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Truckers Against Trafficking: A cause we can all get behind
November 4, 2011
| by: Todd Dills
Truckers News Editor Randy Grider says it best in his column in this month’s issue, titled “Your most important call” in reference to the Truckers Against Trafficking national hotline number for reporting incidents of child sex trafficking witnessed on the nation’s highways.
“Each year in this country,” Grider writes, “tens of thousands of kids are victims of human trafficking,” a $32 billion criminal business. “The average age of human trafficking victims is 12 years old. The life expectancy of a child after being forced into prostitution is 10 years.”
Grider made note of a film the TAT group has produced that premiered at the Great American Trucking Show and that , if you haven’t seen it, is absolutely gut-wrenching, and I can personally attest that it will be particularly so for those of you with young daughters. It centers around the story of an Ohio teen who was abducted from her own neighborhood and who then found herself forced to walk the parking lots of truckstops. A call to TAT’s hotline — (888) 373-7888 — from a driver eventually sprung her from that life.
At the same time, though, the film is heartening in the sense that it makes a clear case for drivers getting involved in combating the problem, one often made in it by several drivers interviewed themselves — all it takes to get it started is a phone call, after all. Spend a half hour at the TAT site watching the film if you haven’t as yet. Store the hotline number in your phone’s contacts and, should you see something you know isn’t right anywhere out there on the roadways, call it in.
Your “most important call,” indeed, could ultimately save lives.
Great organization that everyone needs to be aware of and take part in. I will be posting a link to their site along with their phone number on my Dispatch Me Home Social Site. Thanks Todd for bringing it to everyone’s attention.
I am the social media coordinator for TAT, and we so appreciate your help in spreading the word about how truckers can get involved in the fight against human trafficking. When we founded TAT, we believed that truckers would be the next abolitionist heroes in America. Become a trucker against trafficking; make the call, save lives!
You folks are doing a fantastic service Kylla and I hope you continue all your great work. I have posted your link to my http://www.dispatchmehomeext.ning.com website and would be honored if you also linked to us. I am also honored with your faith in the drivers, the husbands and fathers of the Trucking Industry. If you would like the info to link to my website, please contact Todd and he’ll put you in contact with me. Thanks again for all you are doing.
Kylla, Yes, heroes of the road — I’d say it’s a reality. And as Bandit notes here, combined with the existence of the hotline and your continued work, that definition can now continue to be ever more real.
[...] Klaas went on to note his long-held idea to make such information more readily available to drivers at truck stops via hyper-local television broadcasts — such a service, combined with other efforts like the Amber Alert system and Truckers Against Trafficking’s central hotline for reporting, could well put a further dent in a huge criminal enterprise I wrote about just last week in this hall. [...]
what are you telling these truck drivers who engage in sex with these girls??they wouldnt be at truck stops if there was no need..educate the men!!this is wrong on all fronts!!
[...] Yet another TV show involving truck drivers was in planning stages, Mack trucks were still being made in America, and drivers in ever greater numbers assisting law enforcement in combatting child prostitution via the Truckers Against Trafficking organization’s national hotline. [...]