Is Montreal’s Grand Prix really a sex-trade hotbed?
Formula One race focal point in debate on human trafficking, police ‘repression’
There seems to be no hard evidence that Montreal’s Grand Prix is more of a prostitution-and-human-trafficking hotbed than other big events.
Despite years of police crackdowns and publicity campaigns, the city of Montreal only last month ordered a study to “assess the existence and extent of trafficking in women during the Grand Prix.”
But the Formula One race — Montreal’s biggest tourist draw — has become the focal point for a debate over sex work, with selfdescribed feminist organizations on both sides arguing they are trying to protect women’s rights.
On one side, an anti-prostitution group says anecdotal evidence indicates demand for paid sex soars with the influx of Formula One fans, intensifying the sexual exploitation of girls and women.
On the other, a group representing sex workers, who decry the “hysteria” that has developed around the Grand Prix, suggesting the ensuing “police repression” endangers women trying to make a living.
DIANE MATTE, LA CLES
La Concertation des luttes contre l’exploitation sexuelle, whose members include union federations, the Women’s Y, and organizations that help sexual-assault victims, is organizing a protest on Saturday against the exploitation of women during the Grand Prix.
“We target the Grand Prix because it’s a big, highly publicized event and it’s clear that there will be an impact on the sex industry,” said Diane Matte, co-coordinator of La CLES.
“We know Montreal is a destination for sex tourism year round,” she added. “We also know from women we meet every day here that during the Grand Prix or any other big sports event where a lot of men are coming, the sex industry offers more to answer the demand. Women are solicited more, they are told to work longer hours to answer the needs of men who buy sex. They are under pressure to do more.”
La CLES suggests there is an increase in recruitment of girls and young women for sex work during the Grand Prix, with pimps targeting métro stations, schools, shopping centres and social networks. During the Grand Prix, “Montreal becomes more than ever a hub of exploitation and trafficking, a city where sexual services can be bought with a snap of your fingers,” the group said in a press release.
In Montreal, “you have over 200 massage parlours selling sexual acts,” Matte said. “It’s clear you have to have women there, and it’s clear that if you have an event where there are more men, more women will be brought into massage parlours, strip clubs, escort agencies to satisfy this so-called need.”
La CLES “is not looking at targeting women” who sell sex. “Women are brought into prostitution and the sex industry because of the lack of choices — poverty, racism, and so forth,” Matte said.
“Prostitution is the expression of inequality in our society — economic, social. It’s not a question of whether we think women should be (selling sex) or not, it’s more a question of whether men should be allowed to buy sex or not. We want men to stop buying sexual acts.”
She said Saturday’s protest will also target the Grand Prix itself, which helps foster the objectification of women.
“It’s the coming together of two realities — they’re selling cars but they’re also selling access to women and reinforcing the vision of women whose body is sexualized and very accessible to men.
“When you look at Crescent St., it’s like a festival of sexism and machismo.”
SANDRA WESLEY, CHEZ STELLA
Chez Stella runs a drop-in centre and medical clinic for sex workers, and has launched a social-media campaign to denounce Grand Prix “disinformation campaigns” by governments and prostitution abolitionists that result in “police repression.”
“There are lots of raids in massage parlours, lots of undercover cops who receive sex workers in hotel rooms,” said Sandra Wesley, Chez Stella’s executive director.
She said it’s traumatic for escorts to end up “face to face with a police officer who wants to know your name and question you and detain you until he can establish that you’re not a victim of whatever exploitation that he’s imagining you’re a victim of.”
Police also place fake ads on online classified sites offering sex. That makes clients reluctant to negotiate details before meeting.
“Normally, we want to establish a price and exactly what services we offer and which we don’t, and talk about condom use,” Wesley said. “When the client is afraid we might be a cop, he’s not going to have that conversation before meeting in person.” That leads to situations “where we’re going to meet a client without having discussed all those things, and that can lead to violence and other negative outcomes.”
Afraid of police, some workers don’t provide services during the Grand Prix, “so they’re desperate for money the rest of the month and may take on clients they wouldn’t otherwise take on; they might deviate from normal safety measures and face more violence.”
Though police don’t arrest sex workers for crimes related to their work, several immigrant women have been deported after being identified during Grand Prix operations, Wesley said.
She pointed to a Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women study that found “no evidence to support the claim that large sporting events and trafficking for prostitution are linked.” Wesley noted that during last year’s Grand Prix, Montreal police “did not find any minors, human trafficking or organized crime. They just found women trying to make a living.”
At the Grand Prix, “those men are at the race track during the day. At night, they’re at parties with lots of women willing to have sex for free. So where would they be seeing all these sex workers?”
POLICE RAIDS, STINGS
As they did last year, Montreal police and partners like the RCMP and the Canada Border Services Agency are joining efforts to “thwart demand for sexual services” during the Grand Prix.
“We know that there’s an increase in sex services being offered when there’s a major event,” said RCMP spokesperson Camille Habel. “There must be a higher demand because otherwise they wouldn’t bother getting more girls in.”
Last year, in the days leading up to the Grand Prix, police raided 31 massage parlours and 11 strip clubs and organized sting operations via websites.
More than 1,000 customers were identified at the massage parlours and strip bars, as were almost 350 workers. Six people were arrested. Twenty-seven sex workers were identified via websites selling sexual services, as were six people who worked with the sex workers. One of the assistants was arrested.
Habel said the arrests were not related to sex work, but she could not specify the charges. The arrests may have been sparked by such things as outstanding warrants.
Police also placed ads on online classified sites offering sex with girls under 18, Habel said. Just over 120 people answered the ads, three of whom were arrested for purchasing sexual services from a minor.
In addition, thousands of vehicles were inspected at the U.S. border before entering Canada for signs of human trafficking; officials were also on alert at Trudeau Airport. Four “cases of interest” were pursued — two at a border crossing, and two at the airport — but Habel could not provide details.
“The goal is not to arrest sex workers,” Habel said. “The point is to get the people who exploit and traffic.” Police also check on the welfare of sex workers. “If they’re being exploited, we can give them the resources they need to get out.”
WOMEN’S COUNCIL INPUT
Mayor Denis Coderre has given the Conseil des Montréalaises — a city organization that provides input on women’s issues — three years to study trafficking in women during the Grand Prix.
“We’ve been tasked to see what’s going on and to propose recommendations,” said Conseil member Mireille Paquet, a political scientist.
She said the Conseil will “talk to all the groups — the groups that are for the abolition of prostitution, the groups that are pro-sex worker — but our concern is with trafficking, not with prostitution itself.”
The UN defines human trafficking as “the acquisition of people by improper means such as force, fraud or deception, with the aim of exploiting them.”