Today’s Fight for Abolition
LOME, TOGO—Amazing Grace, the new film about William Wilberforce, concludes with what many consider his greatest life work—the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade in 1807. But a walk through a dusty open-air market in Lome, Togo today makes it painfully clear that the slave trade is flourishing two hundred years later.
Tiny boys—they would be considered “preschoolers” in the West—strain to push overloaded wooden carts through the crowded market. Their workday begins before dawn and continues until late in the evening when they are permitted to collapse beside their cart, in the dirt, for a few hours of rest.
Most of these young laborers can’t remember what rural village they came from or who their families are. All they know is that they will be beaten and killed if they attempt to escape those who took them from their homes and force them to do this brutal work.
Two boys hurry a heavy cart through the market in Lome, Togo.
Image from footage courtesy Pointy Shoe Productions
These child laborers are part of a global slave trade that is more complex and insidious than anything that William Wilberforce could have envisioned. Human bondage comes in so many variations today: nine-year-old girls sold into brothels, preteen boys forced to kill for rebel armies, children shackled twenty hours a day to rug-weaving machines. An estimated 27 million people are currently enslaved around the world, operating in a shadow economy valued at approximately US $12 billion.
How does one begin to think about taking on such overwhelming evil in 2007? Are there lessons to be gleaned from Wilberforce’s example? It’s tempting to regard him as one of history’s great men, but the danger of such a view is that it lets the rest of us off the hook. Since most of us can’t measure up to his extraordinary example, we convince ourselves that the best action is no action. We watch and wait for an obvious heir to the “Wilberforce legacy,” someone we can support with our checkbook and prayers.
The reality is that Wilberforce did not act alone. His bold actions were bolstered by a curious coalition of individuals of differing theologies and parties who came together on the issue of slavery. With prayers, perseverance, and a savvy strategy, this coalition—which came to be known as the Clapham group—labored to change how the British people perceived slavery. It took years, but they finally convinced the nation that slavery was not just an economic issue, it was also a moral issue that demanded redress.
Is a similar shift in the moral climate possible today in our globalized society? As a filmmaker who has spent the past year documenting those on the front lines of today’s abolitionist fight, I’m convinced it is indeed possible. The concept that it is wrong for any individual to own and control another remains as powerful a catalyst for change today as it was in Wilberforce’s time.
Piercing this darkness will require people of faith to put aside their theological and political differences—and their egos—to create a committed community. If we, like that curious coalition from Clapham, England, truly believe that every human is created in the image of a Creator, then we don’t have a choice. We must take action.
Senior Fellow Jody Hassett Sanchez has been filming in India, Pakistan, and Togo for her upcoming documentary film, SOLD: Contemporary Abolitionists and the Global Slave Trade, which will be broadcast and distributed later this year.
The feature film Amazing Grace opens in theaters in the U.S. on February 23. Bristol Bay Productions is also sponsoring the Amazing Change campaign to help people respond to modern-day slavery, in association with such groups as World Vision and International Justice Mission. Also see Wilberforce Central for other resources.
3 Responses (comments are closed) • Provocations, Good and Evil, Philanthropy, Thu 15 Feb 2007
Thank you so much for posting this article. The movie “Amazing Grace” was produced by a graduate of the seminary I attended. The time is long overdue for evangelicals (myself included) to recognize the social implications of the gospel. If Christ came to free people from internal slavery to sin, how can we overlook the external slavery that springs from it? The comment above provides one practical example of a way to make a difference. It will require Americans to place our desire for mercy above our desire for economic well-being. May God help us to do so.
The first thing that popped into my mind after reading this latest provocation is that once again my God-fearing church friends are in NY buying more fake handbags. For years I have refused to go with them on this annual trip as a statement against their support of slave labor. I have shared with them the very short Google search for one to come up with the connection between slave labor and fake goods sold in this country. Yet as image-seeking consumers they flock to New York’s Chinatown, Houston’s Harwin Street, etc., in spite of knowing how and where these goods are made or the kinds of people who are behind the trafficking of these counterfeits. I have no idea of what it is going to take for them to realize they are part of the problem. They are so giddy over their new find, that they refuse to see the pain of those being owned and controlled by cruel power-hungry people on the other side of the globe. They cannot see that their character has fallen beneath the weight of their image.
Bloomfield Hills, Michigan
on 2007 03 15
The time has arrived and ineed has long past that Christians get out of their pews and do something. Perhaps they should read about Caroline Cox i.e. Baroness Caroline the Deputy speaker of Britain’s House of Lords. In her 45 plus trips to Darfur, 68 trips to Armenia and numerous trips to China, Burma, N. Korea, Thailand etc. she has been talking about slavery, injustice and man’s inhumanity to man for almost 25 years.
We all know what to do. It’s the oldest story in the world. Everyone can’t do everything. However, everyone can do at least something. Also to whom much is given; much is required!!