Eva Longoria Parker, Executive Producer of Harvest!

Shine is delighted to announce that actor and social activist, Eva Longoria Parker, has joined us as an Executive Producer on HARVEST. Like us, Eva believes in the power of documentaries to educate and promote social change. She has pledged her support for the film and has offered to help raise funds, publicize and market it as well as to ensure that HARVEST becomes a call to action on the issue of child labor. We are thrilled about working with Eva on HARVEST and thank her for her belief in Shine and the power of film.

Rachel Lloyd and GEMS

Girls Educational and Mentoring Services’ (GEMS), was founded in 1999 by Rachel Lloyd, a young woman who had been sexually exploited as a teenager. Ms. Lloyd came to the U.S in 1997 as a missionary to work with adult women exiting prostitution. While working with adult women in correctional facilities and on the streets, Ms. Lloyd observed the overwhelming need for services for young women at risk for sexual exploitation who were being ignored by traditional social service agencies. It became clear that specialized services were essential for this disenfranchised population.

From a one-woman kitchen table project, GEMS has grown to a nationally recognized and acclaimed organization and now is one of the largest providers of services to commercially sexually exploited and domestically trafficked youth in the US. GEMS’ vision is to end the commercial exploitation and trafficking of children. GEMS advocates at the local, state and national level to promote policies that support young women who have been commercially sexually exploited and domestically trafficked.

Girls Educational and Mentoring Services’ (GEMS) mission is to empower young women, ages 12-21, who have experienced sexual exploitation and domestic trafficking to exit the commercial sex industry and develop to their full potential. GEMS is committed to ending commercial sexual exploitation and domestic trafficking of children by changing individual lives, transforming public perception, and revolutionizing the systems and policies that impact sexually exploited youth.

To read more about Rachel and GEMS click here

Sexual exploitation of boys in Saskatchewan

The sexual exploitation of young boys is one of Saskatchewan’s dark secrets, suggests a new study into the province’s male sex trade.

“We like to talk about the sex trade in Cambodia and Argentina but not about what is happening in our own backyard,” Sue Delanoy, executive director of Saskatoon’s Communities for Children, told a news conference Monday.

The report is based on interviews conducted between April and December 2006 with 40 young men involved in the sex trade in Saskatoon and Regina. Ten of the 40 men were no longer working in the sex trade.

“It may be shocking for people to hear that there are young men who are working in Saskatchewan’s sex trade,” said Susan McIntyre, the report’s author, who has conducted similar studies in Alberta and British Columbia.

“Males enter the sexual-exploitation trade younger and also tend to stay and work longer in the trade than women. Males stay in the trade an average of nine years, while women tend to stay in the trade for three to four years.”

Eighty-three per cent of the young men surveyed began working in the sex trade as teenagers, and on average began turning tricks between the ages of 11 and 13, McIntyre said.

She said a sex-trade worker in Alberta sold his first sexual favour for a place to sleep at the age of eight.

“We are talking about sexual exploitation of kids,” she said.

Citing the findings in her report, McIntyre noted that 85 per cent of the study’s participants were aboriginal boys and men, and that they were catering mostly middle-to upper-class white men.

Continued…

Information gathered from Canada.com

Holiday Auction is Ready!

Please visit www.charityfolks.com to start bidding on Shine’s great new prizes just in time for the holiday season. The auction closes on December 15, so please check it out! Some exciting items include being Nickelodeon president for a day, VIP tickets to Dora and Diego live in New York City, a Cape Cod excursion, and signed baseball memorabelia!