{SCS} Getting started: Slaves, really?

Happy Summer everyone! I hope you enjoyed the longest day of the year! We're kicking off the {SCS} series today on this lovely summer evening. So let's get started. Let's talk about slaves.

Really, slaves? That's not a happy topic for this pretty summer evening.

Yes, slaves.

We can call them sweatshop workers, we can call them prostitutes. Maybe street kids, runaways, or illegal immigrants. Maybe even migrant workers, housekeepers, or waitresses. We give all sorts of names to the people who are enslaved in our world. Slavery is ugly and we'd like to think it doesn't happen anymore, especially in our country. Because we all know that the United States in the land of the free and the home of the brave. The free, right? Everyone is free in our country.

Unfortunately, everyone is not free in our country.

Yes, slavery does exist. It is a huge social problem. This social problem is what is driving me to write this Socially Conscious summer series. Each of us has the opportunity to help end slavery. It's as involved as volunteering with abolitionist organizations, or as simple as buying fair trade coffee instead of Folgers. You can download an app to your phone to check companies' ethics policies. You can lobby your elected officials. We're going to explore all of this, but we need to start at the basics. And what is more basic than the facts?

- There are about 27 million slaves in our world today.

- Of these, 12.3 million are in forced labor

- Half of those enslaved are children

- There are between 100,000 - 300,000 children trapped in prostitution in the United States. They come from all walks of life and backgrounds.

- There are around 17,000 people trafficked into the United States each year. I'd venture to say less than 1,000 get rescued each year (my own conjecture, not cited) So we can all do the math, there could be over 100,000 enslaved individuals in our country.

I'd invite you to check out the statistics from the Polaris Project for more detailed information. This is just a snapshot of the information that is out there. You can also check out Not for Sale, The Freedom Center, Wellspring Living, Seattle Against Slavery, or GEMS.

That's all for today. I just wanted to give you some statistics and resources. I don't mean to be a downer, I just wanted to get started with the facts. We'll move into a lot more positive and interesting stuff soon.