Here is a report written by our very own Seventh Grader: Chiavan Christiensen, who gave it as a speech for the contest Miss Three Rivers. Awesome job Chiavan!
Every Girl's a Princess!
Preventing Human trafficking one girl at a time
We hear a lot about human trafficking but what IS human trafficking? Human trafficking is: 'A criminal activity in which people are recruited, harbored, transported, bought, or kidnapped to serve an exploitative purpose, such as sexual slavery, forced labor, or child soldiery'. It’s such a horrible situation that we often push it aside.
Although it is a huge worldwide problem, much of the human trafficking occurs right here in America. Women and children are forced into slavery, sexual slavery, prostitution, and even shipped as objects on ships to different countries. Human trafficking and prostitution has gone on for thousands of years and has actually been increasing in recent years, not decreasing. It is heartbreaking that this kind of human abuse keeps going on and no one has stopped it yet.
Now, why we don't see this happen? Most of us don’t see women out on our sidewalks working as prostitutes. So, where does this happen? It happens everywhere, really. Las Vegas, Chicago, Seattle, and all over the world, but Portland, Oregon, believe it or not is the LARGEST human trafficking site in the nation. The Portland area has more strip clubs than any other city it’s size in America, and many of the women and girls who work there are trapped in a lifestyle of being used by others for awful purposes. How did they get trapped into this though?
Some girls are kidnapped by men called “Gorilla pimps”. (One of these men attempted to kidnap one of my friends right in front of her home in Gresham.) Some men get online and trick girls into coming to meet them for a “date”. Others go to public places like schools or malls looking for girls that have low self esteem and not a lot of confidence. These girls may think that nobody likes them, or they are not loved, but pimps come to tell them, “Your parents don't love you, but I do.” The girls start to spend more time with the man, until they find out that he is a pimp, and now they are trapped. They can't go back home, they can't see their friends and family ever again because now they are slaves.
Though many victims of human trafficking are adults, girls as young as 7-16 are targets of predators involved in this horrible process. They work as pole dancers, and they are shipped from country to country. I absolutely couldn’t stand it anymore. I needed to help these girls! But I'm only 13. I can’t go into the clubs or walk the streets to help them. So, I thought, what if I rewind the tape a little bit and try to help girls before they become victims?
My platform is 'Every Girl's a Princess; Preventing Human Trafficking One Girl At A Time'. Because many of the girls who get caught up in prostitution and ‘adult’ entertainment have low confidence and self esteem, I am helping in places where at-risk girls are, such as schools, homeless shelters and churches, so I can help young girls see how valuable and precious they are and that all of them deserve to be treated with respect and that every girl truly is a princess. I tell them that they can be who ever they want to be and they can feel confident about themselves.
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