Cause [ Human Trafficking ]
U.S. federal agents recently raided an apartment complex in California. Inside they discovered 72 garment workers. The 72 women had been recruited from Thailand with false promises of employment. Instead they were forced to work 16-hour shifts monitored by armed guards. This took place in metropolitan Los Angeles and went on unnoticed and unaddressed for 7 years. (David Batstone, Not For Sale).
Despite the heroic efforts of historic abolitionists, slavery is not a thing of the past. Estimates on the number of slaves in the world today are as high as 27 million (Kevin Bales, Disposable People). Whether it’s sex slavery in Thailand, forced labor in Brazil, child soldiery in Uganda, heritable debt-bondage in Pakistan, indentured servitude in India, or involuntary sexual servitude in Europe, slavery by any name is still slavery.
Slavery does not exist in isolation. It is the product of socioeconomic division, poor education, vulnerability, unwanted children, corrupt policing, and corrupt leaders. Add predators and desperation to the mix and parents sell their daughters to pimps and pedophiles, children are drugged and forced to murder their neighbors, three generations of work fail to repay a $20 debt due to loan shark accounting. This is the world behind the curtain.
These atrocities are daunting, to be sure, but as Lincoln and Wilberforce fought in their day, so we must fight in ours. This is an opportunity to do something real. This is the Underground Railroad. It’s high time we asked ourselves, “Will I use my freedom to fight, or will I be a slave without chains?”
