"The slave is doomed to worship time and fate and death, because they are greater than anything he finds in himself, and because all his thoughts are of things which they devour."
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
"Men would rather be starving and free than fed in bonds."
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973)
I was reminded today about a trip to Calcutta, where time was spent with some people whose mission was to get children and women, who were sex slaves, out of the brothels, and rehabilitate them, so they could have a new life, or return to their families.
It was not an experience that many people would enjoy, however, it is something which snapped me into awareness by connecting me to a reality, which is unknown to many of us, that of child sex slavery and human trafficking,
I was heading to another part of India, at the time, and met some people, in Calcutta, who had spent a lot of time in Nepal and India learning about the vagaries of child sex slave operations and the businessmen and women who control the industry.
I joined them for a few days, as it appealed to the urban sociologist and social activist part of my heart, so well influenced, in the hallowed classrooms and student activism at UC Berkeley.
Slavery is a growth industry, generating about 13 Billion US, in sales, a year. It is a growth industry because world population continues to grow, and so more slaves are needed to do the things the rest of us get paid for, usually. Profits soar when business owners do not have to pay employees. Depressing, it is, from the standpoint of the huge numbers of children and women, either sold into slavery by their families, or simply kidnapped, by the slave traders, which are huge conglomerates, trafficking across international boundaries, or just between states, in many countries, like the US and Mexico, do now.
Many times, the families, in Nepal or India, cannot afford to take care of their children, and the traders offer them 5-15 US dollars for a child, promising the children will receive education and care with a "host" family, which ends up being a brothel, a factory, or a farm using children as slaves.
Most of the children never return home,since they are in bondage for life, or die from AIDS or other sexually transmitted diseases, if working in the brothels, like in Calcutta. All are raped, and many times the older children, boys and girls around 4-5 years old, have multiple, sexual encounters daily.
Many children die from malnourishment or illnesses transmitted by clients, or beatings, at the hands of the brothel owners or customers performing sex which causes traumatic injuries to their young bodies, especially when objects are forced into bodily cavities during these encounters. A lot of the children, bleed to death, after these encounters..
The "high-end" brothels, some of which are located in tourist hotels, on certain floors, are known to local concierges and travelers from other countries. I watched Americans, Europeans and Asians enter the brothels, paying as little as $1 to $5 for the girls or boys of 12-14 years old. The high prices, in the brothels, are normally paid for virgins. Boys and girls, who are sometimes as young as 4 years old, are considered special commodities in the brothels, if they are virgins.
The living conditions are horrible and many times they are tied to beds, or kept in locked, crowded rooms, with other children, no sanitation, water or food, for long hours, in 100 degree+ weather (like when I was there). I was able to look through peepholes, into some of these rooms, and most of the children are zombie-like, listless, lifeless.
The bedrooms they are led to, with the customers, are just as decrepit, with sexual devices available, for the customers' use, on the children, depending on their sexual deviant behavior: whips, leather harnesses, belts, manacles.
One of the brothel owners, told us, that she waits until a child or woman gets sick, and then she sells them, or their family can buy them back (however, most families will never take a girl back, and sometimes they are killed by their families, if they try to return) since the money the brothel owner gets, for a girl, is usually around 100.00 US, which allows her company (her entire family is involved in slave trade) to buy as many as 10 new children.
During the time I was in Calcutta, there was never a night when I did not shed a tear or two, over the children or women, I had seen earlier in the day.
The sheer magnitude of the sex slave trade is unimaginable, and the conditions it operates under are the most inhumane and ghastly, for a 21st century world. Especially, when you consider that India, like Ghana, or the US, tout themselves as icons of Democracy, in their part of the world.
The estimate is there are 28 Million slaves in the world now, however, I think that to be a conservative number. My estimate is 50,000,000 world slaves, since most of the slaves have unrecorded birth events (no birth certificates) or are, many times, sold and bought before birth, or abducted and never included in statistical analyses. Many women in Africa, South America and Asia, earn money for their family by selling the child, in-vitro, especially if the family cannot afford another child.
A few years ago, there was a furor raised when some San Francisco travel agencies began arranging trips, for vacationers to Thailand, in order to visit brothels to have sex with boys, set up in 3 and 4 star hotels. There was some arrests made in San Francisco over the issue, however, it is something that continues, as a vacation destination commodity.
The child prostitution and sex trade flourishes, at much higher prices, within all levels of society and economic strata. The children, men, and women who are slaves, conscripted to their owners, have no way out, unless someone saves them, rehabilitates them, and educates them so they can take care of themselves, financially. There is no other way.
Until you begin to understand the amount of monies involved in this industry, and see some of these practices, up close and personal, you may never understand that if one person on earth is a slave, none of us are free, until that last one is freed.
You see a lot of stories, in the media, about children, men, women just disappearing and sometimes they are taken places and are sold as slaves to support the sex, farming, mining, fishing, and manufacturing industries. You have probably purchased items made by child slaves in Viet Nam, African nations, China, India, Bangladesh, Mexico, and the US. You just do not know, sometimes.
The Slave Trade is still in operation around the globe. The only two countries where, supposedly, it does not exist in are Greenland and Iceland. Out of 195 countries around the world, there are only 2 countries that have taken an active stand against allowing slavery, in any form to operate?
We aren't doing enough to rid it from the US, and certainly, not speaking out about it enough, to eradicate it from the rest of the world. We close our eyes, for too long, and we don't have to see it; and, we condone it with closed lips and un-typed commentaries and emails, to those groups which need to know their efforts are supported, and politicians who are trying to end it, in their districts, states, and countries now. You don't have to send money; you can write to a newspaper, senator, and say you support efforts to end slavery.
Is this something everyone, not involved in the slave/sex trade, can agree on? Or am I on some Pollyanna, Psychedelic journey, through social media, talking to myself? Please tell me I am not alone in this one. This is abominable, this world of slave traders, to me, living as a humane, evolutionary, 21st century woman. Has consciousness in the 21st century become so polluted from an over-abundance of "causes" , that the issue of slavery is over-shadowed, on this planet?
Such a wonderful summer day, it was in my little village on the Puget Sound, today. I had lunch with a friend, at a great Irish pub, and walked through town, enjoying a green tea latte. The flowers and gardens are blooming and the fragrances over-whelming.
Then, I came home and was transported back to India, remembering those times in Calcutta. The memories arose, after reading about a man's journey, to Ghana, and his experiences with trying to save a boy, this week, who is a slave, there now.
The boy's family is trying to get him back, once they realized he is now a slave. This man and the group he is traveling with, could not rescue the boy, as he was locked away in a building. The villagers were afraid if they left the boy out, the slave traders would harm the village.
I know that feeling of helplessness, when you are on the other side of the gate, staring into the eyes of a child, or a woman, who is a slave, and will remain one, for the time being. Anguish was my emotion, at the time; and, action on the part of others, to free them, is what had to happen, because their owners would not let them go. So, how long before the child is free? How long does he have to be a slave before the rest of the free world comes to his rescue?
"Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally."
