A "Taste" of Slavery

A Sweet Taste?

Do you enjoy the sweet taste of chocolate? It's safe to say that most of us do being that Americans alone spend over 18 billion dollars each year on it. Would that sweet taste suddenly turn bitter if you found out that behind the production of that tasty candy bar were child slaves? Hard to believe? It sure is. However, that doesn't change the fact that if you walk into a grocery store and buy a chocolate bar, the chances are good that it comes from the Ivory Coast. What is the Ivory Coast? A geographical host of cacao plantations on the coast of Africa that enslave children into forced labor. If you're still skeptical, I encourage you to watch the film "The Dark Side of Chocolate". This documentary captures the horrible injustice of human trafficking and how children are trafficked to work as slaves in the cacao plantations.

What about the big corporations? Why don't they do something? Well, until now they just didn't have to, at least in California that is. A bill passed this January (California Transparency in Supply Chains Act) that requires companies in California to disclose their efforts to eradicate slavery and human trafficking from their direct supply chains for goods offered for sale. The disclosure must be posted on the retailer or manufacturer’s website with a conspicuous and easily understood link from the homepage. Now if every other state would jump on board with this, it would be a good start to fighting this slavery. But what can you do about it?

Fair Trade Certified Products

Many have not heard of fair trade certified products. What is fair trade? It is a partnership based on dialogue, mutual understanding and respect for farmers and artisans. Fair Trade means that farmers and artisans get a fair, living wage for their crops and products. Through Fair Trade, farming and working families are able to eat better, send their kids to school, improve health and housing, and invest in their future. Fair Trade builds equitable and sustainable trading partnerships and creates opportunities to break the cycle of poverty. By supporting Fair Trade, you are directly helping developing countries climb out of poverty one family at a time, as well as protecting them from human trafficking.

I personally buy fair trade certified coffee. Not only does it taste extremely good, it is purchased for a good cause! They also give 75% of their profit toward other charitable needs. Vivente International has set the bar when it comes to fair trade coffee, and in my opinion cannot be outdone even by the bigwigs like Starbucks.

There are fair trade products everywhere, you just have to open your eyes. Fair trade chocolate, coffee, tea, even fair trade certified shirts. So what can we do to battle modern day slavery? Make wise buying decisions... buy fair trade. Visit the Fair Trade USA website for a list of certified companies you can purchase from.

To learn more about human trafficking and fair trade, visit us at www.SpeakAgainstInjustice.com

Why Is Human Trafficking Increasing in America?

City of Murrieta Mayor reads human trafficking proclamation

These past few weeks we have been attending meetings and forums on human trafficking in our local area of Riverside County. The statistics show that the illegal trafficking and slavery of persons in our country are increasing, but why? Who is involved? Who is responsible? What can we do about it?

Think about this... why do human slaves have the potential to generate more revenue than guns or drugs?  Because slaves can be sold, used and resold multiple times over again. This is what the gangs, cartels and mafia are beginning to realize. Why sell guns or drugs when it's just a one time deal? Why not utilize a "product" that can be resold multiple times over? Unfortunately this is one main reason why slavery in the United States is increasing.

Victims being trafficked are not only the ones being brought across our borders, they are local citizens like you and me. Our youth are particularly vulnerable. Recruiters often utilize social internet site such as facebook and myspace. They often befriend them, keep in touch with them, and "groom" them as the Riverside County Anti-Human Trafficking Task-force calls it. What happens when one of these young teenagers is struggling with something at home or at school? Many times they put confidence in peers, it is after all a hard time of life. We often turn to those who we feel cares the most, who will hear us, who will "groom" us. When a young, upset or depressed, weak and vulnerable teenager falls into this trap, all hell can break loose. The "groomer" can offer help, a shoulder to cry on, or influence them to make decisions. "Lets meet, I'd like to talk" one may say. Or maybe it's "Come with me, I know somebody who can help". Once that young person falls into the trap, it's all over.

I am reminded of a young teenage girl here in Riverside County. She was convinced to take the short trip across the border to Mexico to make some quick cash in a popular red light district. Needless to say, she never returned. Chances are she is now a victim of sexual exploitation... forced to have sex with multiple men every day, a slave to her master. Why do I feel this way? Because there were some surveillance pictures of her in a popular area ran by sex traffickers.

What can we do to battle this awful injustice? The first step is awareness! We need to educate both ourselves as well as our fellow citizens, schools, law enforcement, and every body we can possibly reach. It's not embedded in our minds to see something fishy and think, "Hmmmm... I wonder if this could be a case of human trafficking?". Know what you children are doing, who they are hanging out with, who their friends are on facebook, myspace and other social networking websites. Educate them, so that they know what to look for as well.

What to look for:
Often times, traffickers use drop houses in average neighborhoods to house victims. Here are some indicators of a drop house:
• Does not look like a typical family home
• May be a rental or vacant home
• Often located near main freeways
• Squatters may be occupying it
• May have out of town landlords
• Vans/SUVs come and go late at night or early morning
• Has attached garage (Traffickers don’t want people to see them transporting persons.)
• Windows closed off, barred, or boarded
• Heavily fenced
• Man/men standing guard out front
• Guard dogs

Obviously, not every house with these indicators is a drop house. But you can report suspicious activity:
Text: 951.213.9159
Email: clue@millionkids.org
Or you may report instances of human trafficking to the National Trafficking Hotline at 1.888.3737.888.

Remember, we are not law enforcement. Never attempt to do do anything about a trafficking situation yourself. What we can do is be the eyes and ears for law enforcement, and we can also be a voice to those who are victimized by this social injustice.

To learn more about this issue or to be a voice by wearing a human trafficking shirt, please visit our website.

The Story Behind Speak Against Injustice

While walking the streets of Southeast Asia, Chad's heart was truly broken by the fact that people (including children) were being trafficked like drugs and sold into forced labor and prostitution. Displayed on storefronts like manikins in a shopping mall, young men, women and children are sold for as little as $3 for sexual encounters. Others may be tricked into working for a recruiting company only to be sold into forced labor. After returning home, he and his wife, Rachel, were made aware that this is also happening right here in our own American towns!

Convicted to act against this horrible injustice, they began to brainstorm how they could make a difference and contribute to the fight. Being screen printers and having a heart to raise awareness of human trafficking, they decided to launch www.SpeakAgainstInjustice.com, an entity dedicated to raising awareness of human trafficking via spoken messages and statistics on t-shirts, sweatshirts and by way of public speaking.

Speak Against Injustice is unique in several ways, which they like to summarize as the "Speak-4".

There are four reasons why purchasing Fair Trade Certified human trafficking shirts from Speak Against Injustice is beneficial.

By purchasing a shirt you are:

1.) Supporting products that are ethically made, and each fair trade certified t-shirt you buy promotes sustainable livelihoods for the garment workers as well as cotton farmers, and ensures a slave free product.

2.) Going Green! Organic cotton represents a return to safe and sustainable practices. It is grown with natural fertilizers and is free from toxic chemicals.

3.) Raising Awareness of social injustice by simply wearing a Speak Against Injustice shirt.

4.) Financially supporting entities who fight against human trafficking as 25% of each sale from your item goes to organizations who are proactive in fighting against Human Trafficking.

While there are more than 27 million slaves in our world today, most have the false assumption that slavery ended a long time ago. To the contrary, there are more slaves in the world today than ever before in history. Will you be there voice... will you speak for them... will you Speak Against Injustice?

To learn more about Speak Against Injustice, please visit their website at http://www.SpeakAgainstInjustice.com

About Human Trafficking

Human Trafficking...
is a modern-day form of slavery. Victims of human trafficking are subjected to force, fraud, or coercion, for the purpose of sexual exploitation or forced labor. Victims are young children, teenagers, men and women.

After drug dealing, human trafficking is tied with the illegal arms industry as the second largest criminal industry in the world today, and it is the fastest growing.

The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) defines Severe Forms of Trafficking in Persons as:

• Sex Trafficking: the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act , in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person forced to perform such an act is under the age of 18 years; or
• Labor Trafficking: the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage or slavery.

Trafficking Victims
Approximately 600,000 to 800,000 victims annually are trafficked across international borders worldwide, according to the U.S. Department of State. These estimates include women, men and children. Victims are generally trafficked into the U.S. from Asia, Central and South America, and Eastern Europe. Many victims trafficked into the United States do not speak and understand English and are therefore isolated and unable to communicate with service providers, law enforcement and others who might be able to help them.

How Victims Are Trafficked
Many victims of trafficking are exploited for purposes of commercial sex, including prostitution, stripping, pornography and live-sex shows. However, trafficking also takes place as labor exploitation, such as domestic servitude, sweatshop factories, or migrant agricultural work. Traffickers use force, fraud and coercion to compel women, men and children to engage in these activities.

Force involves the use of rape, beatings and confinement to control victims. Forceful violence is used especially during the early stages of victimization, known as the seasoning process, which is used to break victims resistance to make them easier to control.

Fraud often involves false offers that induce people into trafficking situations. For example, women and children will reply to advertisements promising jobs as waitresses, maids and dancers in other countries and are then trafficked for purposes of prostitution once they arrive at their destinations.

Coercion involves threats of serious harm to, or physical restraint of, any person; any scheme, plan or pattern intended to cause a person to believe that failure to perform an act would result in serious harm to or physical restraint against any person; or the abuse or threatened abuse of the legal process.

Victims of trafficking are often subjected to debt-bondage, usually in the context of paying off transportation fees into the destination countries. Traffickers often threaten victims with injury or death, or the safety of the victims family back home. Traffickers commonly take away the victims travel documents and isolate them to make escape more difficult.

Victims do not realize that their debts are often legally unenforceable and, in any event, that it is illegal for traffickers to dictate how they have to pay off their debts. In many cases, the victims are trapped into a cycle of debt because they have to pay for all living expenses in addition to the initial transportation expenses. Fines for not meeting daily quotas of service or bad behavior are also used by some trafficking operations to increase debt. Most trafficked victims rarely see the money they are supposedly earning and may not even know the specific amount of their debt. Even if the victims sense that debt-bondage is unjust, it is difficult for them to find help because of language, social, and physical barriers that keep them from obtaining assistance.

Help for Victims of Trafficking
Prior to the enactment of the TVPA in October 2000, no comprehensive Federal law existed to protect victims of trafficking or to prosecute their traffickers. The TVPA is intended to prevent human trafficking overseas, to increase prosecution of human traffickers in the United States, and to protect victims and provide Federal and state assistance to certain victims so that they can rebuild their lives in the United States. Victims of human trafficking who are not U.S. citizens are eligible for a special visa and can receive benefits and services through the TVPA to the same extent as refugees. Victims of trafficking who are U.S. citizens may already be eligible for many benefits due to their citizenship.

If you think you have come in contact with a victim of human trafficking, call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center at 1.888.3737.888. This hotline will help you determine if you have encountered victims of human trafficking, will identify local resources available in your community to help victims, and will help you coordinate with local social service organizations to help protect and serve victims so they can begin the process of restoring their lives. For more information on human trafficking visit www.acf.hhs.gov/trafficking.

Excerpted from U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Fact Sheet: Human Trafficking.

Speak against human trafficking by wearing an anti-trafficking shirt available at www.SpeakAgainstInjustice.com. 


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