TRAVERSE Issue 15 - December 2019 | Page 63

In 2017 it was estimated that more than 45 million people, worldwide, were currently entrapped by slavery. Putting that into perspective is the statistic that during the whole 300 year transat- lantic slave trade around 12 million people were enslaved. It’s true that in modern times very few are chained or brutalised physically … all are brutalised psychologically. Non-Government Organisations are all in agreeance that cur- rently in Australia there’s around 5,000 people who they class as slaves; media reports generally class these people as illegal workers or immigrants. The shocking reality is that slavery comes in many, varied forms and can often by right under our noses. In many ways we would all be responsible for slavery … just think about where your clothes are made. In the recent past there’s been examples of large fashion brands forcing people of developing nations to work for next to nothing, there’s little doubt there will be examples discovered in the future. There’s many ways that we can all be a part of ending modern slavery and one is visiting the As Seen From The Sidecar website (asseenfromthesidecar.org) to learn more. TRAVERSE AVAILABLE IN THE TRAVERSE STORE