ABSTRACT
Every few years an issue relating to children attracts the attention of the media and is quickly turned into an international cause celebre. In the 1970s, it was malnourished and starving children in Africa. During the early 1980s, it was child labor in Asia, which was followed by street children in South America. Child prostitution is viewed as an evil which must be eradicated by all means possible. This is a perfectly understandable response and one with which few people, except possibly pedophiles or others with obvious ulterior motives, would disagree. Attitudes to prostitution in general, and child prostitution in particular, are never neutral and inevitably the latter is viewed as a problem. Although the source of the problem is differently located for child prostitutes abroad and child prostitutes at home, the image of children selling their bodies for profit arouses indignation and outrage.
