The big 2006 debate
Prior to the 2006 FIFA World Cup, a similar debate raged throughout Germany. The minister for family affairs Renate Schmidt got the ball rolling by making the interior ministry responsible for preventing an influx of illegal prostitutes from abroad.
Schmidt was convinced that the world would be watching and that the credibility of Germany's fight against human trafficking was at stake. The minister even sent a stern letter to the German Soccer Federation demanding that the group live up to its "responsibility to society" by supporting measures to control forced prostitution and human trafficking.
Then the German women's group Deutscher Frauenrat, as well as Germany's Catholic and Protestant churches, issued their concerns about the 40 000-odd hookers from Eastern Europe that were expected to make their way to Germany for the tournament. Together, they started a number of campaigns and appeals to draw attention to forced prostitution and even submitted letters to such iconic German national-team players as Oliver Kahn and Michael Ballack.
At the same time, the US Senate devoted an entire session to the subject of forced prostitution during the 2006 FIFA World Cup and the US State Department criticised the German government for not doing enough to stop prostitution during the event. And Claes Borgström, Sweden's equal opportunities ombudsman, urged Swedish football players to boycott the 2006 World Cup, arguing that the sports event will lead to a dramatic rise in prostitution in Berlin.
At the same time, though, sex professionals were busy preparing for the expected influx of customers in 2006. New mega-brothels, more streets with prostitutes and first-class service were planned to help strip football fans of their money while at the same time maintaining an unmatched degree of sanitation.
Germany has a long history of sex traders infiltrating international sporting events, such as the 1972 Munich Olympics, when the city, weary of its global reputation, decided to ban sex workers from city streets and force them to ply their trade in the outskirts. The result was quickly to be found in the tabloids: "photo models" and "hostesses" filled the classifieds with mini announcements informing the visiting hordes where to find the "real Olympic flame".
This time, the Bavarian capital, which was hosting the opening game of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, was expecting a 30% increase in the number of prostitutes in the city. "We don't want to disrupt the business," said Gottfried Schlicht from the city's police headquarters, "but we do want to uncover cases of forced prostitution."
Fearing an influx of unscrupulous operators targeting world cup visitors at their place of accommodation, the Munich police visited each and every hotel in the city surroundings and sensitized staff on how to detect cases of forced prostitution. In addition, concerned about the widening practice of attracting johns with a minimum price of €30, but quadrupling the cover charge when show time rolled around, the police even sent out test johns to uncover fraudulent practices.
In Hamburg, the neighbourhood of St. Pauli - home to the world-famous red-light district surrounding the Reeperbahn - wanted to use the world cup to re-establish its reputation as one of the global sex capitals. The campaign was called "Fair beim Verkehr" (roughly: "fairness in sex") and hoped that memories of Hamburg's brothels would remain long after visitors could no longer remember who won the World Cup tournament.
The hope was also that the Reeperbahn could quickly shed its increasingly smutty image. The some-200 members of a Reeperbahn business consortium were concerned about the recent increase in complaints about unfair business practices in the sex industry.
More and more johns were complaining, said Detlef Ubben of the Hamburg police, of hookers coaxing credit cards complete with PIN numbers from their customers and then charging much higher amounts than the agreed-upon price. "In the heat of the moment, common sense goes out the window," said one police investigator summing up the problem.
In the end, demand fell far short of expectations, with fans apparently too busy partying and meeting Fräuleins at the Fan Fests to think about paying for sex. Also, many fans travelled to Germany with their partners and the hosting cities reported a dramatic traffic decrease in red light districts, in many cases more than 50% less than the forecast business.
A spokesperson for the police head office in Cologne concluded that “football and beer go together well - however, football and prostitution have proven to be not such a good combination.”
