In the midst of all this, something has been living and growing in my mind.
How did people feel okay with making other people their slaves? With participating in genocide and killing huge numbers of people? With standing aside as three thousand and seven hundred people are aborted every day in the United States alone? I know the answer.
It's because they're not people.
Simple, right? If someone has a different color skin, has a different background, or has not been born yet, he or she is not a person and therefore does not have the same rights normal people do. No reason to treat them with common decency.
It must be the way human traffickers view their victims. Sex slavery is the second largest--and fastest growing--criminal industry in the world. In my recent experience, people know that this kind of thing exists, but not near them, and not in such great proportions. According to the FBI, the average age a child is first sexually exploited is 11, and as many as 40% of forced prostitutes nationwide are children. Chicago is the second highest city in the nation in terms of child sexual exploitation. The majority of forced prostitutes are 18 or older, and are either literally grabbed off the street or lured away from home by someone they meet and grow to trust, only to be betrayed into a life of sexual slavery.
Enough.
Like many Americans, I have both a dresser and a closet filled with clothes, and I wear different outfits different days. Not anymore. Every day until Easter, I will be wearing a simple green dress so that when people comment, I will be able to explain what I am doing and talk about an issue that they may or may not be aware of. Sexual slavery is a huge issue, both in numbers of lives affected, and in impact on the lives of those involved. It's worth doing something about, even something as small as wearing one dress for a month and a half.
