WHEN the latest report by Reem Alsalem, the UN’s special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, landed in May, it sent shockwaves through survivors, support organisations and feminist groups alike. 

The report declared that prostitution must be understood as a system of violence involving men and boys who purchase sexual acts, women and girls who are bought to satisfy these acts, and third parties who profit from this exploitation. 

It criticised the term “sex work” for masking the severe human rights abuses inherent in prostitution, advocating instead for terms like “victims” and “prostituted women and girls.”