Valuing Human Life

Have you ever taken the time to think about the value of human life and what it truly means to you? What is the price you would sell your life for? Or is life too amazing and full of surprises with never ending adventures to adequately put a price on it? Lately I have been doing a lot of thinking on this very thought, what does having the opportunity to live life mean to me? By this point you are probably wondering why contemplating the value of human life is so important and what point am I exactly trying to get at. I am about to tell you exactly why each individual person deserves to be valued. 

As I have discussed previously, my platform is human trafficking, “It’s happening here, It’s happening now.”  Just to refresh your memory, human trafficking is known as modern day slavery and is affecting people locally, nationally, and internationally. Recently I came across an article discussing this very topic. Needless to say, I have researched this topic for many years and read many articles but this one was different.  This article discussed how in 1809 the average price of a slave was $40,000 when adjusted in today’s money, while today the price of a person forced into slavery is $90. The point, the price of human life continues to decrease, and to people in the trafficking ring, your life is no more important or even worth anything greater than a few dollars.  

Slavery has played a huge role throughout history but unfortunately as we can see it has never truly disappeared. The fact that there are more than 30 million slaves in the world today, which is more than at the height of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, is disturbing let alone unbelievable. I want to remind people that the value of our life is much greater than $90. In fact our lives are so important that no dollar amount would ever be worthy enough.  That is why it is so important to take a stand against this cause and fight to end modern day slavery.  As Edward Everett stated, “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; And because I cannot do everything I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.” It is important to remember that no one human life is more important than the next and we are all worth more than $90.




Yours truly,

Stacy Schaffer
Miss ND International 2011

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