Anti-Child Prostitution Movement

In the 1990s, the Christian community in Taiwan launched a movement to save young girls from prostitution in the name of “justice for the marginalized.” The phenomenon of child prostitution is closely related to human trafficking, the collapse of social values, poverty in Indigenous families, and the violence and inhumanity of the sex industry. Child prostitution reflected the experiences of the marginalized, and it called for a “faith that stands with the weak” to take action. Consequently, wave after wave of anti-child prostitution social movements emerged, primarily led by Christians. These movements ranged from street protests to the placement of young girls, and from nationwide covenant signings to the enactment of the Child and Juvenile Welfare and Rights Protection Act.

“Justice for the Marginalized”

To confront the situation of the marginalized and to help “justice for the marginalized” cry out, Chris Nan-chou Su, the convener of the Anti-Child Prostitution Action Project, quoted two passages from the Book of Amos in the Bible:

You who afflict the righteous…and turn aside the needy…Therefore he who is prudent will keep silent in such a time, for it is an evil time…But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. (Amos 5:12–13, 24; ESV)

Su bitterly criticized the distorted concept of justice held by Christians. They often sought only superficial fairness and merely considered fulfilling their personal social obligations under the principle of “legality.” They failed to confront the inherent unfairness that already existed in society. Justice frequently tilted toward the strong in society. That is, society defined justice according to the logic of the strong under the law of the jungle. As a result, society further ignored and sacrificed the marginalized who truly needed justice to be upheld.¹
 
What is “justice for the marginalized”? Why is the justice of the weak the true justice?
 
The so-called “marginalized” are not merely severely neglected in terms of power and status, nor are they simply poor and helpless in the distribution of wealth. Their primary difficulty lies in their inability to change their own circumstances. Furthermore, society often considers their circumstances and sacrifices to be reasonable. In fact, superficial justice only causes them to repeatedly drown in their original plight. Justice only manifests among those who have not suffered losses, but its concrete results have nothing to do with the people who truly need assistance. Su pointed out that the experiences and fate of child prostitutes accurately portray the reality that the marginalized face.
 
He used the “Eight Beatitudes” from Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount to interpret the justice of the weak:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are those who mourn, blessed are the meek, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, blessed are the merciful, blessed are the pure in heart, blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake. (Matthew 5:2–10; ESV)

This is a passage recorded in the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, and people call it the “Magna Carta of the Kingdom of Heaven.” Scholars frequently interpret it as the core values that Christianity upholds.
 
Although Su did not explicitly deduce an argument from this passage, we can infer his core concept. Christians follow Jesus and make the realization of the kingdom of heaven their lifelong ambition. These eight value beliefs precisely subvert the assertion that the strong bear witness to justice.
 
The “blessedness” discussed here is not a blessing or reward in the ordinary sense. Whether it is being poor in spirit, mourning, being meek, hungering, being merciful, being pure in heart, making peace, or being persecuted, each represents an expression of weakness. In other words—it embodies a set of values that differ from the world’s emphasis on “strength” or “victory.” It expresses the beliefs that are severely neglected yet indispensable to the concept of justice. Without this belief or basic assertion, so-called “justice” merely legitimizes a justice based on power or violence. It repays “evil with evil,” and ultimately, all victories have nothing to do with the weak. The weak inherently lack or do not possess the ability to display such power. They have always been helpless, incapable, and powerless. When our concern for justice manifests in the experiences and treatment of the weak, justice can truly be upheld. No one needs justice more than the weak, and they do not even have the ability to articulate demands for justice. Therefore, the weak should not remain ignorant of the justice they deserve, yet we treat them with silence or contempt. In other words, we should actively stand on the side of the weak. As people gladly quote from Haruki Murakami: “Between a high, solid wall and an egg that breaks against it, I will always stand on the side of the egg.” This aligns exactly with what Chou Lien-hua strongly voiced at the October 1989 seminar “Care for the Marginalized and Support for Liu Hsia”: “a faith that stands with the weak.”
 
Christians establish human dignity on the basis that humans possess the image of God. The difficult circumstances and unfortunate experiences that trap the marginalized often damage their human dignity. This means they “fall short of the image of God.” Whether they are laborers, women, Indigenous people, the elderly, children, or the disabled, and whether they are poor or rich, or differ in skin color or language, God created all people, and all possess the image of God. Economic development and competition cannot serve as reasons to sacrifice these marginalized groups.
 
Taiwan in the 1980s was an era when traditional values collapsed rapidly. What Taiwan called “modernization” at that time was the social manifestation of highly booming commercial and industrial development. It accompanied the pace of economic takeoff. The phrase “Taiwanese money floods up to the ankles” drove the entire society to act with the attitude that “profit takes precedence” and “victory is above all.” Consequently, in terms of values, society exhibited the phenomenon of “laughing at poverty but not at prostitution.” In the experiences and circumstances of child prostitutes, we saw a microcosm of the collapse of Taiwanese social values. These phenomena included the prostitution of young girls, sexual exploitation, human trafficking, violent coercion, dropping out of school and running away from home, monetary temptation, and extravagant hedonism.
 
In fact, the various phenomena of collapsing social values mentioned above originated from “structural social problems.” Society sacrificed, therefore, the marginalized within this structure, and this allowed a minority interest class to reap massive profits. Young girls suffered violence, threats, exploitation, and restricted freedom in the sex industry. Human traffickers, madams, and pimps ruthlessly and heartlessly sacrificed the girls’ education, growth, and bodily autonomy, and they extracted massive profits from them. The problem of “child prostitutes” was the worst example of the overall collapse of values in this society. It involved the worst aspects of human nature, such as underage girls, Indigenous people, sexual exploitation, and human trafficking. Therefore, saving child prostitutes did not merely target the “child prostitutes” themselves. It involved all groups of people in Taiwanese society: clients, parents, teachers, businesspeople, police, judicial personnel, and government officials.
 
Christians believe that truth exists in this world. Truth does not exist merely as truth, but people seek it as goodness. Truth only becomes real when people can practice it as goodness. The truth of the weak is the goodness of the weak. The goodness of the weak is not their inherent goodness. On the contrary, truth provokes us to love, to sacrifice, and to die, not for the strong, but for the weak. Showing strength rather than weakness actually demonstrates an unwillingness to surrender to the truth of ultimate goodness and ultimate love. When Christians surrender to God, they show weakness to the weak. This reveals that we are even more vulnerable than the weak, because we always hesitate before the truth.
 
Su mentioned that Christians could not turn a blind eye to the distorted phenomenon and the cruel reality that Taiwan society actually had up to 60,000 “child prostitutes.” “Caring for the marginalized” is the fundamental responsibility of Christians. In particular, trafficked “child prostitutes” are the “most marginalized among the marginalized.” Christians should act on their faith and conscience to do their part for those “child prostitutes” who have fallen into the fiery pit. This is the concrete cry of justice for the marginalized, and it challenges the religious morality and the bottom line of conscience of all Christians.²

The “Anti-Child Prostitution” Movement

If the goal is only to do “charity,” ordinary people can donate some money within their means, but this will not bring about any transformation in the overall values of society. On the contrary, only actions that awaken “justice” can truly put an end to the continuous tragedy of young child prostitutes. Su therefore proposed a strategic concept for reconstructing social engineering. He invited people from all walks of life and various active roles in society to participate in this “anti-child prostitution movement.” The movement shifted thus from a negative or passive “rescue movement” toward a positive or active “opposition movement.” It achieved a reconstruction of social morality and transformed the act of doing “charity” into an action that upholds “justice.”
 
Su provided an important “strategic” concept. The design of this “strategy” was highly critical. Its purpose was to include everyone in participating in this movement, because justice is a matter for the entire society, rather than a matter for individuals who suffer unfortunate experiences. This movement aimed to bring about an awakening of social values or conscience. Only in this way could the movement be considered truly successful. Su asked Liang Wang-hui: 

If the Garden of Hope Foundation truly wants to start paying attention to the issue of ‘justice’ and carry out institutional reforms, rather than merely doing ‘charity’ like running a halfway house, you must be mentally prepared. When you do ‘charity,’ everyone will clap, praise you, and encourage you. But when you start promoting ‘justice,’ you will face challenges, and some people will even oppose you.³

This highlights the major difference between “charity” and “justice.” If it is “charity,” this means that only those who care or are related participate when their abilities or conditions permit. In other words, the vast majority of people stand by and watch, so everyone will clap, praise, and encourage. “Justice” is different. It makes clear that no one can remain indifferent to this value. On the contrary, it draws everyone in, because it seeks to confront or change the existing system or attitude. The problem of child prostitution violated the basic moral bottom line of human nature, and the movement had only one goal: “Let Taiwanese society no longer have child prostitutes!” Therefore, to solve the problem more fundamentally and eliminate this social ugliness, it was absolutely necessary to combine the forces of all sectors and fields. The movement invited government and non-governmental organizations to join, so that the effort would not fail due to a lack of strength.
 
Su believed that to thoroughly solve the problem of child prostitution, one must target the mechanism of the entire industry and launch a comprehensive anti-child prostitution movement. On the one hand, the movement strengthened moral appeals (such as humanity, religion, corporate image, society, family ethics, and health and hygiene). On the other hand, it mobilized social resources (such as tourism, hotels, the catering industry, the military, the education sector, the media, the business sector, elected representatives, law enforcement agencies, health and medical care, the arts and culture sector, the entertainment industry, religious circles, political parties, and social groups). Together, they formed an anti-child prostitution network to comprehensively and effectively prevent the recurrence of the child prostitution problem.⁴
 
Consequently, Su, who possessed experience in social movements and expertise in architecture, designed a reconstruction project for the anti-child prostitution movement. This project included three parts: the “source”(guantou), the “end of pipe” (guanmo), and the “processing” (guanzhong). The source referred to the “supply source” (the young girls and their families). The processing referred to promoting collective social awakening and participation (social advocacy and education). The end of pipe was the prevention system (shelter).⁵ He believed that to construct a comprehensive anti-child prostitution social network and provide concrete goals that were easy for all levels of society to engage with, the Garden of Hope Foundation needed to take specific actions. In addition to strengthening and expanding the existing halfway houses for child prostitutes, the foundation’s short-term plan involved inviting all sectors to sign an anti-child prostitution covenant, promoting daisy care activities (such as jogging and evening galas), and holding public hearings and seminars. In the medium and long term, the foundation would push for the establishment of a child prostitution prevention law and halfway schools for child prostitutes. It would also form an anti-child prostitution alliance with all sectors of society to prompt the complete eradication of this evil through comprehensive and practical actions.⁶
 
The year 1992 was the most landmark year for the anti-child prostitution movement. Starting in May, Su launched a “movement” in the name of “justice” with the theme “Let Society Be Their Mother.” On May 2, he held the “Garden of Hope Service” at Grace Baptist Church, where all believers wore masks to demonstrate the faith confession of “weeping with those who weep.” On May 9, he held the “Garden of Hope Musical Evening” at the National Taiwan University Alumni Club, where a group of young girls who are survivors of trafficking performed the autobiographical play “Xiao Li’s Story.” On June 4, he held the “Buy a Daisy, Save a Child Prostitute” street flower sale and rescue event in front of the Evergreen Department Store. On June 13, he held the “Public Hearing and Seminar on the Prevention of Child Prostitution” at the Legislative Yuan. On August 26, the Music Grove Ensemble (yuelin xiaoji) performed the “Garden of Hope Musical Evening” at the Social Education Hall.⁷ Finally, he launched the Anti-Child Prostitution Action Project, which more than twenty groups jointly initiated. He promoted the signing of the Anti-Child Prostitution Covenant. He conducted individual visits and seminars targeting eighteen types of community groups, including tourism, news media, political parties and the military, education and medical care, and individual parents. This comprehensive and society-wide participation led to the planning of a series of activities at the end of the year, such as the “Path of Daisies: Huaxi Street Jogging” and “Transforming Pornography Landmarks into Historical Relics.” These efforts gathered vast social power and launched comprehensive child prostitution prevention work. Only then did the movement fully achieve social education and administrative reform, and it marched toward the general direction of turning the child prostitution industry into a sunset industry.⁸
 
Therefore, challenging the entire industrial structure of pornography—that is, “increasing the risks and costs of the child prostitution industry”—was the most important action in the anti-child prostitution movement project, and it struck directly at the core of the problem. Su proposed that only by thoroughly terminating this industry could they truly help child prostitutes escape this structure. At the same time, this would prevent other young girls from entering the industry for various reasons. In other words, turning this industry into a sunset industry was the only way to truly end the industrial phenomenon of child prostitution. Su specifically pointed out:

Usually, there are two methods to turn an industry into a sunset industry: First, increase business risks and operating costs (such as mobilizing all sectors of society to launch advocacy and supervision, and strengthening law enforcement). Second, cause an imbalance between supply and demand (for a product, this means increasing costs and raising prices [which reduces demand] or lowering the price of raw materials [which leads to an insufficient supply of raw materials]). At this point, we have found the mechanism to turn the child prostitution industry into a sunset industry. It lies in increasing its costs and raising its risks, which naturally produces the effect of an imbalance between supply and demand. This is also the reason why traditional methods, such as moral appeals and rescue and shelter, have failed to comprehensively block the problem of child prostitution. If we want to prevent these girls from returning to their old profession, simple vocational training is absolutely ineffective. Changing their mentality and values is the only way to solve the problem, and this requires long-term cultivation by professionally trained and loving counselors to be effective.⁹

Undeniably, the vast majority of these child prostitutes who fell into the abyss and were arrested were underage girls. Their paths into exploitation varied. Some had experienced vulnerabilities that exposed them to exploitation, while many were deceived by boyfriends or other trusted adults. Parents even sold many of them and pushed them into the fiery pit. The most common deceptive excuse was that a kind uncle would arrange to take care of them in the city, and the parents could receive a reward of hundreds of thousands of New Taiwan dollars by selling their daughters. Because of the concepts of carrying on the family line and favoring boys over girls, parents calculated in their hearts that this money might allow the older sons in the family to enter university and study.¹⁰
 
Chiu Hei-yuan’s “Evaluation Report on the Anti-Child Prostitution Movement” mentioned this transformation. Liang Wang-hui, who came from a background in counseling work, said that when she served as the executive director, she indeed felt quite unaccustomed to the anti-child prostitution movement when it first began. She felt that in engaging in counseling work, it was basically unnecessary to take public action. Liang Wang-hui felt, therefore, that she was not very suitable to participate in promoting the anti-child prostitution movement. Fortunately, in the early days of the movement, Su, a board member with extremely rich experience in social movements, primarily led the effort. The cooperation between the two was quite harmonious. Furthermore, Liang Wang-hui highly affirmed Su’s various concepts and practices. The evaluation report detailed: 

This was also the initial important factor for why the foundation succeeded in its major transformation from ‘counseling’ to a ‘movement’ in solving the problem of child prostitution.¹¹

This shift from counseling to movement reached its clearest public expression in the Anti-Child Prostitution Covenant. Rather than treating child prostitution as the concern of a few social workers, churches, or charitable organizations, the covenant framed it as a matter implicating the whole of Taiwanese society. Its force lay not only in gathering signatures but in making visible the moral claim that no sector could remain outside the struggle to care for exploited young girls and reconstruct social ethics. The movement thus turned “justice for the marginalized” into a public summons addressed to society as a whole.

The covenant’s content directly criticized the overall distortion of human nature, moral corruption, and apathy in Taiwanese society:

In the affluent society of Taiwan, tens of thousands of underage girls sell their bodies every day. This is the act of the rich being heartless, and it is a 100 percent evil deed. Shockingly, there are fathers and mothers who sell their daughters into prostitution for economic gain or vain greed. Shockingly, there are modern people in a developed country who brutalize underage girls to satisfy their abnormal sexual demands. Shockingly, there are enterprises that use child prostitutes as social tools to secure business. Shockingly, there are hotel and inn operators who use child prostitutes to earn extra money. Shockingly, there are tourism operators who use child prostitutes to attract customers…It turns out that the seemingly prosperous society of Taiwan is so dark inside. We cannot tolerate such shameful facts continuing to happen every day!¹²

Because “a sound society does not tolerate child prostitutes, and a society with child prostitutes is certainly not sound,” the movement broadly invited all Taiwanese citizens who could not stay out of the matter to join in signing the anti-child prostitution movement. Approximately 100,000 people participated in the joint signature campaign. In inviting people to sign the “Anti-Child Prostitution Covenant,” the most unexpected achievement was persuading the tourism, hotel, and catering trade associations to also join the ranks of “anti-child prostitution.”

1. Su Nan-chou, “Xu” [Preface], in Buxin zhengyi huan bu hui: Ruoshi zhengyi guanhuai wenji [Cannot Believe Justice Cannot Be Restored: A Collection of Essays on Care and Justice for the Marginalized], ed. Kuangye zazhishe (Taipei: Ya-ge Publishing, 1993), 8.
2. Su Nan-chou, “Zai kuangye fasheng: Yi Jidujiao xiaozhong meiti jieru gongmin yundong” [Speaking in the Wilderness: Intervening in Civic Movements through Christian Niche Media], Xin shizhe zazhi [The New Messenger], no. 121 (December 2010): 26–29; Liao Pi-ying, “Taiwan seqing wenti: Xiankuang baogao” [Taiwan’s Pornography Problem: A Status Report], in Yazhou de nanti: Guanguang yu maichun [Asia’s Dilemma: Tourism and Prostitution] (Taipei: Presbyterian Church in Taiwan Women’s Ministry Committee, 1986), 231.
3. Liang Wang-hui, “Ba” [Afterword], in Angelyn D. Golmon, Wo zhishi tideng de ren: Gao Aiqi xuanjiaoshi zai Taiwan de jianzheng [I Am Just a Lantern Bearer: Missionary Angie Golmon’s Testimony in Taiwan], trans. Lin Shuwen, Su Yukai, and Huang Jingkai (Taipei: Garden of Hope Foundation, 2023), 201.
4. Su Nan-chou, “Taiwan chuji wenti zhi jingji shehuixue chubu fenxi” [A Preliminary Economic and Sociological Analysis of Taiwan’s Child Prostitution Problem], in Jidutu de shehui canyü [Christian Social Participation] (Taipei: Ya-ge Publishing, 1995), 70–71.
5. Su Nan-chou, “Cong shehui gongcheng guandian kan Taiwan fanchuji yundong zhi celüe yü zhanwang” [Strategies and Prospects of Taiwan’s Anti-Child Prostitution Movement from the Perspective of Social Engineering], in Jidutu de shehui canyü [Christian Social Participation], 73–74.
6. Su, “Taiwan chuji wenti zhi jingji shehuixue chubu fenxi,” 71.
7. Su Nan-chou, “Guanhuai chuji, jianquan shehui” [Care for Child Prostitutes, Perfect the Society], Kuangye[Wilderness], no. 33 (May/June 1992): 3.
8. Su, “Cong shehui gongcheng guandian kan Taiwan fanchuji yundong zhi celüe yü zhanwang,” 72.
9. Su, “Taiwan chuji wenti zhi jingji shehuixue chubu fenxi,” 70.
10. Golmon, Wo zhishi tideng de ren, 54.
11. Chiu Hei-yuan, “Fanchuji yundong pinggu baogao” [Evaluation Report on the Anti-Child Prostitution Movement], unpublished manuscript, June 1997, 87, accessed June 8, 2026.
12. Garden of Hope Foundation, Wilderness magazine, and other initiators, “Fanchuji gongyue” [Anti-Child Prostitution Covenant], Kuangye [Wilderness], no. 34 (July/August 1992): 4.