Linnea Henriksson: “Sexual exploitation of children is such a dark crime that we don’t want to understand”

She is the artist who constantly manages to combine the fragile and the strong – both in her music and in her social commitment. For Linnea Henriksson, it all started on a journey that changed everything: as a traveling reporter to the Philippines in 2017, she met children who had survived sexual exploitation. Their courage became her driving force. Today, she wears the word pagasa (“hope”) as a tattoo and constant reminder of why she never stops fighting.

Is there anyone who has inspired you to want to make a difference for children?
In 2017, I was a traveling reporter for Musikhjälpen and that year the theme was “Children are not for sale”. I felt pretty confident going away. I had been a presenter two years earlier and thought that had prepared me mentally for the fact that the world is not just a beautiful place. However, there was no way to prepare for this trip. I traveled to the Philippines, a country with major challenges around child sexual exploitation, and met people from organizations with similar missions to Child X, police officers, investigators, orphanage staff. Through them, I gained an understanding of the enormous challenge of protecting children from sexual exploitation. I met families of victims, neighbors and teachers who told me how a single perpetrator can destroy an entire community. And I met children and young people who had the courage to speak out about their experiences. These brave, strong and wonderfully beautiful children and young people. I think about them all the time. They inspire me to want to make a difference.

What issues in the field (sexual exploitation of children) concern you most?
Sexual exploitation of children is such a dark crime that we don’t want to understand. That makes it so incredibly dangerous and that’s what excites me. I want people to understand. Turning a blind eye or remaining silent only helps the perpetrators. And absolutely. It’s not an easy thing to accept that the perpetrator can be anyone, even a parent, especially when you also understand how incredibly easy it is for a perpetrator to carry out their crime. One thing that is so unpleasant about child sexual exploitation is accessibility. Even physical distance is not a protective factor when we can connect the whole world through the internet and children on the other side of the world can be exploited by perpetrators here in Sweden. It is also such a protected environment for perpetrators. They can carry out their crimes at the computer, maybe in the apartment next to yours, and there is nothing to tell the outside world what is happening. It creates stigma. What we don’t see or know about, is it really happening? “No touch, no harm”, they told me in the Philippines. As if the child won’t be harmed if they carry out the ordered abuse on their own in front of a screen. We need to talk about it. Help spread awareness. Lift up children and young people so that more dare to testify and thus save others. Never let the perpetrator feel the silent security.

Working with vulnerable children can be mentally challenging. What are your top tips for re-energizing?
On my arm there is a tattoo with the word “pagasa”. It was a word that came up again and again in my interviews with the children, so I finally had to ask what it meant. “Hope.” If someone who has suffered the worst can feel hope, then surely I must too? My tattoo is a constant reminder of that. There is always hope!