Prostitution in Guatemala
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Prostitution in Guatemala is legal but procuring is prohibited. There is an offence of “aggravated procuring” where a minor is involved. Keeping a
brothel A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub par ...
is not prohibited. Prostitution is widespread in Guatemala; UNAIDS estimate there to be 26,000 prostitutes in the country. Guatemala City alone has 9
red-light district A red-light district or pleasure district is a part of an urban area where a concentration of prostitution and sex-oriented businesses, such as sex shops, strip clubs, and adult theaters, are found. In most cases, red-light districts are particu ...
s, including La Linea, El Trebol and Parque Concordia. Statistics from the Vigilancia Centinela de las Infecciones de Transmisión Sexual (VICITS) sexual health clinics from 2007 to 2011, showed 10.8 of the sex workers worked on the streets, the rest working indoors at strip clubs, brothels based at residential homes, bars etc.
Child sex tourism Child sex tourism (CST) is tourism for the purpose of engaging in the prostitution of children, which is commercially facilitated child sexual abuse. The definition of '' child'' in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child is "ev ...
is a problem in the country especially in areas such as
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and Guatemala City.
Human trafficking Human trafficking is the trade of humans for the purpose of forced labour, sexual slavery, or commercial sexual exploitation for the trafficker or others. This may encompass providing a spouse in the context of forced marriage, or the extrac ...
is also a significant and growing problem in the country, particularly the exploitation of children in prostitution. Many women and children are brought into the country from
El Salvador El Salvador (; , meaning " The Saviour"), officially the Republic of El Salvador ( es, República de El Salvador), is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south b ...
, Nicaragua, and
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...
by organized rings that force them into prostitution.


Colonial period

In colonial Guatemala, and into the 20th century, prostitution was thought of as necessary to protect the virtues of the "ladies" of Guatemala. Brothels and
street prostitution Street prostitution is a form of sex work in which a sex worker solicits customers from a public place, most commonly a street, while waiting at street corners or walking alongside a street, but also other public places such as parks, benches, e ...
were tolerated and commonplace. Guatemalan law held that prostitutes could not be raped and that violence was an occupational hazard. Any woman, whether a prostitute or not, convicted of "bad conduct" could be incarcerated in a brothel for up to 3 years. Until outlawed in 1906, individual women and their sentences could be brought and sold between brothel madams.


La Linea

In Guatemala City there is a red-light district by the "La Linea" railway track. About 250 prostitutes work there in shacks. The women rent the shacks directly from the owners and work for themselves, not pimps. They do have to pay protection money to local gangs. Generally the local police ignore the area. The 'Oblate Sisters of the Most Holy Redeemer' provide outreach services to the women and run a
drop-in center A drop-in center is a service agency for either the mentally ill, homeless people, teenagers, and other communities that offers a place where people can go to obtain food and other services. A mental health drop-in center can provide a friendly en ...
. The MuJER also provide outreach services to the women in La Linea and the other red-light districts of Guatemala City.


La Linea All-Stars

In 2004, some of the prostitutes formed a five-a-side football team to bring attention to the indignities and dangers of their lives. They joined a local league and their first match was against a high class private girls' school. During the game the parents found out how the team playing their daughters were and had the game stopped. Following this the team was expelled from the league. As a result of the publicity surrounding the incident, a local travel company sponsored them to go on a tour of Guatemala, playing against other teams including other teams of prostitutes, such as the "Tigers of Desire", a team from a brothel in
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. The tour attracted adverse publicity from moral conservatives and sponsorship was withdrawn. Director Chema Rodríguez made a documentary film
Estrellas de La Línea
about the All Stars in 2006.


HIV

With less than 1
percent In mathematics, a percentage (from la, per centum, "by a hundred") is a number or ratio expressed as a fraction of 100. It is often denoted using the percent sign, "%", although the abbreviations "pct.", "pct" and sometimes "pc" are also use ...
of the adult population estimated to be HIV-positive, Guatemala is considered to have a concentrated epidemic."Health Profile: Guatemala"
. United States Agency for International Development (June 2008). Accessed 7 September 2008.
In 2008, national HIV prevalence among sex workers is 4 percent, and among street-based female sex workers prevalence is as high as 12 percent. Following national and local awareness campaigns, education on sexual health and
condom A condom is a sheath-shaped barrier device used during sexual intercourse to reduce the probability of pregnancy or a sexually transmitted infection (STI). There are both male and female condoms. With proper use—and use at every act of in ...
distribution, the HIV prevalence rate amongst sex workers dropped to 1.6% in 2016.


Child prostitution

International tourists travel to
Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...
to engage in
child sex tourism Child sex tourism (CST) is tourism for the purpose of engaging in the prostitution of children, which is commercially facilitated child sexual abuse. The definition of '' child'' in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child is "ev ...
, especially in areas such as Antigua and Guatemala City. Children from poor families fall victims to trafficking for purposes of prostitution through advertisements for lucrative foreign jobs or through personal recruitment.
Street children Street children are poor or homeless children who live on the streets of a city, town, or village. Homeless youth are often called street kids or street child; the definition of street children is contested, but many practitioners and policym ...
are especially vulnerable to sexual exploitation. The NGO End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography, and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT) reported that children between the ages of 8 and 14 were sold for 750 to 1,500 quetzals ($97 to $194) to work in various economic activities, but primarily for sexual exploitation. According to ECPAT, the incidents of trafficking in persons and the sale of children for sexual exploitation have likely increased due to higher unemployment rates and increasing numbers of individuals living in extreme
poverty Poverty is the state of having few material possessions or little income. Poverty can have diverse social, economic, and political causes and effects. When evaluating poverty in ...
. Police, military, and elected officials have been placed under investigation for paying children for sex acts, facilitating child sex trafficking, or protecting venues where trafficking occurs.


Sex trafficking

Guatemala is a source, transit, and destination country for women and children subjected to sex trafficking. Guatemalan women, girls, and boys are exploited in sex trafficking within the country and in Mexico, the United States, Belize, and other foreign countries. Commercial sexual exploitation of Guatemalan children by foreign tourists from Canada, the United States, and Western Europe, and by Guatemalan residents persists. Women and children from other Latin American countries and the United States are exploited in sex trafficking in Guatemala. Government studies of past cases suggest women recruited victims while men ran criminal organizations. Criminal organizations, including gangs, exploit girls in sex trafficking. Some Latin American migrants transiting Guatemala en route to Mexico and the United States are subjected to sex trafficking in Mexico, the United States, or Guatemala. The United States Department of State
Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons The Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons (J/TIP) is an agency within the United States Department of State charged with investigating and creating programs to prevent human trafficking both within the United States and internation ...
ranks Guatemala as a Tier 2 Watch List' country.


References


External links


Sex workers rightsGlobal MarchTeenage prostitution a way of life in Guatemala

Real La Linea prostitutes of Guatemala - 2014
YouTube
Documental Estrellas de la linea
(In Spanish) YouTube {{North America in topic, Prostitution in
Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...
Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...
Society of Guatemala