In recent years, some organizations and movements on the left have placed a greater emphasis on the role of slavery in our nation’s past. To their view, this “original” sin surrounding the nation’s beginnings cast a permanent pall that cannot ever be overcome. Black Lives Matter (BLM) and The 1619 Project are two of the most prominent examples of this, but neither seek to engage and end slavery for its present-day victims.

The U.S. State Department issued its 20th annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report over the summer, which estimated nearly 25 million adults and children around the world are victims of sex trafficking or forced labor—in other words, slavery. According to the State Department, “The United States considers ‘trafficking in persons,’ ‘human trafficking,’ and ‘modern slavery’ to be interchangeable umbrella terms that refer to both sex and labor trafficking.”

In presenting the report, Secretary of State Michael Pompeo noted a biblical truth: “Desecration of the inherent value and immeasurable worth of human beings, each of us created in the image of God, makes human trafficking a truly wicked act.”

As Christians know, the Bible clearly states that humans are created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27, 9:6) and are fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14). The Bible also clearly condemns the selling and enslavement of humans (1 Timothy 1:10, Exodus 21:16). Tragically, there have been those in our nation’s and the world’s history who have sought to misuse other Bible verses to provide support for their sin of owning slaves.

Where memories of the slave trade still linger

With the focus on the issue of slavery in our nation’s past, it’s often overlooked that slavery continues in the open in some parts of the world and is a recent memory in others. In some parts of Africa, those memories are recent, upsetting, and very uncomfortable for us today. The BBC published an article by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani titled, “My Nigerian great-grandfather sold slaves.” It’s an interesting but hard read for someone with Western sensibilities. The author notes that “it would be unfair to judge a 19^th century man by 21^st century principles,” but here the difference is in cultural, between developed and developing nations.

Nwaubani explained that slavery was practiced in Nigeria long before Europeans arrived on the continent and was considered acceptable and even celebrated. “The successful sale of adults was considered an exploit for which a man was hailed by praise singers, akin to exploits in wrestling, war, or in hunting animals like the lion,” she shared. European offers to locals of money for the capture or trade of more slaves only served to increase the growth of the practice.

In the late 19^th and early 20th centuries, her grandfather, Nwaubani Ogogo, lived among the Igbo people and owned several slaves who were seized by the British colonial government. She told how Ogogo found this unfair and stood up to the government earning him the respect of both the locals and the British. She recalled hearing stories while growing up of how his agents would capture slaves, selling them through the port cities of Calabar and Bonny in southern Nigeria.

Although the British worked to eliminate slavery throughout the colonial period, the slave trade in southeastern Nigeria continued until the late 1940s or early 1950s. Igbo historian Adiele Afigbo described it “as one of the best kept secrets of the British colonial administration.”

Nwaubani justified her grandfather’s actions, saying he was eventually appointed a paramount chief by the British, engaged in legitimate businesses and trade, and “willingly donated land for missionaries to build churches and schools.”

Describing Ogogo and his peers, she noted, “Assessing the people of Africa’s past by today’s standards would compel us to cast the majority of our heroes as villains, denying us the right to fully celebrate anyone who was not influenced by Western ideology.” Her line of reasoning is similar to what was taught not so very long ago in the majority of public schools about America’s Founding Fathers.

Combatting slavery today

The State Department’s report, released in late June, rates how 188 countries performed in preventing trafficking, protecting victims, and prosecuting traffickers.

Today, Nigeria is on the Tier 2 Watch List. According to the report, the country’s government “does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so.” There is still a “significant number” of victims of human trafficking in Nigeria and the country has failed to provide evidence of improvement in the last year according to the State Department.

The United States is among 34 countries in Tier 1. Tier 1 countries meet the minimum standards to eliminate trafficking. Tier 2 countries, which include Japan and Saudi Arabia, don’t satisfy the minimum requirements but are making an effort. Tier 3 includes Afghanistan, China, Cuba, Iran, Lesotho, Nicaragua, North Korea, Russia, South Sudan, Syria, and Venezuela among others. For a full list see the TIP Report.

The TIP report proves there are still many places around the world where people think it is fine to own another person. It is equally saddening, however, that there are places in our own country where people think it is fine to traffic another person for sex but fail to equate it with slavery.

“To turn the tide, action must accompany words,” said Pompeo. “Among other steps, governments must end state-sponsored forced labor; they must increase prosecutions of human traffickers; and they should expand their efforts to identify and care for trafficking victims, while ensuring they are not punished for crimes traffickers compelled them to commit.

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The topic of identity politics and the widening opportunity it presents to conservatives continues to be a hot topic. Here are just three examples from recent op eds.

First up is Glenn Stanton writing at Public Discourse:

Is America Running Out of Patience with LGBT Activism?

From surprisingly fast and unexpected victory can come great hubris and the desire to utterly crush one’s opponents.

GLAAD, a leading gay advocacy outfit, released a new report showing that positive attitudes toward homosexuality and people who identify as LGBT have decreased a bit over the last few years. They sum up their findings rather starkly: “This year’s survey reflects a decline with people’s comfort year-over-year in every LGBTQ situation…”

The organization shows great concern over what they describe as the “significant decline in overall comfort and acceptance of LGBTQ people… This year the acceptance pendulum abruptly stopped and swung in the opposite direction.”

Why? Glenn Stanton answers by asking, “Could it be the LGBT community’s post-Obergefell actions and attitudes have not rested well with mainstream America?” Obergefell was the U.S. Supreme Court’s marriage decision.

This is not an outlandish hypothesis. Even some major leaders in the LGBT community have suggested it. Andrew Sullivan, writing about the GLAAD report in New York magazine, warns that no one “seems to notice the profound shift in the tone and substance of advocacy for gay equality in recent years, and the radicalization of the movement’s ideology and rhetoric.” This aggressive radicalization “is surely having an impact,” he holds. How could it not, Sullivan asks, when his movement’s public rhetoric shifted from “live and let live” to the thunderously demonizing “agree with us in every regard or be a bigot”?

In typical fashion, unfortunately, too few social conservatives in political office or on the campaign trail seem to have the intellectual or moral wherewithal to take advantage of this development.

Stanton concludes his article with this:

Perhaps GLAAD and its allies should learn to practice what they preach: tolerance of other people’s beliefs and practices, even if they don’t fully understand them.

Writing at The Federalist, Chad Felix Greene wrote about the same GLAAD report:

Why Americans’ ‘Comfort Levels’ With LGBT People Dropped Last Year

LGBT organizations’ efforts to coerce, impose, and enforce their ideas appear to be resulting in the exact opposite of what they wish to achieve.

Greene writes that the context of the shift in opinion coincides with the LGBT focus on transgender advocacy, and that it “may have an impact on how average Americans view LGBT as a whole.”

The left has a strange sense of entitlement to not only acceptance from the larger society, but also a universal embrace of their ideology. It is not enough to hold legal and civil equality — society must celebrate them as well. As a result, their rhetoric and activism become ever more petty and vindictive and naturally, the majority they accuse becomes more resentful.

. . .

The LGBT movement is deeply reliant on social acceptance and approval and wishes to micromanage how we perceive them. But their efforts to coerce, impose and enforce radical policy and ideas onto the culture appear to be resulting in the exact opposite of what they wish to achieve.

Evidently it extends beyond American sentiment and the GLAAD report — here is Stefano Gennarini also writing at The Federalist:

How Their Refusal To Tolerate Dissent Is Creating A Global Backlash Against LGBT People

Promoting LGBT preferences abroad is more likely to cause backlash against the very people it is intended to help, besides harming our standing in the world, as recent events show.

Last December, Politico published a leaked memo by State Department senior aide Brian Hook, on the importance of realism in U.S. foreign policy… Hook argues that instead of seeking to impose human rights, democracy, and liberal values, the United States should lead by example and incentivize good behavior.

This return to pragmatism breaks with the Obama years’ rigid ideological dogmatism about human rights and clearly rattled the bureaucrats who leaked the memo. But his arguments cannot be easily shoved aside. Promoting a rigid leftist agenda internationally is a form of social engineering.

“Nowhere is the obtuseness of this idealistic approach more evident,” Greene writes, “than in U.S. promotion of LGBT policies abroad.”

Without applying any moral calculus, a realist approach to foreign affairs requires accepting that LGBT rights likely will never be accepted by all the people of the world, no matter how many millions of dollars we pour into foreign LGBT organizations.

“Sadly, extreme LGBT ideologues do not accept reality,” Greene writes, citing the Masterpiece Cakeshop Supreme Court case. Their goal, he writes, “domestically and globally, is to impose social acceptance of homosexuality and transgenderism even on those unwilling to celebrate it.”

Greene notes that United Nations Delegates “routinely complained about the relentless LGBT pressure from the Obama administration,” and concludes:

The State Department should not be peddling LGBT fantasies as legitimate foreign policy. It should severely dial back the LGBT pressure and reset on more attainable and less controversial goals. All-out LGBT diplomacy was always a losing proposition. It should have never happened. Cleaning up this mess will require significant changes.

The moment we are in presents a great chance to win back some cultural ground. Will more social conservative elected officials and candidates find the courage to speak more boldly in defense of common sense and in opposition to the radical left-wing LGBT(etc.) agenda? The Leftist agenda could be imploding — now is the time for our leaders to lead on all the issues — including the social issues.

Read more:  Series: Identity Politics & Paraphilias

RESCHEDULED: IFI Worldview Conference May 5th

We have rescheduled our annual Worldview Conference featuring well-know apologist John Stonestreet for Saturday, May 5th at Medinah Baptist Church. Mr. Stonestreet is s a dynamic speaker and the award-winning author of “Making Sense of Your World” and his newest offer: “A Practical Guide to Culture.”

Join us for a wonderful opportunity to take enhance your biblical worldview and equip you to more effectively engage the culture.

Click HERE to learn more or to register!