The Horror of Human Trafficking
Facing the truth about sexual slavery
By Guest Blogger, Dr. Ana Nogales
Slavery is a thing of the past, a subject we studied in school. It existed long ago before the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation put an end to it in this country.
That’s what I always assumed, but in the last several years I have discovered that my assumption was tragically wrong. Human trafficking is the fastest growing criminal industry in the world and one of our most urgent human rights issues.
It is occurring not only in many countries throughout the world, but right here in the United States, in our towns and communities. And yet, most people are totally unaware of the fact that in the twenty-first century, human beings are forced into sexual slavery so that others may profit.
It wasn’t until I was asked to speak about human trafficking that I realized I knew nothing about it. I turned down the speaking engagement; but soon thereafter, I had a nightmare in which my daughter and I were sold into slavery, and it hit me that this could happen to me, to my daughters or granddaughters, or to any other woman. I began to learn more about the subject, and the more I learned the more horrified I became.
I started treating victims of human trafficking in my practice, hearing their anguished stories about the hell they had gone through. Victims of sexual slavery are forced into prostitution, escort services, online pornography, and strip clubs. They live in constant panic, threatened with punishment if they attempt to escape, often tortured if they try.
The plight of these victims may seem like something out of a frightening movie. But while some may think that the abduction of teenage girls (and boys) who are forced into prostitution occurs only in films like the 2008 movie, Taken!, human slavery is not a fiction. It is far too real.
One of the reasons the general public doesn’t hear the stories that I heard in my office is that victims are often too afraid of retaliation by traffickers. But their voices are beginning to be heard.
The voices of the many terrorized clients whom I treated—and the urgency of this issue—compelled me to write a play, called Don’t Call Me Baby. It portrays the life of a sexual slavery victim, how she tries to keep her past a secret, and how her secret impacts her marriage and her community.
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The voices of the many terrorized clients whom I treated—and the urgency of this issue—compelled me to write a play, called Don’t Call Me Baby. It portrays the life of a sexual slavery victim, how she tries to keep her past a secret, and how her secret impacts her marriage and her community.
This is a story that many would rather not hear about, because it is terribly disturbing to think that such crimes are going on around us, in our so-called civilized society. But human trafficking is our modern-day slave trade. Many of these victims are Latinas from Mexico and Central America who were promised jobs in the U.S. only to be held captive by those in the sexual slave trade business.
Am I exaggerating by calling it a “slave trade”? Unfortunately, I am not. Dr. Laura Lederer, former State Department Advisor on Human Trafficking and Vice President of Global Centurion, an organization designed to fight world slavery, has stated that, “Over the last 10 years, the numbers of women and children [who] have been trafficked have multiplied so that they are now on par with estimates of the numbers of Africans who were enslaved in the 16th and 17th centuries.”
Over the past decade, the trafficking of human beings has reached epidemic proportions, with 1.2 million children becoming new victims of human trafficking every year. In the U.S., the average victim of abduction is an 11-year-old girl.
Human trafficking is a horrific crime that is being committed daily. It would be a moral crime to keep it a secret. If you want to learn more about human trafficking, please visit my website for information and links: www.drnogales.com.
Note from Aurelia: This is the final weekend that Don’t Call Me Baby, the play written by Dr. Ana Nogales on this subject, has its run at Casa 101 Theater in Los Angeles. If you haven’t yet seen the production, learn more and get your tickets at: http://www.casa0101.org/ FYI: I’ll be there Saturday night, so let me know if you’re planning to attend that show!
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Next week, Wednesday, March 31, I'll be presenting the second in a series of webinars for NHLI on Latina Leadership Lessons.
The National Institute for Latino Policy came out with a Latino Datanote this week, stating the Latino population is projected from 54 to 55 Million in 2010 -- approximately 17% of the population.