Hayley’s MTV blog update 3

Hey guys,

Welcome back to my blog! I’m having a lot of fun with this, however, today I want to get just a little bit serious. As a band, we have worked with a few different charities and non-profit organizations over the years. But there is one in particular that we are extremely passionate about and I really want to share it with you guys. It’s called Love146.

So, question, have any of you ever seen the movie “Taken”? I won’t give away too much in case you haven’t… but this movie deals heavily with the issue of sex-trafficking. (If you’ve never seen it, it’s a must!) And just like in the movie, Love146 has one goal, which is to liberate young girls and boys who have been kidnapped and sold into sex slavery. We’ve been working with them for about 2 years now and have been able to be a part of rescuing young women and men from the grips of sexual and just about every other kind of abuse.

Sex trafficking is not just in third world countries… it is literally everywhere. Even in your own town. The commercial sex industry is one of the most largely successful crimes in the whole world. So why is it that we can ignore this issue so easily? Maybe if we realized that there was something we could actually do, personally, to help stop it then we’d be a little more inspired to take action. Over the past two years we have raised money by selling exclusive merch items and donated profits to Love146 to help their cause… but it wasn’t until early this year, when we met some of the rescued victims, that we really saw all of it come together. When the people at Love146 told us that they were actually going to bring some of the girls they had rescued out to our show, we were expecting to meet a group of people that were lifeless and frail. And at one point, they were… but the girls that we got to meet that night were dancing and laughing and holding on to us like they were the happiest people in the world. I didn’t understand how people who had been imprisoned and treated like they weren’t even human could be so happy now. Made all the problems in my life seem so insignificant. All I wanted to do was hang out with these girls who had once been forgotten. I wanted to tell them how they were actually heroes. It changed my life to see these stories that I’d heard for so long come to life. And I realized that Love146 wasn’t just statistics and percentages. It’s real people who deserve the same chance as all of us.

+ Read more of Hayley’s blog after the jump.

I could write for hours about this but if you really are interested, check out www.love146.org. There are stories and videos to catch you up on what exactly Love146 is doing to stop the disgusting epidemic of human trafficking. And if you want to help by a donation you can text “LOVE” to 85944 and $5 will be charged to your phone bill and go to Love146. Again, please visit their website so you can understand how real and how close this issue is to all of us.

Thanks for reading.

Hayley