End Human Trafficking Homepa
Nailing down hard data in human trafficking is a difficult task as it is, and even when you have numbers to back up a certain cause and "prove" its worthiness, they can lack meaning. Who, after all, are the faces behind those black-and-white statistics on the page, and why is it important to care about them? What can the data really say about the emotionally damaging experience of enslavement?
Teen Identity, a girls' empowerment grouped based in Atlanta, GA, released a PSA video this week that chillingly connects the victims of sex trafficking with their stats. Have a look, with more after the jump.
As a major city that houses a super-busy airport and hosts a lot of major sports events, Atlanta is possibly one of the biggest hubs for underage sex trafficking in the U.S. The girls in Teen Identity's video point out that 500 girls are trafficked for sex each month, servicing 7200 men — a startling, yet smart statistic to include in order to emphasize the extent of demand. Further, each weekend, between 100 and 150 girls are "raped for profit," a phrasing that stresses the true horror of this crime: not only are girls violently raped, but money changes hands for that rape to occur.
Holding up hand-written signs with messages like, "They stole my childhood," "Wake me up from this nightmare" and "They silenced my voice," the girls give us a sense of what is lost during those transactions. Approximately 90% of victims — whose average age is 14, but are as young as 9 — have a history of abuse in their lives, and in one way or another, this fact has put them at risk for being trafficked. Perhaps they lack a strong support system at home, or they have run away from a bad situation to find an even worse one. And the abuse they endured prior to being trafficked has surely taken its toll, creating a mindset in which sexual exploitation is acceptable, even deserved.
The message from Teen Identity is a powerful one, giving voice to each girl who pleads, "Don't forget me." Luckily, programs like Teen Identity, StreetGRACE, and the Dear John campaign hear the sex-trafficking victims of Atlanta and are working to help them. Hopefully, their continued efforts will diminish the disturbing "numbers," and keep at bay the damage to girls' lives that can never be quantified.
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