The face of 'modern slavery' looks a lot like us
By Barbara Weicksel
Filed: Sunday, September 30, 2012http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2012/09/the-face-of-modern-slavery-looks-a-lot-like-us/
"The ugly truth is that this goes on right here," he said. "It's the migrant worker unable to pay off the debt to his trafficker. ... The teenage girl — beaten, forced to walk the streets. This should not be happening in America."
These were words spoken in a speech by President Barack Obama at the Clinton Global Initiative's annual meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 25. He was speaking about human trafficking, which he also said should be called by its real name: "modern slavery."
The Center for American Progress reported in 2010 that there were "approximately 1.6 million to 2.8 million homeless young people in the United States, and estimates suggest that disproportionate numbers of those youth are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender.
These vulnerable gay and transgender youth often run away from home because of family conflict and then face overt discrimination when seeking alternative housing...
But to know that on the streets of the United States of America in the year 2012 we have young men and women enslaved as sex objects – to know that in towns and cities all across our nation we have men, women and children working in conditions we wouldn't subject our pets to is an abomination.
It's not just the job of the government to combat this modern slavery. It's the job of every American to combat this atrocity.
