January is Human Trafficking Awareness Month.
Take the 31 Day Challenge with me:
I started the 31 Day Challenge from Trade of Innocence. In this post, I will be writing about 8 of the things I chose from the list to do to get started. I will also tell you a little bit more about each of the items, sites, etc. and tell you how long they took me to do!
1. Put the Polaris Project hotline number in your phone:
1-888-3737-888
Report tips to this hotline for possible exploitation; call to find an emergency shelter, legal services, and counseling if you are being exploited; call to ask questions about the issue of human trafficking; call for training and technical support.
Read more about their services here:
http://www.polarisproject.org/
Total Time: 5 seconds? Well, far less than a minute! It’s just entering a number into your phone for future use and reference.
3. Like the Trade of Innocents Facebook page and follow on Twitter
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/toimovie
Trade of Innocents is a wonderful resource website where this 31 day challenge comes from. It is a great resource for everyday people like you and me who can learn how to be activists where we are and doing what we do.
Total Time: once again, 5 seconds? It takes only as long as it takes for you to log in and click the Like or Follow buttons.
4. Sign the Halogen TV petition
Read more about Halogen TV and the programs they are airing to help raise awareness and fight Human Trafficking here:
http://www.change.org/petitions/help-halogen-tv-raise-awareness-about-human-trafficking-on-national-television
Click the link below to head over to the petition:
http://www.change.org/petitions/help-halogen-tv-raise-awareness-about-human-trafficking-on-national-television
Total Time: 5 minutes or less. I spent most of the time reading over the programing they do. All the petition asks for is your name, email, and zip code. That’s it!
5. Sponsor a Child
Check out World Vision (http://www.worldvision.org/m/
To sponsor a child, it costs only $35-40 a month.
Think about it – stay in instead of eating out just twice per month will give you the cash you need to sponsor a child!
I sponsor 3 children a month and it still costs LESS THAN HALF OF MY CAR PAYMENT.
You can do it too and change the life of child forever!
Total Time: I would say it would not take you longer than 20 minutes to sign up to sponsor a child. And maybe 15 minutes once a month to write a letter to your child. And a little extra for daily prayers. So little time, and so much good it does!!!
7. Join your local Love146 Take Force:
http://146taskforce.org/
Love146 Task Force encourages local groups to gather and make a difference for human trafficking. It’s each of us and our communities. To change society, it starts with a group of little old us!
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
-Margaret Mead
Total Time: 15 minutes or less. First, you have to sign up for an account. Then you search quickly and easily for a local “task force” using your zip code. You click on the nearest or the one of most interest, and click the Request Membership button.
12. Start a human trafficking board on Pinterest!
and/or start a human trafficking playlist on Youtube!
Total Time: 30 seconds or less for each!
You can start the Youtube playlist with #15 below.
13. Sign up for IJM’s 100 Postcard Challenge
All you need to do: sign up for the challenge, collect 100 signatures, return the postcards to IJM and they will personally hand the signed postcard to Congress representatives to encourage them and the government to fight against human trafficking!
http://www.ijm.org/100-postcard-challenge
Total Time: 2 minutes to sign up. I’ll update again next week or so on how much time the follow up on it took.
The site wouldn’t submit the form when I filled mine out, but I emailed IMJ to see what the deal was. Will keep you posted on this.
15. Watch the video of the song “Fragile” by Lamont Hiebert (formerly Ten Shekel Shirt)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdMTSvOb3hA
Total Time: 3 minutes 47 seconds. Literally. If you are a smoker, you could watch it on a smoke break!
The total time for all of this was a bit longer than yours will take because I researched the sites a bit more and re-posted these challenges on all my social networking sites, as well as preparing a youtube video.
I encourage you to give each of these challenges a try! They are super easy and not time consuming in the least! You can make a difference in your everyday life by doing these little things. Do it. Give it a try.
Have an awesome day!
God bless,
Stephanie Oplinger
http://www.soarts.net
