For those who have not seen the movie Taken, I would recommend watching it, not for the entertainment value, even though the Movie is decent, but to open your eyes on what’s going on in the world around us. We all like to live in our little bubbles, going along and hoping nothing happens to anyone in our lives. The trafficking of humans is going on all around us, but like politic’s unless it has a direct impact on us, we tend to ignore it.
For those of you who don’t remember this story I will post it
In 1999, a teenage girl was taken from a Haitian orphanage and smuggled—using phony documentation—into Miami, where she was forced to work as a domestic servant for up to 15 hours a day, seven days a week. She was never paid, not allowed to go to school, occasionally beaten, and subjected to other inhumane treatment. After suffering for nearly six years, she managed to escape in 2005. This March, justice was finally served when three of her captors were convicted in the case.
FBI’s website Keep in mind this was one of the kinder cases, most times the young girl ends up as a prostitute, hooked on drugs and worse……
Now I know most of you are thinking that does not happen to American Citizens, however your wrong, For example, an Anchorage man was found guilty in February of recruiting young women—mostly runaways from other parts of the country—to work for him as prostitutes. He controlled them by getting them addicted to crack cocaine, confining them to a small closet for days at a time, and beating them. Here is the link to his conviction FEDERAL JURY CONVICTS ANCHORAGE MAN IN THE FIRST SEX TRAFFICKING TRIAL IN THE DISTRICT OF ALASKA Once again that story is taken right from the FBI’s website.
Today The Star online reports about a story KUALA LUMPUR(Malaysia) Nine people, including five Johor Immigration Department officers, were arrested in several locations in the state since Friday, for alleged involvement in an international human trafficking syndicate. TheStar
The scale of the problem worldwide:
* An estimated 2.4 million people, 1.2 million of them children, are trafficked each year generating $7 billion a year,
* It is one of the world’s 3 largest illegal trades alongside arms and drugs,
* This trade buys and sells people for as little as $30 for life,
* This trade abuses and reduces people to commodities,
* People Trafficking is the fastest growing form of international crime.
BOB HERBERT Wrote a pretty good article in October 2007 in the NY Times about one ring that was been operated here in the States
Here is just a small part of his article:
As a society, we’re repelled by the slavery of old. But the wholesale transport of women and girls across international borders and around the U.S. — to serve as prostitutes under conditions that in most cases are coercive at best — stirs very little outrage.
Leaf through the Yellow Pages in some American cities and you’ll find pages upon pages of ads: “Korean Girl, 18 — Affordable.” “Korean and Japanese Dolls — Full Service.” “Barely Legal China Doll — Pretty and Petite.”
While I know my grammar is the worst, and most times when I write its about Politics, but this issue is only going to get worse! What if it was your little girl? or your niece?
The FBI reports that most case’s are women and young girls, that are forced into what they call The commercial sex industry, or domestic labor. The number of young boys and young men being forced into the sex industry is on the rise.
I ask all who bother to read this, to think of these victims as your daughter or son,and get mad enough to find out what you can do to help put a stop to this.
