I said the vast majority were teenagers. I said they often enter voluntarily. You were conflating two different things.

And I was referring to classification bias as well. There are "rapists" in prison in the deep south because they received blow jobs from consenting 15 year old girl friends while they were 17 years old. There are certainly 17 year old prostitutes who enter the field voluntarily. Why do we treat that as identical to the horrible crime of a child being brutally raped in the statistics? All the statistics from this one sided hit piece are questionable attempts to sway opinion through classification bias.

And lots of prostitution isn't done through Backpages, it's done through other venues, strip clubs, massage parlors, etc. Do you think that clients are checking ID before they consummate their transaction? Thats the price of illegal prostitution, the customer can't know whether she's 16 or 18, whether she's willing or unwilling. The customer is already breaking the law to fulfill his urges, the prostitute and her pimp are breaking the law to fulfill his urges, none can call the police for any dispute. Their incentives favor more lawbreaking, not cooperation, once they've already crossed the line.

When prostitution is legal, the weirdos we agree we want to catch won't have a sea of consensual prostitution transactions to hide in. What do the police do when they entrap a back page escort labeled "amber alert" or "underage candy" only to find a 21 year old wearing pig-tails? Do you not think police resources can be more effective focused on legitimate under aged sex crimes, if they weren't spread so thin policing consensual activities between consenting adults?

I think he means they start off voluntarily but it devolves into sex slavery and forced prostitution. Like how people in sweatshops are not kidnapped initially, but them find themselves locked in the factory barracks until their "debt" is paid.