Miles Walked/Rode/Hula’ed: 10.67
Money Raised: $150

As I mentioned previously, I’m participating in Tread on Trafficking again this year. It officially started May 1, so I’m a little late in writing this post. I’m going to blame it on the pieces I was finishing for Lucinda’s and Steve Holt, our new puppy. Yes, I got Todd a puppy as an early birthday gift. Yes, I’m an awesome wife. Yes, he’s a sweet puppy, but he’s exhausting. And I’ve never talked about bowel and bladder movements so much in my life.

Here’s a picture of Steve Holt the night we brought him home, when he was called Lebron. (He had two other names before we landed on Steve Holt, but we have to stick with this one because we got an engraved dog tag at PetSmart this weekend with his name on it.)

Anyway, I’m … Read More »

“I got to take out what was hidden in my heart.”
- Trafficking survivor, India

Recently an aid blogger wrote about how she often gets asked what the best way is to get involved with a cause, and she answers:  give money. It doesn’t seem exciting to us here in America, but it’s what’s needed.

There are groups of smart, capable, honest people fighting good fights all over the world. But to continue to do that they need more resources, particularly money. Somebody’s money paid for the rescue operation that led to the freedom of the trafficking survivor I quoted above, and paid for the care she received afterwards that made her feel safe. That is exciting.

Love146‘s Tread on Trafficking is about to begin, and I’m going to be participating as I did last year. Some of you were very generous last year and supported me, and I … Read More »

“After the punter* left it [the payment] seemed like such a small amount. I would look at it, contemplate it, and then hide it somewhere in my house. It never got used for anything worthwhile, despite all my reasonings earlier in the day. It would disappear as fast as it got there, on air, seemingly, or I would leave it hidden and forget about it. I could never say for sure where it went. I would never have used it on anything worthwhile, or special or anything that I actually cared about because I couldn’t put that money into something good. I couldn’t put that money into something I really cared about. Sometimes it went towards my bills or rent; necessities. Once I had it, I had no use for it, except for how it made me feel for that … Read More »

I recently found a new blog that’s written by a former sex worker.* It’s not a fun or easy read, but it is so fascinating. The blog’s writer sold herself through a website that allowed clients to review the prostitutes, and a recent post discussed why giving the johns a chance to openly discuss and criticize the women was such a bad idea. (Not that she thinks any part of prostitution is a good idea, but in this post at least, she really had it out for the reviews in particular.)

In one review she singled out, the reviewer complained that the prostitute didn’t speak very good English and didn’t seem “interested” in what he’d paid her to do. The writer was really upset with this john (and, by extension, all johns who’d made similar comments in the Review section) because … Read More »

My mother said when we were sold, we must ask God to make our masters good, and I asked who He was. She told me, He sit up in the sky. When I was sold, I had a severe, hard master, and I was tied up in the barn and whipped. Oh! Till the blood run down the floor and I asked God, ‘why don’t you come and relieve me? — if I was you and you’se tied up so, I’d do it for you.’
-Sojourner Truth, Address to the Friends of Human Progress Meeting, October 1856

January 11 is National Human Trafficking Awareness Day. In honor of this day, Love 146 has been posting quotes about slavery, like the one above, to their blog every day this month. You should go to their blog and read all of them, because they’re … Read More »

A fight has erupted over a segment on Joan Rivers’ Fashion Police show on E!. For those who don’t know, the show involves a panelist of people who supposedly know something about fashion or style who look at pictures and videos of celebrities and make fun of what they’re wearing. I mean, I think that’s what it involves. I’ve never actually watched an episode since Joan Rivers kind of drives me nuts. (Seriously, I’ve never watched it. This isn’t like those other times when I’ve claimed not to have watched a trashy show. I know you don’t believe me, though. This is why you don’t cry “I-don’t-watch-bad-TV-shows.”)

Some people I respect, like Rachel Lloyd of GEMS, do watch the show. Last week Rachel wrote a piece for The Huffington Post about one of the segments from the show. During the segment, … Read More »

When I went to Love 146’s conference in Connecticut last year one of the most difficult sessions to sit through was about the pornification of our culture. It’s not that it was boring, but the material was really difficult to see and hear, and that’s saying something since the conference was about the sexual trafficking of children. The session was right before lunch and afterwards I remember joining a group outside to walk to a restaurant and no one saying anything to each other. We all kind of looked at our feet as we silently made our way to the restaurant. (And I made friends with some of those people later that weekend, so they weren’t just weird anti-social people. We were all really bummed, is what I’m saying.)

The speaker talked about Alfred Kinsey and Hustler and online porn and Beyonce, and … Read More »

Thanks to everyone who commented on this post. You gave me some insightful answers that weren’t the same old answers I was expecting to get.

This may be unnecessary, but I wanted to give a little more detail to the questions posed after my presentation so that you can better understand the reasons behind my post.

The very first question came from a woman on the front row. She’d been paying attention the whole time and wasn’t shooting me dirty looks or anything. She asked, “So, you’re wanting to do this here, right?” I was confused, but finally figured out she meant do work for Love 146 here in Wichita. (Please note, I had mentioned Love 146 during my presentation, but I discussed probably a dozen groups that work against sex trafficking.)

After I told her that yes, I was interested in starting what … Read More »

Many moons ago (or maybe just one moon, I don’t know) I spoke to a real college class about international sex trafficking. These were people who paid real money* to learn stuff, and then they came back from their lunch break one day and found me, ready to speak to them for half an hour. They were very polite and looked as though they were interested, and I didn’t lose control of any bodily functions, so I felt like the presentation was a success.

After I was done speaking the teacher opened it up for questions. I had apparently fooled even her into believing I knew what I was talking about.

And then people took her up on her offer and actually started asking me questions. And most of them were about domestic trafficking. I had just spent 30 minutes discussing international … Read More »

Does this mean I kind of have to like Kristen Stewart now?

In related news, I’m currently reading the Twilight books. I think I would enjoy them more if I hadn’t seen the first movie, making me unable to picture Bella as someone who isn’t an always-pouting mouth-breather.