Thursday, April 28, 2011

FLESH

It boggles my mind to think of how blessed we are to live in America: to enjoy a walk in the park on a sunny afternoon, take a nice country drive, or eat ice cream while watching Seinfeld reruns. Even more so, it amazes me how we can be so cushioned by these nice things that we don’t realize that others have incredibly harder lives which are filled with atrocities.

Sure, we think someone “over there” in a foreign country is hungry or in the midst of war, which is horrible, but we don’t often think of the word “atrocities” being used for dealings in our neighborhood, on our own street, or maybe even right next door.

A personal friend of mine, Kristin Ross Lauterbach, has created a documentary called FLESH: Bought and Sold in the U.S. which looks at human trafficking and prostitution. Did you know the average age a young girl is forced into prostitution is twelve to fourteen? And that is in the U.S.! The time these young girls should be enjoying life, school dances, and spending time with friends.

FLESH calls into question our definitions of slavery, human trafficking, and prostitution in the United States. This is a story told by girls who have escaped and by those still enslaved, by former and current pimps, the abolitionists of today, including numerous directors of non-profit organizations, a former U.S. Ambassador, LAPD vice, and the L.A. City Task Force on Human Trafficking.

One of the non-profit organizations is Nightlight International which part of Sky Pie Apparel proceeds go to.

The film is showing at Awareness Film Festival on Saturday, May 7th, at 9PM. For more information and to buy tickets go to: Heal One World

No comments:

Post a Comment