On national holidays, most of social welfare organizations get heartwarming presents and donations from all sectors of the society upon holiday mood, except one ― the shelter for prostitution 'victims.'
According to the Act on Prevention of Sex Trade and Protection of its Victims, which was put into force in September 2004, the prostitutes are stipulated as 'victims,' not just 'call girls.' So they are able to get protection and supports from the government now, but still socially biased.
There are 41 shelters nationwide for women who once worked as hookers, where they can get rehabilitation training and recover from the illness caused by prostitution. They keep regular life rhythms, go to hospitals and get legal support to pay off their debt to the pimps. Some of them leave there after achieving licenses for jobs such as hair dressing, skin care and nurse assistance.
But they are lack of aid. From November 2010 to November 2011, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family provided subsidy for both shelters ― one for sexually abused women, the other for prostitution victims.
The latter shelters got 3.28 million won per person in both shelter operation and personnel cost, about half of the 6.42 million won granted to the formers.
Even matching funds subsidized by each local government and education program costs aided by the Ministry of Employment and Labor are counted, the total spending of shelters for prostitution victims is still less than the operating expenses of those for sexual victims.
"It costs 2.8 million won a month to operate, but we only get 1.2 million won from the government, the operator of a shelter for some 10 prostitution victims in Seoul. “As recently, the rental deposit has risen by about 10 million won, it has become more tougher to operate."
What makes matter worse, it is hard to expect more donation from civilians. There are no sponsoring programs for victims of prostitution by leading charities ― Korean Red Cross and The Beautiful Foundation ― in Korea.
"Comparing to the money provided for shelters for sexually abused women and domestic violence victims, we have very small amount of contributions," said the operator of another shelter for prostitution victims.
He noted that they become more cold when the winter comes. "They generally chose to sell sex because of underprivileged family background or domestic violence. But people just criticize them, saying that they deserve it because they become prostitutes by themselves," he said. "We can not feel the holiday warmth like other shelters do. As a result the victims spend even more lonely holiday."