Whenever you do a Google search for ‘human trafficking’, the information that will come up will be dominated by material on sex trafficking. In many cases, this material will feature misleading and sometimes voyeuristic images of victims that are chained up or locked behind bars and wire. It is this messaging and imagery that provides a foundation for a majority of human trafficking awareness campaigns. This singular focus too often overlooks equally destructive trafficking crimes, such as debt bondage, domestic servitude, and child soldiers.
Earlier this year, I participated in a live twitter chat organised by UNICEF and the U.S Department of State. Building upon the hashtag #Everychildfree, this campaign is calculated to have reached four million unique Twitter accounts. While this initiative certainly generated an incredible amount of awareness about the sex trafficking of children, I believe that we nonetheless missed a huge opportunity to use this online event to actually reach vulnerable populations that are a disproportionately affected by all types of trafficking, such as immigrants, minorities, and LGBTQ communities. As an immigrant who was trafficked into the United States, the formula of #Everychildfree certainly would not have captured my attention.
