“ I am not a slave. I am not a trafficking “survivor” or a victim. I’m among the most marginalized and dehumanized persons in our society – I’m a criminal. “
- Maya Morena/Gilda Merlot for Public Anthropologist
“ We must move past the “human trafficking” and “slavery” narratives when it comes to both immigration and sex work.
We organically built these underground markets and networks with friends and family to survive and navigate criminalization . . . . We stay silent even when abused, because it’s safer for us to not be found.
The idea that there are individual evil masterminds that have hijacked the global economy and evaded state authorities for a slave trade is ahistorical and xenophobic. “
- Maya Morena/Gilda Merlot for the Law and Political Economy Seminar Blog at Yale Law School
