{"id":37762,"date":"2018-07-17T05:00:03","date_gmt":"2018-07-17T09:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/lovejoyfeminism\/?p=37762"},"modified":"2018-07-16T06:59:10","modified_gmt":"2018-07-16T10:59:10","slug":"the-right-is-blatantly-misusing-the-term-human-trafficking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/lovejoyfeminism\/2018\/07\/the-right-is-blatantly-misusing-the-term-human-trafficking.html","title":{"rendered":"The Right Is Blatantly Misusing the Term “Human Trafficking”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

White House spiritual advisor Paula White recently visited an immigration detention facility<\/a> holding children. In the In news articles covering her visit, White repeatedly refers to the children at the facility\u2014whom she says were unaccompanied minors\u2014as the recipients of human trafficking.<\/p>\n

White recently visited the Youth for Tomorrow facility in Bristow, Virginia, a foster facility that is taking care of several unaccompanied immigrant children who were trafficked<\/strong> into the U.S. from countries like and Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.<\/p>\n

After visiting the center, White told CBN News<\/a>\u00a0in an interview published Monday that what is being portrayed in the media about the situation is misleading\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

She said that each child is given an assessment when they arrive, which includes medical and debt evaluation.<\/p>\n

White explained that she learned while visiting the center just how many unaccompanied children are in debt to human traffickers<\/strong> who brought them illegally into the U.S.<\/p>\n

White said that at the center she visited, \u201call of the children\u201d faced some sort of debt totaling between $3,000 to as much as $10,000 \u201cbecause they have been smuggled.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also said there are cases in which parents had mortgaged their homes or put their land up to pay for their child\u2019s trafficking<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

White told CBN News National Security Correspondent Erik Rosales that her visit had \u201c100 percent\u201d strengthened her views on border security.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile I recognize how well we are taking care of these children, I also recognize the situation,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are talking about children that are being trafficked<\/strong>.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For weeks, I\u2019ve seen arguments over the separation of immigrant children from their parents hit a wall over claims that most of the children are victims of human trafficking, and that border security is protecting them by taking them from their traffickers. I had thought this claim was simply prima facie false. On reading White\u2019s comments, however, the reality appears to be a concerted effort to play fast and loose with the term \u201chuman trafficking.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

If the children at the shelter White visited were truly unaccompanied minors, it is indeed likely that they were smuggled into the U.S. by someone who was not their parent. In countries like Honduras, widespread gang violence renders teens particularly vulnerable\u2014the boys to recruitment, and the girls to rape or prostitution. Many parents have responded by sending their children north to family members in the U.S., paying \u201ccoyotes\u201d to smuggle them there.<\/p>\n

But is this human trafficking?<\/p>\n

When most people hear the term \u201chuman trafficking,\u201d they think of sex trafficking and other forms of slavery or forced labor. They likely won\u2019t think of human smuggling, where someone is paid to smuggle a person into a country. And yet, that appears to be how White is using the term\u2014to reference human smuggling, and not human trafficking<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I suspect that an obfuscation between human trafficking and human smuggling by commentators on the Right may be the origin of claims that \u201cmost\u201d children who show up at the border are \u201cvictims of human trafficking.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is starting to become repetitive, but, to reiterate once again\u2014when people hear the term \u201cvictims of human trafficking,\u201d they\u2019re going to assume it refers to kids being sold into lives of prostitution or slavery, not children whose parents are paying to send to join relatives in the U.S. to protect them from gang recruitment or violence<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Reading White\u2019s comments made me curious. Was my definition of human trafficking off? Did human trafficking actually include all instances of human smuggling, and not just cases that involve sex slavery, forced labor, or other forms of exploitation? Curious, I looked up how the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime defines the term<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Article 3, paragraph (a) of the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons<\/a> defines Trafficking in Persons as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In other words, no, the UN does not include human smuggling in its definition of human trafficking. Human trafficking by definition must involve exploitation, which is defined as prostitution, forced labor, or the removal of organs.<\/p>\n

What about in the U.S.? Perhaps the term is defined differently by the U.S. government? To answer this question, I looked up how the Department of Homeland Security defines human trafficking<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Human trafficking is modern-day slavery and involves the use of force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The U.S. government does not include human smuggling in its definition of human trafficking either. Human trafficking must involve forcing or coercing a person into \u201csome type of labor or commercial sex act.\u201d<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s not just the Department of Homeland Security! Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has an entire article on their website<\/a> differentiating between human trafficking and human smuggling.<\/p>\n

\n

Trafficking vs. Smuggling<\/h3>\n

Trafficking vs. Smuggling: What\u2019s the Difference?<\/h4>\n

Human trafficking and human smuggling are distinct criminal activities, and the terms are not interchangeable. Human trafficking centers on exploitation<\/u> and is generally defined as:<\/p>\n