Maria J. Velasco
Staff Writer
On Nov. 15 the lights in the President’s Dining Room were dimmed for a viewing of a video made by the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking.
The video showed immigrants who were being forced to work for no pay, under the threat of being deported, killing their families or torture if they sought help. Most of the women in the video were willingly brought to the United States and then held against their will.
A group of about 40 from the ULV community gathered to view and discuss the video and address “Slavery Today: How Do We Respond?”
Much of the discussion focused on terminology.
After the video, Johanna Kardux, director of American Studies at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands and the University of La Verne’s Fulbright Scholar in Residence, and Richard Rose, professor of philosophy and religion, gave short speeches on the subject and the video.
“It’s hard for me to see modern day slavery in the same light as the institutional slavery imposed on African-Americans for 300 years,” Rose said.
Rose said that calling this slavery diminishes the horrible oppression of African-Americans for 300 years.
Kardux agreed that the terminology used to refer to modern day slavery needs to be changed.
“Trafficking cannot be called slavery,”she said. “It is … misplaced. Slavery was completely legalized.” Kardux said.
Both speakers agreed that the trafficking of people is a violation of human rights and there is no excuse for this type of action to be occurring in the United States, but they both said that there should be a different term other than slavery to call attention to the problem.
“It is a strategic political move to call it slavery,” Kardux said.
Following the presentation, the audience was allowed to ask questions.
“I understand there is no comparison, but I do understand why they would compare it,” said Alma Parada, a senior biology major.
The average American does not really understand trafficking, so using the word slavery causes people to actually take notice and care about it, Parada said.
“It calls people’s attention at the expense of forgetting history,” Kardux answered.
Rose said that trafficking victims can go from victim to survivor to advocate all in one lifetime. Slaves did not have those privileges.
“Instead of using the word slavery, they can use something else like forced labor,” Toya Johnson-Moore, a junior criminology major, said. “There needs to be a different term that does not take away from history. Define a new word and use it.”
“The distinction will help (with) the solution,” Adham Chehab, associate professor of business administration, said.
The discussion then turned into the differences between slavery and trafficking.
The main difference is that slavery was forced and legal, human trafficking is not.
“What we have here is different,” Chehab said. “The difference is having something that is legal, having people scared to death. There needs to be better enforcement of the legal system, then we will find a solution,” Chehab said.
Ian Lising, assistant professor of speech and debate, said the only way to solve this problem is to find a universal definition of slavery.
Human slavery occurs in central Europe and many other places.
Every place has a different standard of living, he said.
“We consider 18 hours a day (of work) horrible, but there are a lot of countries where that’s a Saturday,” Lising said.
“What is the universal standard for a human being to be treated?”he asked. “Unless you can find a standard there is no solution.”
In the end everyone seemed to agree that the terminology for modern day slavery needs to be changed, and we as a society need to take action against such disgraceful activity.
“Educate the masses (and) curb this illegal, inhumane activity,” Rose said.
Maria J. Velasco can be reached at mvelasco@ulv.edu.
