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Child sex trafficking organizations set the record straight on QAnon conspiracy theories

Child sex trafficking organizations set the record straight on QAnon conspiracy theories

"Over 800,000 kids go missing in the U.S. every year! Child sex trafficking is the REAL pandemic. #SaveTheChildren #SaveOurChildren #ChildLivesMatter #Pedogate #Pedowood"

If you've been on social media in the past month or two, you've likely seen memes or posts to this effect. And if you're a person with a conscience, it likely caught your eye. Children being trafficked for sex—that's horrible!

Yes, it is. It's absolutely horrible. Child sex trafficking is basically the worst thing human beings can do, no question. But what do those #Pedogate and #Pedowood hashtags mean?

Yes, those. Unfortunately, they point directly to a QAnon-perpetuated conspiracy theory in which the world is being controlled by an elite global cabal of pedophilic Hollywood celebrities and high-level politicians (including Tom Hanks, Oprah, Hillary Clinton, and more) who secretly traffick, abuse, and torture children so they can harvest a fear-induced hormone in their blood to make adrenocrhome, which they consume to keep them young and/or imbibe during their drug-crazed Satanic rituals.

What?! That's crazy.

Yes, it is. It's absolutely crazy. But there are a baffling number of people who believe it, including people who will likely soon be serving in Congress. Many of these people are sharing the #SaveOurChildren and #ChildLivesMatter hashtags right along with #Pedowood and #Pedogate. They conflate this huge number of missing kids with the issue of child sex trafficking, and then point to the celebrity/politician cabal conspiracy theory in the same breath, as if it's all the same thing.

It is not.


The reality is that child sex trafficking is a multi-billion dollar, heinous, disgusting, global industry—but it's not new. It's not a sudden and massive crisis that "the media" is ignoring or that governments and NGOs aren't addressing. Unfortunately, QAnon believers have pushed a lot of misinformation and misleading information into the awareness surrounding this issue that needs to be corrected.

To get to the heart of what child sex trafficking really looks like—and to be thorough in the debunking of QAnon's child trafficking theories—we spoke with organizations whose work centers around stopping trafficking and protecting missing and exploited children.

The QAnon Misinformation

A common question people who have been sucked in by the QAnon world ask is: How do you know it's not true if it's never been investigated?

Some things are simply too ridiculous to be entertained, which honestly should be the case with the QAnon cabal theory. But since it's somehow slipped into the mainstream, it has to be addressed head on.

So I swallowed my pride and directly asked anti-trafficking organizations—the people who specialize in this subject and are intimately involved in investigations—whether or not there was any truth to the theory. It was humiliating, frankly, but I straight up asked them: "It's a known fact that child abusers often hide in plain sight and that high-profile people can be abusers. Based on your work, have you seen any evidence that there is a global cabal of pedophile elites who traffick children in a coordinated underground effort to harvest adrenochrome?"

Across the board, the answer was "No."

I also asked this question: "Pedophiles and traffickers sometimes use coded symbols and code words in their communications with one another. Is there any official documentation that the words 'pizza' or 'hot dog' or 'sauce' have been used for such a purpose? (Or more directly, are the Wikileaks emails evidence of child sex trafficking?)"

Again, the answer was no. Of course.

(For those new to Conspiracyland, the code words question came from the claim QAnon folks make that the FBI has a list of code words and symbols that support the Pizzagate theory, which posits that Hillary Clinton and associates were discussing their dastardly pedophile deeds in code words—pizza, sauce, etc.—via emails released by Wikileaks. The FBI has documented known pedophile symbols, but none of the supposed code words in the Wikileaks emails are listed among them And the Washington D.C. police have called Pizzagate "a fictitious online conspiracy theory.")

Erin Williamson, VP of Global Programs for Love146—an organization that has been working with sex trafficking prevention and survivor care for 17 years—says that conspiracy theories like this just makes more work for the people trying to do the work of educating the public.

"If somebody comes to know trafficking and has no preconceived notions of what trafficking is, you're starting with a blank slate," she says. "You can build from zero. But if someone's coming to the trafficking movement or approaching this issue with preconceived incorrect information, then first you have to get them to the point where they realize all of the information that they've learned thus far is inaccurate before you can start building the accurate information. And it just is going to take so much longer to get people to a point where they actually understand what this accurately looks like."

A national organization that asked to remain anonymous (understandable, considering how my own inbox fills with people accusing me of being a pedophile each time I write about how QAnon is bunk) told Upworthy, "Questions like this distract from the realities of how sex trafficking actually occurs. Offenders do often communicate in code but we haven't seen any such official documentation and don't consider the Wikileaks emails credible. Unfounded conspiracy theories minimize, distract and draw valuable resources away from the tireless work being done by child protection advocates on the ground."

The Polaris Project, which runs the National Trafficking Hotline, offered an example of how resources get usurped by these theories. Last month, a rumor started circulating in the QAnon sphere that the Wayfair website was being used to traffick children because someone spotted an strangely expensive cabinet with a female name.

"The Wayfair theory resulted in online harassment and privacy intrusions of people mistakenly believed to be victims, as well as broad sharing of online sexual abuse material of actual victims who have not been connected in any way to Wayfair," Polaris told Upworthy. "This harm is real for survivors who want to maintain their privacy, victims who are being re-exploited by broader distribution of their abuse materials, or bystanders whose lives can be overwhelmed by the actions of potentially well-meaning online communities."

In addition, Polaris adds, "Conspiracies distract from the more disturbing but simple realities of how sex trafficking actually works, and how we can prevent it."

But isn't awareness about child sex trafficking a good thing, even if it's not all factual?

Love146's Erin Williamson says no.

"In the short term, it might make people aware that there is an issue of child trafficking that exists," she says."But if that doesn't lead to somebody actually engaging with the issue and taking effort to join the movement to actually effectively eradicate the issue, then no. It's harmful. It's just a bunch of white noise that's sucking up resources."

"The question really is how many of the people are going to, as a result of this, actually have enough concern about child trafficking that they do more research, effectively realize what the issue is about, and then consistently or actively engage in addressing it," she adds. "And I don't think we fully know the percentage. My concern is that that percentage will be pretty low."

Perpetuating these kooky cabal theories does more to hurt the child sex trafficking cause than to help it.

Those Missing Kids Numbers

But what about all those missing children then?

Every organization I spoke to pointed out that there are no hard and fast numbers because there's no way to know exactly how many kids are being trafficked or exploited beyond what gets reported. We know that a lot of exploitation doesn't get reported, but most kids who go missing do get reported somewhere.

Two organizations pointed me to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) for missing children statistics. The NCMEC states, "According to the FBI, in 2019 there were 421,394 NCIC entries for missing children. In 2018, the total number of missing children entries into NCIC was 424,066." They clarify that this number represents individual reports of missing children, not the number of missing children themselves. If a child runs away multiple times in a year, each instance is counted separately and included in the yearly total, so the total number of missing children is likely less than those total numbers.

That's a lot of children; however, the vast majority of missing kids make it back home pretty quickly. Think of kids who run away to a friend's house and the parents can't find them, kids who get lost temporarily, or kids who get taken or not returned by a parent in a custody dispute.

The kids who don't return home and who are at risk of exploitation are where NCMEC comes in. In 2019, they assisted law enforcement and families with more than 29,000 cases. Less than one percent of those were non-family abductions, so the idea that loads of kids are just being snatched out of nowhere and sold for sex is totally inaccurate. In addition, NCMEC reports that 91 percent of those cases (around 26,300) were endangered runaways, and of those kids, 1 in 6 were likely victims of child sex trafficking. One is too many, of course, and these numbers are significant. But they're nowhere near 800,000.

Statistics come in various forms, of course. The Polaris Project, which runs the National Trafficking Hotline, tells Upworthy, " In 2019, the National Human Trafficking Hotline reported 2,582 underaged individuals involved in trafficking situations (all types)." However, they note, "It is incredibly important to note that these figures cannot be construed as prevalence."

Again, one child is too many, and these statistics only represent a fraction of the problem. Sharing these numbers is not meant to downplay the issue at all, but rather to explain that there's no real basis for the idea that 800,000 kids go missing and get sucked into child sex trafficking each year in the U.S.

So where did that number come from? There were some articles in the early 2000's that cited numbers close around 800,000. But the most recent statistics are shared above.

Numbers are always a bit fuzzy. What we do know is that children are being trafficked and exploited. Far too many, far too often.

What Child Sex Trafficking Really Looks Like

Child sex trafficking is a complex industry. Sometimes it looks like children being physically transported place to place and being bought and sold for sex. Sometimes it's kids being used to create child pornography. Sometimes it's a drug-addicted parent renting out their children to get money for their addiction. Sometimes it's teens recruiting other teens to engage in sex or create sexual images for money.

Love146's Williamson explained that trafficking can look very different in different parts of the world.

"We run a program in the Philippines, and most of our children come into that program under 10," says Williamson.. "We've accepted kids under the age of one into that program. In those situations, it's really familial a lot of times, and a lot of what is happening is happening over webcams. You'll also see reports of labor trafficking happening in other countries at very young ages.

"What we see in the United States and what we're working with is different. We're not seeing as many under 10 year olds trafficked. I'm not saying it doesn't happen—it does. But more of what we're seeing are adolescents. Preteen and teenagers who are being groomed and recruited, and while some is familial, a lot is not familial."

Williamson explains that the term "runaway" is a bit of a misnomer because some runaways are teens who get pulled away from home by traffickers in sneaky ways.

"Part of what traffickers do is they recruit and groom," she says. "They engage in a relationship for the purposes of exploiting this kid for trafficking. So it can appear that a kid is running away, or choosing to leave their house willingly, but it's actually an intentionality on the part of the traffickers to make it appear that way...to make it appear that way to law enforcement, to the parents, and to the child themselves. So the child says things like, 'I chose to go, I chose to meet up with so and so who I met online, or to meet up with so and so who I met in the park.' So again, even when we talk about the term runaway…they're really being groomed and recruited away from their home."

One common theme among the organizations I communicated with is that there are well-known conditions that greatly increase a child's chances of being trafficked.

Polaris Project says:

"Traffickers recognize and take advantage of people who are vulnerable in certain ways. There are several factors that may make a child vulnerable to sex trafficking including having an unstable living situation, having a history of domestic or sexual abuse, being frequent runaways, being involved in the juvenile justice or foster care systems, experiencing poverty or financial need, and/or dealing with addiction. While anyone can be trafficked, just as anyone can become a victim of any crime, due to factors such as historical oppression, discrimination, and generational trauma, LGBTQ+ youth and youth of color are more likely to be trafficked."

The anonymous organization also explained that certain conditions make kids more vulnerable. "Certain kids who are homeless or runaways, belong to certain minority groups, and who have contact with the child welfare system are particularly vulnerable to this type of exploitation."

Polaris also points out, "In the case of child sex trafficking in particular, the vast majority of victims know their traffickers and trust them. They may be professional traffickers who carefully groom young people on line and lure them into trafficking situations. They may well also be their parents, or other family members or trusted friends."

What We Can Do About it

Learning about the realities of child sex trafficking is the first step. The issue is complex and multi-faceted, but just because it's not simple or easy to solve doesn't mean there's nothing we can do.

One active thing we can do is what trafficking looks like.

"Trafficking is rarely perpetrated by a total stranger who kidnaps children," says Polaris Project. "What we frequently see through the Trafficking Hotline are stories of people being trafficked by intimate partners, family members, and others that they know and may even love and trust."

We can also make sure kids we are in contact with know that we are safe people they can go to if they are in an unsafe situation.

"When we talk to kids, it is always the little things that made the difference," says Love 146's Williamson. "It is always the neighbor who asked how they were doing, who then they realized was a safe person, that they could eventually talk to about what was happening to them in their house. It is always the teacher who they would curse out who would say 'I'm still here for you whenever you need something.' It is the little things that make a difference in a child's life."

Williamson also points out that the systemic issues we debate over in our society also impact child sex trafficking, and addressing those issues will help reduce the vulnerabilities that lead to exploitation.

"For most of us who have been working in this field long enough, there's now a general recognition that we're not going to arrest and prosecute our way out of this issue," she says, "We've tried that. That isn't happening. We need to go upstream. We need to deal with all of the things that make people vulnerable—the inequalities, the racism, the sexism, the homophobia. We need to address all of these issues that have all sorts of consequences, of which trafficking is one of them. It takes a while to get somebody to understand how this is all interrelated.

So when I hear somebody say, 'Black Lives Matter? What about children's lives? There's been a couple of quotes like that. 'Why are we marching for Black Lives Matter? Where's the outcry for trafficked children?' and comparing those two. First of all, this is not a dichotomy—we should be addressing all of this. And my thing is when you look at the statistics, especially here in the United States, trafficking is disproportionately affecting children of color. And so racism is at the heart of both of these issues, when you're talking about the disproportionality of violence against people of color. So it's not an either/or. It's actually a yes/and. Which is why we have to go upstream and start addressing some of these systemic issues."

To learn more about the real issue of child sex trafficking, check out these organizations' websites:

Polaris Project

Love146

The Exodus Road

ECPAT-USA

Child Rescue Coalition

Thorn

Operation Underground Railroad

International Justice Mission

Joy

5 things that made us smile this week

A plane full of strangers restores our faith in humanity, zoo animals give adorable interviews, kids have their wishes granted, and much more.

Five new stories this week that restore our faith in humanity.

True

Need a timeline cleanse? Of course you do. No matter what kind of week you’re having, we bet these five feel-good news snippets will leave you smiling.

This week we’re celebrating:

This Texas woman's breastfeeding superpower

Alyse Ogletree / The Guardian

Texas mom Alyse Ogletree isn’t able to give away money to good causes—so she’s managed to donate something much harder to come by: breastmilk. Ogletree has selflessly donated a record amount of breastmilk (over 700 gallons!) to nourish thousands of premature and medically-fragile babies. Superwoman!

More wishes granted for children fighting critical illnesses

Make-A-Wish® supports kids and families facing critical illnesses, granting “wishes” unique to each child—everything from meeting a celebrity to redesigning their bedroom. Subaru is proud to have helped grant more than 3,600 wishes for kids in need through the Subaru Share the Love Event®. Even better? From now until January 2, Subaru is donating at least $300 to charities like Make-A-Wish® with every new Subaru purchased or leased.

A plane full of strangers helps a struggling single mom

@notaregularnanny Sobbing crying making this video ❤️‍🩹🥲 my faith in humanity was restored after this whole experience #ittakesavillage #myvillage #motherhood #solotravel #solomom #travelingwithkids #stranded #momsoftiktok #faithinhumanityrestored ♬ Outro by m83 - 𝙡𝙤𝙡𝙖

When her flight was canceled, Gabrielle G., a 27-year-old single parent, boarded a flight back home to Florida with her 18-month-old son. Traveling solo with a toddler is a daunting task—but in a now-viral video, Gabrielle shares how a slew of helpful strangers made the trip bearable, offering their seats and entertaining her son while her plane was stuck on the tarmac for hours. More of this, please, humanity!

This bald eagle's new foster baby

World Bird Sanctuary

When a large, male bald eagle started guarding something on the ground at the World Bird Sanctuary in Missouri, keepers discovered that he had become fiercely protective over a rock. Thinking it was an egg, the eagle, named Murphy, began sitting on it, nudging it, and guarding it protectively (which is classic male eagle behavior, his keepers say, as they share equally in bird-raising and have a strong paternal instinct).

Months later, an eagle chick was brought to the sanctuary after surviving a fall from its nest. When keepers put the baby bird and Murphy in the same enclosure, Murphy’s fatherly instincts kicked into high gear, feeding the baby himself. Now, Murphy has a baby of his very own.

These hilarious animal interviews

In a stunning feat of investigative journalism (lol), YouTuber Maya Higa started a series titled “Tiny Mic Interviews,” where she approaches animals at the ZooToYou Conservation Ambassadors with a tiny microphone and asks them the burning questions we all want to know, including “Can I please touch your snoot?” and “What’s your favorite thing about being a capybara?”

Higa “translates” their answers into text on screen, and the results are adorable. BRB, watching this series all day.

For more ways to smile, check out how Subaru is sharing the love this holiday season.

Her delight at finding a snack she liked has people in stitches.

In the age of Amazon and other online retailers, delivery drivers have become an integral part of our lives. But most of us rarely interact with the people who drop packages at our door via UPS or FedEx or USPS, and if we do, it's usually only for a few seconds. We might manage a friendly "Good afternoon!" or quick "Thanks a bunch!" as they hustle to and from their vehicle, always rushing to fulfil their quota as efficiently as possible.

Delivery folks work hard. They're on their feet much of the day, traipsing up hundreds of front walks a week, through all kinds of inclement weather. Yes, it's their job and they're paid to do it, but it's always nice to have your work seen and appreciated, which is one reason a video of UPS driver discovering a sweet treat on a customer's front porch is going viral.

Another reason is that it's just hilariously adorable.

A doorbell camera caught a UPS driver wearing a holiday bauble headband walking up to the door and dropping off a package as she talks to herself. After she takes a photo of the delivery, she sees that the customer had left a little tray of drinks and snacks, and her "Oooh, do I see honey bunny?" is a sign of the hilarity to come.

Watch her reaction and the way she joyfully make her way back to the truck.

Unsurprisingly, people are in love with the driver and her giddy goofiness.

"I literally laughed out loud at her crazy walk back to the truck. I need more people like her in my life."

"I have a friend like that, he just makes my day every time we see each other. 😂"

"That is way adorable! Simple act that makes the day of a random person <3."

"I don’t know anything else about her but she’s my new fave human."

"OMG she reminds me of our mail carrier so much. We leave her cookies at Christmas and she always does a little happy dance that day."

Delivery drivers and former delivery drivers shared that these kinds of gestures really do mean a lot.

"As a former delivery driver, i want you to know that if you leave snacks and drinks out for us, we love you to the moon and back. 💜"

"Driving for Amazon paid my rent for 10 months. Not exaggerating when I say that it was a dark time in my life. Snacks made me smile. every. single. time."

"I mean... I literally took something from every house that had stuff out. I worked 10-12hrs+ during the holidays... I needed every calorie I could get walking 20-30miles a day."

"Even when I didn't take them I appreciate them. it's like seeing a sign that says we love delivery drivers."

"I'll tell you what, the people who leave food got me through my holidays as a postal carrier. Nothing slaps harder than an ice cold redbull and bag of pretzels and ice cold bottle of water that was left in a cooler. I had a lady who asked me what I liked and then had sperate bags labeled "Mail carrier USPS" and "UPS GUY" and "FED EX GUY" with our preferred snacks. She asked me what my favorite ice cream was and she knew my mile long loop and knew when I parked, I'd be done in 15mins, so, she'd be waiting at the truck every day all summer with an ice cream and a napkin.

There are some people who just f---ing make the day feel worth it, if you are one of these people, you are what makes delivering mail worth it. We do notice the nice things you do for us, THANK YOU."

"I do this during the summer. I'm in Texas so it's routinely over 100°F. I'm always trying to make sure there are cold drinks for our postal workers and delivery people."

"I do it during Australian Christmas. 40c/100f plus on a December day. Coke water and Gatorade always gone by lunch."

It's a good reminder that it doesn't take a lot to show appreciation and make someone's day. These kinds of positive interactions, even when asynchronous and not directly face-to-face, are an important part of building the kind of world we all want to live in.

17-month-old saves himself after falling in pool

There's nearly nothing more terrifying than your small child falling into a body of water when you're not looking. It's something that parents have nightmares about while some parents are left grieving that nightmare becoming reality. Accidents around pools are very common, resulting in massive public safety announcements about ways to keep kids safe around bodies of water.

There are initiatives ranging from discouraging parents from using Puddle Jumpers to making sure parents know to avoid putting blue bathing suits on children. Blue bathing suits makes it harder for people to see if a child has gone under water and the popular Puddle Jumpers give kids false confidence and teaches them improper form for swimming. But one of the most important message to parents has been to make sure your children know basic water safety skills and learn to swim.

Typically when small children fall into a pool while briefly unsupervised they panic causing them to quickly become submerged, sinking to the bottom of the pool. The drowning child is then only rescued if a parent, caregiver, older sibling or family dog sees them and jumps into action. But for one San Diego family, their 17-month old knew exactly what to do when he was running by the pool and fell inside. The entire thing was caught on home surveillance camera, piquing interest in the life saving swim lessons.

girl in white tank top on swimming pool during daytime Photo by Rendy Novantino on Unsplash

Little Frankie had been taking Infant Self Rescue (ISR) water safety training for months where the instructor teaches babies how to prepare for falling into water before righting themselves and floating. Watching the video you can see the training immediately kick in as the boy realizes he's going into the water. He immediately takes a deep breath as he's falling. While his little feet were above his head he didn't panic, he maneuvered his body until he could safely turn over to take a breath.

The baby floats on his back until his father sees him. Frankie's dad runs to his side only to stop for a minute in shock that his son was perfectly fine. He saved himself from a possible deadly situation by doing exactly what he was taught to do through those survival swim lessons.

boy in red t-shirt playing with water Photo by Yianni Mathioudakis on Unsplash

"I immediately thought, 'oh my gosh, he did exactly what he was taught to do," Frankie's mom says in part to Fox 5 San Diego. "He did what he was supposed to do and those lessons were invaluable."

The instructor for the ISR classes says he has been inundated with class sign ups after the story of Frankie got out. Witnessing the training save a small child in a real-life situation that could've ended in tragedy encouraged parents to take this type of training more seriously. Thanks to the toddler's months of training, falling into the pool didn't cause him any fear around falling into the pool. The little guy might have thought it was just another part of his training, especially since his dad didn't panic and pulled the boy out of the pool quickly.

ISR lessons can be cost prohibitive but community centers and places like the YMCA offer swim lessons for people of all ages, including infants. They're not the same type of lessons but they all teach water safety, including floating. Learning how to be comfortable in and around water to include some basic water survival skills will help children have safer experiences around water.

Pop Culture

'Wicked' author reveals how one line in 'The Wizard of Oz' inspired Elphaba and Glinda's story

Gregory Maguire says he "fell down to the ground" laughing when the idea hit him.

Public domain

Gregory Maguire was inspired by a line in the original 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz."

Have you ever watched a movie or read a book or listened to a piece of music and wondered, "How did they come up with that idea?" The creative process is so enigmatic even artists themselves don't always know where their ideas come from, so It's a treat when we get to hear the genesis of a brilliant idea straight from the horse's mouth. If you've watched "Wicked" and wondered where the idea for the friendship between Elphaba (the Wicked Witch) and Glinda (the Good Witch) came from, the author of the book has shared the precise moment it came to him.

The hit movie "Wicked" is based on the 20-year-old hit stage musical, which is based on the novel "Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West" written by Gregory Maguire. While the musical is a simplified version of the 1995 book, the basic storyline—the origins of the two witches from "The Wizard of Oz"—lies at the heart of both. In an interview with BBC, Maguire explained how Elphaba and Glinda's friendship popped into his head.

Maguire was visiting Beatrix Potter's farm in Cumbria, England, and thinking about "The Wizard of Oz," which he had loved as a child and thought could be an interesting basis for a story about evil.

"I thought 'alright, what do we know about 'The Wizard of Oz' from our memories,'" he said. "We have the house falling on the witch. What do we know about that witch? All we know about that witch is that she has feet. So I began to think about Glinda and the Wicked Witch of the West…

"There is one scene in the 1939 film where Billie Burke comes down looking all pink and fluffy, and Margaret Hamilton is all crawed and crabbed and she says something like, 'I might have known you'd be behind this, Glinda!' This was my memory, and I thought, now why is she using Glinda's first name? They have known each other. Maybe they've known each other for a long time. Maybe they went to college together. And I fell down onto the ground in the Lake District laughing at the thought that they had gone to college together."

In "Wicked," Glinda and the Wicked Witch, Elphaba, meet as students at Shiz University, a school of wizardry. They get placed as roommates, loathe each other at first, but eventually become best friends. The story grows a lot more complicated from there (and the novel goes darker than the stage play), but it's the character development of the two witches and their relationship with one another that force us to examine our ideas about good and evil.


- YouTubeyoutu.be

Maguire also shared with the Denver Center for Performing Arts what had inspired him to use the "Wizard of Oz" characters in the first place.

"I was living in London in the early 1990’s during the start of the Gulf War. I was interested to see how my own blood temperature chilled at reading a headline in the usually cautious British newspaper, the Times of London: 'Sadaam Hussein: The New Hitler?' I caught myself ready to have a fully formed political opinion about the Gulf War and the necessity of action against Sadaam Hussein on the basis of how that headline made me feel. The use of the word Hitler – what a word! What it evokes! When a few months later several young schoolboys kidnapped and killed a toddler, the British press paid much attention to the nature of the crime. I became interested in the nature of evil, and whether one really could be born bad. I considered briefly writing a novel about Hitler but discarded the notion due to my general discomfort with the reality of those times. But when I realized that nobody had ever written about the second most evil character in our collective American subconscious, the Wicked Witch of the West, I thought I had experienced a small moment of inspiration. Everybody in America knows who the Wicked Witch of the West is, but nobody really knows anything about her. There is more to her than meets the eye."

Authors and artists—and their ideas—help hold a mirror up to humanity for us to see and reflect on who we are, and "Wicked" is one of those stories that makes us take a hard look at what we're seeing in that mirror. Thanks, Gregory Maguire, for launching us on a collective journey that not only entertains but has the potential to change how we see one another.

In act of kindness Louisiana church returns land to Indigenous tribe

In recent years the Land Back Movement has come into public consciousness, it doesn't always necessarily mean physically return the land, but to return the stewardship of the land. Some Indigenous communities work with local government officials to care for the land in a way that will restore lost ecosystems and help the land thrive.

But in some recent instances, land has been physically returned to the local Indigenous communities. One example of physically returning land is California's governor Gavin Newsom returning 2,820 acres of ancestral land to the Shasta Indian Nation in Northwestern California. This move will help restore the natural environment to the area and allow the Shasta members to access sacred ceremonial ground.

a body of water surrounded by lush green trees Photo by Michael Sanchez on Unsplash

In Louisiana a small Indigenous community acquired some of their ancestral lands after the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana started working with the Takapa Ishaq Chawasha tribe to protect the coastline with recycled oyster shells. But in order to move forward with their project they need to know who owns the property. After some searching, the group discovers the coastal area known as Lemon Tree Mound is owned by St. Pauls Episcopal Church.

A parishioner willed the land to the church after his death in the 80s and after the discovery that the land previously belonged to the tribe, the church has recently given it back.

Indigenous People Thanksgiving GIF by INTO ACTIONGiphy

"We at the Episcopal church have strong commitments these days to restorative justice and to creation care. Maybe it's been a while in coming but better late than never," St. Paul's vestry member Greg Williams shares with WUVE Fox 8.

It's not just the local tribe that is excited for the land to be returned but their sister tribes have been expressing their excitement as well, tribal member Rosina Philippe tells the station, "even some of our sister tribes, you know. I got emails from different people saying, you know, doing that AH YEE YEE YEE YEE YEE in the email, spelling it out knowing that they're rejoicing and dancing with us."

The church leaders say they never hesitated to with the thought of giving the church back to the Indigenous tribe, calling the act "a very small thing" for the church. But that small act for the church was a huge thing for the Indigenous community in Louisiana.


"We're filled with gratitude first of all, and we're rejoicing to be connected to the land, to be tied into the land and you know, to have the land returned to the tribe. It's a rematriation, so connecting the tribe back to mother earth is more significant. You know, in that respect they may think it's a little thing but to us it's one of the best things that the church could ever have done. We're rejoicing. We're so very, very happy. It's a very big thing, a big thing," Phillipe says.

While the lemon trees are long gone, the oral history of how the land helped feed their ancestors and served as higher ground during flooding has been a memory passed down for generations. Since the land has been in the hands of the tribe for care, the recycled oysters used to build a barrier to protect the land's edge has grown coral and new oysters are beginning to thrive.

Image credit: Avie Sheck/Instagram (used with permission)

Avie Scheck sings "Creep" while his mom harmonizes with a classical Indian song.

Musical and cultural mashups can be a blast, with some combos you'd never think to put together creating a whole new and delightful experience. We've seen "Carol of the Bells" mashed up with "Pirates of the Caribbean" on harp, Dr. Seuss mashed up with Dr. Dre beats, Irish step dancing to Beyonce's country music and now, Radiohead's "Creep" with classical Indian music.

Avie Sheck has played and sung in bands his whole life while his mother is trained as classical Indian singer. India has a rich musical tradition that goes back some 6,000 years, stemming from sacred Vedic scriptures and chants, and while the pairing of it with Radiohead may be unexpected, the result is quite extraordinary.

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People are raving over the mother-son mashup using words like "stunning," "exquisite" and "sublime," with many people saying it unexpectedly brought them to tears.

"As a Creep cover snob, this is the very best cover I’ve ever heard."

"I feel like I am floating in space right now while listening to this rendition of creep."

"One of those rare covers that I actually welcome that hit right. 👏"

"I can’t even explain it, I got full body chills. Your mom is 🤌🏼 literally stopped in my tracks."

"Bro I’d pay to listen to this live. Amazing!!"

"Watching this live would melt me."

"I am crying … this has tugged at something 😭😭🥹🥹"

Clearly, they struck a nerve with this one.

Believe it or not, Radiohead's "Creep" wasn't a huge success when it was first released in 1992. It was rarely played on the radio because it was considered too depressing for angsty early 90s musical tastes, and it topped out at #78 U.K. Singles Chart. The BBC even banned it for a while due to the f-bomb lyric, but when that word was changed to "very" and the song re-released in 1993, it found its audience and climbed to No. 7 on the U.K. charts.

Since then, it's been covered many times, its sad lyrics about yearning for someone out of your league and feeling like you don't belong hitting people where it hurts (but in the best way) for over 30 years.

Sheck's mom shared what her part of the song meant in a follow-up video on Instagram. She explained that it's about a mother waking up her son to take care of the cows because his friends are already up and about and wondering where he is. But the deeper meaning, she explains, is "You belong here. You belong to the Earth, the people around you, the animals around you. Stop that sadness." What a perfect complement to "Creep."

Classical Indian music has its own sound, structure and feel that make it unique, but it also blends beautifully with other musical styles when creative people make it happen. For instance, at a wedding blending Indian and Scottish cultures, instruments from both countries—bagpipes and the dhol drum—were combined with a perfectly joyful result. Much like this classical Indian/Radiohead mashup, putting two unexpected musical genres together sometimes works far better than people might imagine.

People have asked if the song can be found on Spotify, Apple music, etc., but Sheck explained that he can't share it there because it's an interpolation, not a straight cover, which involves a lot more complicated legal details. The full version can be found on YouTube, however, and he said he may put it on Soundcloud.

You can follow Avie Sheck on Instagram for more and find the full version of the "Creep" cover on Sheck's YouTube channel:

- YouTubewww.youtube.com