Price of Life NYC

Leaders in Action - the New York State Anti-Trafficking Coalition

The classy, polished office on the 40th floor of the Met Life building was already filled with intense discussion when I arrived alongside the Price of Life team. Dorchen Leidholt, of Sanctuary for Families New York (SFFNY), led an earnest group (all women except for myself and two others), as they reviewed a recent protest and press release, as well as plans for the next term’s lobbying efforts. I recognized several faces, including Norma Ramos of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW), and Kathleen Slocum, co-founder of Restore NYC and staff attorney for SFFNY.

Sitting in an office with 20 representatives from different groups that compiled the New York Anti-Trafficking Coalition (NYATC), some of my friends back home might note the drastic change from my typical environment. Two weeks earlier I’d been sitting in a crowded San Antonio apartment as my closest friends gathered to see me off for the summer. That gathering- with gym short clad college students eating vanilla cake because fair-trade chocolate is too expensive- is a stark contrast to the white collar room I now found myself in.

My arrival in New York City was six months in the making, as I had learned about the Price of Life internship through New York City Urban Project (NYCUP) right around New Year’s. NYCUP is a hub for several different poverty-fighting projects in the NYC, one of which being the Price of Life internship that is laying the foundation for a Fall 2013 city-wide, campus-centered, faith based campaign focusing on human trafficking. Considering my personal commitment to fight human trafficking in every way possible, this was a unique and valuable opportunity.

Read the rest of the account of the NYSATC meeting by Price of Life: NYC summer intern Eddie Knight, on the Field Notes page of our website.

Restore NYC & Price of Life- A force for freedom

Recently the Price of Life team met with one of New York’s most vital players in the fight against sex trafficking. After a day of planning for events, such as an artist round table discussion happening on July 16th, and executing intricate presentation for potential partners, we gathered for a memorable meeting.

The meeting was with Jimmy Lee, the executive director of Restore NYC, a nonprofit that provides holistic aftercare for foreign-born sex trafficked survivors. Founder Faith Huckel “diligently led the building of Restore from the ground up and created a movement of awareness of the realities of the modern-day slave trade in New York City,” as stated on their website. Needless to say it was an honor to speak with the now head of Restore after learning the incredible programs they are offering to mainly Korean, Chinese, and Latina women.

Read the rest of the account of the meeting with Jimmy Lee, by Price of Life: NYC Summer Intern, Maria Dora Berruti, on the Field Notes page of our website.

The Price of Life: $100 or 3 months

A Singapore court recently sentenced a man for trafficking under-aged girls into the sex industry. Spencer Gwee Hak Theng was arrested, along with his wife, after police rescued multiple girls, under 18 who were imported from Vietnam and forced into sex work by the pair. They were charged with multiple counts. Gwee was sentenced to 5 years in prison for his role. His wife is still on the run.

Five years. Five years in prison for taking children from their families and home, and selling them for sex multiple times a day, every day of the week, for years on end. Five years for submitting girls to daily horrors and abuse. Only five years paid for destroying and breaking a child’s soul. So, what crime does deserve five years in prison? In New York City, possession of 8 or more ounces of controlled substances results in, at the minimum, 15 years in prison. Even a class A – II felony of less than 8 ounces of narcotic controlled substances can have up to 8 years in prison.

I get so angry when I read about sentencing in trafficking cases. I am happy that governments are acknowledging the problem and taking steps to serve justice, but a mere five years for trading human beings like objects?

This same article detailed the conviction of a taxi driver who paid for sex with a 16 year old. Can you guess how much time he was sentenced to? Three months. Three months for raping a 16 year old girl – twice. Three months for contributing to the sexual exploitation, scarring, and degradation of a child.

I don’t think that we have descended to the point of putting an actual price on someone’s life, but I think we have begun to put prices on people’s worth. What does it say about the 16 year old girl’s worth that johns paid her traffickers a mere $100 to rape the girl? What message does it send that those traffickers were only given 5 years in prison, or that the rapist was only sentenced to 3 months?

I don’t have answers for those questions. I don’t know how to quantify, in years, the worth of a girl’s pain and suffering. Do you? How can governments and legal systems provide justice to victims that reflect and acknowledge everything they have been through?

— Guest Blogger, Price of Life Summer Intern Lydia Chu

“Like a Yelp for Slave-Free … “

Whenever we try and explain what a LOGOFF App is, “Yelp, but slave free” is inevitably one of the first explanations. Here, Mike Notley explains a little bit more what we’re making and why.

By Mike Notley, former InterVarsity student and current NYCUP Intern

What do we do when cultural norms and systemic complacency allow injustice to continue in our world? We create catalysts for change!

LoGOFF is a movement started within our partner project, the NYC Urban Project, as a way to combat human labor trafficking. It stands for Local, Green, Organic, Fair Trade, & Slave Free. We see it as the catalyst for the change in how we consume everything things while fighting for worker rights and their protection. On this past April 28th, people gathered together to brainstorm what this change would look like.

This is what we came up with…

At All Angels Church on the Upper West Side, people of many different backgrounds came to show their support and offer their skill-sets to see God’s kingdom lived out through the act of justice in consumption. We started the day with Worship, acknowledging that we are thankful for a God who is bigger than us and our problems. That if He is the way, the truth, and the life than we know He is fully capable of ending this injustice of Human Trafficking and that we can take comfort in placing our hope in Him because there is victory in His death.

During the afternoon tracks were held that we strategically picked for our first meeting. They included Theology, Design, Development, Data Collection. After collaborating for a couple hours we were excited with the result. We could actually see congruence within all the groups as we began to think big about what this LOGOFF App could look like, what it could do, and how it would help others to easily “LOGOFF of what is easy and LOGON to what is right.”

Keep an eye out on what’s new for LoGOFF in the coming months, our NYCUP Summer Immersion Project where students will be collecting data for the App, and how you can participate to make this a reality!

Who’s complying with the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act?

The Act: As of January 2012, requires companies with more than US$100m in sales worldwide that do business in California to clearly post on their websites the steps they are taking to address human trafficking and slavery.

The Rationale: If consumers know what companies are doing, they can support good practices with their dollars. [That’s the idea behind the New York City Urban Project / Price of Life upcoming LOGOFF creative work day! Are you going?]

Compliance: A University of Delaware study found that about a quarter of eligible companies have not posted the information as required.

Who’s doing it right? The study reports that:

The Jones Group, whose brands include Jones New York, Anne Klein, Rachel Roy and Nine West, [i]s an industry leader in this area, as its disclosures not only addressed all elements but also contained supporting evidence for each of its statements.