Last night, Mark and I attended the 2008 benefit dinner for the International Justice Mission with our good friends, the Clarkes. It was an amazing evening. The ridiculous traffic, pouring down rain, and running a block in the pouring down rain (in holiday attire, high heels, no umbrella), couldn't detract from the magnitude of the time we were there. Both Megan and I attended the Call + Response film a couple months ago, and we were both really impacted to do more in the area of human trafficking and injustice. During the film, the president of IJM, Gary Haugen, spoke on the crisis of injustice in our world. The information and statistics are startling. Did you know that there are more people in slavery today than at any other time in history? The images will break your heart and keep you up at night, but the fact is that it's all too real and happening all around us (all over the world and HERE in the U.S.). It's almost impossible to be exposed to the reality of what's going on and not want to do something about it. Second only to drugs and weapons, humans are the most trafficked product in the world, and the demand for humans is growing as traffickers realize that once they sell a drug or a weapon, their product is gone, but they can sell a human over and over and over and continue to make a profit. Scary, right? Did you know that children are being advertized for sex on Craigslist? It makes you rethink your use of that site. One could go on and on, but the point is that IJM is doing so much right around the world to bring justice to victims of unspeakable acts. They are dedicated to fighting for basic human rights, persecuting the cowards who buy sell women and children for sex, and those who enslave children and adults against their will and without pay. As Haugen said last night at the dinner, the battle is really one of Good against Evil, and last night was truely a celebration with over 1200 people that a lot of Good really is happening through IJM. We were so thrilled to be a part of the evening, and our hope is that many others will join the fight against injustice because it really does matter to those victims. Haugen made a great point that we may not be able to make a difference for all the people in the world, but we CAN make all the difference in the world for some.
To learn more about IJM or the topic of human trafficking, here are just some sites that might interest you, and there are many, many more out there:
I would also really recommend Gary Haugen's book, Just Courage
To close, there was one quote I read on a blog that really stuck in my head. It's by Dr. Martin Luther King. He said, "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
Something to think about...
Hi Amanda,
ReplyDeleteWhat an honor to be mentioned on your blog. Thank you very much for recommending Born to Fly to your readers.
The 3 P's of stopping trafficking are prevention, prosecution, and protection of victims. Our work is in the prevention area. Most kids get taken or sold into trafficking because they don't know anything about what might happen to them. They really think they'll be waitresses or models. Their parents are unaware too.
We're working on a global awareness campaign called the B2F project, which has the potential to dramatically reduce the numbers of kids trafficked.
Thank you for recommending our website, www.born2fly.org. You can also get updates about the fight to stop trafficking on my blog: www.dianascimone.com
Thank you again and we're glad you and Mark are such an enthusiastic part of the fight for justice.
Diana Scimone
President
Born to Fly International, Inc.
"Stopping child trafficking...setting kids free to soar"
www.born2fly.org
www.dianascimone.com
Twitter: @DianaScimone