The number one way victims are trafficked.

Recently Polaris, the statistical NGO that reports findings from the National Human Trafficking Hotline, updated their verbiage to share that human trafficking, and I’ll add exploitation as well, is many times identified through “context and proximity”. Polaris shares:

It’s Not Knowing the Signs – It’s Knowing the Story

Chances are there’s going to be nothing visible, nothing that you can see from across the room, or even from up close, that will alert you that a stranger is being trafficked. That may come as a surprise – especially if you have been to a training where you have been taught the ‘signs’ or indicators of trafficking, such as a person looking disheveled, upset, or scared. But as we learn more about how trafficking really works, we are also learning that the best way to help is to pay attention to people you actually know or interact with – your students, your tenants, your children, your patients, your co-workers. It is all about two magic words:

Context and proximity.

All of us have context (relationships) with others and proximity (closeness) to individuals every day. We know that 93% of victims of sexual abuse and exploitation (0-17 years old) know and have some sort of relationship with their perpetrator. There was a connection before exploitation ever started. This fact of context, proximity, and connection is vital in the fight to end human trafficking and exploitation. 

Why “context and proximity”? Because:

Context and proximity are the number one way victims are trafficked.

Context and proximity are key to identifying victims and getting them the help they need.

Context and proximity are how we can prevent one from being exploited in the first place.

Whether we are a parent, brother, sister, educator, aunt, cousin, friend, physician, classmate etc., our lives intersect with others. Our proximity to others allows us to see their vulnerability and protect those around us.

However, it’s not just looking for the vulnerable people in our lives. It’s being vulnerable ourselves. To prevent exploitation in other’s lives, we have to be vulnerable with those to whom we have context and proximity. 

To protect those in our lives, it’s time we started to:

Share our stories. Ask hard questions. Let them ask us hard questions. Speak life and love over them. Look for things in their lives that may be concerning. 

Even more, we need to open up about relationships: 

What does a healthy relationship look like? 

What are the signs of a toxic relationship?

Share how you have been hurt in your life, and then ask them if THEY have been hurt by anyone. 

In Vulnerability, Rethinking Human Trafficking, Raleigh Sadler says:

God motivates vulnerable people like you and me to love other vulnerable people by his own vulnerability for us. It’s not an us and them situation regardless of our station in life, it’s just kind of all of us. We are all broken. So, how can we walk alongside people instead of seeing them as problems to be fixed? (p. 52) 

What if we opened up, became vulnerable, and built rapport and deep trust with youth in our lives. What if by doing so we prevented them from exploitation. If we are going to live in a world where slavery is eradicated and justice prevails (our vision here at Freedom 4/24), we must prevent it to end it. 

I will end again with these two very important words: Context and proximity. Whether you are a parent, teacher, CEO, or manager... Who is within your context? Who is in proximity to you? Be alert, be vulnerable, be educated, and focus on those close to you. It’s the only way we are going to end the atrocity of human trafficking. There is hope in knowing their story. There is hope in prevention.