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Recently, I've been seeing people saying that Nevada is the state w the highest rates of trafficking (5.6/100K) & wanted to figure out where that came from. Surprise! The stat is absolutely bullshit - here's why it (and the @Polaris_Project stat behind it) is trash.
@Polaris_Project So the number comes from the work of this rando Boston law firm that decided to run some basic stats from the Polaris report, put out a "report" & grift as knowing anything about #trafficking, while spouting anti-#sexwork rhetoric (2/) geoffreygnathanlaw.com/topics/most-ca…
@Polaris_Project But the numbers they're replicating (along with some god awful imagery), are from the @Polaris_Project hotline - which gets a multi-year congressional budget line higher than the budgets of most service providers who... ya know... provide services. (3/) humantraffickinghotline.org/sites/default/…
@Polaris_Project First and foremost, the hotline even says "The data do not define the totality of human trafficking or of a trafficking network in any given area." So even Polaris is saying "we can't claim that NV has the highest rates based on this" (4/) humantraffickinghotline.org/states
@Polaris_Project What IS that number? Well, the hotline got about 40K calls/texts/pings in 2017. Of those, 10K are "unique cases" - but that doesn't mean they were ACTUAL cases of trafficking. About 8K of those were just tips - see something, say something, ya know? (5/) 
@Polaris_Project So there were 2K service referrals, and 866 requests for intervention - which are all legit things & important. But that's also not 10K cases of trafficking. Also - those are people calling the hotline, which means there's a self-selection bias. IF this were a valid number (6/)
@Polaris_Project It would mean the same outreach in every state to promote the number, which isn't true. The hotline is kind of a glorified referrals hotline & many states keep MUCH better referral guides than the hotline. Protocol differs & you may be told to call 311, not the hotline. (7/)
@Polaris_Project It would also mean that every case of trafficking is found through a referral to the hotline. People connect to the provider/outreach worker who can screen their case in a lot of different ways - I don't know a single service provider whose #1 referral method is the hotline (8/)
@Polaris_Project Re: tips; the see something/say something is shows a bias for what people consider "trafficking" and WHAT? The conflation of sex work and #trafficking is a rampant problem that's amplified by the imagery, training and narrative in their materials? No! Save that blonde! (9/)
@Polaris_Project Not to mention - when was the last time you were in a factory, up close on an active farm during harvesting season, talking to construction workers freely, had a long conversation with the person cleaning your hotel room or even in the back of your favorite restaurant? (10/)
@Polaris_Project So what this number says is that in Nevada, a place where the sex industry is very visible and there's a lot of tourism (which is a major investment of DHS in their advertising), more people are calling into a hotline to report things. Literally that's all. (11/)
@Polaris_Project If they're saying that it's because of the brothels/so we shouldn't decriminalize - tell them that NV has the highest rates of arrest for prostitution-related crimes of any state - almost 3x more per capita than the next highest states, so policing is failing (12/)
@Polaris_Project That stats is from the FBI's UCR - which isn't perfect, but is corroborated by local LE reporting & therefore more reliable. Anyway. The stat - bullshit. Anyone who uses it didn't check their work or is operating in bad faith. The connection to sex work - lie. The end. (13/13)
