Emancipation Nation

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While in college, preparing for the world of work, Patrick Atkinson volunteered to answer phones to help people in crisis. Little did he know that answering “the call” would lead him to become the world’s emergency room worker, triaging and healing some of the world’s most vulnerable children. Throughout his career, he has taken great risk to his own personal safety to locate runaways in Times Square when it was crawling with drugs, crime, predators, and vulnerable youth. He worked in war torn Guatemala and El Salvador, entering dangerous territory to rescue children and house them in his orphanage, allowing them to grieve, work through trauma, and experience love and feel safe again. He now works on the issue of trafficking, exploited, and missing persons to help all children understand that love and safety is a right, not a privilege. Patrick is the author of seven books.  He discusses his powerful story and development of his two organizations that still work to serve children: GodsChild.org and ITEMP.org He continues to serve as father and positive role model to countless children around the world. 

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Child marriage is a reality for girls (and boys) around the world. It is defined as formal marriage or informal unions before the age of 18. South Asia is known to have the highest number of child marriages in the world, but it happens all over the world, including the U.S. In fact, only two U.S. states have laws against child marriage. Within the last 20 years, the youngest recorded U.S. marriage was with a 10 year old child. Genevieve Meyer, founder and Director of the Resiliency Foundation, is a survivor of child marriage. She knows that when female children are married off, they are more likely to experience domestic violence, have more children, be less educated, and be trapped in marriages. She fights against child marriage and is one of the advocates that supported the passage of a law against child marriages in the State of Indiana. Genevieve discusses her experience, her work against child marriage, and ways to research what your state allows.

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Through an unconventional lens, Dev Tandon, founder of the OBO Movement, takes us through his philosophy of business and his progressive concepts for a greater, more equitable future for all. While Dev is not directly involved in anti-trafficking work, he explains how the complete reversal of business-as-usual could impact the future of sex and labor trafficking, as well as provide advocates with an equitable and livable income. This visionary and his OBO Movement says seek to make a difference first, and be paid a great salary to do meaningful work. 

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It is typical for advocates to get involved in anti-trafficking work on many fronts and Marie DeLeon is no different. Marie is a survivor that is now giving back by helping survivors explore their own healing journey through workshops in New York City.  She is also a part of the New Yorkers for the Equality Model, a political group comprised of allies, service providers, and survivor leaders in the New York area who advocate and support the Equality Model of law. She explains the model and presents her reasons why the Equality Model aka Nordic Model is the way to go. Finally, Marie explains an interesting one-stop shop program that she is involved with that provides comprehensive care to survivors.

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Stable and safe housing is the foundation upon which all effective anti-trafficking programming and successful recovery is built. Yet housing is the number one barrier to providing effective recovery services to victims. The Samaritan Women's Institute for Shelter Care studies the issue of housing and human trafficking victims. Their findings? There are serious gaps between the number of victims and the available beds for those that need them. The Alliance estimates there are approximately 136 programs and agencies across the U.S. whose sole mission is to provide shelter to victims of trafficking. Thirteen states have no shelter programs at all, and 10 states have an average of one program for the entire state.  The Institute for Shelter Care also identifies two main barriers to effective shelter care: (1) staffing problems, and (2) financial issues. The Institute for Shelter Care was developed to remove the barriers and provide intensive and comprehensive training to anyone that is interested in opening a shelter, or who has a shelter and wants to offer stable and effective services to survivors of trafficking. This episode is packed with critical information on housing from the foremost authority on effective housing for victims of trafficking.

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Taryn Hughes, founder of Forest, Hughes, and Associates, continues her conversation with us on compassion fatigue and secondary traumatic stress. She shares with us the step-by-step process of introducing training to an organization and reveals that at some workplaces, secondary traumatic stress is being categorized as an occupational hazard. Taryn shares some suggestions on self-care as well as some upcoming conferences and presentations for listeners to attend.

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Taryn Hughes is the founder of Forest, Hughes, and Associates in New York, a company that assesses vicarious trauma and secondary traumatic stress in the workplace and brings organizations the healing they need. Beginning with a thorough assessment, these trained healers prescribe interventions that focus on traumatized and stressed agencies and compassion fatigued executives and front line workers. While we try and continue to help victims in these precarious times of coronavirus, many of us are no doubt currently experiencing trauma and compassion fatigue ourselves. Taryn speaks about what to look for, the importance of debriefing traumatized professionals, and the critical role leadership and executives play in being healthy and creating a healthy workplace environment.

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On today’s episode, we are hosting David Corliss, who holds a Ph.D. in statistical astrophysics and is the founder and director of Peace-Work. Peace-Work, as David will explain, is a volunteer cooperative organization of statisticians across the U.S. These statisticians are full-time professionals in various fields, who volunteer at Peace-Work spending their time partnering with organizations to fight human trafficking as well as other social justice issues. Coming from a long line of advocates and social reformers himself, David walks us through the various ways that his organization helps grass roots and struggling organizations and state and local governments to gather data, conduct evaluations, and complete the research needed to document and validate meaningful and effective work. A partnership with his organization can help attract grant and contract dollars. Using science, his organization can also help provide the guidance or next steps needed for social justice movements to be successful. 

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Kerry Brodie, founder and executive director of Emma’s Torch, joins us at the mic. Emma’s Torch is a nonprofit restaurant, café, and catering business in Brooklyn, New York that provides culinary training and job placement services to refugees and survivors of human trafficking. Kerry and her restaurant have been featured in world renown media such as the New Yorker, Rachel Ray, the New York Times, and Vogue Magazine, to name a few. Kerry walks us through the process of how students can enter the program, what happens, and where they can go after they graduate the program. Kerry, having had no business background or knowledge, was able to pursue a dream of empowering individuals over the one thing that brings us all together: food. Gordon Ramsey or Kerry Brodie? I vote Kerry!

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Dr. Jill McCracken and Alex Andrews are co-founders of Sex Worker Outreach Project Behind Bars (SWOP-Behind Bars). Jill has over 15 years of experience researching the sex trade and Alex has experience being incarcerated for consensual sex work. These two come together to create an informative and, for some, eye-opening conversation about setting aside judgement of those in the sex industry that are there by choice and welcome the opportunity to dialogue. SWOP Behind Bars provides services for those incarcerated as a result of being involved in the commercial sex industry, including a letter writing campaign. Once the person is released, they help them find the resources and services they need to re-integrate back into society. The choice to resume involvement in the sex trade or not, they say, is each person's individual choice. SWOP honors that choice without judgement.