>>Dean Grillot: Dr. Cruise here with me again to talk about another important global issue
today, and that is illicit trafficking. Now items of all kinds are illegally and illicitly
trafficked around the world. We're very familiar with some of these right Dr. Cruise? So like
drug trafficking, we think of cocaine and marijuana and methamphetamine and heroin--
illegal drugs. And so there's you know the the massive drug trafficking, the drug trade.
Arms obviously, there are a lot of the there's there's demand all around the world for weapons
in in places where, you know, they either are under sanctions and embargoes and can't
receive them. Criminals that want to that want weapons, so weapons trafficking we're
very familiar with. But human trafficking a, a-- I wouldn't say a new form of trafficking
in any way, shape or form, but certainly one that has grown significantly in recent years
and seems to be kind of overtaking the drug trade in some ways as as one of the most profitable
areas for trafficking. So just let's just start there with these, these forms of trafficking
and and what some thoughts might be about particularly human trafficking?
>>Dr. Cruise: When we think of human trafficking we can think of a couple different things.
By definition, human trafficking refers to those that are taken or trafficked for use
in the sex trade as as prostitutes or sold off for labor. You can often think about big
events such as the Super Bowl, the Olympics. People are brought in, coerced, and then in
many ways abused or not paid fair wages. And then finally one we don't talk about all that
often is child soldiers are also technically a form of human trafficking, very big concern.
And some might be surprised to learn that Oklahoma is actually one of the transport
areas or the the cross-transport areas because of where we sit in the United States. You
mentioned some of these others: gun trafficking, drug trafficking. These often go hand-in-hand.
Where you see one, you're likely to see the other. Again thinking about Oklahoma the drug
trade through the state of Oklahoma is often associated with human trafficking through
the state. And I would also point out that thinking about human trafficking due to the
advances in technology, we also see a lot of organ trafficking becoming a a new commodity.
People either selling off organs, being coerced to sell organs, or whole bodies being taken
to be transplanted into someone else.
>>Dean Grillot: This this is really shocking. The the organ transplant trade basically people
selling an organ, like a kidney, for example, that's I mean you could go on the Internet
and order a kidney. But then you know, livers and lungs and other things being stolen or
taken from prisoners after they've died or they they have perhaps been murdered by other
people. Are people being murdered for for guns? I mean that I think that brings up an
important point that often what goes hand-in-hand with trafficking is violence. And and these
these are clearly activities that are happening on the margins of and and outside the law,
so, you know, with that comes violence and even terrorism. You know a topic we've talked
about before that that terrorists are often engaging in trafficking activities in order
to fund their their work and their terrorist activities, their organizations. Now not all
traffickers are terrorists, but pretty much all terrorists are traffickers. So there's
there's that relationship there that leads to all kinds of other ugly things: organized
crime and and violence and terrorism, in particular. But you know it's not just weapons, drugs,
and humans, and organs. I mean there are animals that are trafficked: exotic animals, art,
antiquities, other kinds of collectibles, butterflies, insects.
>>Dr. Cruise: Butterflies, I'm sure you have sure you have some Harry Potter fans in your
class. The white owls were trafficked when Harry Potter was a very popular book. They
are a an endangered species, and yet people were wanting to get ahold of them. So there
is a huge demand for all sorts of odd products as well as some of the other ones that you've
mentioned. There's a lot of money to be made in this industry.
>>Dean Grillot: So one other little twist on this-- let's talk for a second about counterfeit
goods. So we we all know that some of these things weapons, drugs, humans in particular,
this is all illegal activity, but counterfeiting of every day items like handbags and sunglasses
and belts and clothing. You know, just every day items, but also things like prescription
drugs-- those being counterfeited around the world. So there are huge markets in fake items
and fake goods around the world. You walk down the streets of Rome, you walk down the
streets of New York and you see people lined up selling fake handbags on the street. Why
should we care about that where does that fit into illicit trafficking?
>>Dr. Cruise: Well I think when you're talking about fake prescription drugs there's a very
serious health concern there. Obviously we don't have anyone regulating what is in those
drugs and then people are taking them thinking that they're perhaps giving one thing, and
there's probably other substances that are used as filler in there. It could be very
very dangerous. Now you might think that buying a a fake Gucci bag on the streets of Rome
is no big deal. You get to have this lovely bag and it didn't cost you the the huge amounts
that a real Gucci bag would cost you, but there are consequences of where this bag came
from. Probably the people that are selling it themselves have been trafficked into those
areas. The people that are producing this are surely not being paid a livable wage,
and are probably being coerced themselves. And so there are lives that are in danger
when we go and buy those bags and buy those sunglasses.
>>Dean Grillot: It's contributing, it's hurting the brand and it's contributing to potentially
contributing to black-market and other activities so--
>>Dean Grillot: So but let's, let's finish this discussion by looking at how do you fight
illicit trafficking? This is the hard part right? Because a lot of this is so invisible,
it's not out in the open. You know, we don't you know notice these kinds of activities
going on. So what do we do to fight it if we can't really even see it?
>>Dr. Cruise: This is a, a difficult question to answer and one that really, we're going
to struggle to answer for quite some time. And we're going to try and have been trying
in many, many different ways. One of them is primarily looking at exports and imports,
products that come into the United States. How are those being searched? What are we
looking for? What can we do to make sure that the documents that are used to get animals,
peoples, etcetera through borders that those are legitimate, and then some prosecution
if we find that those are not legitimate. Other issues, you know, monitoring what's
being sold on the web. This is a very controversial issue, but to some degree, there needs to
be some efforts to do that. Animals, as you mentioned, drugs and and other things are
sold on the web as well. But I think there's some things that we can do as individuals
every day we can not buy that purse. We can not--
>>Dean Grillot: I mean it's demand, right?
>>Dr. Cruise: Yeah, it is demand.
>>Dean Grillot: I mean there's a demand issue as well. It's not just the supply but the
demand. So when you say we can do--
>>Dr. Cruise: Yes.
>>Dean Grillot: --something, what we can do is not-- try to avoid purchasing illicitly
produced or illicit products.
>>Dr. Cruise: We can do that. We can also something. We can do just in of ourselves
is educate people to this sort of thing. I mentioned at the beginning that we're talking
about things that are occurring in Oklahoma. We can tell other people about these. We can
make them aware. Information and education is always a good tool in fighting these sorts
of activities.
>>Dean Grillot: Definitely a challenging issue. So be honest -- have you been involved in
illicit trafficking? How about piracy of music or film? I mean these, are these illicit activities?
Let's see what the students think about this issue of illicit trafficking.