22 Month Old Boy Snatched in Spur and the reality that is Human Slavery

Yesterday a video of a baby boy snatched by a stranger in a local family restaurant went viral.  Reading the comments posted in social media is infuriating.  People are making racial remarks and criticising the parent, while human slavery is staring them straight in the eye.

If you haven’t seen the video, here’s the clip posted on Facebook, the full article is available on News24:

Why do we always criticise?

Some of these critics are calling the parents incompetent.  Or calling them out, saying the kid should have been sitting at the table with his parents!  Have you ever been to Spur?  Do you even have any kids?

Others happen to find the time to dig up old cows out of the grave and make the incident a racial joke!   I choose to bring some perspective on the matter.

A little boy was nearly trafficked as a human slave, stolen from his parents, for goodness knows what purpose!  Let’s have enough respect to acknowledge, that it could have happened to any one of us.

What is Human Slavery?

I first learned about human slavery in 2015, after Christene Caine, founder of the A21 campaign posted pictures of their annual #WalkForFreedom photos in social media.

Human trafficking is a form of modern-day slavery.  It’s the exploitation of people.  The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement goes on to say, it is the recruitment, harbouring, transportation, provision or obtaining of a person for labour or services, through the use of force, fraud or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage or slavery.

International Statistics

• In 2016, The Global Slavery Index estimated that 45.8 million people are in some form of modern slavery in 167 countries 
• Human slavery generates an estimated $150 Billion US Dollars profit every year.   It is the fastest growing criminal industry in the world.
• And there is an estimate of 5.5 million children in slavery worldwide!

South African Statistics

• The 2016 Global Slavery Index estimates 248,700 people or 0.45% of the total population live in conditions of modern slavery in South Africa.
• South Africa is a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labour and sex trafficking.
• In South Africa, the largest number of victims/human slaves are South Africans.
• Children are recruited from both rural and urban areas for sex trafficking and domestic servitude, forced to work in street vending, food service, begging, criminal activities, and agriculture.
• Forced begging is human trafficking!
• Girls as young as 12 are being forced into marriage with adult men.

Many children, including those with disabilities, are exploited in forced begging.

It’s time we stop looking into the feeble things of the world.   So, whether a mother breast or bottle feed becomes irrelevant when we consider the enormity of human slavery.  Racist comments become nonsicle when we put things into perspective.

I am of the opinion that demand dominates the industry – in other words  – if there were no demand for prostitutes, the wouldn’t be a supply of prostitutes.  The same goes for rape, molestation and pornography addictions for that matter.  We need to raise our children in a completely new way,  porn is not okay.  We need to set a Godly standard and example for our kids, but this really is a post for another day.

New Vision and Godly Intervention

 

Traffickers use different methods to recruit victims–pictured above are some of the methods of recruitment we’ve seen in our cases. When we know how they are trafficked, we are more equipped to stop it from happening. #KnowledgeIsPower #A21

A post shared by A21 (@a21) on Apr 26, 2017 at 9:04am PDT

The fact remains, we need a new strategy when dealing with beggars on the streets or prostitutes on the corners.  We need a new vision and Godly intervention, because, let’s get real – we cannot do this on our own!

As a start, I encourage you to take the time to educate yourself and your kids, regarding human trafficking.  By educating your loved ones they are able to recognise the signs of trafficking.

We all have a role to play, let’s do it well?

Sources of General and Statistical Information:

• 2016 Global Slavery Index
• The Tips or  Trafficking in Persons Report. South African Information available on page 340.
• The A21 Campaign