Justin and I are taking a workshop for six weeks on modern-day slavery. The series is called "Abolition," and it is basically a grassroots movement to try and learn how we can end slavery here in San Francisco. When I bring this up to people, the common reaction I receive is "what? there's no slaves in San Francisco!" It is so clear that the average person is not aware that 27 million people are enslaved right now, and not only that, we have the power to set them free. Thousands of women, mostly from Southern Asia, are tricked into coming to America and then forced as sex slaves in brothels throughout our cities. These brothels are legally "message parlors" or "spas" - open way passed midnight. These parlors are near our homes and our jobs, and we are oblivious. Plus, there are thousands more slaves working our restaurants or as maids in our suburbs or in the fields on our land. Across the seas, children are forced to harvest our coffee, our sugar, our cocoa for chocolate, or work in factories to produce our clothes and house goods.
I write about this because not only is it on my mind, but because I believe that "no one is free unless all are free." Please, can we free ourselves in the pursuit of serving others, in the uplift of all. "For to be free is to not merely cast ones chains off, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others."
When we have people who are captives, we as a society are saying that we are okay with allowing someone, as human as us, be enslaved...I am not free then, because this implies that others are just as okay with ME not being free.
What will we choose to do?
