When you think of sex trafficking, what comes to your mind? Most would conjure up images of young women being kidnapped and sold as sexual slaves over seas. The images are clouded in darkness with strewn muffled cries. Yeah, you feel bad… but that’s none of your business. It’s far away; nearly not even part of our world. Right? Wrong. Sex trafficking is right under our ignorant noses.
In the U.S., human trafficking takes place within the sight oblivious mothers and fathers. Young daughter lays on her bed, casually typing away on her laptop, sliding her English homework to the side, as she responds to a rather flattering message from an internet friend of a friend.
This is the most common way pimps lure their prey into their grasp. It’s Egypt’s eighth plague, really. “An absolute plague.” Sam Martinez, Clark county’s District Attorney said. With a zero tolerance policy, he loves sending those pimps to prison.
Sadly the path pimps use to lure vulnerable girls into, seducing them into a world of prostitution, is the same path one world use to find cute puppy videos and see updates of your friends and family. Yep the internet. The trafficking of a child usually begins with a social media message from a stranger who falls in love with the unscripted banter and mystery of not setting privacy filters. Then, her page to be viewed by strangers and even criminals.
The stranger could give compliments on their page boosting their self-esteem or remark that they have common friends or even just make a friendly remark to some of their interests. Resuming the conversation for days, months, unknowing to the parents, the relationship grows, urging the girl to meet this mystery person.
Soon, one thing leads to another and boda-bing, boda-boom, the pimp ensnares the girl exploring her vulnerabilities and promises a lifestyle that she would love; that she deserves. She would get men’s attention, make a lot of money, live life in the fast lane, and have a close, close friend in him.
Eventually, this sweet seduction turns into bitter enslavement. Now, the girl may realize the threat, but the pimp just has too much emotional and or physical control over her. He threatens to harm her or her family if she decided to leave. Or, perhaps, she has lost herself in a world of sex, money, and drugs. These women has turned unrecognizable, for she has fallen for this charming snake.
“Social media is a huge recruiting tool for pimps, and parents need to be aware of their social media accounts and track them,” Martinez said, “It’s through their initial contact on social media that they start the process of recruiting, by making promises. They give their victims compliments and build a relationship of trust, and then the victim is in a black hole and they can’t get out.”
Parents need to educate their kids about the real predators; not just the cliché candy or puppy search, but who are conniving and manipulative. Children are easily tricked when they are yearning for a friend. Martinez has prosecuted cases in which victims were as young as 12.
Thankfully, awareness of this problem has increased throughout the years, but it still lies deep. Strengthen laws have made it easier to persecute human traffickers and gave victims the chance to sue their captors.
There are law enforcement efforts nationwide, particularly the FBI, to decrease the amount of selling sex from teenagers, but most of the action takes place in our own neighborhoods, in our own homes.
So, the bottom line is, children need to be guarded in online exchanges especially from people outside of their personal knowing. Their reactions to such messages, if they occur, should be of suspicion and they should have the confidence to tell their parents.
January is National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, so let this serve as a trigger for parents and children alike to identify and ignore strangers on the internet. Don’t lose yourself in your own bedroom.

This affects both me and the world because it is, as mentioned earlier, a plague: an epidemic. Awareness of this topic could create a significant impact on the victims.

I agree with the author because of their stance on internet monitoring. By being knowledgeable about their children’s or own threats, the can keep themselves safe.