The Ugly Truth of Human Trafficking

From Juris Magazine

January is Human Trafficking Awareness and Prevention Month, and since this is a topic very close to my heart, I’m going to be writing a series on what I’ve learned since first studying the issue for a debate case 5 years ago. But I’m not just going to list the problem. Over the next few posts, I’m going to give you concrete ideas of how we can help end this scourge for humanity. The more people who know about modern day slavery, the more people will fight  to end it!

So first, the facts.

There are approximately 30 million slaves worldwide, and up to 17,500 slaves are trafficked into the United States annually. They are trapped physically, mentally and socially, cutting them off from the few resources available for these poor souls.

The definition of human trafficking according to the State Department is the process of recruiting, transportation, transfer, harboring, or receiving of a human being by means of threat, coercion, abduction, fraud, deceit, deception, or abuse of power for the purpose of prostitution, pornography, sexual exploitation, forced labor, involuntary servitude, debt bondage, or another form of slavery.

Another startling statistic is that approximately 50% of trafficking victims are children. The average age of entry into prostitution is around 13 years old according to FBI statistics, and up to 90% of these children have experienced sexual abuse at home. These kids know they cannot return to their own abusive homes.

Imagine for a moment that you are a child, horrifically betrayed by those who were supposed to care for you. Maybe you are like so many who desperately flee to the streets. Someone offers you food and a job, and you take it because you have to survive.

You are out of the frying pan and into the fire. He takes you to a strange place, and threatens to kill you if you leave. Night after night, you are sold to countless men. Some of them hit you, some like it when you are in pain, and you sink into yourself knowing that there is no rescue. These children are forgotten and harmed by their own families, left homeless and helpless on the streets, forced into sweatshops and prostitution, and coerced into horrors that one can only imagine.

My home city is among the top five cities in the nation experiencing a boom in child trafficking. Sacramento creates a perfect triangle for traffickers shuttling slaves to Los Angeles and Las Vegas since it is accessible by its delta as well as the usual routes of road, railroad, and air. It’s one reason why I am so passionately resolved to work to abolish human trafficking.

So, I guess the question is, where are our priorities? If we really value our children, if we really value their well-being, safety, freedom, and if we really value providing a good future filled with opportunity for our country’s children, then funding shelters is primary. This great nation has a duty to protect the children entrusted to her. And that requires our money and our care.

In the wake of the tragic Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings in Connecticut, President Obama declared, “This is our first task — caring for our children. It’s our first job. If we don’t get that right, we don’t get anything right. That’s how, as a society, we will be judged. And by that measure, can we truly say, as a nation, that we are meeting our obligations? Can we honestly say that we’re doing enough to keep our children — all of them — safe from harm?”

The doors are opened wide to the opportunity of freedom. Let the children be set free from their bondage. Let them prosper, learn, laugh, play and be offered the chance to live and to love again. All it takes is our priority and funding. This human rights abuse will end when the children have safe resources to seek. These children deserve better. Do their lives not merit a great fight for their safety? The conscience of a nation dictates their fate.