Vednita Carter and Marian Hatcher. Photo credit: Lynn Savarese.

By Vednita Carter and Marian Hatcher.

We find it dangerous that Teen Vogue is promoting sex work as an occupation to an audience of children by running an op-ed from an uninformed and seriously flawed doctor’s opinion. It’s appalling, because the author is targeting our most vulnerable.

As black survivor leaders, we unequivocally reject the commodification of any human being. The danger here is that children will fall victim to the idea that this is a viable occupation, affirming a dangerous premise that they should be purchased to provide ‘intimacy, affirmation, human connections and emotional support’ to adult men, as the writer justifies sex work.

According to the FBI, black children comprise 57% of all juvenile prostitution arrests — more than any other racial group.

How dare a doctor, who is a woman of color, compare her medical practice to those who she refers to as being “sex workers?” You do not become that which you are taking care of — just as pediatric care is not childhood, gynecological care is not ‘sex work.’ There is no correlation between what she does and the serial rape of children performing horrific sex acts.

On their bellies, their backs and in their mouths, any orifice. Tortured and violated, sometimes before puberty, the predator feels he has a right to do whatever he desires because he paid money for it.

Is Teen Vogue so desperate for readers that they would allow such an exploitive article with virtually no logical basis to be published on their platform?

According to the CDC, suicide is the second leading cause of death for those ages 10–24. Many of these deaths can be attributed to abuse and neglect leading to exploitation.

We know from personal experience that what the doctor proposes is neither sex nor work. In the case of our children, it is always abuse and rape.

Teen Vogue’s editors should think about the little girls and boys reading the op-ed who may feel this is the solution to their problems, only to be met with disappointment at a minimum, and at worst death.

Take for example Desiree Robinson, who was a brilliant, beautiful child of color, with her whole life ahead of her, murdered at 16 years old, sold by one trafficker to another for $250, raped, beaten and her throat slit by a man who purchased her online. She could have been a reader of Teen Vogue.

Shame on you…

Vednita Carter is a Survivor Leader, Founder of Breaking Free/Vednita Carter Ministries.

Marian Hatcher is a Survivor Leader, Policy Analyst, Cook County Sheriff’s Office of Public Policy.