P.S. ..: Slaves among us

Dec. 18 will mark 152 years since the formal abolition of slavery in the United States. For many, that watershed event marked the beginning of a long and convoluted process, including the continued unlearning of racial prejudice, and the reformation of structural inequalities throughout our judicial, economic and political systems. Yet in spite of this, the very practice that abolition sought to destroy is still a significant part of our international landscape. Over the past two weeks, my social media feeds have been flooded with shock and outrage over recently released footage depicting the sale of smuggled youth in Libya. As Time Magazine reported this past Friday, this grainy undercover video has stunned the world and refocused attention on the exploitation of refugees and other migrants in North Africa.

Perhaps what makes the footage so shocking is that it depicts a type of slave trade that many of us imagine as long past expired: bound men huddled together, sold for less than a smartphone. In some ways, this shock is somewhat justified, as modern-day slavery is typically more covert, and involves the recruitment and exploitation of vulnerable people, often through forced labor or sex. Yet, what I find most disturbing is the message that slavery is “resurfacing” due to political unrest when, in reality, slavery never left. Even though slavery has been banned across the globe, and is prohibited by international law, more than 29 million people are living in slavery, the greatest number in human history.

The United States is not immune from these trends. The term “human trafficking” refers to when a person is harbored, provided or obtained for the purposes of exploitation. Trafficking victims, two-thirds of whom are women and girls, are recruited through either coercion or threat and are often sent into the sex trade. In many cases, these women and girls come from low-income backgrounds, are abused runaways or are not U.S. nationals, brought into the United States under the false pretense that they would receive a green card or visa. The number of U.S. human trafficking cases increases every year, and coastal cities like Los Angeles and Seattle are among the world's-largest 'ports' of sex-slavery.

Yet as common as slavery is in contemporary society, little has been done to address its effects. Participating within the modern slave trade appears unavoidable. Goods from corn, to electronics, to toys, to wool, to T-shirts are at times made with forced labor. Eat chestnuts from Kazakhstan, or even brazil nuts from Peru? They easily could have been harvested by slaves. Have you ever done cocaine or synthetic opioids? Have you ever bought strawberries from California? All of these products have been speculated as primary sources of forced labor worldwide. As much as outrage over the recent news emerging from Libya is justified, outrage alone does not solve humanitarian crises. If you’re interested in learning more, visit http://slaveryfootprint.org/.