Impossible is a Dare

by Cooley, Ben;

  Along this journey we met some great people in the fight to end modern-day slavery. Two of those people were Ben Cooley of Hope for Justice and Stacia Freeman of Abolition International. Ben and James had become friends in 2007 and spent many hours over Skype sharing the challenges of being CEOs and the work to help survivors find freedom. Stacia, James and I worked together towards seeing standards set for survivor care in the USA. As we grew closer through the years there was a lot of laughter, friendship and shared experiences, but most of all a common calling to see the end of slavery and the restoration of those rescued from it.

  In 2013 Stacia started talking to us about increased collaboration and a sharing of strengths to make even greater impact. She asked us why we were each trying to do this alone when we could do so much more together. That really resonated with us and we all began to talk and think about what that kind of collaboration could look like. For James and I it would mean no longer running an organization alone. We would be free to focus on what we loved the most: programmes to help restore survivors. Ultimately we all decided we were better together, each organization bringing its own unique strengths and expertise, making one vibrant, larger organization. The merger didn’t come without its growing pains, though, and the process is certainly not for the faint of heart. We had all built successful organizations and were all leaders in our own rights, each with an individual board of directors who had invested their time and talents in that success. It took a year of talking and planning and understanding what each organization could bring to the table before we were ready to move forward. The key was the willingness we all had to lay down our egos and personal desires for what we truly believed was important: changing lives and ending slavery.

  What we were about to do was unprecedented in the anti-trafficking community, and when new organizations were continually appearing, we were about to dismantle our three organizations, restructure them as one and come out the other side more efficient and more effective. We all believed this was the right way forward, and an example of what collaboration could mean and accomplish. In September 2014 we announced the merger to the world, and came under the banner of Hope for Justice, three organizations becoming one. We each had a personal mandate in the fight against slavery, but I’m so thankful we chose to do more together. It’s been a remarkable journey since then, and we’ve seen growth and opportunity in Cambodia and in every country where Hope for Justice works. I am excited to see what the future holds for this organization, the dedicated people within it and, most importantly, the survivors we serve.

  * * *

  Chapter eleven

  Elita’s story

  Elita grew up in Eastern Europe, where she had a tough start to life. Abused as a young child, Elita turned to alcohol to help her cope. She ended up homeless. While in this desperate situation she was approached and offered money to come to the UK and marry a man. With no other option, she agreed.

  When Elita arrived in the UK, she found she had been tricked and was trafficked for the purposes of sexual exploitation and forced labour. She was locked up, raped and forced to have sex with many men. She was also forced to work in different jobs, and her trafficker took all the wages she earned. Elita’s ID documents were taken from her to prevent her running away; she was assaulted and they threatened to kill her.

  In an effort to cope with the trauma inflicted on her, Elita was drinking heavily. She made contact with a support service to help with this, and a worker recognized the signs of trafficking and contacted Hope for Justice. We were able to help her leave the cycle of exploitation and enter a safe house. However, rescue is not an event, it is a process. Elita needed a lot of support to recover from her traumatic experiences, and still struggled with alcohol. When she left the safe house she relapsed. Hope for Justice met with her and, after a lot of hard work, and determination on Elita’s part, she gave rehab another try and is now clean. She has found other ways to deal with her trauma, and is doing so well. Our team are so incredibly proud of her and how far she has come in a short time.

  We don’t have time

  Following our merger with Abolition International and Transitions Global, I had shared with our staff that we were entering into a year of consolidation. A year to focus on health and not necessarily growth. A year to take stock. But we are a dynamic organization. We don’t stop for long. Amazingly, we could do little to slow the momentum of the movement we had together worked so hard to create. I think in many ways our momentum has always been powered by a sense of urgency.

  As much as we would love a year to slow down, to focus our efforts, often we are faced with the fact that we just don’t have time. We don’t have time to sit back and congratulate one another and become nostalgic about what we’ve achieved over the past period. We don’t have time to be offended by things that have been done or not done. We don’t have time to sit and navel-gaze. There has been that pressing need to act hanging over whatever we have done.

  At Hope for Justice, we love our staff. It’s a passion of ours, and particularly Debbie’s, to care for our staff and make sure our team is supported and invested in; to make sure they feel valued, that they feel that their work is needed and encouraged. But there isn’t time for us to go ‘All right, this year needs to be an easy year now. We’re not going to try as hard and we’re not going to go after this or go after that because that will put too much pressure on us.’ We can’t think that way.

  Often we’re faced with an open door of opportunity that we didn’t expect. Sometimes we don’t know what it will lead to or how we’ll make it work, but we know we’re going to walk through it. There isn’t time for us to hang about; too many people are still waiting for us to come. There are too many people who find themselves beyond our reach. There is just that sense that we don’t have time to consolidate or to take time out from doing this or doing that. If the opportunity is there to grow or expand something, then we have to find a way to make that work. And that’s a challenge, because we want to be sustainable. We don’t want to over-promise and under-deliver. But we’re all too aware of the urgency of the task at hand.

  And so, mere weeks into our ‘time of consolidation’, the Lighthouse Project, which we had set up in collaboration with the government in Cambodia only months after the merger, was producing story after story of lives changed. Through the Lighthouse Project, Hope for Justice now received children who had been sexually abused from across the country for the first stages of their aftercare. What’s more, this refusal to slow down was not confined to Cambodia alone, it was intensifying across the globe.

  In the UK we have taken on more staff to help increase outreach and impact. In the USA we have employed some incredible people, including the former head of the anti-human trafficking programme within the FBI’s Civil Rights Unit. I tried to make it a year of consolidation, but people shouldn’t have to wait for their freedom. They can’t wait for it, and we just can’t wait to give it to them. I think some people may have been critical about our expansion. Some people asked if it means we will now give less focus to the UK. The answer is simply: no. Hope for Justice is absolutely, wholeheartedly committed to ending modern-day slavery in the UK. It’s just that now our capacity has grown. When I became a father for the second time, there was simply no question about whether I would love my second daughter as much as my first. You don’t love any less. Your capacity just changes. I am no less passionate about the abolition of the slave trade in the UK, but our capacity has grown. It now includes Cambodia, the USA, Norway and many other countries. Same passion; greater capacity. And with greater capacity comes a greater platform: a global platform. So the question is: What is Hope for Justice going to do now?

  Well, the last thing we want to do is use the platform simply to communicate a message, to be all talk and no action, all words and no substance. Many people have inspired me throughout my life: people I’ve known personally; people I’ve read about and studied, whether that’s Mother Teresa or the founder of the
Salvation Army, William Booth, or Martin Luther King, who inspired a generation to stand up to injustice. Many have inspired me with incredible visions, and I am so grateful to all those people who have stood on platforms and used their voices for things that matter. But what’s the one thing all of these people had in common? They didn’t just use their voices for communication but for creation.

  I believe our generation should use its voice not just to communicate about injustice but also to create a solution, to inspire people, to motivate them to move beyond the confines of their own lives and to use their lives to transform others. To use their freedom to bring freedom to others. To use their resources to empower others. To do more, be more, achieve more. It may be that you’re not being oppressed yourself, but millions of people are being oppressed all across the world. They are in our supply chains. They are being held against their will for forced labour, domestic servitude and sexual exploitation. There are slaves in our country and countries all over the world, and they are waiting for someone to use their voice, to use their voice to prompt action, use their message to inspire mission.

  In some ways this book is a letter from me to you. Let me ask you: Why don’t you join us? Why don’t you join with us to see the true abolition of the slave trade become a reality? Not just to talk about it or even just cry about it, but to see how we actually free every slave. We believe that freedom is worth the fight. We believe justice is non-negotiable. We refuse to abandon the least, the last and the lost. We choose to challenge apathy with action. We choose to greet cynicism with hope. We are purposeful, passionate and pioneering. We are Hope for Justice. This book is not the solution in itself but my hope would be that it could be a part of it. It’s a conversation between me and you, an invitation to be a part of this movement. I believe we can see an end to slavery.

  I believe that we can see every life set free. The world I see is a world where children are free to live, free to play, free to dance. Not bound by a man’s lust, not attacked by a predator who is seeking to exploit them. The world I see is a world in which women are valued and have honour, a world in which men speak well of them; men who won’t degrade women or abuse them and force them to service man after man against their will.

  The world I see is a world where men are able to provide for their families and are not forced to work digging holes without tools in freezing conditions, where their fingers break and hands are deformed. They are not locked in a cellar for years and years in disgusting and inhumane conditions. The world I see does not have families broken by this hideous crime. It does not see businesses profiting from exploitation. It is full of people who are not complicit or apathetic but who take a stand.

  The world I see is a world free from slavery. Frequently, Tim Nelson and I dream of a time, maybe in our later years, when we can sit on a beach and play backgammon and talk about the moment slavery ended for good. And that’s the world I want to live in. People may look at me and think I am ill equipped or simply unable to do this. But I’m going to die trying. Because I would rather live in my preferable future than in a reality in which my brothers and sisters are being bought and sold for profit. If you believe what I believe, if you see what I see, then join us.

  Muhammad Ali once said:

  Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it.

  Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion.

  Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare.

  Impossible is potential.

  Impossible is temporary.

  Impossible is nothing.

  Here’s my dare to you:

  I dare you to end trafficking;

  I dare you to use your freedom to free others;

  I dare you to stand with us to see the abolition of the slave trade.

  Another side to the story

  Elita, victim of human trafficking and rescuee of Hope for Justice

  When I look back on my first encounter with Hope for Justice, everything is a bit foggy. When I first received a visit from Naomi, a member of the Hope for Justice Team, I wasn’t sure what to think. I felt completely alone, with no clothes, no money, no hope. I thought everyone had forgotten about me and I was really on my own. I was just existing. I didn’t have any self-worth at all. I didn’t know someone could care about me, think anything good about me. I felt like the worst person in the world and like I should just disappear from the planet.

  A support worker from another charity said she would help find me a team who could help, but I didn’t believe anyone would want to help. I had nothing; I had burned through all my options. I didn’t know where to go for help. But Naomi and other people helped me and things started to change. It’s hard to keep helping someone who is drunk, but Naomi did. My drinking was a symptom of trauma; I couldn’t just stop through willpower. That’s why they encourage support groups. You just can’t do it on your own.

  After a period of recovery I fell back into drinking and thought my life would finish there; I wasn’t able to live with myself for even one day. I couldn’t cope any more; it was too much, too heavy. While I was in hospital Naomi just started things moving, connecting me to all these people who could help. I didn’t need to do anything really. I just needed to trust. After feeling so alone in this country and not knowing who to turn to, it was amazing not to feel on my own any more.

  I remember the day when Hope for Justice rang me to say that they could sort out a place for me to stay. I’d been staying in B & Bs, but I had to move because of my drinking and behaviour. I was on the street and I didn’t know what to do. I was in a very hopeless situation. I had nothing. I didn’t want to drink any more, I didn’t even want to kill myself, I was just at the end. But somehow there was this strength, and then Naomi rang me, and I couldn’t believe I had a place to stay.

  Somehow, from having nothing, I found the strength and motivation and hope and power to move forward to something better. It’s kind of magical, when you go that far down and get back up again. So many times in my life I’ve tried to get back on my feet, but it’s very difficult when you lose everything and have no-one to help you. I’m very proud that I’ve been able to get up from where I was, from such a dark place.

  Now I just have to take things one day at a time. I don’t want to put big expectations on my future right now because it’s all too uncertain. I would love to stay in the UK, but there are loads of legal things related to my trafficking experience and so on that I need to sort out, and it’s not something I can do in a day. In the future I would really like to go to college and study, and personally I would like to give something back to the community, to the society that helped me. I would definitely like to be something like a support worker and help others. I want to help people get out of dark situations, and show them it’s possible! I know it takes time; I don’t want to rush, but eventually that’s what I really want to do: help others like I have been helped.

  If I encountered someone who had been through what I’ve been through or was in a similarly dark place, I would tell them not to lose their hope, the hope that there is help somewhere that will come at the right time. Don’t give up, be patient and keep fighting. It sometimes feels hard but definitely never give up, whatever happens. There are organizations and individuals that can help you. It can be hard to find the right help and sometimes you feel you’re being passed from one place to the other, but you need to keep in mind that however much you’re destroyed, you deserve the right help. You are worth something. You have the right to be treated like a normal human being. Everyone deserves a life. It’s so easy to forget, but don’t lose hope: find something you believe in. I don’t show my faith to many people because it’s private, but it’s been a massive support to me.

  Don’t let anyone judge you for the mistakes you’ve made, because we are all human beings. I need to be responsible and make amends, but no human being can put me down. Nobody
is worth less or more. We are all the same and have the same rights. Look forward, to every new moment. It’s very easy to forget about the small things, and then you don’t see them any more. But the small things are the most important, the most beautiful. Like when you wake up in the morning and it’s a nice day. Enjoy that morning, because it’s a massive gift. Every day we know the sun will rise and we’ll have a new day, so we get used to it. But it’s always there. We can’t put a price on it; we can’t buy it; we can’t sell it. These things? These things are beautiful.

  * * *

  Epilogue

  Impossible Is a Dare is the story of our fight to see people set free from slavery. Your ‘impossible’ might be the same; your ‘impossible’ might be something different. Regardless of your dream, I hope you’ve found thoughts, challenges and experiences in this book that will prompt you to pursue that dream with passion, purpose and persistence.

  I wasn’t ready to start Hope for Justice. If I’d known all that it would demand, the cost to me, to my family, to others, I don’t know if I’d have done it. And that’s why I’m so glad I started before I was ready, before I knew what it meant. When I first had the vision to hold a massive event to raise awareness of human trafficking, I didn’t imagine it would be me doing it – I thought I wasn’t good enough, strong enough or mature enough. But the right people believed in me and empowered me to achieve something that has come further than I ever imagined.