The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon is a book by William T. Stead. A sensational piece of investigative journalism that described the widespread child sex trade thriving in London during the late 1800's.

Maiden Tribute: A Life of W. T. Stead This journalist who communicated with his Senior Partner instantaneously, whose ecumenical advance beyond his epoch still startles his readers, throughout his life retained his Whitmanesque individualism and rugged speech. W. T. Stead frequently scoffed at the Anglican Sunday prayers that instructed God how to direct the affairs of the world. If God did not comply, it was not for want of pious instruction. Anglicans were wanting, and most of his late Victorian-Edwardian world was Anglican. W. T. Stead (1849-1912) was a Nonconforrmist with and without the capital n. Had he been born with a wooden spoon in his mouth, it meant only that God needed his help to make the world silver. He never ceased to believe the world could be made silver, for mankind in general was anonymously, even though sluggishly, contributing to the infinite ascending spiral traced by the finger of God between the universe and the ideal. Clearly, the position of women in the 1870s was far from the ideal, remote from the privileges selfishly guarded by men. Taking a cue from his mother who campaigned against the Contagious Diseases Actswhich punished women but not men for transmitting syphilishe determined to bring women nearer the honors of Mary the Mother and Mary the Magdalen, for these two women stand out against the gloom of the past radiant as the angels of God, and yet the true ideals of the womanhood of the world. Such appeared implausible. Everywhere he saw in the streets wretched ruins of humanity, women stamped and crushed into devils by society . . . . And the children nursed in debauchery, suckled in crime, predestined to a life of misery and shame! Mrs. Josephine Butler already knew that Britains leadership would not assist: in the grandest house of the kind in Paris, are to be seen portraits of all the great men who had frequented themdiplomatists, generals, and English Lords . . . . The brothel-keeper put a cross underneath the portrait at each visit, to mark the number of visits made to the house by these great men! Before he visited London, the export of English girls for State-regulated prostitution in Brussels imposed upon Stead a sense that he was destined to write an Uncle Toms Cabin on The Slavery of Europe. The burden is greater than I can bear. But if it is ultimately to be laid on my back, God will strengthen me for it. If I have to write it I shall have to plunge into the depths of the social hell, and that is impossible outside a great city. Even high-minded seekers of justice found the social hell a place they could not venture into. Initiating research for The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon, Stead took counsel with civic powers Lord Carnarvon, John Morley, Arthur Balfour, Henry Labouchere among others, and Sir Charles Russell, who declined an invitation to see for himself because as leader of the English Bar he could not play the rle of a detective in a house of ill-fame. As the shocking series of four daily exposes neared its close, why others had not done Steads work was explained by Benjamin Scott, the City Chamberlain who had prompted Stead to take up the cause: We had not the ability or the opportunity that Stead possessed, and lacked the courage. Stead had begun the Maiden Tribute with a complaint against British society, that chivalry was dead and Christianity effete. Benjamin Waugh praised him after the fact: The spirit of both survives in you to-day. Stead accomplished his goal: passage of the Criminal Law Amendment Act, still in force today. Why the British sent him to jail for passing the first child protection law is graced with the word technicality. Branded both a saint and a filthy ex-convict, Stead continued to use his journalistic strength to achieve justice for citizens; in the 1890s he turned to internationalism. Lobbying for arbitration for settling international disputes, he crafted a memorial calling for li

Child prostitution became one of the key concerns of the international community in the 1990s. World congresses were held, international and national laws were changed and concern over "cemmercially sexually exploited children" rose dramatically. Rarely, however, were the children who worked as prostitutes consulted of questioned in this process, and the voices of these children brought into focus. This book is the first to address the children directly, to examine their daily lives, their motivations and their perceptions of what they do. Based on 15 months of fieldwork in a Thai tourist community that survived through child prostitution, this book draws on anthropological theories on childhood and kinship to contextualize the experiences of this group of Thai child prostitutes and to contrast these with the stereotypes held of them by those outside their community.

Child prostitution became one of the key concerns of the international community in the 1990s. World congresses were held, international and national laws were changed and concern over "cemmercially sexually exploited children" rose dramatically. Rarely, however, were the children who worked as prostitutes consulted of questioned in this process, and the voices of these children brought into focus. This book is the first to address the children directly, to examine their daily lives, their motivations and their perceptions of what they do. Based on 15 months of fieldwork in a Thai tourist community that survived through child prostitution, this book draws on anthropological theories on childhood and kinship to contextualize the experiences of this group of Thai child prostitutes and to contrast these with the stereotypes held of them by those outside their community.

The New England Watch and Ward Society provides a new window into the history of American Protestantism during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. By suppressing obscene literature, gambling, and prostitution, the moral reform organization embodied Protestant efforts to shape public morality in an increasing intellectually and culturally diverse society.

Binding Men tells stories about men, violence and law in late Victorian England. It does so by focusing upon five important legal cases, all of which were binding not only upon the males involved but also upon future courts and the men who appeared before them. The subject matter of Prince (1875), Coney (1882), Dudley and Stephens (1884), Clarence (1888) and Jackson (1891) ranged from child abduction, prize-fighting, murder and cannibalism to transmitting gonorrhoea and the capture and imprisonment of a wife by her husband. Each case has its own chapter, depicting the events which led the protagonists into the courtroom, the legal outcome and the judicial pronouncements made to justify this, as well as exploring the broader setting in which the proceedings took place. In so doing, Binding Men describes how a particular case can be seen as being a part of attempts to legally limit male behaviour. The book is essential reading for scholars and students of crime, criminal law, violence, and gender. It will be of interest to those working on the use of narrative in academic writing as well as legal methods. Binding Men’s subject matter and accessible style also make it a must for those with a general interest in crime, history and, in particular, male criminality.

The cliche is that prostitution is the oldest profession. Isn't it time that the subject received a full reference treatment? This major 2-volume set is the first to treat in an inclusive reference what is usually considered a societal failing and the underside of sexuality and economic survival. The A-to-Z encyclopedia offers wide-ranging entries related to prostitution and the sex industry, past and present, both worldwide (mostly in the West) and in the United States. The topic of prostitution has high-interest appeal across disciplines, and the narrative entries illuminate literature, art, law, medicine, economics, politics, women's studies, religion, sociology, sexuality, film, popular culture, public health, nonfiction, American and world history, business, gender, media, education, crime, race, technology, performing arts, family, social work, social mores, pornography, the military, tourism, child labor, and more. It is targeted to the general reader, who will gain useful insight into the human race through time via its sex industry and prostitution. An introduction overviews the scope of prostitution from the earliest historical records, including the Bible. User-friendly lists that are alphabetically and topically arranged help the reader find entries of interest, as does the comprehensive index. A chronology proffers significant dates related to the topic. Each entry is signed and has suggestions for further reading. Sample entries: Abolition; Actresses; Augustine, Saint; Barr, Candy; Bible; Camp Followers; Chamberlain-Kahn Bill of 1918; Child Prostitution; Clothing, Contagious Diseases Acts of 1864, 1866, and 1869; Crime; Debby Doesn't Do It for Free; Dickens, Charles; Devadasi; Entrapment; Fallen Woman Trope; Feminism; Films, Cult; Five Points; Free Love; Geisha; Globalization; Guidebooks; Hip-Hop; HIV/AIDS and the Prostitution Rights Movement; Human Rights; Incest; Internet; Jack the Ripper; Kama Sutra; League of Nations; Lulu; Male Stripping; Mann Act; Mayhew, Henry; Memoirs; Migration and Mobility; Nazi Germany; Poetry; Purity Movements; R&R; Religion; Salvation Army; Scapegoating; Slang; Storyville; Temporary Marriage; Unions; Venice; Window Prostitution.

Concentrating on works by authors such as Fergus Hume, Arthur Conan Doyle, Grant Allen, L.T. Meade, and Marie Belloc Lowndes, Christopher Pittard explores the complex relation between the emergence of detective fictions in the 1880s and 1890s and the concept of purity. The centrality of material and moral purity as a theme of the genre, Pittard argues, both reflected and satirised a contemporary discourse of degeneration in which criminality was equated with dirt and disease and where national boundaries were guarded against the threat of the criminal foreigner. Situating his discussion within the ideologies underpinning George Newnes's Strand Magazine as well as a wide range of nonfiction texts, Pittard demonstrates that the genre was a response to the seductive and impure delights associated with sensation and gothic novels. Further, Pittard suggests that criticism of detective fiction has in turn become obsessed with the idea of purity, thus illustrating how a genre concerned with policing the impure itself became subject to the same fear of contamination. Contributing to the richness of Pittard's project are his discussions of the convergence of medical discourse and detective fiction in the 1890s, including the way social protest movements like the antivivisectionist campaigns and medical explorations of criminality raised questions related to moral purity.

Lurid, controversial, and vulnerable to accusations of titillation or rabble-rousing, the works of Victorian investigative journalism collected here nonetheless brought unseen suffering into the light of day. Even today their exposure has the power to shock. As one investigator promised, “The Report of our Secret Commission will be read to-day with a shuddering horror that will thrill throughout the world.” Secret Commissions brings together nineteen key documents of Victorian investigative journalism. Their authors range from well-known writers such as Charles Dickens, Henry Mayhew, and W.T. Stead to now-forgotten names such as Hugh Shimmin, Elizabeth Banks, and Olive Malvery. Collectively, they show how unsparing descriptions of social injustice became regular features of English journalism long before the advent of American-style “muckraking.” The reports address topics as varied as child abuse, animal cruelty, juvenile prostitution, sweat-shops, slums, gypsies, abortion, infanticide, and other controversial social issues. The collection features detailed chapter introductions, original illustrations, a historical overview of investigative reporting in the nineteenth-century press, and suggestions for further reading.