Stop human trafficking

“The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation", defines human trafficking according to the United Nations.

According to the ILO estimates, there are at least 2.4 million trafficked persons at any given point in time. The figures are of course, increasing on a daily basis because human trafficking, according to the UN Special Rapporteur,  Trafficking in Persons, remains one of the world’s fastest growing criminal activities, and one of the most appalling forms of it too.

A world with ethics knows that it is wrong to deal so brutally with fellow humans. It is even more aware of the injustice of acts like abduction. And the proof that this world hasn’t entirely lost its mind is there for us all to see. We know that fraud and deception can’t be justified, which is why it is done undercover. We covertly own people, we covertly buy or sell them, and we covertly pass them on as generous gifts, covertly, because the world can still differentiate between right and wrong. The traders know that the acts are immoral and they know that we know it, which is why they are forced to hide like rats. We may, for the sake of our consciences, treat humans as if they were worthless dogs but we can’t ever stop that little alarm in our heads, saying, “Hey, this is wrong!”

It is immoral to trade human beings, for we are not commodities! And should never be handled as such! We have a right to freedom. It is our nature to be free. We die in our attempts to gain our liberty and die when we allow enslavement without a fight. I am therefore not going to make human trafficking into something that can be morally questioned. It can’t!

There is therefore no need to justify trafficking. The consumers are unreasonable, perverted and or callous human-beings, who lead other weaker or disadvantaged humans, through their greed and actions into horrendous situations that can never be morally scrutinized. Can it be stopped? No, for there will always be insane human beings with irrational wishes, humans who feel fulfilled only when they possess the power over others. There will always be humans who feel that working is beneath them and those who appreciate the feeling of superiority derived from owning their own humans. The only thing the rest of us are able to do, is to keep fighting. We should keep attempting to save as many fellow men as possible from the claws of trafficking. The fight is not useless and it is needed now more than ever. Every trafficked human is worth it.