Small sacrifices can fight sex trafficking

By YVETTE CABRERA
COLUMNIST
REGISTER COLUMNIST
ycabrera@ocregister.com

But this week, instead of her $15 manicure, Standiford will use her nail salon money toward a $20 contribution for a Soroptimist International project. The goal? To prevent young girls in the Eastern European country of Moldova from becoming victims of sex trafficking.

Article Tab : Cypress resident Cathy Standiford (right) traveled to Kigali, Rwanda in 2006 to meet the women aided by Project Independence, a Soroptimist International project in partnership with Women for Women International, to assist women survivors of war in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Rwanda. The project offered these women life skills education� and vocational training.�
Cypress resident Cathy Standiford (right) traveled to Kigali, Rwanda in 2006 to meet the women aided by Project Independence, a Soroptimist International project in partnership with Women for Women International, to assist women survivors of war in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Rwanda. The project offered these women life skills education� and vocational training.�
PHOTO COURTESY OF CATHY STANDIFORD.

It's a small sacrifice, but she's not alone. Today, Soroptimist members across the world will mark International Human Rights Day by making a similar sacrifice to make a contribution to this human trafficking project, which was selected for what's called the December 10th Soroptimist International President's Appeal.

"If everyone does just a little, little bit, we can have a really, really big impact," Standiford says.

"And, to me, the impact that I'm looking for, and hoping for, is one less girl getting (pulled) into trafficking because either economic opportunities are created for her that don't exist now, or she becomes more resilient."

Despite rising awareness about the topic human trafficking is often a taboo for polite conversation – "our dirty little secret," as Standiford calls it. Even among Soroptimists – a worldwide organization of professional women who advocate improving the lives of women and girls – Standiford knows members who don't think that human trafficking occurs in their communities.

"And yet all the studies, all the research, shows that it's happening in every community throughout the world," says Standiford, who is 2009-2010 president of Soroptimist International of the Americas, which represents 39,000 members in 19 countries and regions, including the United States, and is one of four federations under the umbrella organization of Soroptimist International in the United Kingdom.

Standiford understands the discomfort. Even though she has no qualms about speaking publicly on the topic (as she did last week on an Internet talk radio show) or writing on her blog, or even discussing it with strangers, she says she felt funny recently while carrying a book on trafficking through an airport. She was worried how people would perceive her.

But Standiford, who in August stepped down as Santa Ana's assistant city manager so she could dedicate herself to her Soroptimist presidency, has worked for years to inspire others to let their voices be heard. She remembers that a former Soroptimist president had once said "Silence is a form of acceptance."

"Part of what propels me to push through the discomfort, to risk making people uncomfortable, is that it's important for me not to be silent about things that I feel are unjust," says Standiford.

So part of the message she spreads to anyone who will listen is the connection between poverty and human trafficking.

In Moldova, one of the poorest countries in Europe, parents abandon their children in boarding schools to seek work in neighboring countries. But at 16, when girls often leave the schools, they sometimes are lured by sex traffickers, who often promise non-sex-related work before forcing them into prostitution.

In 2005, Soroptimists began funding a project to educate these girls about the dangers of trafficking, as well as offering other education and life skills.

Here in Orange County, Standiford and her fellow Soroptimists are tackling problems related to the demand side of human trafficking – the men who purchase sex.

In 2007, Soroptimist International of the Americas launched an anti-trafficking awareness project that clubs across Orange County have embraced. This summer, the Soroptimist International club of Garden Grove (Standiford's home club) made human trafficking one of its two priorities.

Standiford says there's an audience she and others are particularly keen to reach. "The opportunity to really make a dent is greater if we start having these difficult conversations with men."

Her dream is that one day human trafficking will no longer be a dirty little secret. Just as drunk driving has become socially unacceptable her hope is that purchasing sex from another human being will likewise be seen as an unacceptable part of our society.

It's a big undertaking, but Standiford always returns to the basic tenet that "the key to the many is the one." Today, that means one less manicure. Tomorrow it might mean a conversation about trafficking.

"Until it becomes socially unacceptable (trafficking) is not going to stop," says Standiford. "And the only way these things become socially unacceptable is when people muster up the courage to start openly talking about it."

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/trafficking-223357-standiford-human.html

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