s going on around and I really had no idea about that.”
Jay Ratliff, a Dallas Cowboy defensive player, has become a spokesman for Traffick911. Jordheim said during the filming for a sex trafficking awareness video, he began to cry when thinking about what it would be like if this happened to his two young daughters.
In Ratliff’s promotion video he said, “If you are one of these men buying these young girls, I am telling you that real men don’t buy children. They don’t buy sex.”
Ratliff along with survivors from sex trafficking and former traffickers will be at the “I’m Not Buying it Tailgate Rally,” the day before the Super Bowl on February 5th in Mansfield, Texas.
