I live just due north of Atlanta. Home to roughly 5 million people, Atlanta is one of the top cities in the country. With the busiest airport in the nation and world-class educational institutions, the people who live here are constantly moving: loving the city, loving the people, loving the culture. Atlanta has exploded into becoming one of the top cities to do business in, giving both hope and a new chance to put food on tables for those who need it the most.
But Atlanta is also home to another business.
A business that is fast on the rise.
A business with more “employees” now than in the history of humanity.
A business that keeps them locked behind bedroom doors.
Every 30 seconds, someone becomes a victim of modern-day slavery, adding to the broken cry of a nation of 27 million men, women and children. Only 1-2 percent will ever be rescued. Those who are not given a second chance are given a sentence of 7 years. With the average age of those sold into to the sex trade being only 12, most of these victims will be dead by the age of 19.
For the few who are rescued, they’re shattered remains of who they used to be. Their dignities have been sold for a few dollars: bought with a purpose and beaten until that purpose is carried out. The average slave is worth only $90.
A few years ago, I went to Atlanta to attend a gala sponsored by a shelter for rescued girls and women located within the city. While we were there, there was a woman sitting at a table to the left of the stage. She was stunning in a long white dress, the proud mother of a newborn baby. We were all shocked when she was invited to the stage to share her story by the founder of the shelter as a young woman who had gone through the program — as a young woman who had been sold into human trafficking, as a young woman who had been sold into the sex trade by her own mother. She was only 10 years old.
She was now a mother herself, married to a loving husband and making a name for herself within a job that she held very proudly. But nothing could mask the pain as she shared the years and the scars, both physical and personal, that it took for her to get to where she was now. She spoke of her “owner,” who had branded her as his property, like cattle before the slaughter. She spoke of the men who came into her room each night. She spoke of how not a single one ever looked her in the eye.
But she also shared the story of the day she was rescued — the day she was brought to her new home with young women and young girls who knew exactly the pain she was going through and exactly the pain she had survived. She said that, without the constant drive of the rest of the world to pull young women like her out of the business, she would most likely be dead.
There are still women, men and children who are in this business because there isn’t a big enough outcry from the public to get them out. Human trafficking exhibits some of the darkest aspects of humanity, that there are people out there who would not just take a life, but torture for the sake of a couple dollars a night. What if it was your daughter? Your son? Your baby? We are fighting for the freedom of 27 million lives enslaved across the world and shining a light on each and every one of them, so they too, may someday see the light that shines in them.
Become one of the freedom fighters ready to see slavery come to an end once and for all. Join the movement.
