Human Goods

Dateline aired an episode on Tuesday inspired by E. Benjamin Skinner’s book, A Crime So Monstrous: Face to Face with Modern-Day Slavery.

Dan Harris’ “How to Buy a Child in 10 Hours” follows the same path Skinner took in his book in going from Manhattan to Haiti to purchase a child slave, or restavek.   The two experiences of attempting to buy children are almost identical, which just reinforces Skinner’s point of how easy it is.

It’s no secret anymore that millions of people in the world continue to live in slavery today. But many of us still consider this a ‘third-world issue’– a problem that plagues developing countries with the worst economic hardship. While this is largely true, it’s important to recognize the huge reality of the West’s connection to international human trafficking, modern-day slavery, and the presence of more than 50,000 slaves in the U.S. today.

What is sex tourism? Who are sex tourists? Where do they come from and what do they do?

Whether rowdy spring breakers on vacation in Thailand, organized sex tour buses through Russia, or single female vacationers in Jamaica– there is a steady stream of tourists from wealthy countries to poorer ones that travel with the goal of having sex with locals for money, many of them children. It’s a daunting, growing problem, but organizations and governments are stepping up to do something about it.

What makes countries so susceptible to human trafficking? What could possibly compel parents to sell their own daughters into sexual bondage? How are so many millions of women entrapped when they seek a better life?

In a glowing “human rights” age like this, how is it possible that more than 27 million people in the world are still owned by others? How is it that captured slaves clear the rainforests in Brazil, that bonded ones sweat in the brick kilns of India, that trafficked ones serve the sexual needs of thousands of Americans? And the list goes on and on.

What is going on in the global landscape when you put this all together?