Child, adult sex trafficking
Where to from here
FRIDAY’S (FT 15/01) editorial on Fiji being at the centre of the Pacific’s child and adult sex trafficking is not new news.
This has been apparent to Fiji citizens for many years. They knew it was happening in their youth, and now they are 60. That’s 40 years old at least.
I believe to shrink from this fact, or shrug it off, is to lie. And condone an ever-present evil that lurks close by in our neighbourhoods.
How easy this is, and how convenient too. Isn’t this where we must begin?
When good people do nothing to acknowledge this, how can they help broken families in their closest neighbourhood and in their own families; when they won’t seek help or encourage others to get it?
Surely we “die” inside – as slowly and definitively as the perpetrators, “the walking dead” – when we do nothing.
This is like maiming our own body permanently and leaving gaping gashes to bleed out. That’s what pretence does.
It’s not a judgement that’s needed here or yelling preachers; but a determined firm resolve that is an internal decision by us first, before it’s ever externalised to action. Start with a decision to face it.
Without this awareness, we remain unable to face the truth honestly, about this dreadful reality; or even begin to know the truth here in our very own homes and neighbourhoods.
If we keep pretending, this is not happening, when our instinct tells us otherwise; or statistics scream aloud in our faces, we are simply avoiding to check on suspicious behaviour. Then something is so off, it stinks.
And it grows like hideous cancer unchecked. It will kill us.
There is nothing as cowardly as those who pretend just to save face, or avoid; or evade or worse, pretend it’s OK, that it isn’t really happening.
Wrong, it is. And has been for years in Fiji.
There are resources available for change offered freely, and there are services to equip us to help in these dark recesses of our communities, and within us.
Why would we not take heed of these resources or the generous opportunities offered to us?
Where to from here – has to begin with stopping pretence, denial and avoiding.
Start with: “What can I do to change me / or this?”
All strength to those clandestine heroines and heroes who are out there, doing this change already. JEAN HATCH
Nabua, Suva