Sound of Feedom (Go See It!)

I went and watched the Sound of Freedom today, and I want to talk about it. (Spoiler free.)

So I saw a trailer for this a month or two ago. I thought, “This looks good, but I probably won’t watch it.” One, a small movie probably won’t come to my town, and two, this is dark. I know human trafficking is real, but it’s not something any of us really want to think about. (Changed my mind on this.) The week or so that the movie came out I saw on YouTube an interview of the actor who played the main character and the real man, Tim Ballard. At this point there was already some controversy out about the movie. This seemed dumb to me and even more so after watching the interview. Now I was interested and started paying more attention. As the movie got bigger, the fight against it did too. They can’t deny human trafficking is real but they tried to down play it. “It s not as bad as they show it. The facts/statistic are wrong.” WHAT?! The facts and statistics are out there showing this. And EVEN IF it’s not “as bad”, human trafficking is a horrible terrible thing. Let’s end it! Why the ---- ---- would you try to down play it?! It makes you wonder who is backing those saying this, or what they have to hide. Also this could change the flow of culture. Think about it. If we take this seriously, what do we do? We protect our kids. How? We be the adult/parent. We don’t let them do just whatever they want. Feeling are important but so is your safety and well being, if not more so. And it shows that there are more important matters out there to focus on then our petty issues. At the end of the movie all my problems felt petty. So this could change what people are focusing on and even how they live. And that goes against the cultural norm right now. Whatever message the media wants to feed us and have us focus on, this ain’t it. So yeah, they are going to try to silence it. Fortunately it has not worked. When I found out it was coming to my town, I immediately planed to go see it. I have talked about it with others and was in favor of it, and after seeing, I am still very much advocating for it.

It’s not a movie to watch to be entertained. It’s not a “fun” watch. But it is important to see. There were things that were hard to watch. Not because it got explicate. The movie did a very good job of not showing anything. You are left in no doubt as to what just or did happen but you do not see any of it. I think some things were a bit different from what really happened but not crazy. Maybe condensed or simplified. There a special message after the movie in which they say that neither the actor nor the real life man are the heroes, but the children who went though this and fought to survive. The acting was good. I’m not one to pick up on bad acting very well, but I do notice it more as I get older but nothing stood out to me as cheep writing or poor acting. Know what your own kids can and cannot handle, but I would thing most teenager could watch this.

So what now? Human trafficking is real and so much bigger than any of us can deal with or likely get our heads around. Monsters walk among us. From being interested in this I have learned things that I never wanted to know or even fathomed imagining. It makes you sick and lose sleep. But what can we do? What can I do? I don’t think I could go on missions like show in the movie to save kids, I don’t think my acting is up to par. I don’t have that much money. I can donate but that seems too little and too easy. And since there are monsters out there, do we live in fear? Obviously not. The buggy man is scariest in the dark. Evil thrives in the shadows and places unseen. So how do you fight them? You expose them to the light. Yes monsters can be just as ugly in the light, but they can’t hide anymore. The movie brings up that human trafficking is the fastest growing crime, but we don’t talk about it because it’s too dark a subject to bring up in polite society. So let’s turn that on its head. Let’s talk about it. Let’s expose it to the light. Its real and it’s there, don’t let it hide. Don’t fear it, but face it and expose it. And let us demand justice. For those who do these horrible, despicable things, I don’t care if they are poor, middle class, or the elite of the world, if you do wrong, you face justice. No more getting out of things because of how much money one has or who they are. We all know this happens. Let’s stand up against this. Let’s hold all accountable. One voice may be silenced but, just as this movie has not been silenced because people refused to listen to the voices for those who spoke against it, we can come together and expose all to the light. This is my take away. I don’t know how much I can really do, but awareness is the first step. Please go so The Sound of Freedom for yourself. Then please join me in shining the light and refusing to let this go crawling back into the shadows. Let’s talk about it, be aware, and do whatever small bit we can.

Thank you, and God Bless