ssshhhhh! We have some dirty secrets here...Sometimes we tend to not talk too much about it because well, our super ego just won't allow it.We want others to think that we are perfect, we do no wrong. Everthings fine over here. But,we are all guilty and in denial. You are guilty, I am guilty. We are guilty of doing nothing about the problem. We are all guilty of not protecting all of our children. Street kids, child sex trafficking, sex tourism, and mail order brides. What comes to your mind when you hear words like that? What places have you told yourself that inexplicable acts like these only take place in? Where do you tend to think of?Rio de Janeiro? Mumbai? Kenya? Russia? Certainly, not America.
Most of the time when we read or hear about children being sold into prostitution or child sex trafficking we assume that it is in some far off land far far away from our North American shores! Sadly our media, as it so often does, will strategically focus on this issue as if it is something new, or unheard of. Some even take the ridiculous attitude and pretend that it “just doesn’t happen behind our borders.” But, “if walls could talk” as my sweet Mother, would say so many times. “If walls could talk” I am sure that many people would probably be surprised and ashamed of the reality.
It happens here! It happens there! It happens everywhere! Unfortunately until, we can come up with some concrete ways of preventing malicious adults from selling children for sex and severely prosecuting those who do so…then, we have a problem. It’s not an American problem, it’s not an African problem, it’s not an Asian problem….it’s a world problem.
UNICEF estimates that 1,000 to 1,500 Guatemalan babies and children are trafficked each year for adoption by couples in North America and Europe. Girls as young as 13 (mainly from Asia and Eastern Europe) are trafficked as “mail-order brides.” In most cases these girls and women are powerless and isolated and at great risk of violence. Large numbers of children are being trafficked in West and Central Africa, mainly for domestic work but also for sexual exploitation and to work in shops or on farms. Nearly 90 per cent of these trafficked domestic workers are girls.
This is little Shaniya Davis. She was five years old. Yes, I said was. Shaniya was found dead after she had been raped. Her lifeless little body had been tossed to the side of the road after the cruel, heartless predator raped and killed her.For many days volunteers and authorities searched for her.
Her mother, who is now in police custody is facing charges of human trafficking.
