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Monday, December 22, 2008

Slavery

This is a devastating article.

It traces elements of the very tragic fact that slavery is bigger than ever. This is not only sexual slavery where children are forced into degradation but also hard labor where people spend generations working off debts of a few dollars.

foreignpolicy.com: A World Enslaved By E. Benjamin Skinner
But the deal isn’t done. Benavil leans in close. “This is a rather delicate question. Is this someone you want as just a worker? Or also someone who will be a ‘partner’? You understand what I mean?”

You don’t blink at being asked if you want the child for sex. “I mean, is it possible to have someone that could be both?”

As many as 17,500 new slaves continue to enter bondage in the United States every year.

Every single man, woman, and child in Lohagara Dhal is a slave. But, in theory at least, Garg neither bought nor owns them. They are working off debts, which, for many, started at less than $10. But interest accrues at over 100 percent annually here. Most of the debts span at least two generations, though they have no legal standing under modern Indian law. They are a fiction that Garg constructs through fraud and maintains through violence. The seed of Gonoo’s slavery, for instance, was a loan of 62 cents. In 1958, his grandfather borrowed that amount from the owner of a farm where he worked. Three generations and three slavemasters later, Gonoo’s family remains in bondage.
The Project To End Human Trafficking

Stop Human Trafficking

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