Episode Transcript
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Hi, this is Jean Marc Cover. We've got a special guest, Meredith.
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She's from Tiger Lily Resources and she's
going to tell us a little bit
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about herself and then she's gonna answer
some questions for us. Hello Rachel.
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Yes, my name is Meredith and
I am a founder of Tiger Lily Resources.
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We are a St. Louis based
nonprofit ministry soon to be expanding nationally.
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UM started doing ministry work back and
started doing sex trafficking outreach and fighting
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that in and uh, we have
grown definitely in ways that I could have
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never imagined. And we are up
against the fight of our lives really with
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some serious evil that a lot of
people just can't even imagine. Fair enough,
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UM, so how did you get
into stopping sex trafficking? Well,
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I am a survivor, and I
honestly did not connect myself to that for
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probably about five years after I got
out of the life. UM, I
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was in a I was at a
friend's house and we were watching a documentary
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which I highly recommend if you were
interested in knowing more about sex trafficking.
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It's nefarious merchant of souls and it's
put on by exodus cry there are another
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ministry that's out of Kansas City,
Missouri that is a global abolitionist for fighting
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human trafficking. They're absolutely amazing.
But I was watching a documentary and uh,
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they'd go all around the world highlighting
what it looks like in various countries,
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and they landed in America and they
told the story of a girl Annie
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that was in Vegas. And when
she told her story, that's when I
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connected that, Oh my gosh,
that was my life. And it just
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hit me like a freight training.
And Uh, I knew I had already
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been in ministry, but we were
serving single moms because I kind of walked
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myself into the life as a suddenly
single mom. I was married and with
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my son's father for thirteen years,
and uh became suddenly single and my world
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came totally crashing down around me and
totally wiped out all of my self worth
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and I was in just the darkest
place in my life. So I walked
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into it um and then it quickly
took me into it further. Uh So
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when I started the ministry, I
intentionally was serving single moms because I didn't
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want them to get to a point
where they felt like that's all they had,
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and I knew that if I was
going through that, that there was
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thousands of other moms that were So
that's what we were focused on. But
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it wasn't until I saw that movie
that the Lord totally wrecked me and dealt
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with me and basically was like,
Okay, are you ready? And I
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was like, am I ready?
I didn't say no, but I was,
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I questioned, and I was like, what do you mean? Am
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I ready? Like that's my story. Nobody knows that I made it through
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that. And he was like,
yeah, but I didn't save you for
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you to play. It's safe.
Are you ready? And that was the
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start of my yes to him and
fighting human trafficking since then and it's been
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absolutely amazing and I will never stop
doing it. Um. What are some
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what? What are things that are
most common misconceptions when it comes to sex
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trafficking? They did a great job
in marketing and marketing the deception. Um.
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They always coin the victims as the
younger, helpless white girls who are
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non English speaking. Um that are
you know, either taken from a country
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brought here or they're chained up and
abducted. UM. That happens, sure,
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but the general practice I guess is
a very slow, slow process.
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Um. It's definitely traffickers knowing how
to build trust and build relationships with their
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victims over time, and they're very
patient because they know how lucrative that one
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victim is. They really take their
time. So, yes, abductions do
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happen, but all in all,
it's a very slow process of a relationship.
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What are something what are some signs
to notice that a child is becoming
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a target for sex trafficking. Um. Definitely, the phones and their hands
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play a huge role today. Um. We start giving kids phones, you
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know, the second they start mumbling
words to kind of occupy them, and
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so they know phones better than most
adults do. Um. So it's like
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second nature for a twelve thirteen year
old to just have her phone or his
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phone. Doesn't doesn't differentiate between boys
and girls. Um, the more on
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social media that they are, um, you know, even innocent postings of
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you know, a cheer competition or
a soccer game or anything like that,
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or if it's a comment from a
child of you know, oh me and
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my mom got into a fight today
and I'm just so tired of her.
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Um. There's trolls that go around
on social media and look for posts like
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that, and they try to be
friend um those children and a lot of
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times they'll pose as another child UM
or just somebody that gives them attention and
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gives them, um, you know, validation. So pay attention to the
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devices in their hands, what apps
are they on, who are they talking
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to. You might know their friends
face to face and that's great, but
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they have a lot more friends in
the palm of their hands, and that's
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a lot of times that's the fishing
line. That's where they get them from.
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So keep an eye on that.
Keep an eye on if children get
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new friends. And then and I
want to say, like children maybe like
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pre teen or young teen um miners
and they start disappearing, you know,
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for hours and hours at a time, come home with different new clothes or
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new items, knew another phone,
things like that. Just be very servant
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of who they're talking to and what
their possessions are. UM. What are
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some of the aftermaths you see in
recovering from sex trafficking. A lot of
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trauma, UM, a lot of
distrust UM. Definitely in the fight or
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flight or freeze mode UM, emptiness, brokenness, UM. There's just so
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much healing there's just layers and layers
of trauma that go along with trafficking.
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It's not just the act of the
sexual violence, but it's absolutely emotional and
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verbal and in substance a lot.
You can't do this um sober so the
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traffickers will introduce them to alcohol and
drugs. Um. So there's just layers
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upon layers upon layers of healing that
need to happen. And uh, definitely
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a broken heart above all things,
so broken trust, broken heart and a
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lot of trauma. Let's support systems
are in place for those recovering from being
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trafficked. Um, there's some I
would, in my opinion, definitely not
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enough. Um, we are getting
better, We're getting uh more, I
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guess well versed of services that are
needed. UM. But you know,
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there's the front line is always law
enforcement or health care. That's the first
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place that they might come across somebody
that needs help or that is hurt.
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UM. So it's very important for
them to know the signs of what they're
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looking for, um, because they
could have them right in front of them
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and not even have a clue,
and then that person just slips away when
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they could have intercepted them. Um. There are you know, programs that
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are specifically for traffic victims, but
there are very few and far between.
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UM. Again, they are growing
in number, not quickly enough, UM,
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and not in depth enough, but
they're getting better. So a lot
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of times we'll find services that are
blended blended services. So you might have
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a recovery substance abuse recovery program that
also integrates trafficking healing and trauma traumacare UM.
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You might have a domestic violence shelter
that is integrated trafficking UM. But
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it's very important to be able to
have a list, a good, strong,
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vetted list of programs that are specifically
for the needs of human trafficking victims,
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because they're just so different than just
a domestic violence or just substance abuse.
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I'm not demeaning them by any means, but if you add all of
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those complexities together, it's just a
whole different ball game of program that's needed.
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No, I can totally see that. UM. What are things you
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would like to see put in place
for software designers to help prevent sex trafficking?
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UM? Better First, the one
the things that are in place already.
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I'll give an example, and I
hope it's okay to name names because
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this is one of the biggest perpetrators
is Facebook. Um. They have community
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standards, which is in one aspect
it's okay, but it's on the other
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hand, it is not beneficial completely
to stopping and guarding the youth that are
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being exploited on that platform. UM. I would like to see better,
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and this would have to kind of
I don't know how this could happen,
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but it would almost have to come
from a personal a person actually manning the
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visual not just an algorithm, not
just bots, but something that can intercept
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visuals of younger faces, UM,
younger pictures. UM. There's just so
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much child um sexual abuse material and
even like soft kitty porn kind of soft
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um that float around on platforms like
that that are just let let through because
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they don't violate community standards, which
is unreal to me. UM. But
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if you and I've had personal experience
with this. I was on a post
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one day that was just it was
a Christian uh, kind of a funny
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meme kind of a group, and
it was a Christian based group, so
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it was very lighthearted, very uplifting, nothing derogatory on this page. And
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I was happening to scroll through the
comment section, and I saw a thumbnail
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comment that had a little picture in
a link, and in the picture it
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was a younger Asian girl, very
provocative, and I was like, let
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me, you know, everything about
that just red flag to me. So
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I clicked on it and it was
a link out of webs out of Facebook
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into another website that was literally porn. Then it was on this So I
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reported it to there the admin of
that page, Hey, flagged this,
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take it off UM. So it's
just people's eyes on their catching things.
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But I also reported it to Facebook
um administrative team, and they responded back
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maybe two days later and said that
they did not remove the post because it
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didn't violate community standards. While at
the same time, I was trying to
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get a paid ad that I was
paying for to put on Facebook that was
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marketing anti human trafficking efforts, and
they responded to me and said that it
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was too sensitive of content and they
wouldn't allow my ad to go on.
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So we're dropping the ball. We
won't catch the people doing it because they
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can get through Facebook standards the them
That's okay. I mean, I do
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swim lessons. I do swim lessons
and I have a picture of me with
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a dolphin, and they told me
that I couldn't have that post because they
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thought I was selling animals. Yeah, I'm selling let me all these I
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mean, there's literally groups that are
on Facebook that are called like generic names
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like kid models, child models.
And you go on these groups and some
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of them are a little you know, actual words thrown in. They're not
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nothing like vulgar or anything. Right, So you go on this and you,
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you know, for the the uneducated, I it would look like,
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oh, look at these cute little
kid models. No, when you look
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at them, they're not cute little
kid models. And when you look at
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the comments section, you can see
all of the uh forty six year old
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dirty men that are commenting on how
cute those little babies are so, and
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that doesn't violate stamples. Yeah,
yeah, no, I they definitely need
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to do a better job of that. And honestly, like and I don't,
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I mean, I think probably Facebook
is probably the worst example um of
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things that are allowed. Were probably
the best example of things that are allowed,
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but the worst example as far as
like anybody in the general population trying
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to take their own efforts to report
and to say hey, look this is
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happening. They won't get down.
So, UM, well, I thought
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if somebody could create started to create
a software that could like facial recognistfition child
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stuff, that would be great.
And if it already exists, I'd love
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to know. Okay, um,
because I know, I mean, I
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know they've had a lot of issues
with corn Hub and stuff as well.
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Yeah, fans, only our only
fans, however, it's only fans.
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Yeah. What are things you would
like to see put in community to help
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prevent sex trafficking? Um? Awareness
and education. Um, the more people
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know, the better you can.
You know, once you learn of something,
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you can't unlearn it. Once you
see it, you can't unsee it.
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And it's just it's pretty awesome to
see after time. Um, you
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know, like I said, we've
been doing this since so to see the
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people that we have connected with an
edge caated them on the topic, how
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their eyes open up to it and
they start spotting things, and you know,
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it's better to question then it is
to say nothing. So if it
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is nothing, at least you questioned
it. You know. So if you
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see something something as simple as you
know, I was an example, I
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was at a gas station, and
there was a girl who was clearly in
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my eyes, I knew that she
was if not traffic, she was definitely
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being exploited. Most likely she was
being trafficked. But just a simple question
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of are you okay? Instead of
hey, how are you? Hey?
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How are you? As that passing
question that nobody really wants the answer to
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anyway, and people can brush it
off all on fine, you know,
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and keep on walking. But that
I to I are you okay? That's
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not a normal question to ask,
So that can definitely open up a door,
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um for the victim to possibly feel
safe enough to be like, you
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know what, I'm not okay and
I could do some help if they're able
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to say that. Um. So, just being mindful of their surroundings,
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of your surroundings. Um, they're
always they always have eyes on them.
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Um. But yeah, just better
awareness in the community and what to look
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for is very important. What are
some long term impacts you have seen survivors
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of sex trafficking. It stays with
them for years. Um. They might
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heal from it, they might get
stronger from it, but it it rises
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up and the memories stick with them
and the memories taunt them. Um.
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We've had. Some of our girls
that have been out of the life now
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for you know, four years,
have moved on. But every once in
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a while, you know, that
wave of memory comes back and it it's
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pretty paralyzing. Sometimes even on their
best days, it's still kind of lingers
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in the background. So, UM, it's just definitely lifelong healing. Um.
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It's probably the worst living hell that
anybody can live through, So it
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doesn't go away quickly. It's definitely
long term. Okay, UM, what
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percentage of those who are captured in
sex traff and come back alive? We
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have no idea. I have no
idea what those numbers are. Um,
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the numbers that we can even go
off of our so honestly, they're they're
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irrelevant. Um. The stats are
nowhere near what the reality really is because
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the only stats that we get are
what's actually reported, UM, what's actually
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caught. UM. You know,
you might see those news stories of the
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big bust that they do. I
know Florida is so good at doing them.
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UM in Polk County. I've been
following Sheriff Grady since seen after they
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do gigantic busts every year, so
that gets reported. But there's so much
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on the lower level of like rural
um trafficking, and that has a completely
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different look than what would be like
regular like suburbia. Um rural trafficking is
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a lot of family, the family, and that hardly ever gets spoken of
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because in small towns, everybody knows
everybody, so that story can't get around,
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you know. And then also we
don't hear the stories of like the
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super high end you know, you
know, politician, elite, even local
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politician and elite. We don't hear
those stories. You know, those are
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ones that are um given to the
elite position people as a gift or a
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bribe. You know it's it's a
gift and turns into a bribe, and
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you don't hear those stories. Um, So we will never know how many
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are dead or alive, but I
can promise you there's probably a lot more
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dead than alive, especially when you
look at just the numbers alone of the
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annual count for missing children. Children
just don't go missing, they don't just
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disappear. So when you see those
numbers, and you know, how many
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amber alerts do you get? You
know, when they had the faces on
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the milk cartans, how often did
you see those? When you're at Walmart
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and you have the board of the
missing faces. How many of those get
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found? You know, so that
number, it's it's astronomical and we'll never
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know. Okay, how much of
it is parents selling their children's first as
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children and young people being kidnapped.
Honestly, in the rural setting, it's
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that is much more prevalent. It
might not always be parents, but family
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members UM. And it could just
even be you know, a circumstance of
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you know, it could be looked
at as sexual abuse, UM. But
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in essence it's trafficking and trafficking in
children UM is very different than trafficking of
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adults. So trafficking in children,
UM, there's an element in trafficking and
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force, fraud or coercion of adults, that's what they have to prove that
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they were forced into it. Um, there was fraudulent you know, activity
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or whatever. They come and work
here and you'll get this and that never
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happens. Coersion, manipulation. If
you don't do this, this will happen.
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UM. But with children, those
elements they don't apply. So a
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lot of times that could just come
that can look like sexual abuse or familiar
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sexual abuse. But there was an
instance of these uncles that were trafficking their
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eight year old niece out in the
country and they were basically trading her to
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be able to get beer and cigarettes. So that is anything that's a value,
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a trade of any kind of value, whether it is a material item,
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money, or work, that's trafficking. So um, yeah, that
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that probably happens a lot more um
than actual abduction. But there was a
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stint for a little while um down
in Atlanta, I want to say,
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probably in twenty nineteen that there was
a huge wave of children being abducted,
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like people like kids would be.
I heard of a story of at these
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two fourteen year olds that were out
on a date at the movie theater and
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both of them got taken. Because
we're being taken out of front yards.
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Um, that happens, but usually
the parent or family element is just easier
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under the very under the radar,
so that happens a lot more often.
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Okay, Um, what advice would
you want to give survivors? Mm?
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Hm, You're loved and you're not
broken. What they did to you doesn't
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define you at all and it's not
your fault and God made you perfectly and
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he can get you through this.
And there are people that are out there
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that I want to help you,
that want to see you be the best
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version of you that you can be, that just want to love you for
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the sake of loving you, and
you're not broken. Okay, Um,
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what advice would you like to give
their family and friends who want to be
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supportive? Be patient, be very
patient. You wanna you know, when
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you get them home and you know
you want to you want to see them,
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You want to see them, want
to get better, and sometimes they
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don't know how to want that.
Sometimes the want to go back is so
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much safer and comfortable because they know
what to expect than it is to go
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forward and heal. That's a lot
of work and they don't know what that
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is, so they'll retreat. So
patients is huge. Um, you know
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a lot of times family members,
you know, it will let me back
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up a little bit life cycle of
somebody who's been in the life, whether
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it starts out as child trafficking that
leaves a forever scar. Like I said,
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So they could be trafficked as a
child, come out and fall back
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into it because that's what they know. So it's it's a crazy cycle and
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a lot of times they'll come in
and out, you know, five,
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six, seven times before they're one, before they're done, or two the
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game is done with them and they
don't come out. So patience is huge.
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Patience and love and prayer, prayer
moves mountains. I could not agree
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more. Um, what do you
do for self care in your line of
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work? I seek Jesus completely.
I refreshed myself constantly. UM. I
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have a very very strong relationship with
my father, and UM, I just
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I made I made kind of a
rule for myself that I protect my peace.
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So, you know, dealing in
this it's very emotionally draining. Um,
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we have to be like their emotionals
there obviously, like their emotional equilibrium.
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So when they're having their high highs
or low lows, we have to
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be that balance. That's very draining. So you know, a lot of
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rest, good food, exercise,
and a lot of prayer and just and
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intentionally choosing to be in his presence
brings me peace and it brings me back
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to like that firm foundation and it
gives me strength. Um, how has
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doing this work impacted your faith?
Exponentially? Grown it completely? Me saying
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yes to him I could have never
imagined what our ministry would have looked like
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on on my own. I could
not do this on my own. Nothing
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about this ministry is mine. It's
completely his. And just surrendering that to
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him every day and watching what he
does within it is just mind blowing on
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inspiring. It literally brings such a
boldness to me of who he is and
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what he's done in my life and
what he's done in these survivors lives that
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I have so much confidence in him. I know who he is, and
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I know what he does, I
know what he's capable of doing. And
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I had a I had a revelation
the other day of you know the verse
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that people love to say, Oh, if you have faith the size of
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a mustard seed, it can move
mountains, which is true. But if
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you have faith the size of a
mountain, imagine what that'll do. You
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know what I'm like, Are we
living our lives with a mustard seed?
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Are we living our lives with a
mountain? I want to live on that
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mountain and see what he's going to
do. So, yeah, it has
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exponentially grown my faith in him.
Okay, is there anything else you would
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like to add that we haven't asked? H Yeah, we are UM.
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We're starting to do a national UM
project expansion. UM. We started here
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in the St. Louis area.
UM. We were very very feet on
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the street and working with the girls
that were UM out on the street or
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they were referred to us through law
enforcement at the jails or hospitals or other
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organizations. UM. We did that
for about two and a half three years
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and it was pretty powerful. And
we have a safe house right now UM
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that is about forty five minutes outside
of the St. Louis area. UM
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that will be back in operation soon. We've got aseptic issue that has to
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be taken care of and it is
a very very higdhe all our ticket and
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ticket done UM. So once that's
repaired, then we can get the house
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back open again. UM. But
we are preparing to expand UM. A
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couple of really cool things that are
happening in that expansion UM. One of
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our board members she developed she's been
a nurse for over forty years and she
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just had gone in to get her
Bachelors of Science degree and her project for
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her graduations. She created this observational
assessment tool and it was based off of
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our outreach pro room is called the
Scarlet line. And that is from the
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story of Rehab. And I'll give
the little snippet of the story of Rehab
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for those who don't know it.
Uh, this is from the Bible.
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From the Walls of Jericho. Rehab
was a prostitute and her home was in
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the walls of Jericho, and the
she housed spies that were coming in to
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check out over the wall to see
if they could take over Jericho to win
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the Promised Land. And she protected
these spies and they were from the other
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team, right, So the spies
told her, well, for you doing
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that, for you risking yourself,
you know we want to protect you.
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So if you hang this scarlet line
out of your window, when these walls
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fall down, you know we'll protect
this because of the scarlet line. So
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you bring anybody inside of your home
that you want to protect. If there's
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anybody outside, the blood is on
their hands. We're not going to protect
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them. If they're in the walls
of your house, we will. We'll
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spare them. So she hung the
wall out, the walls fell down,
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her house was spared, and she
was redeemed from a prostitute, and she
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was put into the lineage of Jesus, which is really cool. I can
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talk about a story redemption. So
UM our outreach is called the Scarlet Line,
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their line to redemption, and our
home is called the House of Rehab.
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Uh. So we started doing that
and her assessment tool is called the
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Scarlet Scale, and that tool is
for emergency rooms or urgent cares that when
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they come in contact with somebody that
just you know, their senses kick that
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we need to be checking and see
if this is somebody who could potentially be
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trafficked. They have observational set of
things that they can look through. If
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they score a certain point, then
they go to the next section, which
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is more of a light Q and
A. So the potential victim has no
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idea that they're being questioned for,
you know, to find out if they're
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a victim or not UM and then
it progresses. If they get to a
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certain point scale, they get connected
with a caseworker who can then help them
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get connected to the upper services for
for healing and to be able to get
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out of the life. So that
is huge. It's being vetted right now
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and once that gets approved, which
it will, I know it will.
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UH, that's going to be going
into a huge medical databases called EPIC and
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that is the largest medical databased like
software records in the country, so they're
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gonna be building that into that system
UM. So that's pretty amazing to be
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able to help the hospitals the front
lines be able to identify much better,
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but the more also UM expanding to
different states. I was on a different
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podcast back in August and it was
the Malka Show, and she has a
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huge following and the show was great, and I've gotten a lot of people
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reach out to me from across the
country from that show and they have wanted
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to know what they could do in
their area to be more active, to
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be more aware, to pull resources
together. So we are teaming up with
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them and we are starting Operation Ambush
and so we're going to be our first
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state that we're starting to partner with, Indiana, and then I have somebody
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in New York that has reached out
in somebody in California, in Oklahoma,
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so that's pretty exciting. So just
we're making UH an intentional expansion of services
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across the country, and we're intentionally
reaching out to other faith based UM programs
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because we all speak the same language
and it's just much stronger to connect with
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other organizations that do follow that same
path. So we're making the largest faith
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based, Christ centered service directory specifically
for traffic victims. So okay, I
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think that's it. UM, thank
you bring me on our show. I
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think we're gonna wrap up here.
Thanks guys for listening. Uh, Rachel
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and Recovery is um on fine.
You can find on any podcast platform and
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00:29:56.200 --> 00:30:00.799
if you want to find us on
social media or as always, you have
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00:30:00.799 --> 00:30:04.599
any questions, reach out to Rachel
and Recovery dot com. Thanks for listening,
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00:30:07.839 --> 00:30:11.119
m H. Thanks H
