Thinks the whole Thai massage industry is being stigmatized after the Brennpunkt documentary – NRK Vestland

Last week, NRK broadcast the Brennpunkt documentary which revealed extensive prostitution in the Thai massage industry:

• Over 80 massage parlors in Norway function as brothels for traveling women
• Many of the salons are involved in pimping, prostitution and possible human trafficking
• 75 percent of the salons in areas close to the center of Bergen, opened to sell sex.

Kristine Moskvil Thorsen in the Church’s City Mission is head of the department for migration in Bergen, and was herself interviewed in the documentary.

She believes the findings in the documentary are already well known.

Now she fears the environment will close down even more, increased stigmatization and a more dangerous existence for the women after the documentary was published.

– The report shows a gloomy picture. Some of the findings that have been presented are known to us who operate in the environment and to other actors such as the police. NRK believes they have uncovered extensive prostitution and pimping and are taking a sensational angle, she says.

In the documentary, a journalist enters several salons with a hidden camera and says he wants to buy sexual services.

The women who are spoken to are censored by NRK in the documentary, but Thorsen believes this censorship is not good enough.

– They can hardly bear to face the day

Thorsen says she has spoken to several of the women who were filmed with a hidden camera.

– Many say that this is incredibly difficult. Several say they can hardly bear to face the day. It is difficult to be shown on TV in a documentary that many did not understand what it was going to be about, she says.

In Norway, it is forbidden to buy, but legal to sell sex. It is also not allowed to facilitate the sale of sex. This falls under the pimp clause.

– By suspending an entire industry, you can expect that more people will move their business to arenas that are less accessible. We have seen in the report that it is difficult to get to those who want to help and contribute. We fear this will make it even more difficult to enter the arena, she says.

In the documentary, Brennpunkt reveals that mothers also offer their daughters for sexual services in salons.

Thorsen believes the documentary should have shown to a greater extent why the women have to sell sex. She says the group is vulnerable and has few other opportunities to make money.

She is also critical of serious Thai masseuses being interviewed in the documentary.

– Here you link one image to an entire industry. Then you stigmatize the entire industry and the vast majority of people with a Thai background, she says.

Disagree with the criticism

Egil Sundvor, editor for the documentary and community department at NRK, responded to the criticism in the radio program Ukeslutt.

– I think it is a bit naive to say that this is known and that it will therefore seem stigmatizing that we broadcast the documentary. Although it is known in certain environments, such as e.g. at the Church’s City Mission, not much has happened for these women, says Sundvor.

He says it was necessary for NRK to go in with a hidden camera because of a very closed environment.

– Hidden camera and identity is an exceptional method when the door is closed and you cannot enter. This documents our findings, he says.

He hopes the debate will turn.

– Our intention has been to tell the story from a closed environment about women who exploit women, where there are very vulnerable women who have few other opportunities to get out of sex sales or prostitution, he says.