Whatever you are fighting for, it is worth it.
This piece is in honor of Human Trafficking Awareness month
This is the post I have always wanted to write.
Not because I think it will get a million likes or comments, not because I have pretty pictures to go with it, and not because it’s a topic that flows easily from my heart and mind to my fingers on the keyboard. A few years ago when I first heard the question, “What breaks your heart?” I didn’t know how to answer it, until I heard this gal named Christine Caine speaking at a leadership conference. She was just starting an organization called A21, dedicated to fighting this big, big thing called sex trafficking. Sure, I knew what a brothel was, what prostitutes were, and what words like rape and slavery meant. I must have heard at some point in my life that women were actually kidnapped and sold as physical goods, but I didn’t really know what a big, big thing it was. Four and a half years, lots of books and documentaries and stories later, I know the answer to the question, because this thing, sex trafficking, it is the thing that absolutely breaks my heart.
Statistics never paint the whole picture, but because they do give a context for the stories of the individual women and men being used every hour of the day as sexual slaves, they are important here:
International consensus estimates that 27 million people are enslaved in some sort of forced labor globally. The international Labor Organization conservatively estimates that approximately 20 million of these women and men are trapped in forced sexual exploitation globally. (Polaris Project)
The average age of a trafficking victim is 12-13 years old. A seventh-grader. (A21)
1-2% of victims are ever rescued. And around the world, it is estimated that 80-90% of rescued victims eventually are lured back to their trafficker.
In the United States, the average pimp can make $150,000-$200,000 a year per prostitute. And the average pimp has 4-6 girls working for him. (There are female pimps, but the role is overwhelmingly played by men). (The Covering House)
And this quote, a fact that I think needs to be shouted from the rooftops in this fight against sexual exploitation: “Legalization and regulation have been promoted as the answer to abuse, health problems and violence in the sex industry. It has been argued that legalization and decriminalization of the entire industry will decrease the illegal sector and help stem the tide of sex trafficking. There is evidence that contradicts this claim. The consequences of legalization in Australia, and a similar legally-sanctioned explosion of the sex industry in the Netherlands, has increased trafficking into both countries. Eighty percent of women in prostitution in the Netherlands have been trafficked into the country.” (source)
Legalizing prostitution makes the problem of trafficking and exploitation overwhelmingly worse. All of the data supports this. I think this knowledge is so, so important, especially for those of us with a misunderstanding of the issue. So many of us see prostitutes every single day outside our offices or on our way through the cities we live in. And we think they are choosing it. I have actually heard this phrase in my presence: “Make that money girl.” I cannot even write that without a pit in my stomach. Because close to 100% of women working the streets for sex are not working for themselves, they are not making any money. They are meeting a daily quota of $500-$1000 with fear of a beating, at best, if they don’t hand that cash to a pimp by morning. This is true around the world in Thailand and India and Germany and it is true in San Francisco and Houston and Atlanta and even my hometown of Spokane.
So what can we do? Oh this question. It hovers on my mind every day. I am a wife and a mom. I have a two year old and an eight month old. My day is Dora and Daniel Tiger, sippy cups and diapers, timeouts and tantrums and please eat your potatoes requests. Even this morning I woke up at 4:00am with a burning desire to write this piece, and would you believe that Harper woke up at 4:30am, telling me stories about taking her baby doll to the doctor for a shot. True story. She never wakes up at 4:30am. Just to get through writing this I had to stop for juice and yogurt and four tickle fights. How on earth do I do this, be an abolitionist and a mama?
Well I’m going to start by talking about it. I’m going to tell you that the sex industry is making billions of dollars and it is ruining lives, marriages and families. It is stealing the innocence of precious souls every day.
I’m going to tell you that innocently buying porn is part of the problem: the sex industry and sexual exploitation run on supply and demand. As long as there is a demand, there will be a supply.
I’m going to beg you to read more about human trafficking, to talk to your daughters about it, and to absolutely talk to your sons about it because their sweet young minds are bombarded from the youngest age with images that entice them to be the buyers in this dark world.
I’m going to keep inviting you to purse parties and asking if you want to buy from the Giving Shop because our money does make a difference in this fight, a huge difference.
I’m going to keep putting brave organizations like A21, Wellspring Living, IJM, Exodus Cry and hundreds of others in front of you.
I’m going to ask you to pray as you drive by strip clubs and massage parlors, asking God to be so near the souls inside of them. And I’m also going to ask you to never give them your business, please, it is not innocent fun. It is costing those women inside a lot.
And in a few years I’m going back to school so I can speak in an even more educated manner about human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Someday soon I may even lobby for political reforms that do a better job of protecting young lives from this grave injustice.
I'm going to believe that if enough of us know about this, understand the causes, the complexities, the supply and demand, and if we all say "No, no more" we can end this.
And I'm going to be brave.
What can we do with the things that break our hearts? These are my answers for now. I am going to honor this sweet season of motherhood that I am in right now, where my babies need me for everything and can't even put their own shoes on yet, because I love it, and I am confident of the work God is doing and what it will look like for me to fight this in 5, 10, 20, 30, 50 years- you better believe I am going home to heaven as an abolitionist. About a year ago I told this to a few of my close friends, and I really believe it is the truth— at the end of my life I think I know the five questions God is going to ask of me:
Were you a faithful, bold follower of Christ?
Did you love your husband and value your marriage above any relationship on earth?
Did your children get your very best, your sincerest effort to point them to the only place they will find the answers to life’s questions: Jesus.
Did you love God’s word and live in manner that reflected that in your friendships and community?
And, Katie, did you speak up for these girls?
Actually answering the question of what breaks my heart has changed everything, just everything. And this is the best I can answer it right now. Have you asked yourself this question yet? Don’t wait, really ask it. The answer will direct the purpose of your life in the most profound ways you can imagine.
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It is 6:50am now, and I just rocked Harper back to sleep for what I hope is a good power nap before the day begins again. As we rocked, we sang one of our favorite songs:
This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine
This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine
This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine
Let it shine
Let it shine
Let is shine
And I don't know, it just seemed fitting.
*There is some discrepancy regarding the data on human trafficking. I have done my best here to represent reliable sources.