By IANS
Kolkata : The most effective weapon against trafficking is not legalisation nor criminalisation, but decriminalisation of women and children, prosecution of pimps and traffickers and education of customers, said Gloria Steinem, America’s most influential feminist.
Steinem, who is the founder of Ms. Magazine, and a member of National Women’s Political Caucus, was speaking at a seminar on “How Women Confront the Demand for Human Trafficking: Insights into Slavery and Emancipation” organised by anti-human trafficking organisation, Apne Aap Women Worldwide, at the American Centre here Monday.
Students, academics, businessmen, panchayat members, local authorities and women and children from red-light areas attended the function.
“The victory of this visit is the meeting of 10 grassroots anti-trafficking groups from around the world from Iceland to Africa to India,” she said.
Steinem spoke to women from the Munshigunge-Watgunge red-light area of the city and shared their stories of courage. The women spoke out against physical violence, beatings and rape and how they overcame exploitation and subjugation.
One woman said: “I fought with the brothel-owner to send my daughter to school. When she threw me out, I decided I would struggle, but send her to school and so found a job as part-time worker in different households. Life is very difficult but my daughter is going to school now.”
Another woman said she had been beaten by her husband and joined Apne Aap to get legal support. “Today, he cannot beat me anymore,” she said.
Steinem responded with her own story. “I was not able to speak about my own abortion for many years till I met a group of women who had faced and dealt with abortion, and that is when I found the courage to speak out,” the icon of the modern feminist movement said.
“I learnt that women can draw strength from each other. I had seen the power of organisation at the grassroots as a 22-year-old woman when I travelled through the villages of India with the Gandhians. I used both these experiences to organise women and men for social justice for the last 40 years,” she said.
Steinem went to Bihar after 50 years to express solidarity with the marginalized Nutt women, men and children of Forbesgunge, who are protesting against sex trafficking.
She heard them in their homes in the Uttari Rampur village of Forbesgunge, spoke to members of the self-help group, visited the Nutt Vikas Kendra and the Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya, where Nutt mothers have enrolled their daughters to break the cycle of inter-generation prostitution.
“You are my future. I may not be around when you grow up, but you will carry the seeds of kindness and compassion and my spirit will be with you,” she told the children.
In her speech to the girls of the Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya, she shared a secret: “I came to India as a student 50 years ago to avoid getting married. My story has a happy ending. We never got married. I am very happy and so is the man I was slated to marry. The moral of the story is that if you listen to your heart and follow it, you will be happy.”
Ruchira Gupta of Apne Aap Women Worldwide said: “Slavery must end. Certain women are sexually exploited and enslaved because they belong to certain castes or marginalized groups. It does not only stigmatise them, but stigmatises all of us who let it exist.”