Slavery and Human Trafficking - International Concern

This week on my blogtalk radio show, I wanted to continue learning about international sex trafficking, so I invited Helen Armstrong to talk with me about this and other forms of modern slavery. Ms. Armstrong has been involved in international human trafficking for many years. She has a degree in teaching from Harvard, and has worked as a teacher in Kenya for many years. Drawing on the experience of many frontline workers in the human trafficking industry, she wrote “Rebuilding Lives,” a manual on English and French, on the rehabilitation of those emerging from slavery around the world.

According to Ms. Armstrong, modern slavery is not too different from what it was 400 years ago. She defines slavery as profiting from another person over whom you have absolute control, who has been kidnapped and in some way violently coerced—physically or psychologically—into remaining in the situation. These criteria apply to all forms of slavery, of which there are many, but for the sake of our discussion, Ms. Armstrong said that sex trafficking and slavery are, basically, one and the same thing.

There are various ways that young women are forced or lured into sex trafficking, but here is one fact that everyone should know: 90% of the women who contacted the National Human Trafficking Resource Center here in the U.S. in 2013 were approached at or below age 13. By age 16, most had already been passed off to their third or fourth pimp. Many parents assume that children need not know about this issue until high school, if at all, which is simply not true. Ms. Armstrong strongly suggests that we speak to our girls about sex slavery as early as age 10 or 11, way before they hit puberty, because they are most vulnerable in middle school. This information helps shatter the misconception that sex slaves are somehow at fault. If a twelve-year-old is approached by a pimp outside of her school, what, exactly, did she do wrong? Pimps target vulnerable young girls who come from tough living situations and are eager to get out. Ms. Armstrong identified two characteristics of sex trafficking that are true the world over: false promises and violence. These young girls are promised a good job, an education, sometimes love, and they are so young that they lack the cognitive skills to understand the risk they are taking. These children are victims of a heinous crime, which also happens to also be a 32 billion dollar a year industry—second largest in the world, behind illegal drugs.

There are other forms of slavery occurring right here in our own communities. Of the 72,000 calls that came into the National Human Trafficking Resource Center in 2013, 27% of them were domestic workers isolated in households. Most of them were women who were not only trapped but also vulnerable to sexual exploitation. You can find slaves in America working in the construction, agriculture, and restaurant industries. Ms. Armstrong and I also discussed the permeable barrier between slavery and domestic violence: many women who suffer domestic abuse are, for all intents and purposes, slaves themselves. They have no control over their lives—no communication with the outside world or access to public places without their husbands.

There is some good news. We are closer than ever before to ending slavery. No economy depends on slavery, and it is illegal by universal consensus. The problem is that the laws are not enforced: governments turn a blind eye because those profiting from the industry are much more powerful than those enslaved by it. We can help end slavery simply by getting involved in local politics. To find out how to take action here in the United States, visit http://www.polarisproject.org, where we put out a summary every two weeks of state legislation that's being debated.

Another tactic that Ms. Armstrong mentioned, which has been specifically helpful in nations like India where entire communities are enslaved, is to get the survivors to organize, to coalesce. Together, their voice has proved to have an impact. To learn more about international trafficking and to become an advocate for slaves worldwide, visit http://www.freetheslaves.net.

And if you or someone you know needs help, please call the Polaris Project right away: 1 888 3737 888

Let's all help end slavery once and for all.