Church of Scientology of Cincinnati Host Seminar to Counter Human Trafficking
Safeguarding the rights of victims of human trafficking
The Church of Scientology Greater Cincinnati held a “Human Trafficking 101” seminar September 21 to educate cvthe community on human trafficking—what it is, how to detect it and what the individual can do to help victims of this crime.
Speakers were Carol Thornton Gamble, Intake and Outreach Coordinator of “Off the Streets,” a program that helps victims of sexual slavery, and an FBI special agent on human trafficking.
A common misconception among Americans is that slavery is a thing of the past or something that only happens in third world countries. Yet, according to the office of the Ohio Attorney General, “a preliminary report on the scope of the problem in Ohio found the most common age at which youth become victims of child sex trafficking is 13. From the study’s sample of 207 individuals, 49 percent were under 18 when they were first trafficked. Nationally, over 100,000 children are thought to be involved in the sex trade.”
Church of Scientology Greater Cincinnati Director of Special Affairs Thalia Ghiglia hosted the seminar and introduced human trafficking as part of the larger issue of human rights. She released a brochure, Scientology: How We Help—United for Human Rights, Making Human Rights a Global Reality, which presents an overview of the Church’s work to forward the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The speakers described human trafficking in the Greater Cincinnati region, both sex and labor trafficking, and what the private citizen can do: How to be alert to instances of human trafficking, how to report it, and what resources exist to investigate and handle it.
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The Church of Scientology Greater Cincinnati is an Ideal Scientology Organization. Its facilities are configured to service Scientologists in their ascent to spiritual freedom and serve as a home for the entire community—a meeting ground of cooperative effort to uplift citizens of all denominations.
Scientologists on five continents engage in collaborative efforts with government agencies and nongovernmental organizations to bring about broad-scale awareness and implementation of the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the world’s premier human rights document.
The Church of Scientology published the brochure Scientology: How We Help—United for Human Rights, Making Human Rights a Global Reality to meet requests for more information about the human rights education and awareness initiative the Church supports. To learn more, visit www.Scientology.org/humanrights.
Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote, “Human rights must be made a fact, not an idealistic dream,” and the Scientology religion is based on the principles of human rights. The Code of a Scientologist calls on all members of the religion to dedicate themselves “to support true humanitarian endeavors in the fields of human rights.”