Emancipation Proclamation and Modern Day Slavery

This past September marked the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed American slaves. On September 22, 1862, Lincoln issued a preliminary proclamation that he would order the emancipation of all slaves in any state of the Confederate States of America

Most people think that we've come a long way since then and slavery is a thing of the past. But sadly, there are more slaves now than at any other time in human history. In fact, there are more slaves in the world today than were seized from Africa during four centuries of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
 

By definition, Human Trafficking is the illegal trade of human beings mainly for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation or forced labor. Human trafficking is modern-day slavery.
 

During the trans-Atlantic slave trade, it is estimated that about 12 million slaves were shipped across the Atlantic to the Portuguese, British, French, Spanish, Dutch, and the Americans. By 1860 the slave population in the United States had reached 4 million.
 

By comparison it is estimated that 27 million people are currently enslaved throughout the world.
 

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, human trafficking is the second largest criminal industry (Drug trafficking is the the first.) The National Human Trafficking Resource Center estimates it's a $32 billion industry.
 

An average slave in the American South in 1850 cost the equivalent of $40,000 in today’s money. By comparison, a slave today costs an average of just $90.
 

In 1850 it was difficult to capture a slave and transport them to the US. By comparison, today millions of economically and socially vulnerable people around the world are being trafficked in many different ways. The internet plays a large factor in this. Human trafficking is a highly sophisticated, organized crime and it is very lucrative. A drug can be sold only once, but a person can be sold over and over.
 

It's not just happening in "some other country." It's happening right here in the United States. The US Department of Justice reports that human trafficking has occurred in nearly every state of the nation and in 91 different cities.  It affects foreigners as well as Americans, adults and young children and both male and female. 

 

This information can be overwhelming.  It can leave you feeling like "What can I do?"  My suggestion is to start by educating yourself on the subject.  In future posts I hope to help with options for doing this.  My plan is to share a list of recommended books you can read on the subject, documentaries that are available and organizations to support. We must first educate ourselves and make others aware that this is happening.  Unless people become informed and aware, this horrendous practice will continue to grow.

 

 

 

 

 

13 year old girl peddled on Backpage

A brutal pimp was sentenced Tuesday to six to 18 years in prison after apologizing for forcing a
13-year-old runaway into prostitution.

Kendale (Ace) Judge, 21, took a plea deal last month for sex trafficking, admitting he met the girl just over a year ago.

He promised to love her, but instead peddled the teenager on the website backpage.com, prosecutors charged. When she tried to escape, he threw her down a flight of stairs, they added.

"I sincerely apologize," Judge said in Brooklyn Supreme Court.

"My own weakness, my own weak-mindedness and lack of education led to my incarceration," he went on. "I now know I was the cause and this is the effect."

Shanique Davis, 21, who helped the pimp by taking the girl's pictures and watching over her, is set to get five-year probation on Wednesday.

Defense attorney Phillip Katowitz managed to convince the judge to deny the media from taking photos of his client, who'll have to register as a sex offender after his release.

The lawyer declined comment


Read more: NY Daily News


You can read my original post about Backpage.com here

Purchase a Christmas CD for the cause

I was shopping at my local Family Christian store yesterday and they were selling this Christmas CD for only $5.  I LOVE Christmas music.  I get this from my mom.  I picked it up and flipped it over to see what songs were on the CD.  What I discovered is that it is produced by IJM and proceeds are going to help victims of slavery.  This was a no brainer for me.  I went home with a great new Christmas CD for only $5 and I knew my money was going towards a great cause.   

The International Justice Mission (IJM) is a human rights agency that brings rescue to victims of slavery, sexual expoitation and other forms of violent oppression.  This CD was written and performed by many of the biggest names in Christian music - including MercyMe, Kari Jobe, Brandon Heath, Mandisa and David Crowder - who share in the vision of the International Justice Mission and donated their time and proceeds to this project.




Purchase the CD online

Every CD You Buy Helps to Rescue Another Victim of SlaverySlavery is thriving. In fact, 27 million men, women and children are held as slaves. That’s why artists Laura Story, Sara Groves, MercyMe and others are uniting for a music initiative to help the victims of slavery and violent oppression. International Justice Mission® is an agency dedicated to defending individual human rights.

In response to Isaiah 1:17, IJM’s professionals work tirelessly to rescue, protect and secure justice for victims across three continents.

Book Review: Sold by Patricia McCormick

 

I put off reading this book because it wasn’t a true story.  I mistakenly thought, “How can they portray the horrors of the sex trade industry in a work of fiction?”  I could not have been more wrong. 

Sold is a painful look at what happened to a young girl from Nepal who was smuggled into India and sold into sexual slavery.  While this is a fictional story it is based on the truth that thousand of young girls are actually living this nightmare every day.  Lakshmi is a thirteen-year-old girl who lives with her family in a small hut on a mountain in Nepal.  The story is told through her eyes and conveys the innocence of a child trapped the horrible world of human trafficking.

Even before Lakshmi is sold into slavery, your heart breaks for her.  The living conditions are so harsh compared to the blessings we have in the United States.  She dreams that one day they will have enough for a tin roof for their little hut. 

“She is looking down the mountain to the village below, at the neighbors’ tin roofs winking cruelly back at her.  A tin roof means that the family has a father who doesn’t gamble away the landlord’s money playing cards in the tea shop.  A tin roof means that when the rains come, the fire stays lit and the baby stays healthy”

Lakshmi grows cucumbers to sell and dreams of her tin roof.  But her stepfather continually gambles away what little they have and when he looks at the cucumbers he sees cigarettes and rice beer, a new vest for himself.  After he has gambled away everything they have he tells Lakshmi that she must go to the city and earn her keep as a maid.    The next morning he takes her to a shop in the city and sells her for 800 rupees.  That is roughly $15 US.

Lakshmi has no idea and thinks she is going to live in a glamorous house where she will work hard for a rich woman and send home money to her family.  Instead she is smuggled into India and sold again to a brothel owner for 10,000 rupees.  After she refuses to do what Mumtaz (the brothel owner) is requesting, she is locked up in a room, beaten with a leather strap until there is no part of her unmarked by the strap and starved for 5 days.  Then Mumtaz sends her some tea.  Lakshmi drinks the tea and begins to feel funny. She is seeing double and can’t get her arms and legs to work. 

 “In the days that follow, many men come to my room.  They crush my bones with their weight.  They split me open.  Then they disappear.  I decide to think it is all a nightmare.  Because if what is happening is real, it is unbearable.”

She is eventually let out of her locked up room and told that she can go home once she has earned enough to pay Mumtaz back.  One day she overhears a customer talking and learns that they pay only 30 rupees for her each time, which is about the same price as a bottle of coke.  And which Lakshmi has never even tasted.  

I won’t tell you how the story ends.  My hope is that you would read this book and give yourself an understanding of what life is like for these girls.  Sold is written in free verse and is a very quick read. 

Authors Note:  Each year nearly 12,000 Nepali girls are sold by their families into a life of sexual slavery in the brothels of India.  Worldwide, the US State Department estimates that nearly half a million children are trafficked into the sex trade annually.

 

 

Upcoming Events in the Chicago area

October 23, 2012

Free Training Seminar - Learn more about sex trafficking from Brenda Myers Powell, CoFounder/COO of The Dreamcatcher Foundation and consultant for PROMISE during an eye-opening evening of human trafficking awareness. Sponsored by Hammond Citywide Crime Watch.

Click Here for Flyer

I've had the opportunity to hear Brenda Myers Powell speak.  She has an amazing story and is doing awesome work helping young women who are involved in or at serious risk of being exploited in the sex trade industry.
  

October 27, 2012

Free Movie Screening - Bright Hope will host a screening of the award-winning film “Nefarious: Merchant of Souls.” This hard-hitting documentary exposes the disturbing trends in modern day slavery.  Click here for details



I've seen this movie and it is hard hitting.  It really captures the horror of what's happening.

November 13 & 14, 2012

Free Training Seminar - Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children & Labor Trafficking of Domestic Minors Training in partnership with The Salvation Army STOP-IT Program

The Salvation Army - Joliet & Will County, Corps Community Center 300 Third Ave., Joliet, Illinois 60433   Click here to register

The Ugly Truth

If your're not familiar with Backpage.com let me introduce you to the sad, ugly truth.  Backpage is a classified advertising website. Similar to Craigslist it offers a wide variety of classified listings including automotive, jobs, and real estate. In fact, it is the second largest classified ad listing service on the Internet in the United States after Craigslist.  Unfortunately, it is also the the largest source for adult services listings on the Internet. This vile website is being used by pimps to peddle girls online.  There are many stories of young girls being seduced online by men who turn out to be pimps or sex-traffickers and this website is providing them an avenue to do that.

If you want to see for yourself how vile it is go to their website (Backpage), choose a random city or one close you.  Then click on the adult section.  Before you do please be warned that this is disturbing and disgusting.  You will see girls in scantily clad, sexy outfits.  Under headings such as Escorts, Body Rubs, Strippers, Dom & Fetish this website is clearly advertising sexual services.  The girls listed claim to be of legal age, but many of them look younger than the age posted.  Many of these ads may be consenting adults, but the ugly truth is that many of them are not.  Minnesota, Ramsey County Attorney John Choi is quoted as saying "When we get a case involving trafficking or prostitution, usually the story is going to start on Backpage.com."  Prosecutors across the country have seen an increase in cases (in 22 states recently) of underage girls being sold for sex on Backpage.com.

Backpage claims that ads submitted to Backpage are subject to an automated scan for terms and code words linked to prostitution. A team of around 100 people then checks each ad individually before it's posted. Each month the team finds around 400 ads offering potentially underage sex. These are sent to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children which in turn alerts law enforcement.  But here is the kicker...The team does not attempt to identify whether the subjects of the ads in question are participating of their own free will.  Nor are these questionable ads removed!

A few years ago Craigslist was doing this very same thing, but caved to the pressure it was getting and removed such ads from it's website.  Some recent strides have been made with Backpage.  Formerly, they were owned by Village Voice Media.  In recent months, Village Voice has separated their newspaper company from Backpage after several high profile companies cancelled ads for publications.  Backpage is now being run by shareholders Mike Lacey and Jim Larkin.

To read about a recent law suit by 3 teens who were trafficked from ads on Backpage click here
Fox News

Awakening

I first heard about Human Trafficking about 4 years ago at my church.  They showed a short clip of young girls being rescued in India.  These girls could not have been more than 7 or 8 years old.  It broke my heart.  The living conditions they were pulling these girls from was horrific.  These girls should have been playing with dolls, but instead they were being held like slaves in dark, dingy, dirty places and being forced to do unthinkable things.  It stirred something in me, but I thought I am in another country what can I do?  I have small kids and I can't pick up and travel to a 3rd world country.  So, I am sad to say I did nothing. 

Then about 2 years ago, our church was highlighting various people who have made an impact in different parts of the world.  One of the organizations was Dress a Girl Around The World.  This organization sews dresses out of pillowcases and sends them to girls in Uganda and many other countries to combat Human Trafficking.  They said that a girl was less likely to be raped if she was wearing a dress.  I was stirred once again.  This was something I could DO! If what I heard was true, then this was a tangible way I could get involved.  I contacted the organization and this is the response I received from them:

Here is what we have been told by village pastors in Uganda:

1)That the fact a girl is wearing a new dress shows she is being cared for and can discourage would-be predators. This made sense to us because we are always taught to act confident in public and not "look like a victim" as this is thought to deter would-be predators here.

2) We put our "hope 4 Women" label on each dress--on the outside--either on the pocket or on the outside hem of the dress. This is, we've been told, to let would be predators know that this girl is not only being cared for because she's wearing a nice dress--AND also sends the signal that she is also being looked after by an organization.

We have no stats to back this up--but it makes sense and we believe if it saves ONE girl from becoming a victim--it is worth the extra expense and time of putting on our label.

Since then I have slowly been collecting pillowcases and materials along with names of people who are willing to help me host an event for Dress a Girl.  The funny thing about this is that I don't sew!  Yes, you got that right.  I don't sew and yet I want to hold an event to sew dresses out of pillowcases.  God is really stretching me out of my comfort zone.  Over the summer, I had a dear friend and neighbor help me and together we made one of the dresses.  It was actually pretty simple.  I am hoping to hold the first event sometime in January.  If you feel moved by this issue and would like to help in any way please let me know. You can learn more about the organization at their website...

Dress a Girl Around the World

 I have been doing a lot of research on the area of Human Trafficking.  It is my hope and prayer that I can raise awareness around this issue.  I am working with my local church to hold quarterly forums where we bring in a speaker to talk about this issue.  I would like to alternate these talks between what is happening globally and what is happening right here in our own back yards.  I would like to do the same thing with this blog.  I'll be sharing current news, local happenings, book reviews, movie suggestions and all things related to ending this horrific practice.  If I can raise awareness and move just one person to action it will be worth it.