IJM campus president’s heart for trafficking victims comes from seeing it in Asia
Photo and story by Michael Cleverley
During the summer of 2022, Abbie Bowman returned to South Asia where she grew up. She visited red-light districts, an area where high amounts of human trafficking take place, and spoke to the women and children forced into prostitution there.
“That is when I started praying about what that looked like for me to be involved in human trafficking, what I could do to stop it,” Bowman said.
Bowman saw the effects of human trafficking on the streets. ...
Campus International Justice Mission officers work to advocate for trafficking victims
By Michael Cleverley
Luke Roche, a senior International Studies major, wanted to fight human trafficking even before he came to Cedarville University. But he didn’t know how.
Roche knew a student org existed that fought against human trafficking, but he didn’t know the org was a student chapter of the International Justice Mission (IJM). And he didn’t learn that IJM was on campus until the end of his freshman year.
“One of my friends in my major was like, ‘There's an org on ...
International Justice Mission student chapter seeks to raise awareness about trafficking
Story and photos by Michael Cleverley
Solar panels play a big role in creating green energy and cutting down the carbon footprint, but an obscure human cost often goes unnoticed. The Uyghurs (wee-ger) are an ethnic minority group that are a target of human rights violations in China. China uses Uyghur labor to produce a variety of products, including solar panels.
The Chinese government uses reeducation camps to indoctrinate Uyghurs with government ideology. Reports released tell of ...
How we can combat human trafficking
By Chris Karenbauer
Human trafficking is the force, fraud or coercion of people to work for little to no pay or provide sexual favors for others. To be considered human trafficking, “force, fraud or coercion” need to be present, except in the case of minors. Human trafficking is involuntary service, often includes some kind of blackmail, and traffickers target vulnerable individuals.
Sex trafficking is more well known than labor trafficking. Sex trafficking is when a trafficker ...
Human trafficking: America’s multibillion dollar business
By Chris Karenbauer
In the early 1990’s, Elijah Muhammed’s parents joined a religious organization, giving the organization their time, money and children. In 2002, Muhammed’s mother sent him and his brother on a pilgrimage to Kansas City. Instead of a religious pilgrimage, Muhammed and his brother were labor trafficked. Muhammed’s parents had no idea what would happen to their children.
“We were immediately put to work, dictated on how to dress, how to speak, how to walk, what ...
Lake testimonies: Three men’s encounters with the Great Lakes
By Heidie (Raine) Senseman
The lakes as recreation
Summer 2002. The water is warm, so the salmon are biting. Jeff Billeter is drinking Miller Lite with Pfizer pharmaceutical representative Adam Dach, six other medical industry professionals, the captain and his first mate aboard a Lake Michigan sportfishing charter.
Charter fishing, a major Great Lakes industry, differs from typical recreational fishing. Groups pay a captain to take them out on the water in his boat and lend ...
Overtaken waters: A primer on the zebra mussel’s invasion of the Great Lakes
By Heidie (Raine) Senseman
The zebra mussel. Dreissena polymorpha. Rounded triangle shells, banded with dark brown stripes that mimic the mammal for which they’re named. The size of a pistachio or fingernail. Often clustered together on top of rocks, buoys, crustaceans or water intake pipes. Glossy. Inedible. Sharp enough to slice your feet.
In its natural habitats — Black Sea lagoons and Caspian Sea drainage basins — the zebra mussel is a fitting creature. Its high capacity for ...
Salvation on the Shoreline: How Lake Michigan Weathered Chicago Through the Great Fire of 1871
By Heidie Senseman
October 9, 1871 — Chicago is on fire.
“The fire in the west division is now raging with unabated fury,” writes The New York Tribune, and “the city of Chicago in ashes,” writes The (Washington D.C.) Evening Star, and “fiery clouds, with flames leaping!” writes The Chicago Tribune, and “doomed city,” writes The Charleston (SC) Daily News.
Eyewitnesses confirm the reports. John Chapin draws sketches of the fire. He says the flames are like towers. The ...
