by Adele
Since the 1990s, “grooming gangs” throughout England have lured thousands of girls as young as 11 into prostitution. Survivor Sarah Wilson describes their tactics in her 2015 memoir Violated: A Shocking and Harrowing Survival Story from the Notorious Rotherham Abuse Scandal. Men befriend lonely girls, sometimes introduced by an older girl. They pose as boyfriends or invite them to “parties,” introducing them to alcohol and drugs. Girls endure repeated rape, gang-rape, and torture, believing they “owe” the men for companionship and drugs, especially after becoming addicted. Abusers give them cell phones so that numerous men can summon them. Some murder their victims and many threaten their families. Upon reaching their late teens, victims are pressured to bring in new girls.
RACISM, AN EXCUSE FOR INACTION
Most British authorities ignore this situation, supposedly because most perpetrators are Muslim men of Pakistani descent and victims usually white. Politicians claim they don’t want to be branded as racist/Islamophobic or inflame right-wing gang violence. This could have some truth, but survivors and feminist activists state that misogyny and classism play a larger role. Many police and social workers constantly blame the working-class victims for supposed “lifestyle choices” to be “worthless sluts.” Survivors describe staff at foster-care homes allowing pimps to regularly pick up girls, even taunting them. Police ignore repeated calls from parents, arresting them if they confront perpetrators.
The same authorities often ignore white, male pedophiles acting alone. The 2022 documentary “Jimmy Savile: A British Horror Story” describes a famous example of police and media ignoring years of a celebrity’s sexual abuse of children. On the other hand, Sarah Wilson describes being rescued and protected by a religious Muslim Pakistani man.
Currently, Elon Musk and white supremacist groups exploit these tragedies, promoting themselves with an anti-immigration narrative. But the cumulative struggles of survivors, parents, feminist activists, and some police investigators, journalists, and social workers are the true reason it is finally being exposed.
In 1996, Irene Ivison founded Parents Against Child Exploitation (PACE) after her daughter was prostituted and murdered. PACE works with UK parents whose children are sexually or criminally exploited or at risk. In the 2000s, the Rotherham town council created Risky Business, the first public service project to acknowledge gangs were victimizing girls. Their social workers took the unusual approach of listening to the girls, gently trying to convince them to leave the gangs. Survivors realized the abuse was not their fault and some found it less difficult to report or testify in court.
FIGHTING BACK
In 2017, journalist Andrew Norfolk interviewed survivor Sammy Woodhouse. This led to the Jay Report—professor Alexis Jay’s independent investigation into the exploitation of 1,400 victims in Rotherham from 1997 to 2013. Woodhouse’s abusers were convicted, but she and 700 other victims had to fight for compensation. A 2018 High Court ruling cleared her criminal record of crimes including robbery and assault her abuser forced her to commit. In 2023, she successfully opposed the city council’s attempt to allow him involvement in her son’s life.
Police detective Maggie Oliver and Sara Rowbotham, a Crisis Intervention Team investigator, each interviewed numerous victims. Police ignored their reports for over a decade but their persistence resulted in the BBC’s 2017 miniseries “Three Girls” and documentary “The Betrayed Girls.” These exposed both abuse and police complicity.
Only a few abusers have been convicted, receiving short sentences, but this proves bringing them to justice is possible. It is important to have hope, since grooming gangs exist worldwide.
Theresa L. Flores describes similar grooming gangs in her 2009 memoir The Slave Across the Street: The Harrowing yet Inspirational True Story of One Girl’s Traumatic Journey from Sex-Slave to Freedom. The perpetrators were an extended family of ethnic minority Christians in Detroit, Mich. Like Wilson, Flores strongly emphasizes that her abusers don’t represent their entire ethnicity or religion. Both survivors found friends and allies from the same culture and religion as their abusers.
Ending exploitation requires the efforts of people from all walks of life. It is important to study successful tactics and organizations created by survivors and their allies. This knowledge shows the horrific magnitude of organized exploitation but gives us confidence that we will replace it with a compassionate society.