Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Speaker addresses worldwide contemporary slavery issues
By Shelley Russell
The Pendulum, Elon U.
October 28, 2008

Most students can remember learning about slavery in their high school history classes. Textbooks documented transatlantic slave trade of the 1800s, the Underground Railroad and the brutal treatment that many blacks faced upon arrival to America.

But slave trade and human trafficking are not just topics of the past. The practices still happen in every country, according to Kathleen Davis of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, based in Cincinnati.

Davis spoke to an audience of Elon students and faculty Monday to spread awareness about the victimization of people from all walks of life.

“We tend to think that only one particular group will be affected, but we have to be careful not to make those assumptions,” Davis said.

She described recent raids in Cincinnati, which freed college-educated contemporary slaves who were forced into slavery because of cultural barriers. American men are often victims of contemporary slavery, as they are forced to work long, unpaid hours in orange groves.

But of the estimated 14,000 to 17,000 slaves brought into the United States each year and a worldwide estimate of between 12 million and 27 million slaves, women and children are the most frequent victims.

Seventy percent of contemporary slaves are women, according to Davis. In addition, an estimated 9 million children are exploited through the worst forms of child labor.

“Slavery remains an invisible crime where victims are powerless and voiceless,” Davis said. “A lot of slavery issues of the past are manifesting themselves in a contemporary form.”

When prompted, few students in the audience said they strive to purchase fair trade products. According to Davis, many everyday products are the products of slave labor. But contemporary slavery does not consist solely of factory workers. It also includes the prostitution, construction, agriculture, pornography and domestic servant industries.

While most people think of slavery as a deliberate act of cruelty, Davis had other thoughts about the contemporary problem.

“Slavery today is about money and economics, not about evil people necessarily wanting to do evil things,” Davis said. “It’s cheaper for a trafficker to throw out a sick slave and get a new one then it would be to take a sick slave to get medical care.”

One of the major issues associated with slavery is debt bondage, in which people must repay loans through labor.

In the United States, 39 states, including North Carolina have passed human trafficking laws. The federal government passed the Trafficking Victims Protection Act in 2000, which recognizes not only the physical force that slave victims must endure, but also the psychological torture.

“These laws aren’t the final solution, they are the first step,” Davis said.

With new technologies and the use of the Internet, Davis remains hopeful that the awareness about contemporary slavery will grow quickly and the problem can be alleviated.

Human rights organizations have taken the initiative to address contemporary slavery, and Davis encouraged the audience to spread awareness and write local government officials about the issue. For more information about slavery or the NURFC, visit www.freedomcenter.org.

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