Overcoming Cybersex Addiction

Steve Watters

Brenda’s heart ached. Her husband, a youth pastor, had been arrested. The problem behind it all was even worse than the arrest itself — he had an uncontrollable sexual addiction.

Frank didn’t see it coming. His job kept him on the road a lot, but he thought his relationship with his wife — a Sunday school teacher — was fine. He didn’t know his wife’s casual conversations about religion in a Christian chat room had grown into an affair, until she announced she was leaving him.

For Brenda and for Frank, these situations were tragedies. They felt hurt, betrayed and helpless. Yet they made it. The good news is that today their relationships are restored and are continually improving. The process was difficult and required incredible patience and forgiveness on their part. It also required a lot of vulnerability and willingness to look at their own lives. Still, they’ll both tell you that their commitment to recovery paid off.

Are you facing a similar tragedy? Are you still in shock after finding a stash of on-line porn or hearing that your wife has lost her job for constantly violating company policies against personal Internet use?

Or perhaps you're just growing more and more concerned about where your spouse’s on-line habits are headed. Has your spouse’s daily on-line time grown from a few minutes into a few hours? Is he on-line later and later into the night? Is she increasingly irritable when you question her Internet use?

Whether your spouse is just starting to show signs of using the Internet too much or has allowed a habit to explode in some tragic way, I encourage you to fight for your relationship. You have every reason to care about the health of your marriage and to take appropriate steps to keep the Internet from driving a wedge between you and your spouse.

The tough challenge for you at this point is to direct your thoughts and emotions in a positive direction. That’s difficult when you feel hurt, anxious, and vulnerable. Dr. James Dobson addresses this struggle in his book Love Must be Tough: “As a love affair begins to deteriorate, the vulnerable partner is inclined to panic. Characteristic responses include grieving, lashing out, begging, pleading, grabbing and holding; or the reaction may be just the opposite, involving appeasement and passivity.” Dr. Dobson says such reactions are understandable but are not often successful in restoring the relationship. “In fact,” he says, “such reactions are usually counterproductive, destroying the relationship the threatened person is trying so desperately to preserve

So what do you do? You start with prayer and follow with a day-to-day commitment to love your spouse the way God loves you. The purpose of this article is to give you some general direction; to answer some of the questions that are likely to be going through your mind and to direct you to resources that can help you understand and address the struggle your marriage is facing.

• What if I only suspect a problem?
• Should I confront my spouse?
• How do I handle his/her denial or refusal to get help?
• When is it appropriate for me to leave?
• My wife has a cybersex problem. What do I do?

What if I only suspect a problem?

A large majority of the population uses the Internet on a frequent basis without having a problem. Additionally millions of Internet surfers are able to limit their use of on-line auction services, stock-trading services, interactive games, and even chat rooms to healthy, productive purposes. It is also typical for many Internet users to go through periods of something like an initial interest binge either when they first go on-line or when they discover a new resource and spend several hours exploring it.

What you should be worried about are signs that your spouse’s use is getting out of control — excessive time on-line that takes him or her away from family, chores, and other responsibilities; irritability or anger when asked about on-line activity or asked to get offline; financial irregularities, and other dramatic changes in routine or behavior.

Additional signs may accompany a secret pornography habit or other on-line sexual activity, says Dr. Kimberly Young, a pioneer in Internet addiction research. She encourage spouses to look for changes in sleep patterns, demands for privacy, evidence of lying, personality changes, a loss of interest in sex and a declining investment in your relationship.

One way to determine if your spouse’s activity is drifting off into inappropriate areas is to simply ask them, “What are you doing while you are on-line?” If they seem defensive or deceptive, you may want to get a more accurate idea by reviewing the history files on your browser. If you have Microsoft Explorer, just click the “History” button near the top of the page. In newer versions of Netscape, you can find a history option under the “Communicator” category. For older versions, just enter the phrase “about:global” into the address box and press enter. If you have version 4.0 or later of America Online, you can just click the arrow to the right hand side of your locator bar to see what AOL and web files have been viewed recently.

The history file usually provides documentation for the locations and times of all Web traffic over the past month or so. A history file that is empty or only has a couple of files despite a lot of recent activity may be an indication that your spouse has found out how to clear the browser history (an option available in the preferences area of the browser). Your spouse may not be aware, however, that pictures from the Web sites they visit are usually stored in a temporary area called a cache file. You can usually find that file on both PCs and Mac computers by using the “Find” feature and doing a search among file folders with the words “cache” or “webcache.” This folder will bring up a list of item names with the suffix “.gif” or “.jpg.” By clicking on those file names, you can see what pictures have been downloaded. If you see either pornography or gambling related images, then you know that someone in your house has a problem that needs to be addressed.

Should I confront my spouse?

If you see indications that your spouse’s Internet use is out of control or if you have reason to believe that he or she is involved in some form of on-line sex or relationship then you need to confront them with your concern. You don’t have to be judgmental or condemning — you simply express with love the things that concern you and wait for your spouse’s response. For example, you say, “Honey, I feel like your on-line activities are taking you away from me and the family;” “I found some inappropriate stuff on our computer, do you know where it came from?” or “I love you, I’m concerned because our marriage is in trouble, I see the following: [detail specific problems].”

There is an outside chance that your spouse was not responsible for the images you found or that your spouse was genuinely not aware that his or her Internet use had given you reason to be concerned. Confrontation under these circumstances is helpful because it gives you the opportunity to restore trust and open communication.

However, if you are tapping into a real problem the response could be ugly. Out of embarrassment, your spouse may grow defensive and try to minimize the problem or may even try to shift blame for his or her actions to you: “There wouldn’t be a problem if you weren’t so paranoid.”

Because of the unpredictability of confrontation, many spouses choose not to confront, even after they have seen early warning signs. Instead they hope for the best and just try to tolerate a less fulfilling relationship. “In that case, they need to quit looking at their spouse through their eyes and see them through God’s eyes,” says Rob Jackson, a Christian counselor who had to fight to restore his marriage. “God doesn’t want you to focus on what you would do to please your spouse, He wants you to focus on what He expects or requires of you — a very different standard.” He doesn’t want sin to keep someone from having an abundant life and a healthy marriage — even if the spouse is too afraid to confront the problem.

As difficult as confrontation can be and as unpredictable as the response can be, some guys actually want to be caught so they can be relieved of a secret struggle. “Hopefully, your spouse is like many who get caught in the trap of addiction,” says Steve Arterburn, founder of New Life Clinics. “They know what they are doing is wrong. They are aware of the sorry nature of their lives. The problem is that they don't know how to initiate changes in their behaviors. What seems most painful to you may be exactly what he needs in order to begin the healing and recovery process.”

“Confrontation is really your only power,” says Marsha Means, an author who wrote about her husband’s struggle with pornography. “You’re powerless; it’s up to God and that person after you confront.”

How do I handle his/her denial or refusal to get help?

Don’t be surprised if your spouse either denies having a problem (despite your evidence) or admits having a problem but refuses to take meaningful steps to address it.

“Denial of a problem or not wanting to get help is a symptom of the real problem and if you have to wait for your spouse to say they’re finally ready, they may never get there,” says Dr. Harry Schaumburg, a sexual addiction counselor. Schaumburg believes your approach should be to invite them to help you improve your marriage. You could say: “This whole thing that you’ve been struggling with — without seeing change — has really taken its toll on me. I don’t like how it affects how I feel about you. I want us to restore relationship. I want us to build something. You need to do this, because I’m hurting.”

If your spouse will not respond to that Rob Jackson recommends that you follow the model of confrontation laid out in Matthew 18:15-16:

If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that 'every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.'

In other words, if confronting one-on-one doesn’t work, confront your spouse with witnesses: business partners, friends, or a pastor (but not your children).

“Love bomb them,” says Dr. Jennifer Schneider, a researcher who wrote about her response to an adulterous husband in her book Back from Betrayal. She recommends a format similar to the interventions spouses often use to confront alcoholics.

Rob Jackson recommends that you go into the confrontation with a treatment game plan (a support group, counseling sessions, etc.) already worked out among your witness team. If your spouse still seems reluctant to get help, you will need to say, “Here is what you are doing, here are the directives, I’m willing to get help too, if not, you are jeopardizing the relationship to the point of separation.” Rob believes this approach is important because the addict needs to work as a team player and quit trying to be independent of the family. “No one family member is more important than the rest of the family,” he says.

When is it appropriate for me to leave?

Christian counselors generally agree that you should physically separate yourself from your spouse if you or your children are being exploited or victimized or enduring ongoing verbal abuse or emotional cruelty. You should not tolerate an environment where physical, emotional and sexual abuse is occurring. When there is not a direct threat, however, Rob Jackson believes that separation should be the exception rather than the rule. He suggests that some women tend to minimize their husband’s behavior and not recognize it as abusive. He recommends that those women go with their hearts if they feel that their husband’s actions are not cherishing and have made their home unsafe.

Separation that does occur should be therapeutic, not in anger, Rob says. He compares therapeutic separation to the fire lines that firefighters often set to stop blazes. By intentionally burning a controlled area, they can remove the threat of a disastrous wildfire. Similarly, instead of having a problem flare up and destroy a relationship, a brief therapeutic separation can create an environment for recovery that will hopefully keep the couple from having to go through a permanent separation later.

This process should be mediated by a pastor or counselor who establishes goals for what the couple will try to achieve during their time apart. The first phase of the separation involves thirty days with no contact between the husband and wife. Any arrangements for finances or care for children should be negotiated up front so that communication can be limited strictly to emergencies. This experience shows couples what divorce feels like. Rob notices that couples going through problems often only have a psuedodivorce. One of the partners gets kicked out of the house but then the two still have sex occasionally, have long phone calls and other kinds of on-again, off-again contact, making recovery difficult. Total separation, however, forces the spouse with the addiction to see what losing his or her partner completely would be like.

During this time, the husband and wife will spend time working on individual issues with a counselor. Over the next thirty days, the couple will start including a joint counseling session once a week. They will also add in a date night once a week where they spend time being civil towards each other. By the seventh or eighth week, the couple should start addressing what kind of minimal changes will have to occur for when they come back together — no infidelity, no cybersex, and so forth.

In the last phase, the couple moves back in together, maintaining a period of joint counseling and beginning to tackle long-term issues such as communication and financial management.

My wife has a cybersex problem. What do I do?

The Pure Intimacy Web site is divided into an area for the person who struggles with on-line sexual temptation and another area for the concerned spouse. Surprisingly, at least 25 percent of those visiting the area for the concerned spouse identify themselves as men. The emails they write tell about their wive’s on-line affairs or sometimes even problems with pornography. The saddest thing about these emails is that the men are really hurt and don’t have a clue what to do about it all.

“Because of the incredible shame they face, men are not as eager to talk through their spouse’s sexual problems as women often are,” says Dr. Schneider, who believes many aren’t getting the help they need. “Shame is greater for the husband of a sex addict, because their wife’s actions go against cultural expectations,” says Marnie Faree, a marriage and family therapist. She believes it causes men to question what their wife's addiction says about their masculinity and their marriage.

According to Faree, husbands of sex addicts typically respond in one of two ways: either they grow very controlling and angry and then refuse to take responsibility for their role in the problem or they become very passive and try to ignore the problem.

In your hurt and embarrassment, you have to find a balance between those extremes. You can’t ignore the problem — you have to fight for your relationship, but you can’t do it out of a sense of anger or control. You have to boldly share your concerns with your wife and then release her to God and often to professional help as well.

That’s what Frank resolved to do when his wife left him for someone she met on-line. For a year, Frank prayed for his wife and continued to extend forgiveness and unconditional love as best as he could despite his hurt. That was exactly what his wife needed. “Frank just amazes me with his unconditional love and he says that … comes [only] from God,” she says, now that they are back together. “I still can’t believe God gave him the strength to forgive me and not let it eat away at him and our marriage.”

Frank was also willing to take the difficult step of looking at his own life to see how he could help improve his marriage. Now he encourages other men to look at underlying relational problems that may be fueling their wive’s struggle. “Find out why your wife is resorting to this type of behavior,” he says, “See if it is out of loneliness or not enough communication in the marriage.” Once Frank realized that he had not been communicating his feelings very well, he started sending his wife emails — a format that helped him to open up. “I couldn’t believe they were from my husband,” his wife says. “I was so moved by what he was saying. He could never say that in person. I started falling in love with him all over again. I saw a side of him I’d never seen before.”

Why Do Women Need Romance More Than Men?

James C. Dobson, Ph.D.

Q: I have often wondered why women seem to need romantic involvement so much more than men. Why do you think emotional coolness is a greater problem for wives than for their husbands?

A: An unknown portion of this romantic need in women is probably related to genetic influences implemented by the hypothalamus region in the brain. Beyond this, the characteristic features probably result from differences in early experiences of girls and boys. The entire orientation for little girls in our society is toward romantic excitement. It begins during the preschool years with childhood fantasies, such as Cinderella dazzling the crowd (and particularly the Prince) with her irresistible charm, or Sleeping Beauty, being tenderly kissed back to consciousness by the handsome young man of her dreams. While little boys are identifying with football superstars and gun-toting cowboys, their sisters are playing "Barbie Dolls" and other role-oriented games that focus on dating and heterosexual relationships. Later, the typical high school girl will spend much more time daydreaming about marriage than will her masculine counterpart. He will think about sex, to be sure, but she will be glassy-eyed over love. She will buy and read the romantic pulp magazines ... not he! Thus, males and females come to marriage with a lifelong difference in outlook and expectation.

Why, then, are men so uninformed of this common aspect of feminine nature? They haven't been told. For centuries, women have been admonished to meet their husbands' sexual needs–or else. Every female alive knows that the masculine appetite for sex demands gratification, one way or the other. But a woman's need for emotional fulfillment is just as pressing and urgent as the physiological requirement for sexual release in the male. Both can be stymied, but at an enormous cost! And as such, it is as unfortunate for a man to ignore his wife's need for romantic love as it is for her to foreclose on his sexual appetite.

For the benefit of my masculine readers, let me restate my message more directly: Your wife is probably more vulnerable to your warmth and kindness than you have realized heretofore. Nothing builds her esteem more effectively than for you to let her (and others) know that you respect and value her as a person. And nothing destroys her self-confidence more quickly than your ridicule or rejection. If you doubt this fact, I urge you to conduct a simple experiment. At the breakfast table tomorrow morning, spontaneously tell your children how fortunate they are to have the mother whom God has given them. Without speaking directly to her, tell them how hard she works to keep them clean and well fed, and then mention how much you appreciate and love her.

Just drop these words casually into the middle of your conversation while she is scrambling the eggs. Her reaction will give you valuable insight into her emotional state. If she goes into shock and burns the eggs, then it has definitely been too long since you gave her an unsolicited compliment. If she flashes a mischievous smile and suggests that you miss the 8:05 train this once, you'll then know how to cure the headaches she's been having at bedtime each evening. But if she fails to notice your comments, you must recognize that she is in critical condition and can only be resuscitated by taking her on a weekend trip to a nearby resort, at which time you will have flowers, candy and a love letter waiting in the selected motel.

How long has it been since you consciously attempted to convey respect to your wife?

Dr. James Dobson is founder and president of Focus on the Family.

Court rejects suit over right to sex

SHANGHAI (Reuters)

A Chinese court has rejected a woman's claims for compensation for her sex life, which was ruined when her husband was injured in an accident, the Shanghai Daily reported Thursday.

Wei Suying, 31, whose husband has suffered from erectile dysfunction since a 2003 workplace accident, filed suit in a Shanghai court asking for 220,000 yuan ($27,650) in compensation from the shopping center where the accident occurred, it said.

The compensation included claims for mental anguish and for her purchases of products such as vibrators.

"I was not even 30 years old when my husband had the accident, which deprived me of my right to enjoy sexual life," the newspaper quoted Wei as saying.

But the court ruled that Chinese law does not define an individual's sex life as a protected right. Relatives can only ask for mental anguish compensation when a victim dies, the report said.

Wei's husband, Zhang Chengxiang, stumbled and hit his genitals on the corner of some audio equipment when an iron bar fell from a vent and knocked his head while he was working in a shopping center, it said.

The shopping center had paid Zhang 130,000 yuan ($16,340) in compensation in a previous lawsuit.

In pre-communist China, sex was less a taboo than it became under former leader Mao Zedong, when it became a matter of doing one's reproductive duty for the state.

Since then, the government has embarked upon a stern family planning policy to control a booming population -- the world's largest -- but official attitudes toward sex remain puritan, though they are changing slowly.

MYTHS OF AIDS AND SEX

Charles L. Geshekter

The poster is seen in Kenya. Below a lurid picture of a worm wriggling through a human heart, the caption reads: "Careless sex is a fruit with a worm in it. AIDS."

At the 10^th International AIDS Conference in Yokohama in August, Dr. Yuichi Shiokawa put the sentiment in a different way. The African AIDS epidemic, he said, could be brought under control only if Africans restrained their sexual cravings.

But Professor Nathan Clumeck of the Universite Libre in Brussels is skeptical that Africans will ever do so. In a recent interview with Le Monde, Clumeck claimed that "sex, love and disease do not mean the same thing to Africans as they do to West Europeans because the notion of guilt doesn't exist in the same way as it does in the Judeo-Christian culture of the West."

Such myths about the sexual excesses of Africans are old ones.

Early European travelers returned from Africa bringing tales of black men allegedly performing carnal athletic feats with black women who were themselves sexually insatiable. The affront to Victorian sensibilities was cited alongside tribal conflicts and other "uncivilized" behavior to justify the need for colonial social control.

Today, AIDS researchers have added new, undocumented twists to an old repertoire: stories of Zairians who rub monkey's blood into cuts as an aphrodisiac; claims that ulcerated genitals are becoming widespread; and urban folklore about philandering East African truck drivers who get HIV from prostitutes and then infect their wives.

The World Health Organization claims that 10 million HIV-positive Africans are responsible for 300,000 cases of AIDS reported since 1981. On the face of it this seems to be a catastrophe. Unlike in developed countries, where over 90 percent of AIDS cases are homosexual males, intravenous drug users and blood transfusion recipients, African AIDS is supposedly suffered by men and women in equal numbers who contract it, presumably from heterosexual intercourse. The African figures are often cited by the AIDS establishment and safe sex activists in Europe and the United States to prove that "everyone" is at risk.

BUT INCREASINGLY, discrepancies about the dynamics of HIV transmission, skepticism about what really causes AIDS and mounting evidence of imprecise medical diagnoses are stirring up a backlash among African scientists. They argue that in Africa AIDS is not a contagious epidemic linked to sexual habits but is the new name for old diseases that result from inadequate health care, widespread malnutrition, endemic infections and unsanitary water supplies. Dr. Richard Chirimuuta of Zimbabwe notes sarcastically that in order to have one-third of the sexually active adults in some central and east African countries infected with AIDS, "life in these countries must be one endless orgy."

A growing number of African physicians including Dr. Mark Mattah (Midland Center for Neurology in England), Dr. Sam Okware (former director of AIDS research in Uganda) and Dr. P.A.K. Addy (director of clinical microbiology in Kumasi, Ghana) say they think the panic over the heterosexual transmission of AIDS may be a hoax. Dr. Felix Konotey-Ahulu, a Ghanaian physician at London's Cromwell Hospital, toured Africa countries a few years ago to assess the "epidemic." In a scathing report for Lancet, Dr. Konotey-Ahulu asked, "If tens of thousands are dying from AIDS (and Africans do not cremate their dead), where are the graves?"

Some Western scientists, including Dr. Luc Montagnier, the French virologist who discovered HIV, claim that the practice of female circumcision facilitates the spread of AIDS. How do they explain the fact that Somalia, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Sudan, where female circumcision is the most widespread, are among the countries with the lowest incidence of AIDS?

In fact, there is little evidence to support Western perceptions of African sexual promiscuity. Widespread modesty codes for women, whose sexuality is considered a gift to be used for procreation, make many African societies seem chaste compared to the West. The Somalis, Afars, Oromos and Amharas of northeast Africa think that public displays of sexual feelings demean a woman's "gift," so that sexual contacts are restricted to ceremonial touching or dancing. Initial sexual relationships are geared to the beginnings of making a family. The notion of "boyfriends" and "girlfriends," virtually universal in the West, has no parallel in most traditional African cultures.

No one has ever shown that people in Rwanda, Uganda, Zaire and Kenya-the so-called "AIDS belt"-are more active sexually than people in Nigeria, which has reported only 722 AIDS cases out of a population of 100 million, or Cameroon, which reported 2,870 cases in 20 million. Scientists dismiss the notion that males from any continent or region are more addicted to sex than those from another because testosterone levels, the measure of sexual vigor in men, never vary more than a tiny fraction of a percent anywhere in the world.

IN 1991, researchers from the French group Medicins Sans Frontieres and the Harvard School of Public Health conducted a survey of sexual behavior in the Moyo district of northwest Uganda. Their findings revealed behavior that was not very different from that of the West. On average, women had their first sex at age 17, men at 19. Eighteen percent of women and 50 percent of men reported premarital sex; 1.6 percent of the women and 4.1 percent of the men had casual sex in the month preceding the study, while 2 percent of women and 15 percent of men did so in the preceding year.

No national sex surveys have ever been carried out in Africa, yet AIDS researchers blithely assume that heterosexual HIV transmission in Africa parallels the dynamics for HIV among homosexual men in the West. There is no scientific basis for this. Because female-to-male transmission of HIV is extremely difficult, AIDS has never "exploded" into the heterosexual populations of the U.S. and Europe, even though condom-less sex remains the norm.

From 1985 to 1991, Dr. Nancy Padian and her associates studied 72 HIV-negative male partners of HIV-infected women. As reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association (1991), they found only "one probable instance" of female-to-male transmission. As for sexual transmission in general, a definitive study in the British Medical Journal (1989) by the European Study Group on AIDS concluded that the only sexual practice leading to an increased risk of HIV infection for men or women was receptive anal intercourse.

Even the definition of AIDS differs from one continent to another. In Europe and America, AIDS-defining diseases include 29 unrelated maladies ranging from pneumocystis carinii pneumonia and pulmonary tuberculosis to cervical cancer. In addition, an HIV-positive test and a T-cell count below 200 are necessary for a confirmed diagnosis.

But in Africa, the term "AIDS" is used to describe symptoms associated with a number of previously known diseases. In the mid-1980s, those common diseases were suddenly reclassified as "special opportunistic AIDS-related infections" and Africans were warned to change their sexual practices through abstinence, monogamy and condoms-or they would die.

Hilarie Standing, a British medical anthropologist and AIDS researcher, concedes that African "risk populations are assumed rather than revealed." So why are AIDS cases in Africa nearly evenly divided between men and women? The answer lies in the World Health Organization's definition of "AIDS" in Africa which differs decisively from AIDS in the West. The WHO's clinical-case definition for AIDS in Africa (adopted in 1985) is not based on an HIV test or T-cell counts but on the combined symptoms of chronic diarrhea, prolonged fever, 10 percent body weight loss in two months and a persistent cough, none of which are new or uncommon on the African continent.

HIV TESTS are notoriously unreliable in Africa. A 1994 study in the Journal of Infectious Diseases concluded that HIV tests were useless in central Africa, where the microbes responsible for tuberculosis, malaria and leprosy were so prevalent that they registered over 70 percent false positive results.

Furthermore, everything we know about viruses tells us that they are equal opportunity microbes. They will attack men and women weakened by malnutrition, the most effective cause of immune suppression. Venereal diseases left untreated can also impair one's immunity, rendering any victim susceptible to other infections. Africans are often assumed to die from "AIDS-like" symptoms after their immune systems have been weakened by malaria, tuberculosis, cholera or parasitic diseases.

By calling these deaths "AIDS" and claiming there is a new epidemic in Africa, are health officials from the West, perhaps unwittingly, helping to provide opportunities for development agencies, biomedical researchers and pharmaceutical companies who clamor for more money and markets? Certainly, promulgating the idea that AIDS is an epidemic caused by sexual promiscuity will deepen Africa's dependency on Western aid for diagnostic tests, high-tech sterilization equipment and medical personnel.

Another consequence of having millions of Africans threatened by AIDS may be to make it politically acceptable to use the continent as a laboratory for vaccine trials and the distribution of toxic, anti-HIV drugs like AZT. Vaccine experiments in the United States have been curtailed due to government regulations and fear of lawsuits from research-related injuries. However, according to a 1994 Rockefeller Foundation report, "Accelerating Preventive HIV Vaccines for the World," risky HIV vaccine trials would be tolerated-even welcomed-in African countries.

Because of the extraordinary time lag between HIV infection and onset of "AIDS"-now set at six to 12 years-AIDS activists warn that their awareness campaign will require many years of active government intervention and funding to overcome resistance to behavioral changes.

These new missionaries with their messages of safe sex seem especially preoccupied with changing men's behavior. They want to turn African women into "gatekeepers" who negotiate sexual relations and risk-reduction strategies. At the Yokohama AIDS conference and the recent U.N. Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, feminists insisted that AIDS would be halted only when women were empowered to reduce inequalities by creating "networks" that enhanced gender sensitivity and prevented sexual victimization.

IT IS the political economy of underdevelopment, not sexual intercourse, that is killing Africans. Poor harvests, rural poverty, migratory labor systems, urban crowding, ecological degradation and the sadistic violence of civil wars imperil and destroy far more African lives. When essential services for water, power and transport break down, public sanitation deteriorates and the risks of cholera and dysentery increase. African poverty, not some extraordinary sexual behavior, is the best predictor of AIDS-defining diseases.

AIDS skeptics should scrutinize ethnocentric stereotypes about African sexuality and thoroughly reappraise the entire HIV=AIDS orthodoxy. The purported link between HIV and AIDS was only hypothesized 10 years ago but it has subsequently acquired a life of its own, especially among fund raisers and sex educators who, like the theory, remain immune to criticism.

Of course, people everywhere should be encouraged to behave more thoughtfully in their sexual lives. They should be provided with reliable counseling about condom use, contraception, family planning and venereal diseases. But whether in Cameroon or California, sex education must no longer be distorted by terrifying, dubious misinformation that equates sex with death. *

Dr. Charles L. Geshekter is a professor of African history at the California State University, Chico.

WHY DO YOU WANT A GIRLFRIEND?

Think about why you want to take things to the next level.

So there’s this girl. Yeah, we know: She’s fun, pretty, spiritually strong, and a good friend. You love hanging out with her, and you’ve started wondering about taking things to the next level—you know, a relationship. But why?

It sounds like you’ve got a good thing going. You know each other well. You have fun hanging out together without the awkwardness of being a couple. And you’re getting great practice in learning how to relate to the opposite sex.

So in all your deep contemplation, ask yourself these questions:

• Why do I want this girl friend to become my girlfriend?

• How would bringing romance into our friendship improve things?

• Am I sensing that she wants me to be more than a friend?

Stick with friendship if . . .

. . . your only motive is to have a cool label to throw around: girlfriend instead of friend who’s a girl.

. . . you catch yourself thinking that being “girl-less” from a romantic standpoint means being less of a guy.

. . . your other friends are pressuring you into something that shouldn’t be.

. . . your hormones are taking over your brain (a desire to kiss is not a good enough reason to want a girlfriend).

BOOM: A GUY'S GUIDE TO GROWING UP

Is Your Mr. Right on Campus?

Rachel L. Craig

Finding Mr. Perf … er, Mr. Right for Me

Whether or not we're seriously thinking about marriage yet (oftentimes biology tests get in the way of wedding planning) it's good for us to be aware of the important things to look for in a future spouse.

I was listening to a Christian counseling program on the radio the other day — yes, I enjoy hearing about other people's weird problems. A woman called in asking for advice about finding a spouse — she said she couldn't figure out what she was doing wrong. "Well, what are your standards and expectations for a husband?" the host asked.

There are numerous traits the Bible instructs us to look for in a future spouse — someone that we'll likely be spending the rest of our lives with.

It turned out she had a list of around 100 criteria for a guy she would seriously consider for marriage — 100! Imagine her chances of actually meeting a guy who even comes close to her ideal! Considering that some of her requirements were contradictions, I'd say her chances are pretty close to nil.

Now, while I realize a list that detailed is overkill, it got me wondering what traits I should be looking for. I've always had a vague list in my head, but I've never really thought through the details.

There are numerous traits the Bible instructs us to look for in a future spouse — someone that we'll likely be spending the rest of our lives with.

You Already Know Trait #1 …

He has to be a Christian — and not only in label, but someone who is seeking to walk as Jesus walked. In 2 Corinthians 6:14-15 Paul instructs us, "Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For … [w]hat does a believer have in common with an unbeliever?" There are no ifs, ands or buts about it.

When we confessed Jesus as Lord of our lives, we became "a new creation" (2 Corinthians 5:17). We switched from a self-centered life to a God-centered life. As one RBC Ministries booklet puts it, our acceptance of Christ "should have a profound impact on our priorities, our goals, our lifestyles, and our relationships"¹ so that they are no longer compatible with those of a non-believer, no matter how much we may "click" in other ways.

Character

I can't count the number of times I've had a guy walk into one of my classes, slouch down in his chair, and with a little laugh half complain, half brag that he's "so tired" because he got drunk the night before. What a winner!

I start looking at a guy's character as soon as I'm even mildly interested in him — it's what makes me either like him more or wonder how I ever could've found him attractive. Character qualities are a great indicator of one's desire to become more like Christ. It's crucial to take a close look at a guy's heart. Justifying not-so-great traits — or simply a lack of good traits — in someone you really like is easy. "But he's so great most of the time," we rationalize. "You just don't know him like I do."

However, if there's one place that we don't want to overlook someone's bad side, it's in the dating relationship. We have to put aside our reasons to settle:

• But we've been together so long!
• I'm afraid he's the only guy who'll ever want me.
• I won't ever find someone better.
• If I don't marry him, I'll end up 50 years-old, single, and quite possibly start adopting cats until I become a crazed cat lady.

(OK, so that last one is a little extreme, but worry can conjure up some pretty unlikely situations.)

Although marriage may be a ways off for most of us, there are some things to keep in mind when considering a dating relationship. In his article, "Seven Keys to Lifelong Love," Dr. James Dobson reminds us that, "the dating relationship is designed to conceal information, not reveal it. Both partners put on their best faces for the one they seek to attract. They guard secrets that might be a turn-off. Therefore, many newlyweds get a big surprise during the first year of married life." He recommends that you have a close relationship (friendship or dating) for at least a year before considering marriage in order to "get beyond the facade and into the inner character of the person."

So what should we look for? Scripture mentions numerous character traits God values (such as the fruits of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23). Proverbs emphasizes that a godly man is a man of wisdom — that is, he has good judgment, is understanding, is constantly seeking God and working to live according to God's character.²

Leadership

Although it's sometimes a tough issue for us women to deal with, the Bible says that God has called men to be the "head" of the marriage partnership.

It will be his responsibility to take care of your family's needs and to lead your family spiritually. It's important to consider whether or not he has the qualities and maturity necessary to do all these things — to be a leader — and yet not become egotistical or take advantage of his power. Is he a guy that you can honestly look forward to following?

Communication

Communication is how we stay connected; it's what makes for closeness, understanding, and "younity." When people say that they've "grown apart," it's because somewhere along the line they quit communicating with each other. Make sure you can both safely share thoughts and emotions, and that you're able to address problems and frustrations with calmness and rationality, rather than avoid problems or get into a fight.

However, we females need to understand that communicating well — especially in the area of emotions — is something most guys struggle with. Some guys are willing to work on this, and some don't see it as a problem. It's hard to accept, but often a guy can't and won't ever be what you want him to. It's best to assume that the way and amount that he communicates now is how it's going to stay, so make sure that you can handle it if he's the silent type.

Family

His Family: How we treat family says a lot. Watch how he treats his mom — it's probably how he'll eventually treat you. The exception is if he's too tied to Mom. I've seen enough Dr. Phil episodes to know that marrying a guy who's afraid to stand up to his mom — or simply won't for one reason or another — is asking for conflict. The Bible says that when a man marries he's to separate from his family and unite with his wife (Genesis 2:24).

Your Family: It's important to consider what your family thinks of him and why. If their disapproval isn't based on biblical reasons, then it's less vital for you to take into consideration. However, if your parents disapprove for other reasons, be willing to hear them out — without interrupting or getting defensive. Even as adults we are called to honor our parents — to respect them and their opinions.

For most of us, our parents really do want what's best for us. Christians or not, truly consider what they have to say about the guy and your relationship. As we all know from watching others' mistakes, people outside a relationship often see things those in it don't. Try to be patient and understand their point of view. As hard as it is to admit, parents are often right in the end.

What It All Comes Down To

Besides our decision to follow Christ, who we marry is one of — if not the — most important decisions we'll ever make. Take dating relationships slowly. (Too often, we undervalue good guy-girl friendships.) Ask God to reveal to you whether or not you're supposed to be with a certain guy. Pray that He make obvious any "red flags." God loves us and wants our best. Study scripture — God has given us the Bible so we'll know Him and what He values.

While it's normal to worry about never marrying, God explicitly tells us that marriage is good, and that it's His plan for the majority of us. As hard as it is, it's our job to trust God to provide for the future — including providing a spouse, if that's His plan.

C O F F E E S H O P

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What are some of the traits you think are important to look for in your dating relationships?
Our assignment as we begin to think about marriage and seek out a partner is to continue growing in Christ, focus on building friendships with guys, and patiently trust God to work out His plan in our lives. While we seek a mate, we should continue to seek God even harder. Christ is always our number one priority.

Twelve Marriage Killers

James C. Dobson, Ph.D.

My advice to young couples is simply this: Don't permit the possibility of divorce to enter your thinking. Even in moments of great conflict and discouragement, divorce is no solution. It merely substitutes a new set of miseries for the ones left behind.

Guard your relationship against erosion as though you were defending your very lives. Yes, you can make it together. Not only can you survive, but you can keep your love alive if you give it priority in your system of values.

Any one of the following evils can rip your relationship to shreds if given a place in your lives:

1. Overcommitment and physical exhaustion
Beware of this danger. It is especially insidious for young couples who are trying to get started in a profession or in school. Do not try to go to college, work full-time, have a baby, manage a toddler, fix up a house, and start a business at the same time. It sounds ridiculous, but many young couples do just that and are then surprised when their marriage falls apart. Why wouldn't it? The only time they see each other is when they are worn out! It is especially dangerous to have the husband vastly overcommitted and the wife staying home with a preschooler. Her profound loneliness builds discontent and depression, and we all know where that leads. You must reserve time for one another if you want to keep your love alive.

2. Excessive credit and conflict over how money will be spent
Pay cash for consumable items, or don't buy. Don't spend more for a house or car than you can afford, leaving too few resources for dating, short trips, baby-sitters, etc. Allocate your funds with the wisdom of Solomon.

3. Selfishness
There are two kinds of people in the world, the givers and the takers. A marriage between two givers can be a beautiful thing. Friction is the order of the day, however, for a giver and a taker. But two takers can claw each other to pieces within a period of six weeks. In short, selfishness will devastate a marriage every time.

4. Interference from in-laws
If either the husband or wife has not been fully emancipated from the parents, it is best not to live near them. Autonomy is difficult for some mothers (and fathers) to grant, and close proximity is built for trouble.

5. Unrealistic expectations
Some couples come into marriage anticipating rose-covered cottages, walks down primrose lanes, and uninterrupted joy. Counselor Jean Lush believes, and I agree, that this romantic illusion is particularly characteristic of American women who expect more from their husbands than they are capable of delivering. The consequent disappointment is an emotional trap. Bring your expectations in line with reality.

6. Space invaders
I am not referring to aliens from Mars. Rather, my concern is for those who violate the breathing room needed by their partners, quickly suffocating them and destroying the attraction between them. Jealousy is one way this phenomenon manifests itself. Another is low self-esteem, which leads the insecure spouse to trample the territory of the other. Love must be free and it must be confident.

7. Alcohol or substance abuse
These are killers, not only of marriages, but also of people. Avoid them like the plague.

8. Pornography, gambling and other addictions
It should be obvious to everyone that the human personality is flawed. It has a tendency to get hooked on destructive behaviors, especially early in life. During an introductory stage, people think they can play with enticements such as pornography or gambling and not get hurt. Indeed, many do walk away unaffected. For some, however, there is a weakness and a vulnerability that is unknown until too late. Then they become addicted to something that tears at the fabric of the family.

This warning may seem foolish and even prudish to my readers, but I've made a 25-year study of those who wreck their lives. Their problems often begin in experimentation with a known evil and ultimately end in death—or the death of a marriage. The restrictions and commandments of Scriptures were designed to protect us from evil, though it is difficult to believe when we are young. "The wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23). If we keep our lives clean and do not permit ourselves to toy with evil, the addictions that have ravaged humanity can never touch us.

9. Sexual frustration, loneliness, low self-esteem, and the greener grass of infidelity
A deadly combination!

10. Business failure
It does bad things to men, especially. Their agitation over financial reverses sometimes sublimates to anger within the family.

11. Business success
It is almost as risky to succeed wildly as it is to fail miserably in business. The writer of Proverbs said, "Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread" (30:8).

12. Getting married too young
Girls who marry between 14 and 17 years of age are more than twice as likely to divorce as those who marry at 18 or 19 years of age. Those who marry at 18 or 19 are 1.5 times as likely to divorce as those who marry in their 20s. The pressures of adolescence and the stresses of early married life do not mix well. Finish the first before taking on the second.

These are the marriage killers I've seen most often. But in truth, the list is virtually limitless. All that is needed to grow the most vigorous weeds is a small crack in your sidewalk. If you are going to beat the odds and maintain an intimate long-term marriage, you must take the task seriously. The natural order of things will carry you away from one another, not bring you together.

How will you beat the odds? How will you build a solid relationship that will last until death takes you across the great divide? How will you include yourselves among that dwindling number of older couples who have garnered a lifetime of happy memories and experiences? Even after 50 or 60 years, they still look to one another for encouragement and understanding. Their children have grown up in a stable and loving environment and have no ugly scars or bitter memories to erase. Their grandchildren need not be told, delicately, why "Nana and Papa don't live together anymore." Only love prevails.

That is the way God intended it to be, and it is still possible for you to achieve. But there is no time to lose. Reinforce the river banks. Brace up the bulwarks. Bring in the dredges and deepen the bed. Keep the powerful currents in their proper channels. Only that measure of determination will preserve the love with which you began, and there is very little in life that competes with that priority.

Dr. James Dobson is founder and Chairman of the Board of Focus on the Family.

Preparing Your Child for the Online World

Lisa Brock

Before you invest big bucks on the latest computer for your child, it is important to first understand the potential dangers that lurk there, and how to help keep your child safe from pornography and predators.

Just as you teach your child how to confront dangers in the real world, you need to prepare them for life in the online world.

Prepare Your Child for the Real World and the Online World

When kids rip the wrapping paper off the box and a new computer emerges, it's all smiles.

But before you set up that new computer and head online, parents and guardians should already have a plan for managing online access. Although the Internet provides tremendous access to educational resources for children, it also harbors a lurking danger: sexual offenders use the Internet to mask their identities and cultivate relationships directly with children.

Just as you teach your child how to confront dangers in the real world, you need to prepare them for life in the online world. You wouldn't think of letting your child rollerblade for the first time without safety pads, and you wouldn't dream of letting him or her give out your home phone number to someone they didn't know on the street.

Yet many parents and guardians set up a home computer without considering online safety basics. Keep your gift-giving memories happy and your child safer by following these practical tips provided by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC).


Take the Threat Seriously: Action Step # 1—Get Informed

The reality is that a computer opens up your home to the world. "Although the Internet offers many benefits to youth, it gives offenders access to children when they are supposedly 'safe' at home," said Nancy McBride, national safety director for the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC).

"Using the word 'stranger' with a child does not carry the impact you might think."

One in five children is sexually solicited online, according to Online Victimization: A Report on the Nation's Youth, issued by NCMEC, the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, and the University of New Hampshire's Crimes Against Children Research Center. Researchers talked to 1,501 children ages 10-17 and published their results in June 2000. They found that 70 percent of inappropriate solicitations of children occur while a child is using a home computer. Yet only 25 percent of children receiving a sexual solicitation told a parent or guardian.

Parents and guardians of girls should be especially concerned. Two-thirds of these solicitations are aimed at teen girls. Your daughter may not associate the seemingly friendly, flattering, and supportive older guys online with someone who means her harm. And she may not think it can happen to her.

Like many other parents or guardians (read one family's story about how monitoring software is not always enough) you may think you can keep your children safer from online threats by telling them to avoid "strangers." But using the word "stranger" with a child does not carry the impact you might think, said McBride.

"Children don't think about a 'stranger' the way a parent does," said McBride. "A child thinks a 'stranger' is someone scary and ugly who they don't know." To a child who may have swapped photos with someone online and spent hours "getting to know" him or her – that person is no longer a "stranger."

"It is important for parents and guardians to be aware of the dangers children may face online," said Christine Loftus with the NetSmartz Workshop, a free online interactive workshop for youth about Internet safety. "These dangers include exposure to inappropriate material, sexual solicitation, harassment, and bullying."

Cyber-bullying can make your child feel miserable and involves children spreading online rumors or gossip about each other. Unlike online solicitation of children where the aggressor seeks to lure the child into inappropriate sexual behavior, cyber-bullying attacks a child directly and can be as emotionally destructive as face-to-face teasing and physical intimidation.

To jolt parents and guardians into action, NCMEC created the "Help Delete Online Predators" campaign in 2004 with the Ad Council, which sent public service ads to more than 28,000 media outlets. A second wave of ads were issued in 2005 targeting teen girls and urging them to hear the message about online predators,"Don't Believe the Type."




Don't Pull the Plug: Action Step #2—Put the Computer in a Public Area of Your Home

You may be tempted to return that newly-purchased computer or to pull the plug on the Internet completely, but experts say that banishing the Internet from your home is not the answer. "That's not going to work because your child has access to computers in so many places," said Nancy McBride, national safety director for the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC).

Don't be afraid to ask questions. It's okay to ask who your child is talking to online.

Public access can be key to nurturing a safer online environment in your home. NCMEC recommends that you put your family's computer in a public area, such as a family room or living room.

When the computer is in a high-traffic area, parents and guardians are more diligent about checking on its usage. Easy access allows a parent or guardian to monitor activities and how much time children spend online.

Internet filters and blocking software can be helpful tools for parents and guardians, according to McBride. "But just like in the real world, they are still no substitute for a parent's guidance and supervision."

And don't be afraid to ask questions. It's okay to ask who your child is talking to online. After all, you wouldn't allow your child to go to another person's house without knowing who the person is – the same rules apply online. "Your child should have no expectation of privacy on a computer," said McBride. "The computer is not their personal diary."

The point is not to be overbearing and nosey – it's to be as informed about your child's online life as you are about his/her "real" life. You should know who your child has on his/her buddy list. Find out their favorite online hangouts and websites. Set rules and guidelines for what they can and cannot do online.



Preparing Your Child for the Online World

Overcome Your Tech-Phobia: Action Step #3—Understand Technology Basics

According to a 2004 study by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) partner ADVO,

"The reality is that your children need your guidance online, just like in the real world."

one in five parents and guardians do not know any Internet codes, passwords, instant message handles or e-mail addresses that their children use online. Less than 5 percent of parents and guardians are familiar with the most commonly used Internet chat abbreviations, like "POS," which stands for "parent over shoulder."

Because parents and guardians may feel like their children are leaps and bounds ahead of them when it comes to technology, they often don't know how to help their children address online safety.

If you're one of those parents or guardians who does not feel confident in the technology arena, Nancy McBride, national safety director for NCMEC, recommends you take a class or read a book to learn the basics. She also suggests that you ask your children to show you what they know about the computer. Use the tutorial as a time to talk about setting some rules for Internet use.

It's also important not to assume that your child knows more than you do. Research by NCMEC for its national public service advertising campaign which talks to teen girls about the risks they can encounter online, found that children viewed themselves as super-surfers online, and were overconfident about their abilities to handle online threats.

"The reality is that your children need your guidance online, just like in the real world," said McBride. "Parents and guardians need to be as knowledgeable of today's online world as they are about the mechanics of crossing a street or driving a car."




Preparing Your Child for the Online World

Talk With Your Kids About Online Safety: Action Step #4—Set Basic Rules for Internet Use

Talk with your child before setting up and logging onto his or her new computer. Setting basic rules for Internet access can go a long way toward building a nurturing online environment in your home.

"Emphasize that it's not their fault if they see something that makes them feel scared or uncomfortable."

These rules can include when and how often your child may go online, how to keep his or her identity private, not responding to communication that makes them scared, uncomfortable, or confused, talking to a parent or guardian before meeting someone he or she first met online, and respecting the rights of others while online. NetSmartz, an interactive, educational safety resource from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), provides safety pledges tailored to a child's age that you can adapt for use with your family.

A fun way to learn safety rules is to visit www.NetSmartzKids.org. It's a safe website loaded with interactive activities, games and music, that teaches the dangers to watch out for online and how to avoid them.

For example, in "Who's Your Friend on the Internet," Nettie and Webster, two NetSmartz characters, introduce children to three mystery guests behind doors on a stage. Two of the voices sound like children. One sounds dangerous. Children are asked to pick which door hides the person who could be their "friend." When all the doors are revealed, children find out that all three voices are the same "WizzyWig" (WizzyWigs are characters representing possible dangers to children online). The activity teaches children that people online may not be who they say they are.

It's also important that you talk with your child about what to do if they find something online that makes them feel scared, uncomfortable, or confused. You don't want your child or teen to hesitate to come to you about something scary or upsetting because they are afraid that you will pull the plug on their Internet privileges.

Instead, says Christine Loftus from NetSmartz Workshop, show children how to turn off the power switch on the monitor if something such as pornography or an instant message upsets them. Shutting off the monitor enables the child to block the image but does not shut off the computer, and enables you to hit the ON button to look at the screen and find out why your child is upset.

"Emphasize that it's not their fault if they see something that makes them feel scared or uncomfortable." If your child does come to you with something disturbing, report it to the proper authorities, such as your Internet service provider or the CyberTipline.

Article courtesy of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children

Base Instincts

DONALD MACINTYRE/TONGDUCHON

Filipina and Russian women are being sold into sexual slavery in the seedy bars and nightclubs that serve U.S. military bases in South Korea

For the G.I.s at camp casey in Tongduchon, 20 kilometers from the demilitarized zone separating the Koreas, about the only place for an evening's entertainment is "downrange," or "the 'ville." Barely 100 meters from Camp Casey's main gate, this is a seedy mile of sleazy bars, greasy-spoon restaurants and shops hawking everything from American-size bomber jackets to see-through lingerie. But it's the bars that rule the strip: dimly lit dives with names like U.S.A., Las Vegas and Sexy Club, and signs warning that the premises are off-limits to Koreans. Filipinas and Russians in micro miniskirts idle in the doorways, trying to coax G.I.s inside. This is where U.S. soldiers head after an arduous day of drills and training.

On a recent night, three sergeants from the American Midwest sit at a table in a pizza joint downrange with a heavily made-up, platinum blonde Russian in a tight T shirt and pants. She sips mango juice and says nothing. Dressed in T shirts and jeans, the men swig Budweisers from the bottle and joke with each other. They do not want to give their names. "Just chillin' out," says one, his brown hair cropped on the sides and brush-cut short on top. He likes the Army, he says, though he can't wait to get home to see his young daughter. He is proud to be up here, "protecting democracy" from North Korean aggression. But that concern doesn't extend to the Russian and Filipina women who work the bars where he spends his free time: they're just part of the landscape. "The women are here because they've been tricked," he says, nonchalantly. "They're told they're going to be bartending or waitressing, but once they get here, things are different," he adds, with a knowing look.

The fact that the women may have been forced into prostitution doesn't seem to bother most of their soldier-patrons. Nor, until recently, did it bother the military brass at the bases. But now a U.S. Senator and 12 members of Congress are demanding action. Alarmed by a Fox Television news report casing brothels where trafficked women were allegedly forced to prostitute themselves to G.I.s, the lawmakers sent a letter to the Pentagon in May, asking for an investigation. "If U.S. soldiers are patrolling or frequenting these establishments, the military is in effect helping to line the pockets of human traffickers," the legislators told U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. In June, the Pentagon pledged to investigate the trafficking allegations in Korea and check other U.S. military installations around the world. (A Pentagon spokesman could not confirm whether such an investigation had started. In a written statement, the U.S. military in Korea says it has nearly completed an inquiry into the allegations.)

In Korea, concern over the behavior of U.S. troops comes at a particularly sensitive time. Many younger Koreans resent the U.S. military presence on their soil. Sex crimes involving G.I.s prompt periodic outbursts of anti-Americanism. And last Wednesday, 3,000 angry demonstrators staged a noisy protest in downtown Seoul over the death of two young teenage girls who were crushed by a military vehicle during a June training exercise on a public highway not far from Tongduchon. Numerous apologies from the U.S. military have failed to cool growing public anger over the incident. The military has refused to relinquish jurisdiction over the soldiers.

For their part, the U.S. lawmakers are particularly concerned about the charge that soldiers are paying to have sex with women who have been forced into prostitution. In 2000, Congress passed the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act, putting Washington at the forefront of efforts to combat the growing worldwide trade in women. Republican Congressman Christopher Smith, the chief sponsor of the law and one of the lawmakers pushing the Pentagon to clean up its act, says he was shocked to learn that it's business as usual up in Tongduchon: "There needs to be a very aggressive ending of this outrage," he told TIME. "We need to lead by example."

A good place to start the campaign might be Club Y, a sleazy haunt that Filipinas working on the strip call "a bad bar." Rosie Danan found out just how bad the week she started working there in late 1999, at the age of 16. Back home in Manila, a recruiting agency had promised Danan the job would require her merely to serve drinks and chat with customers. After she arrived in Korea—on a false passport—Club Y's mama-san took her papers away and told her the rules: she would be serving up her body as well as booze. She would get no days off for the first three months. And later, she could earn days off only if she sold enough drink and sex. She would live in a room above the club and, unless she was with the mama-san, would not be allowed outside except for three minutes a day to make a phone call. The penalty for coming back late: $8 a minute.

At least 16 Filipinas have escaped from bars near Tongduchon since June, bringing with them similar horror stories. Official statistics show 5,000 women have been trafficked in Korea since the mid-'90s, but human-rights groups says the real figure is much higher. More than 8,500 foreign women entered Korea last year on "entertainment" visas, mostly Filipinas and Russians. These visas are a tool for international trafficking, says Goh Hyun Ung, a spokesman for the International Organization for Migration: "The women don't know they are going to be locked up as soon as they get to clubs and forced into prostitution." Goh says U.S. soldiers sometimes help Filipinas escape from clubs, but most are ignorant of the trafficking. He blames commanders for not educating the troops: "The U.S. military in Korea has always pretended the problem didn't exist."

Danan had to dance on stage every night, eight times a night—and, the mama-san warned, all her clothes had better be off before the song ended. It was the most humiliating thing she had ever done. But a few days later, it got worse—a G.I. came in and paid to take her to one of Club Y's squalid VIP rooms, where sex costs $60 for 10 minutes and about $160 for half an hour. The mama-san gave her tissues and a condom, and hit her when she resisted. "Every time I am crying," says Danan. "The mama-san said, 'If you cry like that in the business, the business is going down.'"

In June, U.S. Secretary of the Army Thomas White wrote Congressman Smith to assure him that military brass in Korea "in no way encourage, support or condone any aspect of prostitution or human trafficking." Colonel Sam Taylor, a spokesman at the main U.S. installation in Seoul, says the military is aware of the worldwide problem of human trafficking. "If presented with evidence of illegal activity, we'll start the process in motion to make those establishments off-limits."

But the reality is the bars are utterly dependent on their American patrons. Of the 41 major U.S. military camps in Korea, the 12 biggest are served by nearby "camptowns," where bar owners licensed by the Korean government sell tax-free alcohol to G.I.s. (Korean civilians are not allowed in the bars.) Some 2 million customers visited the camptowns in 2000, the last year for which figures are available, according to Korea's Culture and Tourism Ministry. Troops at all the military installations in Korea are briefed on the consequences of engaging in illegal activities, including the one-year jail term that paying for sex can bring under U.S. military law. There are no briefings on the issue of trafficking, Taylor says: "It is probably something we will start to brief them on."

But last week there was little indication that much had changed downrange. Young men with crew cuts still loiter in bars, fondling Filipina and Russian women, or paying for lap dances. And at least some of the bars still offer "VIP services." The bar owners deny that their dancers are tricked or forced into prostitution. Hyun Ju, Club Y's manager, is emphatic that "no woman has ever been mistreated at this club." She claims that "the owner treats the girls like family. He even takes the girls on holiday to the swimming pool." Kim Kyong Soo, president of the Korean Special Tourism Industry Association, which represents bar owners serving U.S. soldiers across Korea, says his members complain that the U.S. military allows Filipinas into Camp Casey to have sex with soldiers. "That's where the prostitution begins," he insists. "If we put a stop to that, it would be much easier for the entertainers to do their job." ("That activity should not be taking place. It is certainly something we are going to ask questions about," says military spokesman Taylor.)

Kim, who owns the Palace Club on the Tongduchon strip, has himself been accused of trafficking in women. In Aug. 1999, police issued an arrest warrant for him on suspicion he brought more than 1,000 Filipina and Russian women into Korea to work as bar girls around U.S. military bases. Kim says he followed legal procedures. A judge cancelled the warrant for lack of evidence and closed the case.

Kim was working in the area in the early 1960s, when bar owners near the base were granted government approval to form the Tongduchon Special Tourism Industry Association. That gave them the right to buy and sell alcohol tax free to U.S. soldiers and other foreigners. At a time when Korea was still dirt-poor, this was a vital source of foreign exchange—and a way to keep G.I.s from troubling Korean women not involved in the sex industry. Until the early 1990s, the women working downrange were almost all Korean. But in the mid-'90s, with the economy booming, Korean bar girls became too expensive. So, Kim claims, he negotiated with the Korean government to bring in Filipina and Russian women on special entertainment visas. Contacted by TIME, an immigration official said he had never heard of such an agreement.

The supervision of the camptown bar owners association is the responsibility of the Culture and Tourism Ministry. But Choi Byung Goo, a ministry director, says he does not know if there is any prostitution in the camptowns. "The bars are tourist restaurants for foreigners," he says. "There is no way we can know how they operate their businesses." If he had gone to Tongduchon last week, he might have heard about the four Filipinas who say they escaped from one of the clubs, where they were forced to dance naked and got a day off only if they sold an impossibly high number of drinks a month. The women told their stories to a researcher at RMIT University in Melbourne, who is conducting an undercover investigation into conditions in Tongduchon. Despite Choi's protestations of ignorance, the researcher says the government is aware of the trafficking: "They would have to know. The anti-prostitution and trafficking NGOs have all been lobbying them on this issue."

Danan's story had a happy ending—almost. She escaped from her mama-san a year and a half ago with the help of a Filipino priest. Last June, she returned to Korea hoping to marry her G.I. boyfriend, only to face another bitter disappointment. He beat her, she says, and almost smothered her with a pillow. So she went back to the shelter run by the Filipino priest. Downrange, some of the soldiers say they have heard stories like that. But a lot of guys are just young and lonely and looking for a woman to drink a beer with. "It's about companionship, it's not about sex," says a soldier who's heard about trafficking, while enjoying the rock 'n' roll music at the Sun Club. At Club Y, a soldier sits with his buddy nursing a beer as two Filipinas perform a lap dance for G.I.s at the table behind him. He thought prostitution was legal in Korea and has not heard about the trafficking, but says, "There's nothing I could do about it." At the pizza joint, the three sergeants don't have anything more to say, telling a reporter: "We shouldn't be talking to you." Why not? "We're here to protect democracy. We're not here to practice it." They finish their beers and head out onto the strip, the platinum blonde Russian in tow.

With reporting by Kim Yooseung/Tongduchon

Korea's 'crackdown culture' - now it's brothels

David Scofield

Korea loves "crackdowns". Whether designed to tackle the scourge of mobile-phone use while driving or to clamp down on drivers stopping past the white line on the roads, South Korean police revel in crackdowns. As a driver in South Korea for more than six years, I witnessed a number of such exercises in selective enforcement. Typically, the government announces a crackdown on some illegal, but common, behavior and the police dedicate all their energies to the task. During the cell-phone crackdown in Seoul a year ago I watched a fully loaded city bus fly through a very red light while no fewer than four police officers looked on. No one moved. The driver of the bus might have endangered the lives of everyone in the vicinity, but as best one could tell he wasn't talking on his mobile phone at the time, so there was nothing to be done.

This week the police launched another "crackdown". This one, we are told, is designed to stamp out prostitution. But like so many other examples of myopic enforcement, this attack on a well-entrenched component of Korea's culture and economy has been tried before - and failed.

In 2000, then-president Kim Dae-jung's government announced the appointment of an intrepid female police chief to Seoul's Miari district, home to one of the capital's oldest prostitution areas. The government announced that this new female firebrand would stop at nothing to rout the rot of prostitution, with the full help and aid of the government.

Two months later the press and the public had long forgotten the brave crusade by police chief Kim Kang-ja, and the whole program dissipated, as it were.

This week, it's another female police officer, Lee Kum-hyung, director of the women's and juvenile affairs division at the National Police Agency, who is the face behind this latest attempt to rout what was to have been routed four years ago. Will it work? It's very doubtful. Not just because the program has been given a ridiculously short shelf life - the "crackdown" will wrap up on October 22 - but because it fails to address the cultural and economic underpinnings of the issue. Prostitution, for example, is one of the few growth areas in an otherwise declining economy.

Though the police and government are quick to point out that the drive will continue beyond October 22, though not in such a deliberate way and with less fanfare, other new crackdowns after October 22 will surely steal the spotlight: tailgating, or changing traffic lanes without signaling. New causes will rise to the fore and prostitution will continue on as it has for more than a thousand years.

Indeed, the drive behind this latest exercise is international pressure, not domestic outcry. South Korea has been included in the US State Department's 2004 Trafficking in Persons Report, which admonishes Korea for a being a "source, destination and transit" country for women trafficked for sexual exploitation. Membership on the list could have real economic ramifications if the US perceives no serious attempt by South Korea to address or mitigate the problem. The United States could seek to penalize the country by inhibiting access to US markets.

South Korea's new anti-prostitution legislation does, through its passage anyway, address the issue of human trafficking directly, and it does assign criminal responsibility to brothel owners and brokers - not, as was the case before, to the sex workers themselves. South Korea's 1948 anti-prostitution law did not differentiate between owners and workers, which meant the sex workers themselves were often punished, fined or even imprisoned, dissuading most from coming forward or giving evidence against unscrupulous brothel owners who participated in trafficking. Many of the country's lowliest brothel proprietors would quickly put their sex workers into debt by charging exorbitant rates for room, board and other "services", a practice that in effect indentured the young women to the owner, since "debts" would always far outstrip their incomes, allowing the owners to swap and sell the girls among the owners, a virtual slave trade.

The new law declares any such debts invalid and protects the workers, who are described as victims. This is positive and progressive, but the crackdown will in all likelihood still fail.

Prostitution has been a component of Korean culture for literally thousands of years, and any attempt to eliminate this still viable cultural artifact will not succeed if it does not address the demand for sex services within South Korean society. A report issued by the Korean Institute of Criminology in 2003 indicates that 20% of men in their 20s pay for sex at least four times a month. Elected officials and private business people discuss and negotiate deals not only in boardrooms, but also in "business clubs" where whiskey and elaborate plates of overpriced fruit accompany a bevy of attractive young women, or girls - there to peel the grapes, pour the shots and perform sexual services for money.

These establishments are in every village and town and in virtually every neighborhood in every city in South Korea. The total employment and revenue generated is hard to pin down as, depending on the type of establishment, many women and girls work freelance, called in to entertain certain customers or help out when business is particularly brisk. The revenue generated is estimated to be more than US$21 billion a year, or more than 4% of the nation's gross domestic product (GDP), according to the Ministry of Gender Equality, which also says more than 500,000 women and girls are employed. These numbers are believed to be low, not reflecting the real scope of prostitution in South Korea.

To exorcise this industry from Korea will take a lot more than police crackdowns, of whatever duration; it will require a change in culture. Many women, those not indentured but who work for clubs, bars, barber shops, coffee shops and other businesses of their own volition, do so for one simple reason - money. South Korean businesses still discriminate heavily against women, especially those over 25, as they are thought to be in transit, awaiting marriage and therefore, traditionally, unemployment. For the companies, it is sound business strategy since in-house training costs tremendous amounts every year. To invest in training women only to have them quit when they marry is considered a great risk, and is used by many of South Korea's largest employers to justify their discriminatory hiring, promotion and retention strategies. Historically, women are disposable in corporate Korea.

Employment opportunities - jobs that pay enough so that women can live independently - are very few and far between. Many of the women working in the sex trade have college diplomas and, indeed, university degrees. Some of those who work in the higher-end places have graduate degreess as well and are hired for their ability to converse with business clients., professors and doctors. These days in Korea only a foreign degree from a "big name" school somewhat assures employment. These are not illiterate women with poor educations for the most part, but well-educated women with few other options in a limping economy.

Tackling prostitution, not eliminating but regulating it, requires a serious, sustained commitment at the highest levels of the South Korean government and new legislation demanding equal rights and treatment for women in the workforce - as a start. This coupled with a national effort to redress cultural precepts that make it acceptable for men, married or not, to buy sex is vital to check Korea's large and growing sex industry. Success rests not in high-profile campaigns involving sensational, but limited, police action but in opening the industry, legalizing it, and strictly enforcing employment rights and health checks. It is important to guarantee workplace safety and workers' rights, while accepting the cultural and economic necessity of the trade.

David Scofield, former lecturer at the Graduate Institute of Peace Studies, Kyung Hee University, is currently conducting post-graduate research at the School of East Asian Studies, University of Sheffield, United Kingdom.

1 Out of 5 Prostitutes Begin Sex Trade Under Age of 14

Chung Ah-young Staff Reporter About 20 percent of teenage prostitutes in the southeastern port city of Pusan began working in the industry when they were under 14 just for money, according to a survey. The Pusan Metropolitan Police Agency Friday released the survey of 85 teenagers and 157 men who were caught engaging in the sex trade in the city last year. Police said that 44.7 percent of the underage prostitutes sold sex to make money to cover entertainment costs like social gatherings. About 31, or 36 percent of them said they sold sex for a living, indicating their motivation in turning to prostitution. Most of them needed money as they had run away from home out of frustration with their parents' divorce or domestic violence. Others chose prostitution to make money to buy clothes and other goods. According to the survey, 1.2 percent began prostitution under the age of 12, while 17.6 percent first sold sex between the ages of 13 and 14. Also 58.8 percent or 50 teens first engaged in the sex trade between the ages of 15 and 16, while 22.4 percent started prostitution at 17 or 18. Police said that prostitutes are getting younger as adults are luring vulnerable teenagers into the sex trade with promises of money. About 47 percent, or 40 teenage sex workers, received 100,000-150,000 won for a prostitution job. Some 21 percent, or 18 teenagers, took 60,000-100,000 won, while 16.5 percent earned less than 50,000 won. Among the 157 men who bought sex from girls, office workers accounted for 30.6 percent, followed by independent business owners with 22.9 percent. According to the survey, 82.9 percent, or 58 out of 70 jobs, were organized via the Internet. Police said that it was very serious that teenagers were degrading themselves and showing no respect for the people who care for them. ``Police will strive to ensure teenagers are better informed about the dangers of the sex industry while strengthening the crackdown on the sex trade in cyber space,'' a police officer said. Police also warned that a lot of prostitutes have pimps who collect money from them and offer to protect them in return. Some pimps use brothels for the women and have watchers on street corners to watch for suspicious activity and prevent their escape. Pimps make money from the women who sell sex, and often do not protect them at all. Some pimps are the most dangerous of all, police pointed out. Last year, police in Pusan caught 181 men buying sex from teenagers. Under the anti-prostitution law, 31 out of 1,169 men, who engaged in sex with adult prostitutes, were arrested in the region.