In 1976, California led the way in initiating laws to prevent runaway children from being arrested and sent to juvenile facilities for merely being runaways. This was intended to aid children whose situations were too difficult at home for children to tolerate. It was argued that these children should not be force to live under unacceptable conditions present in the home environment, neither should they be treated as criminals merely because adults were failing to provide an adequate living situation for their children. The law was passed, launching a nationwide acceptance by the end of the 70's.

The affects of this law are clearly seen, here in 1997. Over the past 20 years a new problem has grown from this change, however well intended.

Before 1979, it was a rare occurrence to find children under 18 living on the streets. If children ran away from home, they could be picked up by the police and placed in juvenile detention facilities. Today, it is an ordinary event to find young children living on the streets of our cities.

By 1988, some 450,700 children were reported as runaways, and 127,100 children were categorized as throwaways. Runaways are defined as children who left home without permission. Throwaways are children who either were told to leave the home, the parents refused to allow the children to return home, or children whose parents made no effort to find them.

To be an adult and homeless is difficult enough, but for a child, it is utterly hopeless. The ones who are old enough to get a job find it difficult without an address or a phone number to secure employment. The ones too young to work are forced to find other means of survival.

There are adults who thrive on these children's desperation. They offer them a place to stay, give them food, a place to take a bath, a warm bed, or at least a roof over their heads and walls to keep out the cold. They lure these children in, befriend them, and ultimately use them for profit. Drugs may come into play, creating a new sense of comfort for these children who only just before were lonely, frightened and had no hope for what the next day would hold.

These children, boys and girls alike, are conned or forced into selling themselves for someone else's profit. Often they are convinced that it was their own choice by the adults who seek to use them. Depending on how swiftly the transition was made, they are either convinced, persuaded, pressured or forced into doing what the adult wishes them to do.

There is no such thing as a child prostitute. I hear the phrase used all the time, but it is not an accurate portrayal of the situation. These children are being used and abused by adults. Their only reward is a small amount of money for each encounter with an adult who has sexual contact with them. The pimps who control them retain the largest portion of the moneys paid to abuse their bodies, yet, in our society, it has become somehow acceptable. The child is blamed in this type of abuse.

Our thinking and our understanding has grown in the area of abuse over the last two decades. We now know that a child is not to blame for the actions of an adult. We understand that blaming the child is a ploy used to keep abuse hidden. We are aware of the fact that it is the adult in control who is responsible for the actions taking place.

Why is it, then, that because this form of abuse has been given the title of "child prostitution" that we have become so used to hearing it, that we accept it as such. It is another form of child abuse, and nothing more. The child is not to blame. As long as the adults involved are not held accountable for their actions, this form of abuse will continue.

A person found to be having sex with a minor who is considered to be a "child prostitute" is not handled as a child molester, merely a customer.

When the police are closing in on a pimp who works young children, they simply move them to another town to avoid prosecution. Another "child prostitution ring" is allowed to continue to abuse children each time they simply go away from that area. If these "pimps" were not considered as pimps, but rather the child molesters they really are, the problem would be handled much differently.

An adult who has sexual contact with a minor child, is a child molester. They abuse children to fulfill their own desires.

An adult who uses children's bodies for profit, is a child molester, to a new degree. They abuse children for their own profit.

A child who has sexual contact with an adult, is a victim of child sexual abuse.

There are no other definitions for the above situations, yet, as a society, we look the other way because of the title this problem has been given. This is the myth of "child prostitution".

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