The Power of a Movement

A Letter to the Anti-Trafficking Community as January, Human Trafficking Prevention Month, Comes to a Close

Dr. Shobana Powell, DSW, LCSW

Today I want to say thank you.

Thank you to all the anti-trafficking advocates and survivors who pull strength from the depths of your souls when you feel you have nothing left.

Thank you to those who fight against systems that may hold more power than us, but will never be more powerful than we are together.

Thank you to our grassroots organizers who have lost rest and security and peace because you are fighting for others’ rights to rest and security and peace.

Thank you to the survivors of sex trafficking and prostitution who are braving the backlash from very real pimps and traffickers and sex buyers in order to speak your truth and stand up for survivors everywhere.

Thank you to the survivors who do not have the safety to be in the public eye, but who fight tirelessly behind the scenes, with little to no recognition, but with immeasurable impact.

Thank you to the survivors who do not have the safety to even do this work behind the scenes, the survivors who live their lives outside of this advocacy work. Your existence, your surviving, your thriving is not only a challenge to those who have oppressed and exploited you but an inspiration to thousands who are where you once were. You give us hope. We see you, we acknowledge you, we value you, and we are with you.

Thank you to the advocates who have risked friendships, family, loved ones, and careers to stand up and say the sex trade is a system of oppression, an extension of colonization and slavery, when there are so many powers that be who want to silence you.

Thank you for the fire within you that reignites our candles when ours feel so close to going out.

Thank you for confronting the realities of exploitation and abuse in the sex trade, the psychological, physical, and emotional harms, when it would be so much easier to minimize or excuse them.

Thank you for the countless days and nights you felt like you were going in circles trying to explain that abuse is abuse, that we have to stop blaming survivors for their own victimization, that Black and brown and trans and immigrant bodies are worth more than sex. We deserve real economic opportunities, not an open door for the privileged to exploit us.

Thank you for the unending ways in which you have sacrificed to be in this fight because you know there are so many who cannot.

Thank you for your laughter and joy and friendship when many of us felt we could not go on.

Thank you for taking care of yourself and even taking breaks when you need to, so you can continue fighting in this movement.

Thank you for reminding us that we are not alone.

Thank you for being you. We, as a movement, as a community, would not be who we are without you.