This month I've taken some time, having been inspired by the Asbury University initiative to spread awareness of the current human trafficking epidemic, to dig up some statistics and facts on my own. My personal goal was to highlight the American acceptance of pornography and show the links to the casual degradation of the human dignity of others and of ourselves. In short, I was looking for statistics that involved adults, as I personally didn't want to dip my hands in the stories of child exploitation.
I searched. I ran another search. But alas, 'Child exploitation.' 'The exploitation of children in the sex trade.'....these were the stats that kept cropping up. It wasn't until I accidentally began to read one of the personal stories that I understood why the statistics didn't deal with adults. At first I thought it was because minors and legal adults were two different scenarios in the realm of human trade, but I was so wrong.
And now I'm pissed.
This is the story I unearthed:
Read the article here. (It is harsh but not graphic. Worth a read).
I knew children were used because they were weaker and fearful.
I didn't realize that many of the women and men you see in the trade had been trained by people they trusted from their earlier years. That's why the statistics only mentioned children!!
Exploited children grow up to be exploited adults. Prostitutes, phone escorts and participants of home/professional porn are often supplying funds to people who own them or claim to protect them.
It seems so 'common sense' when I write it here however I was among the crowd that accepted that whores were junkies and sluts but this trade is huge!!! Booming in frequency and numbers worldwide, human trade snatches up the defenseless and pays big money to the monsters that manipulate them.
But I'll tell you something else I know. There is no trade without demand.
You can label the pimps, traders and kidnappers as the monsters but they are just the ones that supply the products to the customers.
There are articles written on the links to pornography, phone sex, massage parlors and escort services and the perpetuation of the growing demand to 'create the supply for the need', which is really the simple bottom line to this atrocity. That was my original focus when I started my 'facts search' at the beginning of this month.
They are easy to find in a google search and I urge you to learn the facts for yourselves.
But what I really want to emphasize as this month comes rolling to an end is the power of individual perspective.
* Human dignity has no place in exploitation.
* A 'subhuman workforce' describes modern trafficking in the exact same way it was
used to describe America's shameful past of slave-trading/owning.
* Participants within the sex industry, whether voluntary or not, are not nameless.
Once they are seen as just a body with a stage name or a voice with a false identity
another log is thrown onto the fire of an already unchecked inferno.
*The tools you are using to read this post can more easily be used to fuel the
trafficking epidemic with porn searches and phone sex (I had an ad pop up for a
phone line as I was researching for this post) than they can to fight against it.
Change this. The sites and searches you frequent will thrive. Period.
It's the age old truth; if you aren't part of the solution you're part of the problem.
The reality is before you. Act!
20 Ways You Can Help Fight Human Trafficking
The Polaris Project
Humantrafficking.org
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