HOME-SCHOOLING: Running to help child sex slaves

Canadian home-schoolers Eric and Rebecca Proffitt are taking their five daughters on an unusual tour this summer. They are visiting the landmarks of Washington, New York and England — but not as tourists. Instead, the family is trailing Eric as he runs nearly 20 miles a day with chains on his hands, feet and torso to call attention to the enslavement of children for sex.

“Nearly 60 percent of people in slavery are children — and 80 percent of slaves are exploited sexually,” Eric explained at the Human Impact Forum held recently at the University of Maryland.

Nancy Winston of Shared Hope International offered the findings of the group’s recent report, “Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: America’s Prostituted Children,” which estimates at least 100,000 children are being trafficked each year in the U.S.

Many victims are not paid, but are coerced through threat. Theresa Flores recounted her two-year nightmare of being drugged and raped, then forced to service countless men by a criminal ring that threatened her family, beat and tortured her, and promised to expose her with photos in her affluent suburban school.

Pornography plays a huge role in the cycle of exploitation, the experts report. It is used to create demand among the buyers, it is used to groom the victims to perform the acts, and it depicts the actual criminal act itself.

The profit motive is the accelerant for the trade in underage sex slaves. Unlike drug dealers, Miss Winston reports, flesh dealers cooperate with each other to provide product — the prostituted girls or boys — to various events or locations, buy and sell the prostituted youths from each other, use technology to warn each other of enforcement efforts, and collude with each other to control the victims. Adding to the problem, few customers are ever arrested or prosecuted.

Department of Justice figures show the average age of entry into prostitution is 13. Incest or molestation is a huge causative factor; up to 95 percent of victims were molested in the home first. Some 30 percent of victims are first prostituted by a member of their own family. Drug-addicted mothers often trade their daughters to their dealers in exchange for drugs.

The Proffitts’ desire is to attack this modern-day slave trade by creating change in the culture that allows it.

“During the slavery era in America, the Underground Railroad helped victims go from an area that had a culture supporting slavery to an area where the culture didn’t support it. Even when the Fugitive Slave Act was passed, the people of the North resisted sending the victims back into slavery. In the same way, we need to create a culture which will not allow children to be enslaved as objects of greed and lust,” Mr. Proffitt said.

Beginning at the Lincoln Memorial earlier this month and running to the Statue of Liberty, Eric has been running about 20 miles a day in the hot August weather, weighed down by stainless steel chains. He trained for months to prepare for the blisters and abrasions that develop as the heavy chains rub the skin raw with each step.

His wife and five daughters are trailing him in a van posted with statistics about the enslavement of children. Supporters are invited to run with him, and in the evenings, he speaks, sings and shares the message: End the demand, protect the victims, make it unacceptable for anyone’s body to be exploited for greed, power or profit.

After running this modern-age “Freedom Trail” in the U.S., the Proffitt family will repeat the same process in Britain, culminating with the 200th anniversary celebration of William Wilberforce’s successful crusade to end slavery in that nation, a story immortalized in the movie “Amazing Grace.”

The Proffitts are just one example of how home-schoolers can bring the power of a united family to a societal problem. For information on Run 4 the Rescue, or to follow the family’s progress, visit www.run4therescue.com.

• Kate Tsubata is a freelance writer and home-schooler living in Maryland.