Is tradition an excuse for slavery?

Haiti is a small Caribbean country that occupies the western and the smaller pertion of the island Hispaniola; sharing soe of its space with the Dominican Republic. Haiti is best known for the fact that is was the first country in the Americas to Abolish slavery, when it won it independence in1804 after a struggle led by Toussaint Louvertue. However, everyday, thousands of Haitians look slavery in the face due to poverty and social breakdowns. The recent natural disaster on Haiti has made the economy and living conditions even worse.
January 12,2010 at prexisely 4:39 pm Haiti's most trgic natural disaster occured. An earthquake with the magnitude of 7.o struck the little nation bringing it to the attention of the media worldwide. One of the effects of this earthquake was the destruction of homes resulting in thousands of Haitian children being homeless. These homeless children soon became vulnerable and victims to sexual as well as domestic exploitation and abuse. It was during this time that an undercover journalist went from New York to Haiti and discovered that he would be able to purchase a ten year old Haitian girl for the small price of 150 American dollars. When he asked the traffiker if he felt selling children was morally just; the trafficker responded that it was apart of the Haitian tradition.
To some extent he was not lying; modern slavery in Haiti, in the forn of the Restavec system, is rooted in early Haitian cultural traditions. In the begginning poor families on the countryside would give their children away to wealthy families in the city; these children would then do domestic work for the families, in exchange the families would clothe,feed, and educate the children. Since then this system has morphed into something very grotesque. My arguement is that child slavery is againts what Haiti originally stood for and tradition should never be used to excuse its immorality. My plan of action is that we need to show even the poorest of families in Haiti that they alone have a duty in looking after their children, regardless of how uncertain the future may seem. If America and other powerful counrties would go in an help fund the building of more schools and help stable Haiti economically then maybe families would have an alternative choice as to where their children will stay.

Victim or Criminal?

Every day, across the globe, children are forced to work without pay as prostitutes. The psychological toll this industry has on these children is detrimental to the child’s sanity. Some children feel attached to their pimps; others find it hard to stay away from prostitution and move forward with their lives. Others reach the point of committing violent crimes.


Sara Kruzan was convicted of killing her pimp, G.G., at the age of sixteen. G.G., who met Sara when she was eleven, used a common tactic of pimps called “grooming;” he gained her trust by acting as a father figure – something Sara never had. By the age of thirteen, G.G. raped and forced her to sleep with other men for profit, while pocketing the money for himself. After three years of prostitution, Sara reached her limit and killed her pimp. When her case was taken to court, the judge tried her as an adult, rather than a juvenile. The end result was life in prison without parole.


Victims of human trafficking and similar situations who commit crimes should not be sentenced to jail time; rather, they should be psychologically evaluated and sent to an appropriate rehabilitation center. In The Psychological Trauma of Modern Day Slavery: Sex Trafficking and its Impact on the Field of Psychology in Thailand, it says “[h]uman trafficking has a tremendous psychological impact on its victims as a result of the manipulation, abuse, and cultural shock experienced when forced to work a less than desirable job…” The psychological damage that takes place is enough to drive some victims to violence, as in Sara’s case. It is evident that Sara has almost rehabilitated herself through her time in jail. She speaks of how she has changed for the better, and that she is now capable of making healthy life choices. It is arguable that had Sara been granted the opportunity to receive psychological help, she probably would have grown from the entire process. Trafficking victims (even those who commit crimes) require and deserve psychological help. Bottom line, a child as young as Sara should have been treated as a victim, not a criminal.

Forgiveness is key

Imagine, being taken from your home. Sold and thrown into a country where you don’t know anyone, you don’t know the

language, and you’re forced to work; without pay, under threat of violence, with no means to escape. After you’re freed, if you’re that lucky, can you find the will to forgive what’s been done to you? For many people, that would probably be a hard question to answer, because we could only imagine how difficult it would be to forgive anyone who put us through so much pain and for reason that we rarely ever understand. It may be hard for those who have experienced the trauma to ever adapt to the idea of forgiving those who have essentially taken their life away from them. Although it seems like it’s nearly impossible, forgiveness is an important step in the healing and rehabilitation of former slaves back into society. Therapy is an important part of healing, but one can never fully heal and move on, until they can forgive those whom have done them wrong. “Without forgiveness, there's no future”-Desmond Tutu. Desmond is a South African activist whom fully advocates for forgiveness. In the book, The Impossible Will Take a Little while, Desmond talks about Rwanda, and how the people were able to move on, and forgive those whom had massacred so many of them. Instead of seeking revenge “there was this remarkable Truth and Reconciliation Commission to which people told their heart-rending stories, victims expressing their willingness to forgive and perpetrators telling their stories of sordid atrocities while also asking for forgiveness they had wronged so grievously.” The fact that people are willing to forgive, and that others are even willing to admit their faults, allows everyone to move on in the process of healing. Although the topic is different, the answer is still the same. In order for slavery to end today, we need to help those who have been hurt forgive those who have hurt them. Forgiving does not only help one mentally but physically as well. Being able to forgive, allows one to let go of the not only the pain and suffering, but also the fear they had for so many years. Kevin Bales, author of Ending Slavery, also believes that forgiveness is an important step in ending the vicious cycle of slavery. “Forgiveness will be hard—for many it may be impossible—but is there full freedom without forgiveness? If the slaves of today carry their pain and recrimination into liberation, bitterness will flow down through the generations. We will have to let freed slaves lead us; let them say how they can best ease their anger and pain. The children of slaves and the children of slaveholders will have to find a way to share the world without anger. Even as we seek to destroy the evil of slavery forever, we must help build the reconciliation that silences slavery’s echo of hatred.” The hatred that lives in those who have been enslaved moves on through generations and even the mindset of slave holders moves on to their children. In order for slavery for fully end, we must help show slaves that the best revenge is forgiveness, because when one forgive, then can they move on to be successful.

Maquiladoras

Working in depressing conditions, making far less than minimum wage, and having your labor rights denied is slavery. In Mexico sweatshops which are called Maquiladoras, mostly employ women from poverty stricken communities that are between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five. These Maquiladoras manufacture goods for the United States, Japan, Europe, China, and North Korea. The women who are employed by the maquiladoras are paid around fifty cents to three dollars an hour, and work about forty eight hours or more a week. Women are considered to be preferred to men because women will typically work for cheaper wages."Some maquiladora operators have admitted a preference for women, because women often display a greater level of patience and higher dexterity than men in performing the standardized and repetitive work of an assembly plant"(The Maquiladora Reader: Cross-Border).The employees of the maquiladoras work under very horrible conditions. "Industrial accidents and toxic exposures are common in the plants." Often workers are not given adequate training or provided with safety equipment." "Physical risks such as noise, heat, vibrations, poor ventilation, and awkward posture have a high occurrence in maquiladoras." There are also many forms of discrimination against the women. Women must have mandatory pregnancy tests, and if they are found to be pregnant they are most times forced to resign.

They do not provide nor have any interest in the healthcare, education, or housing of their employees or their families. The employees of maquiladoras usually live in “do it yourself projects.” The shacks are usually made with wood pallets that are bought from their employers for a dollar each. “They drag wood pallets to a squatter village and recycled material is collected; a shack is nailed, tied, and somehow erected to withstand the almost unbreakable daytime heat and nighttime cold, sandstorms, occasional rain, and vermin to raise their family." These problems are the worst in Tijuana and Juarez, Mexico.”

In 1994 the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was adopted by Mexico. NAFTA stepped in to try and stimulate trade, exports, jobs, and increase the economic growth in Mexico. This plan did increase jobs but as jobs increased wages decreased. "The profits that are generated from the maquiladoras are typically sent back to the United States, or other investor based countries, and therefore, maquiladoras do not promote direct economic development within Mexico"(The Maquiladora Reader: Cross-Border). Jose Guerro, wrote a poem about his mother who was a maquiladora worker, “I remember waking up and her already being gone, She would catch the ruta before the sun and arrive home after dawn, Being awake that early in Juarez can be dangerous for a woman, She always lied and said she was a fashion designer but in reality she spent long hours sewing holes into designer jeans that her children would never wear, The Maquiladora swallowed her and she just became part of the machine...” This is slavery; if the maquiladoras were on the California side of the border, they would be making at least eight dollars an hour, receive healthcare, and their labor rights would be enforced. Instead these companies bring their businesses across the boarder to Mexico and abuse these workers by denying their rights and paying them next to nothing wages.

There are some organizations that help to improve the problems in the Maquiladoras. One of these organizations is the Maquiladora Health & Safety Support Network. This is a group of trained professionals that donate their time and expertise to create safer and healthier working conditions for the one million maquiladora workers employed by primarily U.S.-owned transnational corporations along Mexico's northern border from Matamoros to Tijuana. Hopefully one day this problem will be resolved and these maquiladora workers will finally get paid what they deserve.

Should Prostitution Be Legal?

When one hears the word prostitution there are often many negative connotations associated with it. There are child prostitutes, STDs, and just a general image of crime and immorality. If prostitution were legalized many of these negative aspects could be eliminated or reduced. There are many pros and cons to prostitution but the benefits outweigh the potential negative aspects. With the legalization and regulation of prostitution sex workers could be tested regularly for STDs which would do a great deal to combat the spread of these diseases. If there was some type of licensing for prostitutes it would be easy to identify sex workers who are not free of STDs or those who are not of age. This would reduce the amount of underage children being trafficked across borders and forced into prostitution. It would also help combat the spread of STDs because sex workers who are not clean can have there license taken away. There are many dangers associated with prostitution but these dangers can be eliminated or greatly reduced through regulation. Prostitution would have to take place in a brothel or some other type of establishment and there will probably need to be some security present. This would help eliminate the violence that prostitutes are often the victims of. Use of condoms would have to be a requirement if prostitution were legalized and would have to be strictly enforced possibly by undercover police posing as "johns". Also instead of victims being illegally trafficked into other countries and taken advantage of they can legally migrate and reap the benefits of their own labor. This would do a great deal to end human trafficking since many victims of human trafficking are trafficked for the purpose of forced prostitution. Prostitution is not going to end so it should at least be regulated to reduce the dangers associated with it and help combat human trafficking.

Companies Envolved with Child Labor.

Nike has been accused several times of using slave child labor in other countries. Their biggest case is the one of making shoes in Indonesia. It is said that they higher kids under the age of 16 in a regular bases paying them only the minimum wage or nothing. These children are forcefully put to work by family members and at times even sold to companies. So does Nike support slave child labor? The legal age to work in Indonesia is any child 14 years or older, and Indonesia has over 2.4 million children working in rural areas and a quarter million working in urban areas between the ages 10 and 14. There are many more children under the age of ten working in Indonesia. These children sometimes have nowhere to go and they finish living in the same factories they work in all day. Indonesian culture has ignored all the laws against child labor for many years. Recently, the minimum wage was raised so they could in some way help all the children forcefully working under the legal age and this too has been ignored by many employers. When a country takes no major actions against child slave labor is it still wrong for companies to come in, hire, and use children’s labor?

Child Sex Tourism

With more than two million children reported being linked to prostitution in countries across the world and the total number of acts of child molestation being much larger (albeit more vague, with estimates ranging from five to twenty-five percent of all Americans falling victim), it is no wonder that the child sex industry is among those most harshly prosecuted trades in almost all nations. Countries such as India, Brazil, or Cambodia, all popular tourism locations, combat child sex tourism even more aggressively than many other humanitarian crises perhaps deserving equal attention. But despite these legislative efforts, tourism continues to expand at a rate faster than nearly all other criminal activities. Despite employing numerous task forces to preemptively track down sexual offenders and allowing for extraterritorial legal action, the various governments and NGOs that work against the industry are skirting around a more centralized method of dealing with these offenders. The child sex trade itself and the notions of pedophilia that accompany it are seen almost unanimously as taboo issues that most governments are reluctant to raise awareness against for the sake of social stability, issues that have to be overcome if child prostitution is to be stamped out. If the UN and other international councils do not aggressively advocate against sexual abuse and threaten those who would partake in it with more severe sentences, the notion that one can simply vacation to a country whose laws are seen as being more lax will continue as a standard. In addition, due to an alarmingly large number of children entering the sex trade of their own accord, more federal education for children under the age of 12 regarding the dangers of sex and the illegality of intercourse with adults should be present, most realistic through the inclusion of sexual education in elementary curricula for those countries with the highest rate of child abuse. Though raising awareness at such young ages and for the general population as a whole is an unpleasant prospect, it is ultimately the last effective option in restricting the child sex trade.

Worldwide Child Soldiers

"Over the past ten to fifteen years", the topics child slavery and child soldiers have caught the attention of the outside world. Child soldiers have come about by abductions. In the event of abductions, once they are taken captive, they become child soldiers because the leaders convince the children, coerce them into being a killer, promise them "glory and excitement". Another reason is that these children have been exposed to poverty stricken areas and unsafe conditions at home. Child abductions and forceful tactics of entering children into the war time situations happen most in Africa. Over half of child soldiers are in Africa. Children as young as eight and ten, once abducted are forced to become child soldiers.
Pictures of kids holding guns and killing others are sprawled all over the television for billions to see. But what isn't usually portrayed that should be are the young girls that are also abducted and forced to enter into the armies. These girls are then force to service the men in the army and even become their wives. They are also physically and sexually abused. These facts show that not only boys are exposed to the cruelty.
A couple of countries that have struck me are Mozambique and Angola. The leaders in these countries pray on young children and not adults because they know that children are vulnerable. They know that adults would never abide to their rules. Children can't fight back, physically or mentally. These leaders will use threats of violence, drugs, coercion, and any other tactics they need to use in order to get these children to do what they want.
There are provisions that have been taken to try to stop these types of things from happening. Once of the efforts happened in 1990 when the United Kingdom passed the "Convention on the Rights of the Child". This was created to help the children that were abducted and forced into the world of being a child soldier.
How will these children be able to cope once they escape from these armies or are rescued? Who do they turn to? How will they be able to settle back into regular civilization? Should these children once out of the armies go to better places other than where they originated from or should they go to places that will have better situations for them? There should be more programs out there trying to help these children cope and be ready for the REAL world . There could also be camps set up for these victims, something like more rehabilitation centers. There should be places set aside only for these children. The horrible things they have experienced, only they could understand from each other. Outsiders will only judge them. There could also be older escapees who have grown and forgiven and learned that they were not monsters and help these children to regain a purpose in life and they can feel like they amount to something.

Fair Trade Festival

Come out and support fair trade vendors along with free music and food this Friday (November 12th) on the Peace Quad here at Loyola.

Child Abduction

The enslavement of an adult is an unjust and immoral practice, but most slaves are children. The reason for such a statistic is because children are more easily manipulated, are more easily exploited commercially (prostitution, begging, or trafficking), and are much harder to trace than adults. Children can be exploited in such ways as forced labor, organ removal, servitude, recruitment as child soldier, cults, or athletes. Since the beginning of slavery, child enslavement has been a prevalent and common practice that dates back to child slavery in ancient Greece.

Many factors can attribute to the abduction of children. Most abducted children are from third world/under developed countries that lack many of the basic laws that would otherwise protect children from predators. In some cases, nations that lack infrastructure and development fall victims to natural disasters that not only cause great damage to these nations but give way to the displacement and homelessness of many children. The most famous of such events include the 2004 earthquake near the Western coast of Sumatra that took the lives of 230,000 people and displaced 1.69 million, and the 2010 Earthquake in Haiti that also took the lives of an estimated 230,000 and left 1 million people homeless.

Child slavery is such a prevalent practice due to its profitability. Such statistics prove how lucrative the child sex trade is, "Investigators and researchers estimate the average predator in the U.S. can make more than $200,000 a year off one young girl. – NBC Report by Teri Williams". UNICEF values the global market of child trafficking at over $12 billion a year with over 2.5 million child victims.

However, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Such organization such as the SCT and Humantrafficking.org , whose missions are to target buyers/predators for conviction in hopes of decreasing the demand part of the problem, as well as to provide resources for empowerment, rehabilitation, and self-improvement.

Slavery results from economic disparities

The trafficker, the slave owning entrepreneur, and the unfortunate bonded individual all have one thing in common, and that is the need for economic success. Exploiting individuals to achieve the minimum cost of labor satisfies the demand for maximized profits. As long as there are individuals who are willing to exploit humans in efforts of attaining the maximum profit, slavery is said to continue. 

Those who fall into slavery often come from vulnerable situations. Extreme poverty contributes significantly to global slave trade. Desperate families will sell their children with the allusion that the child will experience a better life, or simply the family cannot afford another mouth to feed. Traffickers prey on desperate situations including natural disasters. After the devastating earthquake in Haiti last January, despite promises from Haitian leaders to protect orphaned children, the number of smuggled individuals (especially children) skyrocketed. This same behavior was witnessed in south Asia after the tsunami in 2003. After both disasters children were devalued to the point that smugglers offered to trade children for sex, cooking, and laundry. 

Traffickers have very little to nothing invested in their slaves, resulting in up to 500% profit. This economic venture proves too tempting to those whom have traded their morals for potential economic growth. A simple way to combat this issue and to minimize the exploiters' profits is, as a consumer to demand fair traded items. The combination of excessive materialism and the desire to spend the least amount of currency possible fuels the human trafficking industry. When we as consumers decide to elevate the fad of buying fair trade and organic items into a movement and demand true fairly traded items, the profits reaped by slave owners will diminish significantly.

 

Raising awareness along with passing and enforcing legislation can also minimize the number of those who reside in bondage. Organizations such as the Polaris Project and Free the Slaves are successful in both raising awareness and inspiring legislation. While slavery is illegal in every country, indifferent public officials seldom seek to assist those who are enslaved. We as responsible citizens of society have the moral obligation to demand people of power to take actions against exploiters and assist those who have been taken advantage of.

Magic Carpet

Here is a common scenario: Your friend invites you over her new apartment. You arrive, leave your shoes at the door, walk in, and embrace the soft fresh carpet between your toes.

"Why is this rug so impeccably wonderful?" You ask.

"It's handmade, imported directly from South Asia." She replies enthusiastically.

Like most people, the idea of how and by whom a certain product is made does not even past the mind, and thus is left undiscovered. It turns out that the handmade carpet industry located in South Asia exploits nearly 300,000 children, as calculated by The South Asian Coalition on Child Servitude. This means that evidence of the atrocities of slavery and child labor is literally right beneath your nose, in fact-your standing on it. Children around the ages of 4 to 15 years are by many means captured and trafficked into working for these handmade carpet companies. They receive extremely low pay, if any at all. If the child laborers are forced to live in the loom, they are then required to pay for food and shelter, thus resulting in a form of debt bondage. Other child slaves are traded in by their own parents for money, while others are simply kidnapped from their families.

Carpet makers adore the advantages to having children workers, any which include a child's typically better eyesight perfect for making elaborate designs in bad lighting and the simple fact that children do not know their rights making them accepting of the horrible treatment and deadly working environment. Children working as carpet makers are forced to handle harmful tools without any proper training and are exposed to many types of health problems. They are malnourished, their bodies deformed from sitting in cramped loom sheds, and even bare respiratory problems due to inhaling dust and wool fibers.

What's most upsetting about this is that once the child is trafficked into the carpet industry, the chances of he or she getting sold to another type of slavery becomes very high, especially for girls who make up about a quarter of the child laborers. These young girls, who are probably already getting sexually abused by other workers, can easily end up being trafficked into the sex trade. Another dire effect of child labor is its negative effect on the economy and household. Since employers choose to employ children, opportunities for adults diminish, and children are unable to attend school and get educated, causing poverty to be passed down. It seems impossible to break this cycle, but as always there is hope. Organizations such as Goodweave have already helped by building awareness about child labor in the carpet industry and inventing a certification system to ensure rugs have not been made by the hands of child slaves.

Works cited:

http://www.anti-slaverysociety.addr.com/carpets.htm

http://goodweave.org/index.php?cid=29

If words can’t express one’s thoughts, how can they express one’s pain?

A person’s pain cannot be fully comprehended or explained simply through words. The words have to posses the ability to invoke feeling in the listener. However, even though the listener may hear the words being expressed, they are not able to fully comprehend the meaning behind them. Granted there are doctors trained in fields of science to help people cope with their pain; but the amount of physical, emotional, and psychological pain endured is far too great. These doctors sift through the victim’s mind and pick out the things he or she thinks is important in helping the victim cope. Elaine Scarry, explains that “physicians do not trust the human voice…they in effect perceive the voice of the patient as an ‘unreliable narrator’ of bodily events, a voice which must be bypassed as quickly as possible so that they can get around and behind it to the physical events themselves”(The Body in Pain The Making and Unmaking of the World). In other words, physicians often request a verbal explanation from the patient, but only does so to allow the patient to feel they have given an accurate explanation of there pain. However, the physician accepts the explanation and now purges further to uncover the root of the victim’s pain.

The initial reaction to bondage and torture is fear. In the case of modern day slavery, fear of torture and the tormentor is what fuels the pain. There is fear of the unknown, which is a natural human response to discomfort. By being enslaved, slaves are victims of torture as well as psychologically disturbed. Once the tormentor or slaveholder invokes that fear, psychologically, the victim is not able to escape. They may physically become free, but will always be held captive in their minds. Doctors such as Dr. Vaknin, the author of Malignant Self Love Narcissism Revisited, states: “Torture robs the victim of the most basic modes of relating to reality…Torture has no cut-off date. The sounds, the voices, the smells, the sensations reverberate long after the episode has ended”(The Psychology of Torture). Torture prolongs fear and causes it to be ever-present. With victims of slavery, the torture is so extreme it constantly haunts the slave.

Repression is a tactic that many victims of slavery use to try and remain sane. The act of repression is burying a memory deep into one’s brain in an effort to forget. Although this is true, there are things that will trigger the memory and send the person back in to that former state of fear. The memory that person has will never be erased and has had far to great of an impact to be forgotten. For instance, in the case of the brothel mother Katarina ("DMS"), she was once involved in sex work but later took part in running the brothel. This exemplifies the toll that being a sex worker took on her. She believed that " the brothel is simply a second home where young women come to make money" (DMS).

Even though victims struggle daily with fear, there are outlets to express this pain other than language. Because pain and fear can’t justly be vocalized, victims have the option of expressing their pain through artwork, theatre, music and drama. By channeling these negative feelings into something positive, they can even create pieces of work that inspire others. This is a form of positive reinforcement that allows for an action to be repeated thus giving the victim a way to overcome what happened to them. As with James Kofi Annan in “DMS”, he fueled his “anger” of being enslaved into education. He was determined to become the best pupil and rose to the top of his class. However, even after such an accomplishment, he was still psychologically tormented by the events of being enslaved. This is a small step, but he stated that by helping others, he is slowly helping himself along the road of rehabilitation. Other slaves who find themselves free and the verge of recovery can take on this challenge of bettering themselves through helping others or through expressive forms of art.

-Raney Antoine & Jessiona Bryant

REHABILITATION IS CRUCIAL

Rehabilitation is a crucial step in a slaves road to freedom and true happiness. When I talk about rehabilitation I am talking about the dictionary definition of the word, to restore to a former state or capacity. I am not just talking about an actual rehabilitation center although sometimes that is necessary, especially when drug addictions are involved. A slave can also be rehabilitated through education, entrepreneurship, and by finding meaning in life. The horrors of slavery are not things that can easily be forgotten. "To be free is not merely to cast off one's chains," -Nelson Mandela The Impossible Will Take a Little While. Someone who has physically escaped enslavement might still be burdened psychologically. Slaves who suffer from drug addictions desperately need rehabilitation. Their drug addictions can cause them to return to brothel that they have escaped from. "The challenge for every prisoner, particularly political prisoners, is how to survive prison intact, how to emerge from prison undiminished, how to conserve and even replenish one's beliefs." -Nelson Mandela. In Victor E. Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning Frankl observed three mental reactions a prisoner has. He observed this while imprisoned in German concentration camps. Frankl talks in terms of a prisoner but his work can just as easily be applied to slavery. These prisoners were forced to do work against their will for no pay so they were slaves. The first mental reaction a prisoner experiences is shock to the horrors of slavery or imprisonment. The prisoner witnesses atrocities that occur without any recourse. The second is a state of apathy that the prisoner adopts as a necessary protective mechanism. The prisoner regresses to a more primitive mental state. He must learn to value only what helps him survive. The third reaction occurs after the prisoners release and liberation. The prisoner suffers from severe disillusionment with life outside of prison or slavery. This new found freedom is different from what they expected. They are physically free but mentally and emotionally scarred. That is why some type of rehabiltation or therapy is necessary. Education is a great way to start a new life outside of slavery. It gives you increased job oppurtunities which allow you to provide for yourself. Entrepreneurship is also great because it gives a former slave a sense of accomplishment. They are able to provide for themselves which makes them feel empowered. Frankl states that the way to find true happiness is by finding meaning in life. the main way to find meaning in life is by creating something or doing a deed.

Debt bondage

Imagine this, you are doing your best to raise and provide a good life for your children but each day is a struggle. One day you hear that you can provide a better life for them in a different country. Great right? The only problem is; how are you going to get into that other country? From a source you hear that there is a man who is from this different country and he can get you and your family over there! So you seek out this man and he tells you that he will do the job, so you put your trust in him and once your family is in this new country the man tells you that it took a lot of money to get you into the country and that he wants it back. The only option he gives you is to work for him and repay your debt or he will call the immigration services.

Slavery is wrong in all aspects, but still some forms of slavery may be avoided. Although for some people it is hard to avoid being exploited, many have the option of choosing a different lifestyle. However the people who fall into the category of being in bonded labor may never escape. Debt bondage is considered by many to be a modern day form of slavery, and it affects many people as well as their families all over the world. A person becomes in bonded labor when they are being forced to pay off a loan through physical labor. The person in debt may be tricked or trapped into working for little to no money, and the value of their work is significantly greater than the original sum of money borrowed. Poverty, lack of education, and violence from their captors is what keeps most people in bonded labor. Governments in the area where this is prevalent make no effort to enforce laws even though this is illegal worldwide. It has gotten so bad that many children are born into the debt that their family owes, and these children end up living their lives trying to pay off a debt which in many cases have accumulated interest. Also due to a need for cheap labor, cases of debt bondage are increasing! According to the online antislavery organization “Today the international Labor organization estimates a minimum 9.3 million are in forced labor in the Asia pacific region, the majority of whom are in debt bondage.”

The question is why is slavery still going on in this modern day society? My argument is that this form of slavery is not fair to the many people who just wanted to provide a better life for their children. Also we need more organizations to help do something about this unnecessary form of exploitation. The fact that debt bondage is increasing is horrible and many people need to become aware of this. That is why it is important to educated people from all over the world. Maybe then will modern forms of slavery decrease or be gone forever.

Child Soldiers

Many nations around the world are using children in warfare. Some of these children become child soldiers voluntarily and some are abducted. Most child soldiers, who join of their own free will; join because they are trying to escape poverty, starvation, and physical or sexual abuse. They also join because they are separated from their families, lack of education, and they don’t have any where to go. Others join voluntarily because they relate to the groups ideology. Once these children become child soldiers, some are coerced into killing members of their own families, other child soldiers, and civilians. Others serve as porters, cooks, guards, messengers, spies, and sex slaves. In order to make the child soldiers follow orders and not resist, they are given drugs. They are given "amphetamines, crack cocaine, palm wine, brown-brown (cocaine mixed with gun powder), marijuana and tranquilizers." These drugs affect the child soldier's sense of reality.
The problem of child soldiers is most critical in Africa, where children as young as nine have been involved in armed conflicts. These armies use child soldiers because they are cheap, and easy to manipulate. "Their underdeveloped ability to assess danger means they are often willing to take risks and difficult assignments that adults or older teenagers will refuse." These children are forced to commit unthinkable crimes, and once they are rescued or escape, "face an enormous challenge in trying to return to normal civilian life."
Whether these children are abducted or become soldiers of their on free will, should we view them as victims even though they have committed so many horrible crimes? Should they receive mercy? Should the reasons behind them joining grant them mercy or make them a victim? These children should be viewed as victims and given mercy. "Child-soldier expert Michael Wessells told Vision that no choice is a “free choice” because it is typically grounded in dire circumstances, including poverty, starvation, separation from their families, physical or sexual abuse, or lack of livelihood or education." These children join because they have no other choice. In A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier an autobiography by Ishmael Beah, he tells us how he was "separated from his family when their village was attacked by rebel forces, for a while he avoided abduction into the armed conflict that enveloped his country. Eventually, however, hunger and insecurity led him to join the government forces, who compelled him not only to fight against the rebel opposition but to perpetrate acts of extreme violence against innocent civilians along the way."
These children should not be at fault for what they have done because it was out of their control. Organizations such as, Amnesty International, The Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and UNICEF, draw attention to this problem and help children who become child soldiers. No child should have to become a child soldier, or be kidnapped from their families and forced to become one. These children should have a normal childhood but instead it is tainted with blood, and the horrible crimes that they must live with for the rest of their lives.

Unholy Matrimony

Imagine being kidnapped from your home or even sold from your parents, and forced to either die or marry someone three times your age. What if escape is not an option, because you have nowhere else to turn, and you may mostly likely be beaten or killed? There is a huge problem with forced marriage in the world today, and most of them are children. A forced marriage is a marriage performed without the consent of both parties. More than one hundred young girls in the developing world will be married in the next ten years. Why does this happen? Some parents will force their children to marry, because they feel that these men can give them financial security. Child marriage is also viewed as preserving a family’s honor. What are the effects of child marriage? Child marriage brings about many problems such as abuse, health problems, maternal /infant mortality, AIDS, illiteracy, and even abandonment.
Programs like the Institute of Health Management Pachod, work in countries like India, and provide skills and education for these young girls. Programs like this are helpful, because most of these girls have only up to a fourth grade education. Anju Malhorta, vice president of the International Center for Research on Women, finds that many girls and parents that live in communities where child marriage is common want to delay the age to eighteen, but lack the resources. Anju Malhorta also believes international donors could improve effectiveness of aid money integrating child marriage prevention into current development initiatives, ensure the health and survival of infants, and most importantly, invest in girls’ education.
This topic raises a question that we all should ask, is this really slavery? The dictionary definition of slavery is the state or condition of being a slave; a civil relationship whereby one person has absolute power over another and controls his life, liberty, and fortune. Slavery? You decide.

Slavery: A Tragic Recipe for World Domination

The following story is a fictional representation of what slaves have provided for the United States, the world’s most powerful nation:

There are twenty students in Mr. Sam’s math class. Out of the twenty students, only two of them are smart enough to pass the class, which is a requirement for graduation. The rest of the class is full of slackers who are willing to do anything other than the work itself to avoid failing. The lazy students understand that graduation is in jeopardy, so they devise a scheme that will ensure their success. Unfortunately for the two ambitious students, the plan revolves around them doing everyone else’s work. They are oblivious to the scheme until one day after class, when the slackers take them by surprise and beat them senseless in an abandoned parking lot. The slackers impose their will on their defenseless classmates beyond the point of surrender. Scared for their lives, the ambitious students agree to do homework and projects for the rest of the class.

As time progresses, the good students continue to do work for the everyone else. Their peers’ work is now their main priority due to the brutality they may otherwise encounter, and they have no time to do their own assignments. While their grades are plummeting, the slackers’ grades are skyrocketing. In the end, the abusers graduate the class and move on to bigger and better things, and the students responsible for the others‘ success, become failures themselves.

This is a portrayal of how historical slavery built the United States' economy. However, due to the brutal mistreatment of slaves, people don't often refer to free labor as the most profitable practice in history. It's important that americans, african americans especially, understand the impact that their ancestors had (and still have) on the world's greatest superpower. It is blatantly unfair for slave owners to reap the benefits of slave labor without properly crediting the workers themselves. Awareness needs to be spread regarding the impact of slaves on the united states economy, so perhaps they can finally be 'paid back'.

Is Tradition an Excuse to Have Child Slaves?

Every day Haitian children are sent away in hopes of a better life. This has become a Haitian tradition. When Haitians don’t have enough money to support their children they sent them to live with another family or many times complete strangers. These foster parents are supposed to take care of these children as if they were their own. They’re supposed to send them to school, buy them clothe, and guide the to a better future. However, this hardly ever happens. These children are taken in as servants, forced to work without pay, secluded from other children in the household and not often sent to school. Before the earthquake out of Haiti’s eight million people 300,000 children were restaveks. After the earthquake one million Haitians were left homeless so the number of restaveks also raised a lot. The big question with all this is. Is this Haitian tradition or child slavery? If the parents give away the children willingly is it still slavery? Jean-Robert Cadet, a former restavek, now runs an organization against restaveks. Cadet tells us that the only reason why restaveks are still around today is because it is socially accepted as tradition. Cadet says only a small percent of restaveks are treated well and sent to school, this makes Haitian parents prefer sending of their kids and hoping they end up with a good family than watching them die while living with them. So is this so called “ tradition” slavery?

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The N Word: An Acceptable Term of Endearment?

The word nigger comes from the Latin "niger" meaning black. However, during slavery in America it was used by white slaveholders as a term to refer to a group of slaves. Over time, the definition has evolved to "usually offensive; a member of a socially disadvantaged class of persons." Other definitions include "lowlife,"a person of any race or origin regarded as contemptible, inferior, ignorant, etc." Since the definition has such a negative connotation, why would anyone want to be embraced by such language?

Many African Americans argue that the word should not be used at all. Op-ed columnist and motivational speaker Mychal S. Massie writes "people who respect themselves and honestly respect others don't show affection and respect with such loathsome and baneful language." Those who support this view feel as though the term is extremely derogatory, based on its history. In other words, the history marks the vulgarity of the word. The horrific imagery linked to the word makes some cringe at just the sound of it.

Some argue that the word is now used as a term of endearment. They argue that the context in which it is spoken and who is using it can alter the meaning of the word. Also, many argue that if one pronounces the "er" at the end of the word, then it is disrespectful. However, if the "er" is replaced with an "a," the entire meaning of the word changes, and it then becomes a term of endearment. While those who argue this point argue that it is a term of endearment, they also are often those who get offended when anyone outside of the African American race uses the word.

Now I'll ask you to consider this: if it is a term of endearment, why are only certain people allowed to use it? Most terms of endearment are accepted by everyone. What about the word makes it so special that only blacks can use it? Also, how can erasing two letters from the word change the entire meaning (when it essentially is the same word)?

Except for in historical contexts, there is no reason for the use of the word. It is not a term of endearment, and taking away the last two letters does not alter the meaning. If it truly were a term of endearment, then those who use it would have no problem with those outside of their race using it as well. Nigger should not be as accepted in the black community as it is today. The word has an offensive and grotesque historical meaning that it has not yet shed.

Running Away Into Slavery

Two hundred years ago in this country, the only way for slaves to escape was to run away from the men who would seek to exploit them. Today, most of the girls who are enslaved as prostitutes in the United States are not shipped here from overseas by international sex merchants, but are “home-grown runaway kids” according to Nicholas Kristof in a July 14th article of The New York Times. He claims that of the 100-600 thousand children engaged in prostitution in the United States, many are girls in their early teens who are attempting to escape from a particularly stressful or volatile family situation, such as a mother’s boyfriend making unwanted advances. These rebellious girls, often as young as 13, do not trust police and as they aimlessly wander the streets without any direction other than away from home, are approached by the only type of people on the look-out for such a girl, pimps. These pimps buy the girls dinner, give them shelter in the form of a motel room, tell them they love them, often being their first of many unwanted sexual partners. Then they force the girls at the point of a knife or gun to have sex with multiple men a night, for free because the “boyfriend”, as these pimps refer to themselves, collects all the proceeds. Customers are met either on the street or, increasingly, on the internet and are often unaware that it is against the girls’ wills, but then again would a grown man having sex with a 13 year old prostitute care? Probably not, perhaps along with the Federal Government because as Kristof agrees, sex slavery and human trafficking does receive nearly the amount of attention it should compared with other major crimes due to the fact that the victims, prostitutes, don’t make good “poster children” and are even considered criminals in the eyes of the state. This is wrong because of the three involved parties in these transactions, being the broker (pimp), the product (prostitute) and the consumer ("john"), only two should be punished, the first and the last. The person caught in the middle should be rehabilitated and receive benefits for going through such a terrible experience as Sweden has made efforts to do. We should follow Sweden’s model, adopted in 1999 as well as policies that benefit our system specifically such as improving the domestic situations in the homes that lead to these girls running away,  but especially providing resources for runaway girls to turn use instead of pimps.

Free the Slaves Loyola NO Chapter Facebook Presence

The Free the Slaves Chapter at Loyola will have its second meeting on Tuesday September 28 at 12:30 in the Library Living Room.  Check out their new Facebook page and keep up with their events.  We're already planning a benefit concert!

Walmart leads the world in labor exploitation

Walmart is one of the worst exploiters of labor in existence. It goes past the scale of anything witnessed in historical cases of slavery. Walmart has expanded its influence to parts of the developing world where labor is in abundance and squeezes the life out of its workers for maximum profits. Walmart has to face over 5000 lawsuits a year for human rights violations.

WalMart's excessive exploitation of child labor forced even China to take action. China proudly reported that it had broken up a child labor ring in Guangdong province that used over 100 children ages 13 to 15 and paid an average wage of 42 cents an hour with no overtime. The minimum wage in China is 64 cents an hour and the minimum working age is 16.

In addition to overuse of child labor and exploitation of the impoverished, WalMart finds that it's cheaper to wash employees' blood out of manufactured clothing before selling it than to provide
gloves and safe machines to their seamstresses. Muhammad Saidur Rehman, A Wal-Mart factory owner in Bangladesh said "We still suffer from the legacy of the colonial days ... We consider the workers to be our slaves, and this belief is made all the easier by a supply of labor that is endlessly abundant."

Many people have tried to fight Walmart and those who seek fair trade products are now being heard more loudly than in previous years. However, Walmart even thought of that and in 2005, was caught passing off imported sweatshop-produced products as "being made in the USA".

Walmart is a role-model for all people abusing sweatshop and slave labor. It has gained immense wealth and influence at the cost of countless lives. I am waiting for the day when "the bigger they are, the harder they fall" sings its sweet song into Walmart's coffers. Hopefully in the future no corporation will ever be able to out-do Walmart.