Creative Retirement - Great Decisions
7 . HUMAN TRAFFICKING IN THE 21st CENTURY
Modern Day Slavery -- May 1, 2015
Human Trafficking in the 21st Century
Human trafficking represents a multibillion in international trade per annum and continues to be one of the fastest growing criminal industries. While undeniably a global phenomenon, the U.S., as one of the world’s leading human trafficking importers, bears a special responsibility to combat this practice. The U.S. and the international community have adopted various treaties and laws to prevent trafficking, but to truly understand and combat the issue, they must find the root causes enabling traffickers to exploit millions of victims.
The text and the video read like a request for funding for a research grant. We don't know the scope of the problem with numbers ranging by 500 percent. A clip with the President cites a figure five times the high range of the text and video. Thus a 2500% spread of numbers means nobody knows what they are talking about. There was virtually nothing on Prevention, Protection, and Prosecution, the Three P's, that are said to be needed.
To start from the beginning, Webster said the beginning of wisdom is to call things by the right names. That means to define the terms. Define Human Trafficking/slavery. Does the definition include all prostitution; there are people who believe all prostitution is slavery. A hundred years ago that included marriage. Similarly, is all child labor statutory slavery ? Would this include cleaning one s room or helping on family businesses ? Detasselling corn and walking beans is almost a right of passage in Iowa. What about wage slaves?, most adults have no control over their lives from 8 to 5.
Next example, What is a child ? Is it a sub-teen ? For some federal programs it is age 25. What about the draft ? We ended that by calling it a form of slavery because we didn't like the Vietnamese War. The result is to quadruple the labor cost and we now have a mercenary army such that we don't feel we can afford to have a top military anymore. Imprisonment is certainly state slavery. The definition must be determined and this may account for the wide numbers of 2500% we have seen quoted today.
How bad is slavery? The Iowa/Texas turkey farm case took some retards out of the welfare system and had them doing some productive work for their satisfaction and for the economy. *1* Slavery in the southern plantation economy provided housing and meals to people taken captive as an ancient custom of African tribesman (in fact, a past practice of the whole world). Slaves were expensive to plantation owners and they were proved with housing and working conditions that were better than those of Nebraska farmers living in mud huts working from before sunup to after sun down. How about the wage slave in office, shop, and factory? Money and benefits are provided, but does one really have a choice of working or not? I for one enjoyed air conditioned comfort and an array of expensive toys to perform the tasks demanded by my masters. At the other end is chains and beating -- not conducive to productivty.
The typical government approach is to throw money as a solution. A rule of economics is that your get more of what you subsidize. Restitution for freed slaves -- however that is defined -- is an expensive prospect that does not solve any underlying problem(s). An offer of free money will result in the claim of "slavery" as the magic word by masses of unqualified to cross our borders in the future -- just like "fear for my life" has been the magic words recited by tens of thousands in the last two years desiring to be put up in hotels. Restitution sounds nice, but it is the most expensive approach to a problem which must be addressed (in the home country) in a manner that is in agreement with human nature. Not subsidized.
Personally, I would consider that a failure to provide education for girls is criminal abuse.
Attack that and many other problems go away. What are the issues and solutions?
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*1* You webpage author was shouted down at this point and economics and practical aspects were not discussed. I don't know what happened in the second half.
A consideration, with sadness, is that people that fool themselves with emotional words, who have not the intelligence nor will to look clearly at problems, alternatives and seek solutions are indications that the human species is doomed to not be able to survive in a rational world and thus the species will more than likely cease to exist. As human endeavor is absorbed by superior, tho artificial, intelligence, the bulk of mankind will simply avoid solutions and just riot to protest that "its not fair" while their civilization burns around them.
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Last updated : May 1, 2015
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