Barbarous Legacy Reborn, Multiplied, Savored by Distracted Masses

Modern-day Slavery (human trafficking, forced labor, forced sexual exploitation, debt bondage, unlivable shelter)

Post-Confederacy Era Establishment

Built and Bolstered by Consumerists and the Wealthy

M

ore than forty million people (est. 40.3 million) at any time during 2016 languished in “modern slavery.” In that number, “24.9 million [languished] in forced labor,” and “15.4 million in forced marriage.”

• In any four victims, one child is a slave.

• Women and girls bear the brunt of slavery.

• 99 percent of victims in the commercial sex industry, and

• 58 percent in other sectors

In the 24.9 million people trapped in forced labor

• 16 million are exploited in the private sector (e.g. domestic work, construction, or agriculture)
• 4.8 million are in forced sexual exploitation, and
• 4 million in state authorities’ imposed forced labor

“Forced labor,” according to the ILO, “can be understood as work that is performed involuntarily and under the menace of any penalty. It refers to situations in which persons are coerced to work through the use of violence or intimidation; or by more subtle means, such as manipulated debt, retention of identity papers, or threats of denunciation to immigration authorities.”

Definition of “forced labor” encompasses:

“traditional practices of forced labor, such as vestiges of slavery or slave-like practices;

various forms of debt bondage

Evidence of slavery in recent decades

• New forms of forced labor including human trafficking

• ‘Modern-slavery’ that includes “working and living conditions contrary to human dignity”

Indicators for determining when a situation amounts to forced labor

• Restrictions on workers’ freedom of movement

• Withholding of wages or identity documents

• Evidence of physical or sexual violence

• Threats and intimidation

• Fraudulent debt from which workers cannot escape

The International Labor Organization (1919-2020) is the only tripartite (187 member states of governments, employers, workers) United Nations agency assembled to

·       set labor standards

·       develop policies and

·       devise programs promoting decent work for all women and men

I

LO Member states

Afghanistan	Albania	Algeria
Angola	Antigua and Barbuda	Argentina
Armenia	Australia	Austria
Azerbaijan	Bahamas	Bahrain
Bangladesh	Barbados	Belarus
Belgium	Belize	Benin
Bolivia (Plurinational State of)	Bosnia and Herzegovina	Botswana
Brazil	Brunei Darussalam	Bulgaria
Burkina Faso	Burundi	Cabo Verde
Cambodia	Cameroon	Canada
Central African Republic	Chad	Chile
China	Colombia	Comoros
Congo	Cook Islands	Costa Rica
Côte d’Ivoire	Croatia	Cuba
Cyprus	Czechia	Democratic Republic of the Congo
Denmark	Djibouti	Dominica
Dominican Republic	Ecuador	Egypt
El Salvador	Equatorial Guinea	Eritrea
Estonia	Eswatini	Ethiopia
Fiji	Finland	France
Gabon	Gambia	Georgia
Germany	Ghana	Greece
Grenada	Guatemala	Guinea
Guinea-Bissau	Guyana	Haiti
Honduras	Hungary	Iceland
India	Indonesia	Iran (Islamic Republic of)
Iraq	Ireland	Israel
Italy	Jamaica	Japan
Jordan	Kazakhstan	Kenya
Kiribati	Kuwait	Kyrgyzstan
Lao People’s Democratic Republic	Latvia	Lebanon
Lesotho	Liberia	Libya
Lithuania	Luxembourg	Madagascar
Malawi	Malaysia	Maldives
Mali	Malta	Marshall Islands
Mauritania	Mauritius	Mexico
Mongolia	Montenegro	Morocco
Mozambique	Myanmar	Namibia
Nepal	Netherlands	New Zealand
Nicaragua	Niger	Nigeria
North Macedonia	Norway	Oman
Pakistan	Palau	Panama
Papua New Guinea	Paraguay	Peru
Philippines	Poland	Portugal
Qatar	Republic of Korea	Republic of Moldova
Romania	Russian Federation	Rwanda
Saint Kitts and Nevis	Saint Lucia	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Samoa	San Marino	Sao Tome and Principe
Saudi Arabia	Senegal	Serbia
Seychelles	Sierra Leone	Singapore
Slovakia	Slovenia	Solomon Islands
Somalia	South Africa	South Sudan
Spain	Sri Lanka	Sudan
Suriname	Sweden	Switzerland
Syrian Arab Republic	Tajikistan	Thailand
Timor-Leste	Togo	Tonga
Trinidad and Tobago	Tunisia	Turkey
Turkmenistan	Tuvalu	Uganda
Ukraine	United Arab Emirates	United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
United Republic of Tanzania	United States of America	Uruguay
Uzbekistan	Vanuatu	Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of)
Viet Nam	Yemen	Zambia
Zimbabwe

https://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/how-the-ilo-works/member-states/lang--en/index.htm

Complicit in Modern-day slavery

I

nfluential People’s Complicity in Slavery

Sex trafficker, abuser of minors, all-round criminal Jeffrey Epstein entertained in his element such powerful and influential public figures as 

• William (Bill) Jefferson Blythe Clinton, 

• William (Bill) Henry Gates III, 

• Businessman and television personality (2017-present US president) Donald John Trump, and 

• British royal, third child of Queen Elizabeth, Prince Andrew (Duke of York, etc)

Donald John Trump, Businessman, Television personality, 45th US president and

Jeffrey Edward Epstein

The Trump-Epstein social relationship reportedly began “in the late 1980s” and reportedly extended into the 2000s.

“‘I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy,’ Trump is recorded saying.

 ‘He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it — Jeffrey enjoys his social life.’”

News accounts chronicling the Trump-Epstein relationship show the following:

• Frequent mention of “Trump attending Epstein-hosted social events and Epstein attending events at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club … from the late 1990s and early 2000s”

• Epstein – Trump’s “Friends and associates” reporting the two men “had socialized for years, drawn together by a mix of money, women and power.”

• Trump and Epstein together at a Mar-a-Lago party discussing women and laughing together appear in a 1992 video later discovered and aired by NBC.

• Businessman George Houraney reported “Trump asked him to organize a ‘calendar girl’ party at Mar-a-Lago — and said he and Epstein would be the only men in attendance” (New York Times).

• Message pads law enforcement removed from Epstein’s Florida mansion reveal that businessman Donald Trump in November 2004 had “called Epstein twice”; and among Epstein’s possessions was his “black book” containing “many notable people’s numbers” including “several phone numbers for Trump, an emergency contact, and a number for Trump’s security.”
• The brother of Jeffrey Epstein reported that “Trump [had flown] ‘numerous times’ on Epstein’s plane.”

William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III), US president (1993- 2001); governor of Arkansas (1979–1981; 1983–1992), attorney general of Arkansas (1977–1979) and

Jeffrey Edward Epstein

A Daily Beast investigation uncovered ties between Epstein and the Clinton administration dating back to the president’s earliest days in the White House

• “As early as 1993, records show, Epstein donated $10,000 to the White House Historical Association and attended a donors’ reception hosted by Bill and Hillary Clinton.

• “Around the same time, according to a source familiar with the connection, Epstein visited presidential aide Mark Middleton several times at the White House.

• “Two years later, businesswoman Lynn Forester de Rothschild” [New Jersey-born Lynn Forester is the wife, successively, of Alexander Platt (Divorced), Andrew Stein (1983–1993), and Sir Evelyn Robert de Rothschild (2000–present), whose last marriage garnered an invitation from Hillary Rodham and Bill Clinton to honeymoon at the White House. She reportedly champions a “political movement called ‘Inclusive Capitalism’; and poured money into the HR Clinton and the deceased John McCain presidential campaigns] “wrote a personal letter to Clinton [?] thanking him for their talk about the [Epstein (?)] financier.”

Net worth estimates alphabetically

Bill Clinton: $120 million

Jeffrey Edward Epstein at the time of death: $577 million

Lynn Forester de Rothschild: $673.6 million

Bill Gates: (2019) $107.1 billion

Barack Obama: $70 million

Donald Trump (2020): $2.1 billion

C

onsumers’ Complicity in Slavery

Products at Risk of Modern Slavery

Import value (in thousands of US$) - Source - Countries

Laptops, Computers, Mobile phones	91,036,688
China Malaysia
Apparel, Clothing accessories	47,246,259
Argentina Brazil China India Malaysia Thailand Vietnam Argentina
Fish	3,283,788
China Ghana Indonesia Japan Russia South Korea Taiwan Thailand
Cocoa	1,200,273
Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) Ghana
Timber	865,708
Brazil Peru

Slavery

Follow the Money, and the Indifference

For the enslavers, modern slavery “is a multibillion-dollar industry.”

Traffickers’ estimated total annual revenues in 2014 was $150-plus billion dollars

1809 American slaves reportedly sold for an estimated equivalency, in today’s currency, of $40,000

In 2020, one slave “can be bought for $90.”

Slavery by descent or “chattel slavery” is the form most commonly associated with the word ‘slavery’— the enslaved being the personal property of the enslaver (by conquest during the Roman Empire or from slave raiding during the Atlantic or Arab slave trade)—that ancient “slavery” long abolished has been replaced by a much more multifaceted construct whose numbers far exceed the chattel era or the Atlantic slave trade era.

In the modern era, traffickers use the Internet and popular social networking sites to locate vulnerable people for purposes of exploitation. Social media and smartphone apps are used to sell the slaves.

2016

USA neglect and discard

• Guatemalan teens were discovered “being held captive by traffickers and forced to work at a local egg farm in Ohio”

• The Obama government “placed migrant children with human traffickers” by failing diligently to check background or visit housing of adults claiming to be sponsors of migrant children

Among (2016) 1,067 potential labor trafficking cases reported to the National Human Trafficking Hotline, the largest number involved

• domestic work (197)

• agriculture and farm work (125)

• traveling sales crews (100)

• restaurant or food services (74) and

• health and beauty services (45), among others.

2017

• National Human Trafficking Hotline received reports of 8,524 suspected human trafficking cases.

• Human Trafficking Institute reports 783 active criminal and civil human trafficking cases involving 1,930 defendants: (approx.) 89 percent criminal cases, 11 percent civil suits.

• The National Domestic Workers Alliance estimated approximately two million domestic workers in modern slavery in the United States (The United States government keeps no official records of modern slavery reported cases, investigations, or litigation)

National Domestic Worker Alliance affiliated organizations reported:

• 66 percent of victims report having experienced physical or sexual abuse, either by their employer or a family member of their employer

• 78 percent report being threatened by deportation by their employers if they complained

• 85 percent of victims reported having pay withheld or being paid well below minimum wage

• 80 percent were tricked with false or otherwise deceptive contracts

2018

The Global Slavery Index (2018) figures: 

• roughly 40.3 million individuals are currently caught in modern slavery, 
• 71 percent of whom are women and girls; 
• one-in-four are children.

Modern slavery in the United States: 1.3 victims per 1,000.

2019-2020

US State Department data: Men, women, and children trafficked across international borders annually (estimated):

• 600,000 to 820,000: 70 percent women and girls, up to 50 percent minors.

• People trafficked annually within the United States (estimated): 50,000

UK government studies revealed in 2020 modern slavery had risen “by 51 percent.”

• Registered cases in March 2019: 5,144

• Registered cases in Marcy 2018: 3,412

P

erhaps when the activists stop tearing down all those American Confederacy and other Empire era statues, they will start tearing down the slave institutions they create and sustain every day of their lives. 

None are so blind as those who cannot or will not see the stone in their own eyes or the misguidedness in their deeds.

Those who cannot or will not see their own complicity in political, psychological and social regression (cannot sense and take hold of their responsibility for writing new chapters, not burning the books of the past) are themselves contributors to the sad state of the human condition; and, indeed, the sad state of the world.  

Sources

International Labor Organization “Forced labour, modern slavery and human trafficking” [Source: Global Estimates of Modern Slavery: Forced Labour and Forced Marriage, Geneva, September 2017] https://www.ilo.org/global/topics/forced-labour/lang--en/index.htm

“What is forced labour, modern slavery and human trafficking?” https://www.ilo.org/global/topics/forced-labour/definition/lang--en/index.htm

“Ratifications of C029— Forced Labour Convention, 1930 (No. 29)” entry into force: May 1, 1932;

Ratifying Countries: 178

Non ratifying Countries

Afghanistan	Brunei Darussalam
China	Marshall Islands
Palau	Republic of Korea
Tonga	Tuvalu
United States of America

https://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:11300:0::NO::P11300_INSTRUMENT_ID:312174

Ratifications of C105—Abolition of Forced Labour Convention, 1957 (No. 105)” entry into force January 17, 1959

Ratifying Countries: 175

USA ratified: September 25, 1991

https://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:11300:0::NO:11300:P11300_INSTRUMENT_ID:312250:NO

Exceptions to the “forced labor” definition

Compulsory military service

Normal civic obligations

Prison labour (under certain conditions)

Work in emergency, situations (such as war, calamity or threatened calamity e.g. fire, flood, famine, earthquake)

Minor communal services (within the community)

Prohibition of State Authorities-imposed Forced labor

 “Abolition of Forced Labour Convention No. 105,” adopted by the ILO in 1957, addresses forced labor imposed by state authorities; and specifically prohibits the use of forced labor:

as punishment for the expression of political views

for the purposes of economic development

as a means of labor discipline

as a punishment for participation in strikes

as a means of racial, religious or other discrimination.

https://www.ilo.org/global/topics/forced-labour/definition/lang--en/index.htm

The International Labor Organization was founded in 1919 “in the belief that peace and social justice go hand in hand.”

The International Labour Organization and the quest for social justice, 1919-2009, a March 16, 2009, book by Gerry Rodgers, Lee Swepston,  Eddy Lee, and Jasmien van Daele exploring key ideas championed by the ILO and applied through political and economic upheavals over 90 years: “rights at work, the quality of employment, income protection, employment and poverty reduction, a fair globalization, the overriding goal of decent work for all.” https://www.ilo.org/global/publications/ilo-bookstore/order-online/books/WCMS_104643/lang--en/index.htm

https://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/lang--en/index.htm

The ILO’s original constitutional text, established in 1919, “has been modified by the amendment of 1922 which entered into force on June 4, 1934; the Instrument of Amendment of 1945 which entered into force on September 26, 1946; the Instrument of Amendment of 1946 which entered into force on April 20, 1948; the Instrument of Amendment of 1953 which entered into force on May 20, 1954; the Instrument of Amendment of 1962 which entered into force on  May 22, 1963; and the Instrument of Amendment of 1972 which entered into force on November 1, 1974.”

“A Daily Beast investigation has uncovered ties between Epstein and the Clinton administration that date back to the president’s earliest days in the White House.” Emily Shugerman, Gender Reporter Suzi Parker August 19, 2019 https://www.thedailybeast.com/jeffrey-epstein-visited-clinton-white-house-multiple-times-in-early-90s

Business Insider “Les Wexner just stepped down as the CEO of L Brands amid fury over his relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Here are all the famous people Epstein was connected to.” Taylor Nicole Rogers. February 20, 2020 https://www.businessinsider.com/famous-people-jeffery-epstein-money-manager-sexual-trafficking-connected-2019-7

Vox “Jeffrey Epstein’s connections to Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, explained: Here’s what we know.” Andrew Prokopandrew August 10, 2019: “Soon after Bill Clinton concluded his presidency in 2001, the ties deepened. Clinton entered a new stage of his career, in which he’d travel the world, launch philanthropic initiatives, hang out with rich people and celebrities, and make money.… Jeffrey Epstein died while awaiting trial [August 10, 2019, Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York, New York] in what jail officials say was a suicide — bringing one of the highest-profile prosecutions in the nation to an abrupt conclusion.” https://www.vox.com/2019/7/9/20686347/jeffrey-epstein-trump-bill-clinton

Lynn Forester de Rothschild. Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynn_Forester_de_Rothschild

 “The couple [knghtlly] divide their time between homes in New York and London, the summer home on Martha’s Vineyard and the Rothschild family’s historic Ascott country estate in England.” Married to a “knight,” New Jersey-born Lynn Forester “is known socially as ‘Lady de Rothschild.’”

Slavery in the 21st century Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_21st_century

Global Slavery Index United States https://www.globalslaveryindex.org/2018/findings/country-studies/united-states/

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