Christians who defend slavery

On February 20, 2025, "the Trump administration officially designated eight Latin American cartels, including six from Mexico, as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) for their major roles in drug smuggling and human trafficking into the United States." 72%, of those trafficked for sex in the U.S. are immigrants. Most of them are here illegally.

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/how-us-military-action-against-drug-cartels-in-mexico-could-unfold/?

 
I'm concerned that Trump haters, many of whom are Democrat Christians, don't seem to understand the seriousness of this. Particularly the sex trafficking of women and children, as well as labor trafficking. Let's call it by a less sanitized name: slavery. Drugs are not a renewable, sustainable enterprise--slavery is. Once they sneak (or openly transport with open borders as in the Biden administration) them in, the victims and their families have to repay exorbitant prices to the cartels/smugglers. There are always more dues to pay. Some Christians are looking the other way just as they were in the 1850s-1860s or during the Jim Crow era. They waste their time with ever expanding and lucrative DEI contracts while ignoring the slavery right in front of them.

Ten or fifteen years ago there were many articles, documentaries, and meetings about this cancer. More than today. It's as though we Christians were all talk and no walk, a common failing. Now that someone is actually getting tough there's more virtue signaling, hand wringing and Lawfare.

https://www.heritage.org/border-security/commentary/fighting-human-trafficking-and-battling-bidens-open-border?

https://www.foxnews.com/us/illegal-smuggling-coyotes-now-advertising-canada-border-amid-trump-migrant-crackdown-report?

Sound of Freedom movie--what's the controversy?

Why are some in the MSM and Americans deep in the Democrat political pool denying the truth and seriousness of the film, "Sound of Freedom," with Jim Caviezel playing Tim Ballard? It's a film about a modern abolition movement and underground railroad to free children in sex slavery. With most crimes, it's follow the money.

1. Trafficking in persons (TIP) is the 3rd largest industry in the world, with arms being #1, and illegal drugs #2. It's hard to get a firm fix on the dollars, but ILO claimed $150 Billion for labor trafficking (2014), and other international sources say 70% of that is sex trafficking of women and children. It's a "renewable" product, and once someone is enslaved the money continues to roll in for the owner or syndicate, unlike the illegal drug industry when the commodity is gone when sold, smoked or ingested. In the sex industry, it's 100% on return of investment.

2. Sex trafficking is closely tied to the pornography industry, which is also a global multi-billion dollar industry. Statistics for this industry are for 2023, whereas most government statistics are 2-3 years behind. It's about $97 billion. Pornography is the gate way drug for the consumer, and the training manual for the victims.

 
3. Technology--Big Tech--is right in the middle of all this slime and degradation. Internet porn is probably a third of the recurring business and the image of a woman or children, both boys and girls, and be reused thousands of times, enslaving the consumer in the privacy of his/her home while revictimizing the victim, who may be dead or long ago out of the industry. It's "clean" on subscription with just a few clicks. The income is beyond your imagination. That's why the stats are all over the place.

 
4. The sex trafficking and labor and debt bondage are all tied together. We Americans consume many products produced by forced labor, maybe something small like elements in our smart phones or huge like the windmills on the prairies. Africa and China primarily are the source for just those 2. The List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor comprises 159 goods from 78 countries and areas, as of September 28, 2022. (Dept. of Labor) Here you get into the money of Politics. I can't claim to know the routes and how-to's, but getting Washington to clean up its act will take massive political will from the PEOPLE. If we have politicians who refuse to watch a movie because they are afraid of Christians or conservatives, the quagmire is deep and wide, and money is at the bottom of the pit.

Human Trafficking Statistics by State [Updated August 2022] (worldpopulationreview.com)

2022 Trafficking in Persons Report - United States Department of State

The Shocking Information the Porn Industry Doesn't Want You to Know | Adventist News Network

Cracking The $150 Billion Business Of Human Trafficking (forbes.com)

Slavery is a $32bn industry so why aren't we following the money trail? | Global development | The Guardian  (2013 article)

Economics of forced labour: ILO says forced labour generates annual profits of US$ 150 billion

Transgender Ideology, Biden Border Abet Child Sex Slavery, Rescuer Says (dailysignal.com)

Trafficking in Persons Report 2022

Before we talk reparations with California governor Newsom trying to earn points so he can get to the White House with all the crazies, lets do something about the 28,000,000 slaves, mostly in Africa and Asia, that haven't been set free. Instead of giving money to African leaders as reparations to combat climate change, Biden should be asking them for reparations for black Americans, if this were actually a moral issue.  Africans are the ones who sold their enemies or victims of raids to the Europeans who couldn't go into the interior. We outlawed slavery in the Civil War. Many African countries have done it only with lip service.

"Let us stand together and press for accountability from those leaders who condone and support human trafficking, create conditions ripe for mass exploitation, and perpetuate this fundamental insult to human dignity. Those that perpetrate, condone, or support this crime must be held accountable." Anthony Blinken, U.S. Secretary of State, Biden administration.

Reading through the report [search by country name] you may wonder as I did, how much of the money and effort are going for ending slavery--I see climate change, many groups skimming funds for "counseling" for victims, services for marginalized people (aka diversity and inclusion) LGBTQ rights, etc., the usual woke agenda now being imported to countries with more than enough of their own problems without taking advice from the Bidenistas.
President Clinton signed this Act in 2000 and President Bush put it into action. It has been tweaked and fiddled and diddled. Time for action. I don't know how fraud is avoided because reporting a reduction of the crime of slavery or passing more laws would seem to reduce the funding, although I'm not sure how that works. 

Typical report, after the dull, dry information of inadequate facilities, staffers and laws, what makes the 2022 report different is the toll the pandemic took: "As reported over the past five years, human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Kenya, and traffickers exploit victims from Kenya abroad. Traffickers exploit children in forced labor in domestic service, agriculture, fishing, cattle herding, street vending, and forced begging. Traffickers exploit women and children in sex trafficking, often facilitated by family members in informal settings, throughout Kenya, including in sex tourism in Nairobi, Mombasa, and Kisumu. In 2020, an international NGO reported there are between 35,000 and 40,000 victims of sex trafficking, including child sex tourism, in Kenya, of which approximately 19,000 are children; most perpetrators are Kenyan and, to a lesser extent, foreign tourists. Government officials and NGOs report traffickers increasingly exploit children in sex trafficking in private villas and vacation homes to avoid law enforcement detection in hotels. Workers in Khat cultivation areas and near gold mines in western Kenya, truck drivers along major highways, and fishermen on Lake Victoria also exploit children in sex trafficking.

During the pandemic, traffickers increasingly exploited children in sex trafficking, including using online recruitment tactics, and in forced labor in domestic work and forced begging. Employment agencies, both legal and fraudulent, recruit Kenyans to work in the Middle East (particularly Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, and Oman), Central and Southeast Asia, Europe, Northern Africa, and North America, where traffickers exploit them in massage parlors, brothels, domestic servitude, or manual labor; Kenyans who voluntarily migrate in search of employment opportunities are also vulnerable to exploitative conditions."

I wonder if Kenyan children get counseling about top and bottom surgery or if that is just for American sexually abused children.

https://www.state.gov/reports/2022-trafficking-in-persons-report/kenya/

Trafficking in Persons Report, 20th

As this 20th anniversary report is released, we and our allies and partners find ourselves confronting a crisis that has reached previously unimagined proportions. While urgency has always marked the fight against human trafficking, the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic have magnified the need for all stakeholders to work together in the fight more than ever. We know that human traffickers prey upon the most vulnerable and look for opportunities to exploit them. Instability and lack of access to critical services caused by the pandemic mean that the number of people vulnerable to exploitation by traffickers is rapidly growing. (2020)

https://bd.usembassy.gov/release-of-the-20th-annual-trafficking-in-persons-report/

https://sharedhope.org/2020/07/13/20th-anniversary-of-trafficking-in-persons-report/

https://www.insidernj.com/press-release/rep-smith-20th-annual-trafficking-persons-tip-report-released/

The link to the report was down and archived.

Change in focus under Biden--climate change, various "vulnerabilities" and discrimination.

This year’s Trafficking in Persons Report sends a strong message to the world that global crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and enduring discriminatory policies and practices, have a disproportionate effect on individuals already oppressed by other injustices. These challenges further compound existing vulnerabilities to exploitation, including human trafficking. We must break this inhumane cycle of discrimination and injustices if we hope to one day eliminate human trafficking. (2021)

Modern day slavery--labor, sex and children

Our book club selection today was "7 men and 7 women," by Eric Metaxas. Two of the individuals, William Wilberforce and Hannah More were English abolitionists. Amazing stories--and few people know of them, nor did most people of their era (18th century) know about the evils of slavery. Same thing is happening today. There's more slavery today than in the 18th century. Candace Owens interviews Tim Ballard who is fighting sex slavery--of children. The fastest growing criminal enterprise in the world is selling people. Most people don't know that. Now you'll have no excuse. Candace and Tim are telling you.

https://www.prageru.com/video/the-candace-owens-show-tim-ballard/?

Operation Underground Railroad (ourrescue.org)

White Fragility

Robin DiAngelo has made a fortune being a racist. She writes in White Fragility, that “All white people are invested in and collude with racism,” and that “The white collective fundamentally hates blackness for what it reminds us of: that we are capable and guilty of perpetrating immeasurable harm and that our gains come through the subjugation of others.” She also claims if we disagree with her we're racists. Kafkatrap. 

Would DiAngelo be allowed into our churches, book clubs and non-profit reading lists if she were speaking such vile filth about Jews, Blacks or Asians? Robin, if you are a racist and need to unload your guilt and promote your moral superiority, speak for yourself. Don't come to my social and educational events. Keep those books in your basement archive. 

I hope she donates her ill-gotten, slave-pimping wealth to an organization that wants to stop slavery in this time and place, this century--it exceeds the numbers of the 18th century, and is still primarily based in Africa and Asia. It includes labor slavery, sex slavery, and child slavery. Check the annual reports for TIP U.S. Department of State.

https://thelogicalliberal.com/2020/06/13/white-fragility/?

https://slowtowrite.com/white-fragility-is-pro-racism/?

https://thefederalist.com/2019/06/18/white-fragility-inherently-racist-idea-retired-immediately/?

https://dailycaller.com/2020/06/24/tucker-carlson-white-fragility-robin-diangelo/?

January 31, on this day in history, 1865 and 1919

This day in history, "January 31, 1865, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery in America. The amendment read, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude…shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” . . .

In 1864, an amendment abolishing slavery passed the U.S. Senate but died in the House as Democrats rallied in the name of states’ rights. The election of 1864 brought Lincoln back to the White House along with significant Republican majorities in both houses, so it appeared the amendment was headed for passage when the new Congress convened in March 1865. Lincoln preferred that the amendment receive bipartisan support–some Democrats indicated support for the measure, but many still resisted. The amendment passed 119 to 56, seven votes above the necessary two-thirds majority. Several Democrats abstained, but the 13th Amendment was sent to the states for ratification, which came in December 6, 1865. With the passage of the amendment, the institution that had indelibly shaped American history was eradicated." https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/today-in-history-january-31/ss-BBZjpd7?

Also on this day in history, January 31, 1919, Jackie Robinson was born in Georgia and he became the first black to break the color barrier in major league baseball in 1947. He was a Republican, and today the media will tell you everything bad about the RNC in those days, but the Democrats were still fighting "inclusion and diversity," and did so for many years. So let's leave it there that they are still rewriting their own poor history.

Slavery has existed from the earliest recorded history and is still a global scourge--estimates of the number of slaves globally today range from around 21 million to 46 million -- labor and sex and even children. This is larger than the 18th century Atlantic slave trade. https://www.antislavery.org/slavery-today/modern-slavery/

We can all be proud that the U.S. opposition to slavery is today bi-partisan. The current legislation began under President Clinton in 2000 and has continued under Bush, Obama, and Trump. This is the 2019 Trafficking in Persons report. https://www.state.gov/reports/2019-trafficking-in-persons-report/
However, reading that report is discouraging.  Less than .03% of the millions of slaves are identified and rescued. If a church spent a year studying the 2019 Trafficking in Persons report of our State Department, it would never run out of material, issues, causes, and places to put their money. And yet we have people trafficked across the border daily.

The international slave trade

I'm not going to share the awful photos going around the internet of the slave trade in Libya or the riots in Paris demanding that someone DO something about slavery after the CNN report. Modern day slavery is bigger than the 18th c. trans-Atlantic slave trade--about 21 million people; where was the outrage when it has been reported for years? In the U.S. we'd rather focus on microaggressions and reparations for events of 3 centuries ago.

The U.S. has a Trafficking in Persons law begun under President Clinton in 2000 and it is continually reauthorized. The 2001 TIP report names Austria, Belgium, Canada, Germany, and other countries as transit and destination areas for trafficked East European women. Also NGOs and Christian organizations have been battling both the sex slavery and labor slavery for years. Even the much maligned Glenn Beck has done extensive stories on this scourge. In 2000 when I wrote my retirement plan, I noted the international slave trade.

Unfortunately, if you look through the TIP 18 annual reports, you see it is a "monitoring" country by country report on what each are doing. No teeth. Like the bank robbery commercial. Or the Congressional "ethics" committee. Europe has its own "monitoring" organization with annual reports for modern slavery, called GRETA.

[2001] "The United Kingdom (UK) is a destination country for trafficked men, women, and girls. A Government-sponsored report estimates that up to 1,500 women and girls are trafficked into the UK annually for purposes of sexual exploitation from Eastern Europe and the Balkans, South America, Nigeria, Thailand, and Vietnam. Although there are no reliable data as to the numbers of victims, men, women, and children from the Indian sub-continent, Sri Lanka, Turkey, the former Yugoslavia, Romania, China, Congo, Angola, Colombia, and Ecuador also are trafficked to the UK; labor exploitation occurs primarily in agriculture, sweatshops, and industry." (2001 TIP report, State Dept)

[2009] Libya: "Both migrants and trafficking victims are routinely smuggled through Libya to Europe, especially to or through Italy and Malta, en route to various locations on the continent. Libya’s migrant population of 1.5 to 2 million represents about one-third of its overall population. Although precise figures are unavailable, foreign observers estimate that one-half to one percent of foreigners (i.e., up to 20,000 people) may be victims of trafficking. In some cases, smuggling debts and illegal status leave migrants vulnerable to coercion, resulting in cases of forced prostitution and forced labor;" (2009 TIP report, State Dept)

[2016] "The purpose of this Report is to enlighten, energize, and empower." (John Kerry, 2016 TIP report, State Dept)

So it seems it does take a war to end slavery, even one fought with impure motives and by people unclear about what they were doing, not just monitoring and annual task force reports.

https://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/

Set the sex slaves free

 Unless you're Catholic. Unless Catholics are willing to provide contraceptives and abortions, no government funding to free women. It just sounds so right and just when the ACLU explains it in PC language: "routinely denies reproductive health services to its clients because of its religious beliefs that prohibit abortion or emergency contraception." Kill the child, or else lose the money to free the slaves. Social agendas of progressives in government also removed Catholics from child adoption services because the goal of the government isn't doing what's best for children, but a far reaching social goal.

 https://www.aclu.org/news/aclu-sues-federal-records-grant-religious-group-obstructs-trafficking-victims-access

In 1930, Protestant churches began to cave on the contraceptive issue, and it's been down hill for Western society since. Now abortion, harvesting fertilized eggs, embryonic stem cell medical experiments, gay adoptions, easy divorce, law suits against nuns, same sex marriage and intersex bathrooms are all denying freedom of religious teaching.

That said, any church that accepts government funding for a food pantry, a playground for the poor, Section 8 housing, a program for the disabled, an ESL program for Muslims is required to do the government's bidding. President GHW Bush started this slide. It's probably time to cut all those ties (although even the laws will probably prevent that since churches will be forced to comply).

In the 20th century, there were 40 million Christians killed by their governments. Are we honoring their memory?

The assault against Americans' religious freedom continues—on all fronts and this is the best summary I've seen covering the HHS mandate, the public square, academe and public schools. Includes quotes from SCOTUS decisions and founding fathers.  http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/10/religious-liberty-and-expression-under-attack-restoring-americas-first-freedoms

Donations for personal hygiene

We took about $50 of groceries to the Thanksgiving service at UALC on Thursday (nicest church service of the year with the best hymns).  But I kept aside a bag of personal care items I’ve been buying—shampoo, sanitary napkins, deodorant, bar soap, toothpaste, tooth brushes, liquid hand soap. These are for Tammy Jewell’s ministry, “God’s Hygiene Help Center,” which offers basic hygiene care to people who have lost their dignity because they simply can’t afford everyday items.  Some are for children, some for out of work men and women looking for jobs, some for the elderly and homeless.

Jewell is a former victim of human trafficking who came to know Jesus. Now she reaches out to addicts and trafficking victims.  When she shares Jesus, she also offers some small material aid.

From UALC.org Cornerstone, Nov. 22-26, 2015

C.A.T.C.H. Court and Judge Paul M. Herbert

October 31 I attended a presentation at UALC Mill Run campus on the C.A.T.C.H court of Franklin County, Ohio, which is a diversion program offering women victimized by human trafficking the chance to leave lives of trauma, homelessness, substance abuse and incarceration. It was started in 2009 by Judge Paul M. Herbert, a Christian, who had a personal experience with a woman in his court room that was like that of the disgraced woman in Luke’s account of the woman who bathed Jesus’ feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair.  He told us the most important word in the Bible is “SEE.”

He told us that prostitution isn’t the glamorous, self selected life of “Pretty woman” the Julia Roberts film where women are exchanging sex for money.  He showed footage of severe physical abuse. We heard about branding with tattoos, pimps being “married” to all his girls, new identities, traumatic brain injuries, broken bones and rape.  That’s NOT sex for hire. . . it’s slavery.  One third of the prostitutes were in the field before age 15, and now average age is 12-13; 62% are before their 18th birthday.  Ohio passed a Statute of Human Trafficking, June, 27, 2012—every human trafficking victim is also a prostitute—victim and criminal. 92% of those arrested for prostitution also fit the definition of human trafficking.

The C.A.T.C.H. program graduates have a very high rate of success. We also heard from a graduate of the program, Vanessa Perkins who today is employed by the very court system that previously tried and convicted her and has completed 5 years of sobriety with no new offenses.  She serves on the Board of Freedom a la Cart.  Story here.

This video is very similar to the presentation I heard this morning.

https://vimeo.com/106539001

Thank you Suzanne Tyack who brought this program to UALC.

Internet safety for teens

Keep children away from predators by sharing.

More women becoming ring leaders in slave trade

“There are more than 27 million slaves worldwide, according to the United Nations, generating an estimated $32 billion in profits, most of which are earned on the backs of young women, yet more and more case findings are uncovering women as ringleaders and operators of trafficking syndicates,” says Sharon Buchbinder.

 
http://www.thedailybeast.com/witw/articles/2013/08/07/when-women-are-found-trafficking-other-women.html

• A Saudi Arabian princess charged in Los Angeles: Meshael Alayban faces one felony count of human trafficking after being accused of holding a domestic servant against her will at her condominium in Irvine, Calif. Alayban is one of the wives of Saudi Prince Abdulrahman bin Nasser bin Abdulaziz al Saud. A female servant, originally from Kenya, escaped and flagged down a bus, after which she told her story to local police. The woman says she was promised weekends off and a good wage but was forced to work 16-hour days, seven days a week and was paid only $220 a month. Alayban faces a maximum sentence of 12 years if convicted. She is being held in the Orange County jail in lieu of $5 million bail.

• United Nations study shows females traffic more sex workers than men in developing countries: Using data from 155 countries, the UN’s first international report attempting to calculate the scope, nature and patterns of human trafficking found a disproportionately high number of female perpetrators selling other women into slavery. The report uncovered an alarming trend: women who were once victims of the sex trade often develop into ringleaders of the illegal, underground sex industry. Researchers cite money, poverty and a skewed psychological perspective for possible reasons for this phenomenon.

• Woman recently sentenced to more than seven years in a federal prison for trafficking a 16-year-old in three different states: Jessica Loren Posey was sentenced earlier this year to serve time for transporting a juvenile girl to Tennessee, Kentucky and Ohio for the purpose of prostitution. According to a U.S. attorney, Posey met the girl at a party and coerced her to engage in sex for money. Posey, 25, marketed the girl using uploaded pictures on various pornographic websites, and she arranged meetings at hotel rooms, driving the girl there.

In 2000 the Dutch legalized prostitution

“Twelve years on, and we can now see the results of this experiment. Rather than afford better protection for the women, it has simply increased the market. Rather than confine the brothels to a discrete (and avoidable) part of the city, the sex industry has spilt out all over Amsterdam — including on-street. Rather than be given rights in the ‘workplace’, the prostitutes have found the pimps are as brutal as ever. The government-funded union set up to protect them has been shunned by the vast majority of prostitutes, who remain too scared to complain.

Pimps, under legalisation, have been reclassified as managers and businessmen. Abuse suffered by the women is now called an ‘occupational hazard’, like a stone dropped on a builder’s toe. Sex tourism has grown faster in Amsterdam than the regular type of tourism: as the city became the brothel of Europe, women have been imported by traffickers from Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia to meet the demand. In other words, the pimps remained but became legit — violence was still prevalent but part of the job, and trafficking increased. Support for the women to leave prostitution became almost nonexistent. The innate murkiness of the job has not been washed away by legal benediction.”

Sin has a way of doing that—makes the bad worse.

You can cross Holland off the cruise list.

Trafficking in persons, United States, 2008-2010

Data from the Human Trafficking Reporting System (HTRS)

Most confirmed human trafficking suspects were male (81%), while 19% were female. Based on cases in which race was known, nearly two-thirds (62%) of confirmed sex trafficking suspects were identified as black. Confirmed labor trafficking suspects were more likely to be identified as Hispanic (48%). Most suspects in confirmed sex trafficking incidents were between the ages of 18 and 34 (77%) and were U.S. citizens (86%).

About 8 in 10 of the suspected incidents of human trafficking were classified as sex trafficking, and about 1 in 10 incidents were classified as labor trafficking. Federal agencies were more likely to lead labor trafficking investigations (29%) than sex trafficking investigations (7%).

For more information, check the report, April 2011

The Real History of Slavery by Thomas Sowell

The following is a partial review of Thomas Sowell’s book, “Black Rednecks and White Liberals,” and appeared in the October 2005 issue of Freeman, a libertarian publication. Review is by Richard M. Ebeling.  I don’t know how successful this book was—seems to be a compilation of his columns which appeared in newspapers—and I don’t know if there were revisions.  It would be good to review the history of slavery, especially since in modern times, we now know it is a larger enterprise in the 21st century than it was in the 18th century because of selling sex, and cheap labor.  And just as Arabs sold black Africans to the Europeans from raids in the interior of Africa, so Muslims today are capturing and selling slaves in Africa and Asia.  So his conclusion (the reviewer, I assume) that ending it in the British Empire closed that chapter isn’t accurate.

“A related theme that Sowell discusses in a chapter on “The Real History of Slavery” is that the institution of human bondage is far older than the experience of black enslavement in colonial and then independent America. Indeed, slavery has burdened the human race during all of recorded history and everywhere around the globe. Its origins and practice have had nothing to do with race or racism. Ancient Greeks enslaved other Greeks; Romans enslaved other Europeans; Asians enslaved Asians; and Africans enslaved Africans, just as the Aztecs enslaved other native groups in what we now call Mexico and Central America. Among the most prominent slave traders and slave owners up to our own time have been Arabs, who enslaved Europeans, black Africans, and Asians. In fact, while officially banned, it is an open secret that such slavery still exists in a number of Muslim countries in Africa and the Middle East.

Equally ignored, Sowell reminds us, is that it was only in the West that slavery was challenged on philosophical and political grounds, and that antislavery efforts became a mass movement in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Slavery was first ended in the European countries, and then Western pressure in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries brought about its demise in most of the rest of the world. But this fact has been downplayed because it does not fit into the politically correct fashions of our time. It is significant that in 1984, on the 150th anniversary of the ending of slavery in the British Empire, there was virtually no celebration of what was a historically profound turning point in bringing this terrible institution to a close around the world.’

Expensive lunch, but interesting Christian missionaries

Today I attended a luncheon and information session sponsored by the Fellowship of Christian Faculty and Staff at the Faculty Club on the Ohio State campus. The topic was human trafficking, aka slavery. Yes, it's still a big business--bigger than the transatlantic slave trade of the 18th century . . . estimates run to 12.7 million people, and some figures are higher. It's very lucrative--humans can be resold many times. And about two million of them are children. 46% of "johns" (male customers) would knowingly buy sex from a minor according to a survey of perverts. That's why, I suppose, the Planned Parenthood abortion clinics don't report their underage clients--they're in on it, as undercover videos have shown.

The speakers were Joe Chongsiriwatana, a former software engineer, who will be representing ZOE International Ministries in Thailand. Joe and his wife Yumi met and married at Ohio State, recently lived in San Francisco raising their 3 children, and have been called by God to minister to children in Chiang Mai, Thailand, children either who have been sold into prostitution and have been picked up by the police and brought to the facility, or those about to be sold by their parents.

The other speaker was Connie Anderson, Director of Justice Ministries, for the Great Lakes area of Intervarsity. She talked about a few local programs and ministries for victims of prostitution and trafficking, like Price of Life, DOMA International and Gracehaven Shelter and CORRC. She commented that the problem is so huge you don't know where to start, so she suggested (with a slide of a snow covered mountain) that we kick a few rocks to start an avalanche.

IJM - Reality of Human Trafficking from International Justice Mission on Vimeo.

But what irritates me is what I had to pay for parking. $5 for a salad bar isn't excessive, but $6.00 for 2.5 hours of parking is. All the parking lots and garages on the OSU campus have changed in recent years--I can't even remember the last time I was there. When I got to the gate I saw the sign "no key cards until 4 p.m." and the price sign I saw was $2 for 3 hours, but that apparently was for evening. So it was an $11.00 salad.

Enough about illegal guns and drugs, let's talk about people

"The United States (U.S.) is a destination country for thousands of men, women, and children trafficked largely from East Asia, Mexico, and Central America for the purposes of sexual and labor exploitation. A majority of foreign victims identified during the year were victims of trafficking for forced labor. Some men and women, responding to fraudulent offers of employment in the United States, migrate willingly—legally and illegally—but are subsequently subjected to conditions of involuntary servitude or debt bondage at work sites or in the commercial sex trade. An unknown number of American citizens and legal residents are trafficked within the country primarily for sexual servitude and, to a lesser extent, forced labor."

Whether for sex or labor, it's slavery, and the U.S. has had an anti-trafficking program since 2000. In 2007, the last year for records (in the 2008 report) $23 million was allocated for domestic programs to boost anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts, identify and protect victims of trafficking, and raise awareness of trafficking as a means of preventing new incidents. Sounds like a drop in the bucket, for the size of the problem. We give much more to the children of illegal immgrants than we do stopping slavery streaming across our borders.

President Obama needs to toss some more change this direction. And the 2008 report is still up. Reports from the Bush years are fast disappearing from the web. Get them while they last, or before they've been digitally altered. Trafficking in Persons Report, 2008.