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Ignite Justice

There are over 27 million people in slavery in our world and that is a very, very low estimate.  These slaves do not just live in Africa, Asia or Eastern Europe these slaves live in the U.S., in Canada, in our cities.  You are a lot closer than you realize to the human trafficking epidemic.  Every 30 seconds a young girl, a teenage boy, a baby are sold for forced sex, forced labour, for enslavement.

 
Yesterday evening Dianne & I, along with about 100 others, attended the Ignite the Road the Justice Tour at the Ottawa Little Theatre.   The tour is lead by Miss Canada 2011, Tara Teng, a beautiful and well spoken 23 year old.  Tara Teng has travelled the world getting a firsthand look at human trafficking and exploitation.  Yesterday evening she shared stories of what she has witnessed and her heart to see the end of exploiting other human beings.

Tara shared about a Vietnamese refugee village situated on the banks of the Ton Lesap River in Phnom Penh Cambodia.  The village is filled with people who belong nowhere, they are not welcome in their home country and they are not welcome in Cambodia.  The simply do not exist.  There is no access to justice, medical services, education, fresh water, or the capacity to earn an income. Children are abused, vulnerable to traffickers and many have no opportunity for education.  Teng spoke about a 16 year old Afghan girl, brought to Canada by her uncle to marry his friend to repay the families debt.   She was forced into a nightmare of slavery and abuse in Toronto.   Cases of exploitation do not always involve crossing borders.  On July 22, 2011 an Okanagan Valley, B.C. father was charged with pimping out his underage daughter for sex.

Tara’s question for the audience was “now that you know, what will you do?”  You are not only accountable for your actions, you are also accountable for the knowledge you have.  Now that you know about the horror of trafficking and exploitation, what will you do?

3 years ago I was in Bangkok, Thailand and I visited the red light district with a ywam ministry team.  I was forever changed.  You cannot witness the way young girls and boys are presented to be sold and not forever have a desire to fight for justice.  These are human beings, boys and girls, the same as you and I but they are numbered and sold like cattle in an auction.

Will you take a stand for others?  Will you stand for justice?

The Abolitionist Action List

Read:

• Invisible Chains: Canada’s Underground World of Human Trafficking by Benjamin Perrin
• The Natashas: Inside the New Global Sex Trade by Victor Malarek
• A Crime So Monstrous by E. Benjamin Skinner
• Priceless by Tom Davis
• The Whistleblower by Kathryn Bolkovac and Cari Lynn

Watch:

• TRADE – full length film about how girls are trafficked into the U.S.
• Fields of Mudan - short film about a young girl’s introduction to a brothel
• The Candy Shop Documentary by Whitestone Motion Pictures – artistic short film using metaphor and symbolism
• Enslaved & Exploited: The Story of Sex Trafficking in Canada by Hope for the Sold
• Sex+Money: The National Search for Human Worth

Follow & Subscribe:

• http://www.hopeforthesold.com
• http://humantrafficking.change.org/
• http://www.endmoderndayslavery.ca/
• http://love146.org/blog
• http://exoduscry.com
• http://www.ijm.ca/
• http://salvationist.ca/trafficking
• http://www.transitionsglobal.org
• even more resources: http://salvationist.ca/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Resource-List-Websites-Books-Films-UPDATED.pdf

 For kids:

• http://kidsintheknow.ca/app/en/

Me with Tara Teng, Miss Canada 2011 & fellow abolitionist.

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