By: Lucille Femine
First, my personal story on child kidnapping:
When my daughter was 11 years old, I was walking down the street in NYC, on our way to a first day of school on a lovely September morning. She held my hand, skipping along. I smiled down at her. Suddenly a man came up behind us, grabbed her and ran with her in his arms into a waiting car about 50 yards behind us.
It was so unbelievable that my first thought was – he must know her. He’s kidding. But soon enough, I realized he was not kidding at all; he was kidnapping her.
Now, many of you have heard the story of the mother who lifted a 2000 pound car to save her child who was trapped beneath it. Well, that was the level of necessity I rose to at that moment. I still, to this day, don’t know how I ran so fast. I wasn’t a runner at all and barely exercised. But I ran that 50 or so yards. I ran so fast the kidnapper still hadn’t had a chance to close the back door. I jumped in and saw he was sitting on her. She was reaching out to me with one free arm, calling, “Mommy! Mommy!”
With the back door still open and my legs partially hanging out, the man told the driver to take off. Then, he started kicking me out of the car. Again, I don’t know how I did it but I somehow held on. (later I saw my legs were black and blue) But what sustained me was the thought – he’s going to rape her and then kill her.
That horrible possibility or certainty alone gave me the strength to hit back while I screamed continuously, taking a breath only enough to keep it up.
Soon I could sense people stopping in the streets, wondering what was going on. This must have freaked him out because he hurriedly let go of her, kicked us out of the car and sped off.
I stood in the middle of the street, holding onto her while she clung to me. I stared after the car in shock, vowing to never let her out of my sight.
I was lucky. After all, most of the time parents are not as fortunate as I was to be present when their child was being abducted.
I can’t possibly imagine what my life would have been like if I had lost her. Even if she came back to me, she would have been scarred for life, robbed of her innocence and joy and no longer a child. She probably would have hated me for allowing that to happen to her.
The next day, I went to the police station and told an officer the whole story, with great passion. He sat taking notes on a tiny pad, never looking at me or acknowledging anything I said. Finally, he looked up at me with a wooden, unsympathetic face and asked, “Are you having an affair?”
I was stunned and just as shocked as I was at the kidnapping. Here I had just gone through an incredible, emotional trauma and saved my daughter’s life and he asks such an insane, actually non-sequiter question.
He shrugged and explained that people do that when they’re going through a divorce (which I wasn’t) or some such thing that made no sense. He also said, in his broad wisdom, while smirking, that people don’t kidnap children in the middle of the day. Really?
He drove me around the neighborhood after that, apathetically looking for any sign of the kidnappers. He also resented me for not taking down the license plate number, as if I was in such a state to do that. Again, it was another reason to mistrust my story.
I bring up this last part to ask a question: just how much interest or energy do the police put into child abductions and kidnappings? I’m sure many of them do and have children of their own, an added incentive. But still, was this policeman’s attitude a disturbing norm?
I don’t know but this brings me to present time and what is occurring in this very country regarding child kidnapping.
First, let’s take up the title. Why do you think child trafficking is so much more of a booming business than drugs or alcohol? Well, alcohol and drugs are used up right away but a child can be sold and resold and resold. You get the profit margin? The dollar signs buzzing in those degraded kidnapper’s eyes?
Many people assume child trafficking occurs mostly in foreign, third-world countries. However, an alarming number happens right here in the US.
For example, in Tennessee alone, it is more common than earlier believed. This is because of the closeness to Atlanta and other nearby places where large entertainment and sports events occur. Clients are referred to as “sex tourists.” Atlanta has one of the highest rates of child trafficking. ~ Mark Gwyn, Director/Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.
In Georgia, you can call the National Human Trafficking Hotline for help at any time: 1.888.373.7888
Here’s a vital, shocking statistic: “Every two minutes a child is trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation in the United States.” ~ U.S. Department of Justice.
One of the reasons many of these criminals are not brought to justice is because they terrorize their victims into not running away or informing on them. These children are convinced they will be killed or their families killed. Or they feel so humiliated, they won’t go home, for fear of being labeled a prostitute. After a while, many of them begin to feel it’s what they are “supposed to be doing.”
In addition, there is no distinction per the law between children who do this by choice and those who are trafficked – they are both criminals. This is another reason these children don’t come forward; they are in fear of the police.
Even Craigslist has built up a sex slave market and these pimps are never arrested, being under such cover.
Many girls come from broken homes and, tragically, are lured into this dangerous world because they are looking for “love.” Keep in mind, as well, that 50% of the children trafficked are boys. Their lives are ruined just as easily.
Not only that, many children don’t want to be “saved,” as they willingly choose this life style. No doubt this decision is influenced by a bad home life but this makes it more difficult to move a child into a more survival mindset.
In addition, many children have already been sexually exploited at home or near home (44%), so being abducted for child prostitution becomes hardly the worst thing that ever happened to them. In fact, some druggie parents even pimp out their own children.
Under these various circumstances, it is difficult to quantify how many children are violated and abducted.
The United States spends much more of it’s 1.2 billion on advertising child trafficking rather than working on evidence and on rescuing children. Also, these anti-trafficking groups push more the pimping of girls, so the boys that are trafficked don’t get the attention they need, including transgender boys.
Child trafficking is rising in this country and one wonders why. If we examine what has been occurring here for many years, it is not surprising.
First of all, family life has suffered greatly with all the stress of two parents having to go to work and even then, the bills and debts pile up. Children are neglected, if not physically, then emotionally.
With the rise of socialism in this country, attended by Common Core, children belong to the state and lose that family protection and closeness, which most often will keep a child from straying into a harmful lifestyle. They would have more self-respect.
You may not associate GMO food and drugs – including psychiatric drugs – with child trafficking but extend the thought a bit: drugs and bad, contaminated, toxic food make people not only sick but depressed as hell. Children ingesting both these forms of poison can easily fall into thinking very badly about themselves with no motivation to do anything constructive or what is their hearts. A sick body can easily swallow up a dream.
The most influential cause, I would say, is the decaying moral level in this country. People are isolated and greatly encouraged to continue so. Children are stuck in their iphones as the ultimate in life experience.
When I was a kid, we knew everyone on the block and all their families, in-laws, cousins, dogs, etc. Sure, we had TV and veged out in the evenings but not all day long. We talked instead of texted. We actually answered the phone without knowing who it was!
We had block parties and helped each other out. They weren’t family but they were friends, not far from the same thing in those days.
If our neighbors and our community were truly our friends, we would look out for each other, wouldn’t we? As much as our own children. We would do more about crime and child trafficking because we would care.
It is actually a very natural and sane state of being to care about each other because our survival depends on it. Imagine a world all by yourself without others to help you, sell you food, clothing, houses, heat, electricity, roads to travel on, cars to buy, provide a taxi in the rain or smile at you for no reason. Do we need a reason? You can think of a lot more.
So, if you don’t know who your neighbor is, go find out. Things can snowball from there into a real community of live human beings. There’s safety and strength in numbers. They are part of you and your life. That’s how we will make it.
Sources:
http://www.youth-spark.org/learn/trafficking-resource-hub/
http://abcnews.go.com/US/domestic-sex-trafficking-increasing-united-states/story?id=10557194
http://www.youthforhumanrights.org/
Lucille Femine, Executive Director of the Liberty Beacon project
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