Human trafficking lurks behind closed doors and even right in front of your face. It is located throughout all parts of the world in communities, both big and small, and is often overlooked by individuals today in society. I never understood human trafficking as a whole since the proper foundation was never laid out clearly in front of me.
I was assigned a Signature Assignment for my Freshman Year Seminar class on the subject of human trafficking. My group was to analyze the history of human trafficking, identify a problem, and come up with a solution based on the subject matter. I needed to gain a deeper understanding of human trafficking as a whole before helping my group come up with a solution to help spread awareness on human trafficking.
Human trafficking is more than just prostitution. Human trafficking involves individuals being forced to do acts against their will. These acts can include slavery, sexual coercion, and even the black market of human organs.
My research continued and I started to recognize cities across the country that have been involved in some sort of human trafficking. This completely took me by surprise and I continued to dig into the research to learn more about human trafficking.
My group's solution to raise awareness was through the means of social media. Twitter includes a tweet's activity which made it easier for my group to produce results of our tweet out to the public. The tweet included: "There are approximately 20-30 million slaves in the world today, please join the fight #endhumantrafficking". The tweet also included a link to the Human Trafficking Awareness Partnership website to help encourage individuals who came across the tweet to get involved in terms of donating, interning, volunteering, or sponsoring for this organization.
This tweet received just under 4,000 views in 24 hours. I think this proves that a little can go a long way especially in today's world of technological advancements. I could see that various individuals were exposed to the horrible truth about human trafficking and my group's plan for a solution helped bring awareness to this issue.
Human trafficking surrounds the world in various shapes and forms. This assignment encourage me to gain a deeper understanding of what human trafficking really is. My group and I brought awareness to the public and proved that a little piece of information can go a long way.
