Blind Eye

It's not always easy being gifted with mercy.  I cry at every movie, tv show or commercial involving anything with pain, puppies or children leaving for college. I also grieve with people, I hurt when they hurt and I sometimes find myself desperately searching for ways to help when there simply are none. My gift of mercy is also coupled with a very passionate personality and if something touches my heart it becomes very difficult for me to leave it alone. And today, once again an issue I am passionate about has touched my heart...Human Trafficking.

This article showed up today and it grieves my heart. http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/07/29/fbi-rescues-at-least-105-child-prostitutes-in-nationwide-undercover-operation/ This is unacceptable my friends.  Children on OUR streets, the streets of a free nation, being sold for sex. We're not talking about Cambodia or Kenya, we're talking about Atlanta, Charlotte, Tampa.  Trust me, I also have much to say about the same issue in foreign countries. 

This should outrage us but I have to ask why it doesn't?  

I believe everyone of us reading this article and this blog would find the act of sex slavery despicable.  So why is it so easy to turn a blind eye to it?  In my view, I believe it's because we feel so separated from it. But are we? Sure, we're not buying these girls, nor are we selling them, but perhaps as a nation we are giving this industry its roots and and it's fuel...and I believe we are doing that, with dare I say it, pornography.

Do you realize that as a nation we spend more on porn than it would cost to end world hunger?  Sex slavery exists like every other business because of supply and demand and we are creating that very demand.

A sweet young friend of mine recently went on a trip to Cambodia to fight against this issue as she served in a home that rescued girls as young as 5. Yes, 5. Here's what she had to say in her blog, "It is no secret in Cambodia that sex is a big thing that the Westerners want. Most of the time, it is safe to assume that a Western, white man with a younger Khmer girl is only using her for that evening. It is sickening". You can read more at http://bemymagnificentobsession.blogspot.com/2013/06/what-its-like.html

Young rescued girls of Cambodia

For something that seems so innocent and personal, it isn't.  It's demoralizing and objectifying to a woman. It's easy to click on a link, pick up a magazine or enter a club, but I have to ask, would it still be easy if you knew that woman was a daughter, a once little girl who used to play dress up, play with dolls and have big dreams?  Or maybe a girl who was thrown out like trash by a family who didn't know how or even desire to care for her? Perhaps even a little one innocently playing and then being snatched up by a predator. Do you think it would be as easy to look at her if you were able to see her heart as well as her body?  A heart, raw and broken believing she is nothing, unlovable or useless. Well, I don't. 

What else does pornography do? It dehumanizes people and it deceives them.  It also kills marriages and relationships. It no longer sits hidden under a mattress or in a drawer, it comes to you, straight to your inbox and through your television. It removes all value to the peered upon one and it deceives the onlooker. I have never met a woman who had big dreams to become involved with porn, nor have I ever met a man who sought out to become addicted to it. But yet, they both happen. Every. Single. Day.  Let's not even discuss the chemical changes it creates in your body causing an ever increasing demand for more and for different.  Yes, there are sick predators in this world, but there are also normal every day people who have become so chemically altered and addicted that are doing far more offensive things than they ever could have imagined...thus the leap from porn to sex slavery.

As much as I could go on, I will close with this. I'm not naive to think that everyone reading this is immune to the deception of porn.  It may very well be an issue within your own home. I'm also not naive enough to think that everyone will share my views and in fact, some may very well find me extreme. However, if porn has made it's way in your home, would you consider kicking it out? Even if you feel it's harmless, there's nothing, absolutely nothing positive it will add.  Let's not be known as the nation that feeds the selling of young girls and spends billions on pornographic materials. Also, if you find me too conservative, well, that's ok. I'm a mother of 3 daughters who would give her life for them and if I know there are daughters out there in the world who need me, well then, here I am. Told ya that gift of mercy is a difficult one!

So, let's not turn a blind eye to the issue of sex slavery but instead go ahead and turn a blind eye to pornography and quit viewing it. 

PS. Not to self promote, just a passion for the issue, if you or a spouse does indeed have a problem please seek the help . We'd be honored to walk alongside you at www.firstcarecc.com . Not sure if it's a problem in your life, explore that here http://www.xxxchurch.com/