It's Super Bowl Time—Cue the Winger Sex Trafficking Myths!

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J.—It's Super Bowl time again, so all the sports fans will want to stock up on beer, pretzels, chips, buffalo wings, cocaine and prostitutes, right? At least, that's the idea you'd get if you were reading the right-wing "news"letters and blogs like Townhall.com, FocusOnTheFamily.com ... and the Congressional Record? We've reported on this faux "phenomenon" before, but this year, Ronald Reagan's adopted son Michael was first out of the gate, claiming, "Sex trafficking has become a stealth parasite that attaches itself to major sporting events, taking advantage of a large number of fans and the demand for illicit sex. ... Dallas police and federal authorities arrested 133 minors for prostitution during the 2011 Super Bowl, and according to Forbes Magazine 10,000 prostitutes were transported to Miami for the Super Bowl in 2010." Incidentally, those are lies. According to Pete Kotz of the Houston Press, "Last year's [2011] panic came courtesy of Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. ... Abbott organized task forces with the FBI, ICE and Homeland Security. He raised an army of volunteers from religious and women's groups. All were on deck to rescue the thousands of underage girls who'd be sold like ground chuck throughout Big D. ... Sure enough, when it was all over, cops had managed just 105 arrests metrowide, mostly by rousting the local talent. Twelve women faced penalties no greater than for speeding tickets. Only two arrests involved human trafficking." As for the claim that 10,000 prostitutes were transported to Miami for the 2010 Super Bowl, the Global Alliance Against Trafficking in Women, in its report (.pdf) "What's the Cost of a Rumour?," noted that Super Bowls have typically attracted 150,000 to 200,000 fans, which would mean that if Forbes Magazine were correct, one in 15 or 20 "man, woman and child holding a ticket would have their own personal hooker, from the vice presidential wing of FedEx to Little Timmy from Green Bay." In a section titled, "Short-term events are likely not profitable for traffickers or sex workers," the report states, "The idea of traffickers being magnetically drawn to large sporting events ignores the cost-benefit analysis for a short-term event, especially given the fact that sex workers have often been displaced or removed during street 'clean-up' activities. Short-term sports events are not only insufficiently profitable for traffickers, sex workers and business owners, they have more often than not reported a drop in business (or 'demand') during large sporting events." Similarly, journalist Susan Elizabeth Shepard of SportsOnEarth.com wrote, "Any actual nexus for human trafficking would require a larger-than-normal number of willing buyers. Sports fans would need to be willing to risk arrest away from home, in addition to desiring commercial sex from coerced victims, possibly underage ones." However, because of the publicity surrounding various professional athletes' sex scandals over the years, Shepard concluded, "That image makes the concept of the Super Bowl as a massive sex-trafficking event just believable enough—regardless of the truth." Of course, the fact that there's no truth to the trafficking/prostitute influx claims didn't stop U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-Christieland) from spending upwards of a half-hour ranting about it in Congress on January 28. Smith is wary of a "likely influx of both domestic and international traffickers" who will "[s]adly, but almost certainly ... bring with them sexually exploited trafficking victims—many of them from abroad—in an attempt to cash in on the Super Bowl crowds." Yep, who could doubt that traffickers will spend upwards of $1,500 apiece to bring women, maybe even kids, across the Atlantic in the hopes of selling their sexual services to Super Bowl attendees for—what? A blowjob or fuck the fans could get on the streets of nearby New York City for, tops, $150? Or in a decent brothel for a couple of hundred more? (No offense to some porn stars of our acquaintance, but European pussy ain't that much better than American.) And speaking of New York City, the only Super Bowl-related "trafficking" story to hit the newsstands recently was one in the New York Daily News, which reported that Yolanda Ostoloza of Hollywood, Florida, brought her 15-year-old daughter to the Big Apple to do "the fetish stuff" with Super Bowl attendees (or, we're guessing, anyone else with enough cash to pay the freight). However, when vice cops caught the kid in a sting, it was revealed that for $200, the girl was willing to perform "an undisclosed sex act" on the two cops—again, not a a hell of a price per "session" if mom was expecting the kid to earn enough to pay for the airfare, hotel rooms and food for the two of them plus Yolanda's pimp, for whom the cops are still searching. But Yolanda and daughter weren't the only prostitution-related busts in NYC of late. Earlier this week, following "an 11-month investigation by the state Organized Crime Task Force, the Department of Homeland Security and the NYPD," cops busted 18 more pros, three of whom were allegedly trafficked in from Mexico, who allegedly were offering "high-end" Super Bowl attendees (or, really, anybody) "party packs" consisting of cocaine and a fuck. That's on top of the 298 alleged prostitutes the police have arrested since the beginning of the year, at least one of whom, 10 days ago, texted to "regular customers" the offer "new sexy & beautiful girls R in town waiting for u." Talk about your hard sell! Anyway, the cops say the number of busts is 30 percent higher than usual for the same time period—but then again, it was the result of "an 11-month investigation by the state Organized Crime Task Force, the Department of Homeland Security and the NYPD," so one might expect they'd find a few more targets than just the regular gals out on the streets. Anyway, bottom line: If you're looking for a hooker, they're pretty much everywhere and not that hard to find—but only during major sporting events do politicians get to score political points by supporting a crackdown on a myth.