Today, February 11th, my group and I went to speak with Tom Murphy, co-chief creative officer of Not So Super. Not So Super is a social media driven campaign dedicated to educating people about sex trafficking in the US, and how sex trafficking connects to the Super Bowl. We sat down with Tom Murphy to interview him, and share information with each other. We started off the interview by asking Tom how Not So Super started. He said that one of the creators of Not So Super is a lawyer who is passionate about brining justice to girls who had been arrested for voluntary prostitution, but actually have been sex trafficked. The lawyer and a couple others including Tom did lots of research concerning sex trafficking and they came to realize that the Super Bowl, a day that is supposed to be about football, was one of the biggest days of the year for girls who have been trafficked. Victims of trafficking are often sent out to go to parties and motels to “entertain” groups of football fans during the Superbowl. Tom said “There are lots of groups of guys who will be drinking, doing drugs, and want girls, so one of them will text a friend, or call the number on the back page which has sex adds, and say ‘you got girls?’ And just like that, trafficked victims will be pushed back and forth between Johns.” He explained how trafficked victims are thought as “party favors.” Once the lawyer, Tom, and other members of the Not So Super campaign realized how awful, relevant and connected the Super Bowl and sex trafficking is, they felt they needed to continue and carry the campaign out farther, past the posters.

Next, we asked Tom “What kind of reaction did the campaign receive?” Tom said that many people were surprised and left unsettled with the campaign. The whole campaign was done over social media. Not So Super created a trend where a man or woman draws lines under their eyes and posts it with the tag #notsosuper. Many people started using the hashtag all over Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. They want the makeup under the eyes to be equivalent to the pink ribbon associated with breast cancer. Not So Super also worked with several celebrities to promote the campaign. Tom sad the campaign was targeted towards Johns, and made to let Johns know that what they’re doing is wrong, and these aren’t just prostitutes, but they’re actual people. He said “Stop the demand, illuminate the supply.”

We asked Tom what were the goals for Not So Super, and he said that wanted to compel Johns to thinking about what they’re actually doing. They wanted to connect with Johns so they would listen, so they thought that the Super Bowl would be a good way to make Johns think about the girls they’re forcing themselves on. They made a “day in the life” series on twitter where they would tweet from the perspective of trafficked victims, so readers would feel connected and touched by the issue on a personal level. Not So Super hoped these posts would make the issue come to life for many Johns.

We asked Tom, “What got you interested in sex trafficking?” And he replied, “Sex trafficking always seemed like the worse problem in the world, to me. It seemed disgusting and so wrong to take women and children, strip them of their rights, and to force them to have intercourse with strangers.”

We asked Tom, “What’s the next step now that the Super Bowl is over?” And he said that was the million dollar question. They’ve all become so passionate about sex trafficking, that they want to continue with educating the public about the issue. They still want to appeal to Johns, so they are going to continue with the sports theme. Now instead of focusing in on the Super Bowl, Not So Super is going to focus on the olympics, the World Cup, and March Madness.

Earlier, Tom had told us that the campaign worked with first hand victims of sex trafficking, so we asked Tom what it was like working with the victims. Tom explained that it was extremely devastating and powerful. He had never encountered that in his normal life. He said, “My heart still sinks whenever I think about. You wonder how someone could do this to another human being. What happened to them. I often try to get in mind of pimp what they’re thinking. I think another huge issue about sex trafficking is what’s it like for rescued victims getting back into normal world. It’s the reality we live in against their reality.”

It was wonderful interviewing a man who has chosen to fight against sex trafficking. Sex trafficking in the US is targeted to women and girls, so it was really great knowing that even though it didn’t affect him or his gender, that he still cared.