Sound of Freedom
God’s kids are not for sale.
Yesterday, I went to the cinema to watch the movie “Sound of Freedom,” a film I had eagerly awaited since summer. It was absolutely devastating.
For those unfamiliar, the film is based on the life of Tim Ballard, a former agent for the Department of Homeland Security who worked undercover in the U.S. Child Sex Tourism Jump Team.
The story begins with a Mexican little girl named Rocio playing music. Later, we see the father (Roberto) and the little brother (Miguel) as a woman (Giselle) approaches them, promising the young girl and her brother a career in the entertainment industry.
The little girl is excited and begs her father to take them for an audition. When he drives them to the apartment where the audition will take place, the woman asks him to leave and come back to take them at 7 pm. When he returns, his kids are nowhere to be found.
That’s the beginning of the movie. It’s worth mentioning that, according to Teresa Huizar, CEO of the National Children Alliance, the majority of child trafficking victims know and trust their traffickers.
In the next scene, we see the protagonist actor, impersonating Tim Ballard, with a colleague, arresting a pedophile involved in the child trafficking business. Tim gains the prisoner’s trust, unknowingly leading him to little Miguel.
Miguel narrates to Tim the horrifying experiences he and other kids went through in Colombia. We witness heartbreaking scenes of how the traffickers treated them like soulless objects.
Miguel was sold first, so he didn’t know much about what happened to his sister. Still, he begged Tim to find her and bring her home safe.
After this, we see reunions between son and father – a powerful scene that feels incomplete, as the father stated, “How would you feel if you walked into your kid’s room, and one of the beds was empty?”
That’s the turning point. Tim, already with his heart breaking into a million pieces, feels obligated to take action. They could be his kids; they could be our kids.
He decides to go to Colombia and bring Rocio back to her family, along with as many children as possible. His wife is supportive, saying, “Go and save those kids.”
Tim, with the help of the Department of Homeland Security, goes to Colombia, revealing our worst nightmares of trafficking rings, cartels, pedophiles, and sex hotels.
His journey is a painful eye-opener. Human trafficking is a $150 billion-a-year criminal enterprise globally, with 27% of victims being children.
More than 500,000 children a year go missing in the US alone, while the US is 1st in the world for sex trafficking.
I won’t delve into the details of how Tim and his supporters saved hundreds of kids – watch the movie for that. But I want to focus on why he did it, putting his life in so much danger. As he said,
“God’s kids are not for sale!”
Child trafficking is not a new topic, yet we tend to ignore it while media overshadows crucial information.
Billions of kids are in a living hell, and what are we doing? Closing our eyes, changing the subject, and discussing meaningless things – how hypocritical.
I’m not discussing narratives; this is real life, real kids suffering. How can we be indifferent?
In conclusion, the protagonist said,
“the most powerful man is the narrator,”
and he is right.
I decided to write about this because I couldn’t stand by if I didn’t. It could be my kid or yours.
How can we sleep at night knowing kids suffer in the hands of perverted monsters, living in constant fear, their hopes and dreams stripped away in their tender age?
We should raise our voice, stand for them. Only if united can things change.
Unless root factors enabling sex trafficking are addressed, no amount of resources and aftercare will stop this crisis.
We should open a dialogue, talk, find solutions – it’s not complex or taboo. We owe it to those kids, because, God’s kids are not for sale!
