If you have not seen the movie, you most certainly have heard of the movie blockbuster, “Sound of Freedom”.
It is a well-made movie, the script is taken and adapted from a real-life human trafficking situation and follows an organization actively engaged in its prevention. With the film’s popularity, I thought it might be helpful to address some questions about its content and how it relates to our work:
- Does the film accurately portray the vulnerability and most common recruitment methods of child trafficking in America? No.
- Does the film suggest that sexually abused children reverted to health and well-being, without considering the long and arduous journey of healing that most survivors must travel? Perhaps. But it’s a story intending to inspire and/or entertain and raise awareness, not present the most effective methods for long-term and restorative healing.
Healing from this level of abuse happens in layers and can take years—if not a lifetime. The girl portrayed in the film doesn’t “get rescued” and return to the life she had before, or even begin a new one full of sunshine and rainbows. Watching Sound of Freedom was a good reminder that our community can benefit from engaging with and learning more about the journey that leaving the sex trade truly is, and why a restorative care home is so needed to help young women begin their journey of restoration, building a solid foundation to begin a new life of true freedom.
If this movie awakens people to pervasive realities of human trafficking and provokes a conversation and desire to learn more about what is happening right here in their own back yard, or even to seek out what they could do…. Then, I am very thankful for this movie.
Chaplain Krista Hull