GOT To STOP Fashion Sparks Courageous Conversations

Congratulations to UNITAS (United Together Against Human Trafficking) and the curriculum writing and development team on winning the 2022 Anthem Award for their Transformative Anti-Human Trafficking Curriculum.   

Got To Stop LLC CEO and Founder, Erika L. Ewing,, along with her colleagues was part of the DREAM Team who created LIGHTS."

LIGHTS is a narrative-based prevention education curriculum designed to empower young people with knowledge and skills to protect themselves from human trafficking and exploitation." LIGHTS was created by experts with over 100-years of combined experience. Additional survivors were also contracted and were key to informing LIGHTS. 

https://app.participate.com/pages/lights-curriculum-overview)

Got To Stop LLC endeavors to raise awareness and educate school communities on ways to prevent and reduce the illegal dehumanizing and demoralizing sale of children.

Human Trafficking is a lifestyle. It involves the use of force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act.[1] It is the largest growing industry in the United States. It surpasses the selling of illegal guns and drugs. Annually, human trafficking globally generates an estimated $150 billion in profits.[2] United States ranks as the number one country for Human Trafficking. The motive of traffickers—regardless of the type of human trafficking they are engaged in—is clear: money!2 Whether it is labor trafficking, sex-trafficking, or organ trafficking, bodies are being bought and sold every second of the day. 

Our children are online more frequently, for educational, social, and recreational purposes as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Children’s social media usage has increased. Online predators, who are motivated by money, take advantage of the rise in economic turmoil, health disparities, food insecurity, homelessness, increased internet usage, are lurking on social media apps, gaming platforms, group chats, direct messaging, gift exchange and mobile payment services. Due to Covid-19 lockdown mandates, children who may seek help may not get the support they need because access to preventive and protection services are not easily accessible.  

Predators breed in vulnerable conditions and profit substantially from disadvantaged and trauma-related situations. When children’s basic physiological, financial, or social-emotional needs are not met or conflicts/abuses exist in the home, children can fall into the hands of sexual predators. While children are home or unsupervised, online predators stalk social media pages recruiting boys and girls or finding peer recruiters and luring them away from their homes and within their homes leading them into the life of commercial sexual exploitation. 

While all children are vulnerable to human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation in the African-American community; Black girls, Black boys, and Black LBGTQI youth are targeted at higher rates than any other race in the United States. Human Trafficking statistics in the African-American community are inaccurate because cases are unreported/underreported or the statistics for white trafficked children include Latinx. “Moreover, today’s anti-trafficking movement has failed to understand and address the racial contours of domestic sex trafficking in the United States and even perpetuates the racial myths that undermine the proper identification of minority youth as sex trafficking victims.”[3]

Parents and schools must take joint responsibility in teaching our kids how to use technology safely and responsibly. We must take accountability.  Got To Stop LLC can show you how to take action now!

[1] https://www.dhs.gov/blue-campaign/what-human-trafficking

[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/carmenniethammer/2020/02/02/cracking-the-150-billion-business-of-human-trafficking/?sh=2522af634142

[3] https://thevoiceofblackcincinnati.com/african-american-human-trafficking/