our mission continues to provide an unfiltered view of government. already this year we brought you primary election coverage, the presidential impeachment process, and now the federal response to the coronavirus. you can watch all of c-span public affair programming on television, online, or listed on our free radio app. be part of the national conversation through c-span's daily "washington journal" program. or throw social media feed. c-span, created by private industry, america's cable television company as a public service and brought to you today by your television provider. [applause] thank you molly and good evening everyone welcomed to this evenings. [laughter] welcome to this evening's screen showing. this distinguished speakers series featuring a

conversation with cyntoia brown-long i want to thank molly who just heard from its her suggestion we bring cyntoia to campus. she was also instrumental in developing the program for cyntoia visit and tonight's event, so thank you molly. [applause] i also want to thank jess burns and all of my colleagues for their work on this form and so many other events throughout the year. i'd like to acknowledge more than a dozen cosponsors of tonight's event. there are really too many to name individually but i hope you sell them recognize on the screen before we started. it is gratifying that so many organizations acrossga the universe will be joining us to support this event. head demonstrates the concern and commitment of so many students, faculty, staff with the issues we will discuss

with tonight's guests. we understand these are challenging topics that touch on difficult personal experiences. i want to encourage you to support each other, to seek support from offices like careli and others at tufts who are well prepared and ready to deal these issues. as you solemnly introductory video we are celebrating to us college anniversary. it was founded in 2000 with the purpose of advancing commitment to civic life. our mission, then and now is to ensure all tufts students across all schools and academic disciplines acquire the knowledge, skills, valleys become leaders and problem solvers and their communities in near and far. the college began with this dingle student program now knownut as tish scholars. give them a shout out.

we offer in support dozens of initiatives for students in-and-out of the classroom on campus and around the world. we are also home to a nationally recognized research center that studies voting, civic education and other civic and at and life. the community partnerships always essential element of our work have evolved and expanded to encompass more communities and broader impacts. the distinguished speakers series began sevener years ago with a visit by senator elizabeth warren. bit of irony today. [laughter] today, other tisch college events have grown -- it was did not mean that in any way we as a treat to have her here and host there. today other tisch college events have grown to match the scope of our work. we are excited about this years lineup of visitors and guest speakers. yesterday we hosted a lunch

about the black power movement with professor rhonda williams and laterck this year we hope will host fungus on joe kennedy, congressman eric swallow to talk about impeachment, veteran journalist scott jennings and many other scholarss and leaders whose work will inform ourrs views, challenge some of our beliefs, and encourage our participation in civic life. with this diversity of speakers and went to highlight different ways by which people can impact issues they care about and help build a more just and equitable world. tonight's guest personifies that idea and reminds us that from humble beginnings, far outside the halls of h power, all of us can learn from our lived experiences and use them to become a force for change. sent toya brown long as an advocate for criminal justice

reform and human trafficking she was born to aum young mother who struggles with alcohol abuse and who was a victim of trafficking as a teenager cyntoia became a victim of trafficking herself and at 16, she was arrested for killing a man who solicited her for. cyntoia was tried as an adult incense a life in prison without parole. her trafficker was never arrested. in prison, cyntoia experience a profound spiritual transformation. the documentary called me facing life, cyntoia's story chronicles her experiences and as a result many celebrities clergy and other influential people began advocating on her behalf. the # free cyntoia went viral. eventually her sentence was commuted by the governor of tennessee.

on august of last year, after 15in years behind bars, cyntoia was released from prison. since then, cyntoia, has become a powerful advocate for justice reform, especially for women and children in american prisons. she published a memoir, free cyntoia : my search for redemption in the american prison system. she wrote while she was incarcerated. she and herer husband jamie opened an institute justice recognized cyntoia for an honorary. she was also 2020 nominee forr the naacp literary image award. joining our guests on stagege tonight is professor e hilary benda. she is the founding director of the tufts university present initiative at tisch

college for it i mentioned earlier tisch college has expanded its scope and type it is one of the newerha initiatives we are especially proud of. hillary manages the college degree program at the massachusetts correctional instituteon desmet institution in concorde which is an partnership between tisch university and bunker hill college show awarded associate degree to a group of incarcerated men in the program. as part of the present initiative hilary also runs an insight outside course at the maximum-security prison and surelylyet massachusetts through which tufts students and incarcerated individuals take a course together. hilary's current research is in the field of higher education and incarceration. she is a senior lecturer at tufts and directs the program in women's and gender and sexuality studies. hilary is a strong advocate for the importance of bringing

higher education into prison and we are grateful she joins us tonight. please join meue in welcoming professorom hilary benda in our speaker cyntoia brown-long. [applause] [applause] >> i want to start by thanking you again. such an honor to be here with you said honor to have you at tufts i hope it's the first of many visits. i also want to thank you for your beautiful book for sharing your journey with us, and educating us on issues of the criminal justice system, your particular journey and on your face.

so, i think for people who haven't may be read cyntoia's book, i want to start by acknowledging how recently you are free. august, right? 3:18 a.m.? so i'm wondering doing to share with this kind of a first cover all of the firsts you get to experience a first meal or something? >> everything is pretty much a first my first meal actually talks about in the book was a can of ravioli. >> host: how was that? >> guest: at 3:18 a.m. it was great. >> host: before we start talking about your story, i wanted to ask you if you could reflect on what it has been like telling your story?

i can only imagine going over some of the really difficult details, can be hard. or maybe also very helpful in ways? >> guest: it's definitely been a blessing to sitit and talk about my story of what i went through. coming from a background i find a lot of us don't have a voice, a voice is a way to share our experiences it's like they don't count. so to have the opportunity to sit and talk about that is incredible, to tell everyone each and every time is a blessing. >> host: you talk at one point in the book about your various trials and being kind of of battle of narratives, not really aboutng who's telling the truth, but his telling the better story. i wonder if there is a way you are kind of getting the final

word here in shaping your story? >> guest: will god definitely always has the last word. i found that out. a lot of times when you are in the court system you think well, if i just explain this and let them know it happens, this is what's going to take place. if i present this caselaw to this this court they're going to rule in my fave your.ne that is not what happens. what happens is whoever can spin the best narrative who can put on the best performance of the courtroom is who ends up winning. nine times outni of ten it's going to be the prosecution. that was a very, very, very hard hurdle to overcome. i always thank god who has the last say. >> host: one of the things you do so powerfully in the book y is convey this sense of your self as a child, particularly in the earlier part of the

k.book. as a teenager, as someone who was loved and loving and searching for love and independence just like all teenagers do, that's their job. you also talk about ways you repeatedly were victimized. and how long it took you, i think until 2017, ten years into your sentence, you still hadn't really identified what your experiences were ass victimization and a victim of trafficking rather the teen prostitute the media was presenting youus as. you can talk about why think it took so long for you, for so many women i imagine who experience that rumbled reality. >> guest: you always have a saying about people who other h childhood taken away from them. i don't think we really

understand what that means. for me my experience was there several adults that i was around her putting me in the position of being an adult. and i was a child. i had grown women who were teaching me my body was a commodity, it was a means to get things from men and it was completely acceptable to expect things in return for my companionship for and things of that nature. i was told my entire existence revolves about pleasing a man some form. i was 13 when they started teaching me these things. that is really what started me on the trajectory of being more vulnerable to being exploited. i was told these things were normal. so my worldview had been reshaped to think this is how relationships work, this is how relationships between men and girls, which i was still a girl it was notl a woman, that's how this goes by the time i met a man who convinced

me that we were in a relationship and part of this relationship meant i was allowed to have with men for money and bring it back to him i thought it was back to normal.t the society i was in at that point did not call me a trafficking victim i was called the teen prostitute i was made to believe these are my choices, they were more made of my own volition, there is never any conversation about the adults that it taught me these things, the worldview that had been skewed to convince me to it do these things not from the people i was around, not from the court system. it took a long time for that understanding to -- was sold a lot of work now. i can't tell you just how many times i was told i was fat. and i was just hot. instead of the fact i was a child who is being misled. and a gun to held your head.

the media portrayal of you through those early years, while into your car's duration was pretty horrific. you have a sense of how the media might handle the situation better, it sounds like you do, have things gotten better since then in thee last 15 years or so, ten years you think? >> guest: and my case it was deafening as pain is a horrible monster, the media referred to me as a teen prostitute. i was just painted as is filthy dangerous individual. obviously, now things havee changed. i see some media referring to some cases of child prostitution is no such thing

as child prostitution and sexual exploitation. changing with their still work that needs to be done in terms of the criminal justice aspect of it, i don't see much that is change, me personally it's cchange, they see a lot of times, especially with young kids, the pictures are posted up on the news, they are painted as this horrible individual, the not talked about the kids they are, maybe some of the circumstances they may have been involved in at the time there's always this rush to judgment, rushed to try people by the media. think that is unfortunate just because we live in a country where you think you're just be innocent until provenn guilty. >> one of the things i expected not sure any of us expected at this point, but in theory, one is incarcerated or enters into the system and the rehabilitation begins.

>> guest: sounds good. >> host: i want to figure talk about the reality and the re- traumatizing effect of getting caught in the web of the system. there are specific ways that impacted your sense of yourself? >> guest: the reality that i had many of the women was incarcerated with experience was from the time we set foot into the facility we were treated as, we were there to be warehouse, we are to be warehouse, put under some strict control, rules changed every single day, the only time our rehabilitation was an issue was when there is a federal grants at stake when there is some sort of funding there is going to commend a part of the receiving that funding there had to be certain programs in place. even then, was however much was necessary to get by to

comply with whatever standards that set for that grant. would definitely need to work more on treating people from the time they walk into that door as we need to be focused on how to be get them to the other side? how could we help them to become their best selves to make sure this person has successful reentry intofu society. : : : going through the multiple trials in preparation for various trials, you also described you are working with light red to was really on been trying to help but even in that case didn't want you to tell your story and was essentially silencing you. that really struck me that it's not personal and there's something systemic about entering the system and being of

liberated. >> the entire nature of the court proceedings and trial proceedings is adversarial and all about strategy and taking, this is what they had and howells spin it. yes i understand this is what your truth is and it does not sound visible go with this. it does not only happen with the defendant happens a lot with the victims, your victims to go through the process and they think they will get some sort of closure in there just as lost as the defendants in the case. there is no real restoration, no real rebuilding of what has been broken. >> years is so much a story of incredible survival really thriving against all odds and i'm wondering if we can turn to the more positive things that happen once you were in the

system. specifically thinking about your college experience. i was telling you earlier it was very moving for m me and many of us involved in network to hear you talk about the university program in your life. >> can you share some of that and the students in meeting the students would like. >> absolutely. >> that was an inside out programm generally. so you were working with a lot of university students. >> they call it part of their salt curriculum which is serving and learning together. it's a life program of gravitation. i was four years into serving my sense when it mean to be part of the program, i jump through a lot of hurdles. i was expecting, i was going too further my education and i go before the court and go before the governor and it's going to

look good oner paper, once i got into the class i realized i had been welcome to the community. all through my early life in public school and made to feel like i was an outcast and made to feel because of things that had gone through or because of things i had done i was just written off, i was no good, the court process that amplifies them. and for me too be welcomed in the community of people who do not see any of that. they just saw me and they love me. that was redeeming beyond anything i had ever experienced. they saw something in me that washa worth salvaging. they saw something in me that was worthin investing in and hep me too believe in myself. and i started excelling in everything that i put my mind to. i ended up getting a 4.0 in every single class. [applause]

wow. in prior to being in the program the highest education i had in school was seventh grade. >> what do you think the students, you talk about being accepted what were those interactions like, i don't know if there's a specific example of a moment where he treated you as certainly. >> the university itself into university where there's a lot of affluent people who send their children there. [laughter] , a lot of these kids come from very privileged backgrounds, although they were the same age as me in the early stages,

completely different from my own and you go into thinking you're going to expect one thing but what i found is we had moreg in common than i had ever thought. and it was really cool to be able listen have these conversations and you can see they were interested in learning what life was to my perspective and interested in seeing how can they be more respectful of that of my experiences, how can they be more helpful of change in the prisonon system and the justice system and i left knowing this could happen to me too. so they were that much more invested to try to change things. theo you see as a result of experience and for education in your future goal. >> i thought about law school, and just a matter when i would

have time for, i like coming out and speaking to people. and just setting aside time to do that, absolutelyy love education and is very, very rewarding. >> will talk in a few minutes about everything that you are doing and you are educating e already. >> i wanted to ask you also about the really powerful role that you created in the book that your adoptive mom played in your life and in your journey. i wondered if you could talk about that. how is she part of it with you. >> my mother adopted me when i was a mental, she was only one my dad had ever known and always want to really give me the life that anyone would want to give a child, even when i struggled she was always there tried to figure out how can i help when the school would call her up, she

would be like what can i do. obviously they give her know answer, but she tried very hard and sheer was there and when i s arrested i saw all the people that i was hanging around in teaching me all these things that no 13-year-old girl should ever learn, they were nowhere to be found, the only person left standing was my mother and she had been my best friend from that moment, she came to visit me every other week in prison, the social club, her in my husband. >> in fact she got to know your husband before you are out. >> yes they be youro best frie friends. >> i was very struck by how you never -- it's just a teenager's job to blame her mother first, i tell you with expert experience.

in at least at this point and as you wrotepo the book you have sh a loving relationship with your mom and there was a very powerful moment when you talk about the plexiglass and you got sent to the max and the visits had to be behind plexiglass and you felt not angry but guilty you were an incredible child and you're an incredible person. >> i went through a lot of those same feelings, i think everybo everybody, your parents don't understand what your life is like, i thought my mom was ancient, she could not understand what school was like for me when i saw the think she's going through, i felt like she was not listening to what i was saying, i stopped telling her things and started keeping

things from her so she cannot be there for me in the ways she needed to be as my parent and the positive role model in m my life, i definitely spent some her waymy life pushing but it was that time that i was there. i would do anything under the sun to push myself further away from my mother but there she was still standing and there she was for me that made me realize wow, i got this t wrong. >> is it fair to say that not all women serving time have a person like that in their life? >> that is quite fair. a lot of people in prison, they go and if they do have any ofamily and if they do have children it's very hard to maintain a relationship, you pretty much liver relationship over a paid phone call when you can afford it at times and it's

a hassle to get to it. it's very hard to parent of payroll over a telephone pre-that's hard to experience and very hard for a lot of families and is a job for the prison, if you don't hassle and somehow get your visitation privileges restricted by the administration, there's a lot of barriers to break up families when it comes to the prison system. so many women don't have their motherte there. especially as long as she was there for me. >> in massachusetts they decrease the number of visitors you can have. >> i'm wondering if you would share -- i will say just working in prison for the last seven years or so has brought me two

questions like nothing else in my life has up to this point and i know that's been an enormous part of your journey and i wonder if you can talk about the role of it in your journey. >> i was speaking with a group of students earlier and i was asked the same question and i'll tell you guys just like i told them, faith is the only reason that i'm sitting here with you all today. i had tried everything when i tried to get a person under prison i had put my faith in case law and made journeys, i had seven of them and very experienced attorneys, each time that field and i looked back and i said well, every time i put my faith in men i get failed. and i met my husband who told me god said you're getting out of prison. this is a time when all my bills had been denying and he said are

you going to trust what man says or what god says.s and i said you know what, i'm going to try to trust what god says. he introduced me too jesus and i said introduced me because i said i been told about jesus, i've been told about someone who died on the cross for my sins and if i believed in him i would have eternal life, i never reallyly knew him or got to know him or never knew what having a relationship with him meant. never really understood his own journey and they really got to know him through a whole different perspective and it changed everything, having a relationship within was completely different than anything i've ever been told in my earlier life growing up in the baptist church about faith. i'd say that's when my faith was truly born. >> thank you.

>> it is interesting when i first joined at christian university i was completely resistant. and to talk about god, i was so angry at that point because i spent so much time praying that god freed me from prison and i saw that i was still sitting in there, i had. that i was not giving life in prison but i pray that i not be tried as an adult but i was tried as an adult. and i was like god is not real, this is not real, no one is listening to me. i went around and pulled up to anyone who would listen that god was not real. but i was proven wrong. and i saw just because we think things are supposed to go on a certain way and the things that we see don't line up, that does not mean he doesn't have a plan, he always has a plan for each and every one of our lives we can see where it's leading us

but i promise you he plans for our good and he made a believer out of me. >> you talk at one point about seeing god as communities, is that something you could talk about a little, i don't know if you feel that way still? >> this is a journey, when i talk about my faith and now, you can't tell me nothing about jesus. but it has not always been that way, i went to this long searching process and thinking this must be what it is andro ts must explain this but when i really got into the program of the system and this is a community of believers, this is the first r time i had really interaction with people who profess to believe in jesus where my experience was completely different, they looked at me how jesus walked around and looked at people, how

he would sit around with people who would consider to be lowest of the low and that's who he came and wanted to have dinner with and talk with betsy he said you're no different than this guy over here. i love you just the same and they treated mehi that way, it s a completely different experience to see i do belong to a community, i'm not an outcast and some of it needs to be thrown away and that was powerful. >> you alluded to this earlier but it seems like your personal growth, your relationship to love, particularly romantic love in your relationship to your faith y in god were all intertwined and there's a moment in the book where you describe

something that your husband jamie said and you describe it as a sake of thing he ever said was don't revere me, don't put me on a pedestal, it is not me who should be on a pedestal. in very different version of love than what you've experienced as a child. can you talk about that intertwining of love. >> i was speaking earlier about how i was told everything about my relationship about pleasing a man in them and that i was introduced to, i was supposed to put them and their needs on a pedestal and i was always taught, that was always supposed to do as a woman. then amy jamie and he's like wait a minute, that's not what this is, you don't look for me you don't live your life for me, you live your life for christ. and i was like wow. that is completely different.

and he showed me the difference between being with someone who is led by their own ambition who is led how they feel they should treat other people and being with someone in the love for christ it's completely different. and that's what really showed me, god put this man in my life, god did it, all the time i was looking for me and i was looking for my own ideas about what relationships was but he's the one that sent me the person that he created for me and it's completely different than everything i hade encountered. so now i get to spend my days with my best friend, my partner, he is my husband, he is everything. hesb is awesome. >> i wonder if you could talk a little bit about what you are doing now, you did a lot of work

as in some sense you found your freedom before you released and we knew you were going to be freed, you started working on juvenile sentencing laws, you worked on a firm bill in tennessee that did not pass the first time it may be continue working on not, redesigning juvenile facilities, thinking about different protocols for how to work with juveniles who get caught in the system. you also talk about your capstone project for the experience of developing glittee first word. >> trafficking, expectation and rights. did you hear that. >> i'm wondering if you can talk about -- you talk tonight about the importance of your speaking and how you see your role as an

advocate, and activists in the world going forward, granted it's been a few months and i'm sure things will continue to shift your already still involved. >> like you saids that began while i was still in prison, an initiative for education. they help me too understand that just because i was sold out of giving my life in prison did not mean i my life was over and i still choose how i was going tod live the life and for me i want my life to have meaning, i doni not want to lay there can be done. so when i saw there was things that needed to be changed, i want to sit in the classroom and be talking, i don't want to say this is right and should be this way, i wanted to see what i can do about and that's what i started doing, i started having conversationsav with people and next thing you know i'm sitting in the prison visitation area with a state representative talking about a bill that he's going to present on my behalf to

change the settings laws to juveniles. i wasin intent t tennessee, very conservative, it has yet to pass, i just testified in the senate about the bill, so we are still working, that's been five years in the making but so many opportunities like that to design, redesign for davidson county has yet to be built and will be being built soon but the just feeling the power that i have a voice in my experience matters and what i have to say matters and i have a seat at the table two. and it's made all the difference. >> i have many more questions and was just signaled that was our last spring going to open it up to the audience, i'm going to

ask people to be sure that you are asking a question, not repeat questions, be concise and we have mike's so if you would raise your hand, will have a mic brought to you. >> thank you for coming here. it is wonderful all you have done and i would like to ask, you have gone through quite a transformation that happened, was their help along the way to address what that would look like, did you have spiritual advice, was into something that happened without it, how did the understanding come about? >> an understanding of god for

you. >> that's really a good question. i had my own encounter with god, i did not know what it was, i wrote about in the book about was having where i dreamed something and then it would happen and i cannot explain that with my usual explanation that this isn't real, does not exist and there's nothing going on. so i had tope spend a lot of tie thinking, wait a minute. and that really planted the se seed, a lot of seeds were planted and i had to go through a lot and god had to take me through a lot of different processes for the seeds to grow and he sent my husband along to water it and that really helped my faith to be born but it was definitely a long drawn out process. and we all have our own journey, we all go through phases where

we may be trying to figure out who is god, is god real and some of us struggle with being angry, i struggled from being angry. but he definitely has a plan and when i had the opportunity to sit and be still and really focus and put my eyes on him, he will speak to you, he spoke to me until speak to you t too. >> hi. firstly, thank you for sharing your story and for the transformation, and this is shaping the community tonight. i briefly introduce before the top initiative is offering an associates degree through theff community college for cohort of

21 men and women conquer. the present initiative is working to offer a bachelors degree through test with a major study in the school of arts and sciences. our students want to have a positive impact on the communities while they're still incarcerated in as they released in this major gives them the tools to do that. in the tough mission statement says it is dedicated to the creation and application of knowledge for experiences for students and faculty in an inclusive and clobbered environment and complex challenges to extinguish students of actin citizens of the world. so having heard this and having done education and present and understanding the profound impact that it can have on someone, how do you understand the mission statement or the role in uploading that mission statement and the role of education in general. >> i think every university that

seeks to try to better their community that tries to equip young people to be successful, you have to acknowledge the other population. you have to acknowledge the population of people who were there and partier community as well. what about them. i know my own experience with the community, the small group of people who block the program had to fight for. , they currently don't receive any funding from the actual tuniversity, that would go a lg way for universities to stand up and say hey we know there's conversations going on with reform and reentry and we know equipping people and giving them the tools they need to succeed is good for all society not to seize individuals and we want to be a part of the solution so were going to go into the

prisons and educate these people and help, and do our part, i think that goes a long way and absolutelyth and keeping the mission statement. the question is how committed are they to the statement. >> it's nice to see you here, i became engrossed in your story on twitter last year and it's amazing to see you here in person. and they justt wanted to know historically black and brown bodies have been to the ways in a disproportionate amount of black menl and women were in prison compared to white menen d women and i wanted to know how you thought your experience was in the accursed nation as a woman of color and how do you think the identity polity in your attorney or judge or the specific general. i came to see that it wasn't

just like you were, and mattered and whether you have the money to pay. in if you knew where you came from, there were so many different factors thatac were ud to degrade people and put them in a lower class. so classes of individuals, i saw that a lot with a lot of the women in the hispanic population. dating get access to educational services, they were expected to learn english, they were not giving any kind of resources, not getting translators for medical services, the list goes on and on. we were poor white women who came from situations who had abusive husbands who happen to be police officers and their stories were never told and they were given life sentences for defending themselves. so i think whether you're a a

woman, whether you're poor, there's so many different factors to used to put people down and make them undeserving and that's unfortunate. because everybody's life matters, everybody's voice matters, it's ridiculous, not just if you can afford it. >> thank you again and thank you for sharing your story, in response to the earlier question on the commission statement and upholding the mission statement in regards to the bachelors degree in massachusetts. you been talking to students and faculty across the university to try to answer and figure out the questions or worries that they might have in doing this potential expansion of the program and although the topics of inequality are brought up an abstract way, many people spoke about the ability of

incarcerated people and matching the academic rigor of the university. and i've been teaching at this program and with the students i see firsthand that the officers have what i do and in fact they do so with a greater appreciation and dedication to education that i see here. in the experience of incarceration, how do you think the experiences of our concord at the concord campus and those who have similar stories and backgrounds would say that their academic abilities for an academic environment here. >> i love what you're doing, i see what you're doing. [laughter] like you said, the presser unturned professor said we were working harder than some outside students, they did just enough tono get by and a lot of them suddenly doing it because i have to do it i really don't feel

like school, i'd rather party but for those of us who had been denied it and we had no stimulation there in the prison and this was just her ticket to do something better to do something more, a lot of the women in programs where the first one in their family timber gone to college and take college classes, they were all told it was not for them and they were not good enough and they can never afford and it was never an option. you are that much more hungry for. what i found the we could encourage the outside students in the outside students had told us, i kinda just took this for granted. in the learning experience just from thenn going inside and leaving outside the classroom and having the real-world experience same thing beyond the textbook from beyond the lecture was far more rewarding for them and they love what you're doing,

i would love if all of you can go on and advocate for the program and continue to speak the truth and continue to call it out. >> we want to thank you so much for sharing your testimony and what an amazing story of breakthrough in the boldness and bravery that you do have. thank you for sharing that. i wanted to ask a question, more of the system of trafficking, you mentioned that your trafficker was arrested but wasn't he a little bit more about the supply and demand of trafficking given that it's a billion-dollar industry and there's a lot going on there and operates a business, what is your suggestions and what you thinking about in terms of partnering with solutions to the mantle and the trafficker and from the top down, what does not look like and what are some ways

that we can support and help and work through thishi broken world and getting a restart. >> you said a word when he said supply and demand. there's a lot of talk about decriminalizing the buying of sex and whenever it's open season like that use evenpe more people being motivated to exploit young girls, vulnerable populations. it is definitely not supporting that, it's definitely not saying were going to punish the people for producing, no, they're part of the problem. like you said supply and demand, a lot of people don't know under the federal statute, not only people who encourage young girls to go out and sell their bodies but to the people who purchase

young girls for are legally traffickers as well. so continue to talk about that and educating people on that that's something and personally committed to but the glitter project is the initiative on team trafficking exploitation and rate is committed to dialogue that talks about that because i saw a correlation between a lot of the things we understand as normal and okayhi and a lot of the social norms that i grew up with an eye see no that contributed to my thought of understanding of what was all right for me as a young girl to do with men. that's a conversation we need to be having, we have movies that glorify the commodification of women's bodies, that's a conversation we need too have. >> is glitter tennessee-based at this point or can we talk about you expanding inthyo some way. >> it definitely is going to be

expanded, were actually working on that and glitter, it's a grassroots learning initiative, you could leave her tonight and talk to someone about something that you learned, you can read this book and talk. about something that you learn to someone else, it's about educating one another that's only way we can contain social norm and the only way we can reprogram the understanding of what's okay in our society. i started the glitter project when i came across a study that said 57% the certain young girls choose to prosecute themselves. but these individuals who are on the frontline of defending young girls from being exploited think that's a problem. that is an issue. that's really good, in order for change we have to talk about the

truth. >> thank you for coming tonight, i really appreciated hearing your story and in the intro they talked about social media major story go viral, i want to know how did it feel to get out and see your story being told for social media, what was the level of accuracy that your story was told and how can we c use social media in the future for advocacy work. >> good question. social media is not always about 1000% accurate, i think we all know that. but what's important is about people having conversation. and for me and about me personally but i thought of all the young girls who were currently or are currently going through what i went through, i think about the women who are still s in prison, people forget about them and their experiences in men who people just write

those experiences off, when i saw someone talking about my own situation itu said while, they'e shedding a light for them. so that has the potential to create change, but like i said you have to take it a step further from having the conversation, you have to assess second question which is what can i do to help and actually do it. so for me it wasy really promising and really helpful and really help that a lot of the things that we see people going off about on social media when it comes to the system in individual cases that it translates i and changes the law and the practices to people who you don't necessarily see their names. >> last question.

>> i appreciate you being here so much, i follow your story. i can't even imagine the devastation that i was still receiving a life sentence in prison and i wasnc just wonderig how did you not fall into bitterness and how did you not feel like giving up into this horrible situation into advocacy for yourself and other people. >> it was devastating to be told i will never enjoy prom or homecoming and then there telling me my life is done. it's completely devastating. it was something in me that was defiant and i will not let these people tell me my life is over and i'm going to continue to fight. it's definitely a resilience that comes from the lord, i did not know it at the time that

that was the lord pushing beyond and keeping me going but it was definitely him because when i look back i can't tell you and how i can be a sound mind and be able to not have that bitterne bitterness, it's nothing but him and forgiveness. >> women in your acknowledgment and you end with god but before god you name some of the people who were your community inside and who are still in your community. i'm wondering if you can say something about the complexity of the freedom given that. >> for me a lot of people when they talk about being free when i was incarcerated, they talk about what they're going to do and the things that they wanted to do,. for me it was a sense of responsibility and this is something that god has allowed me too do, he put me in this m

position to help them and shut a light so i feel like i'm carrying this, when you lookli t me i want you to think of other people who had been written off who people think that were sent away for x amount of years, but know god can turn anyone around. these are people, mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and they can be sitting here having the same conversation with you as i am and is putting a face to them in a face to their experience because i think a lot of times they have been demonized, they have been painted in the worst possible light and at the end of the day there people just like me and you. if you ever get the opportunity to go and i highly advise it because it will completely change your life and i'm not saying that because i'm biased, i've been told that time and time again by students who come to the present,, by judges who set on a court, my own former

district attorney, there is something that completely changes when you're able to put a face to someone and see the humanity in them. >> thank you so much for being here, for sharing your story with us for your beautiful book, i think everybody here for coming out and i hope you will read her book, the world book day. it's a good day to do it. thank you. >> thank you. [applause]

>> this weekend on book tv, saturday at 6:00 p.m. eastern richard former director of the consumer financial protection bureau. >> this is how can sumer's and the problems they face, is about consumer finance and how it's changed and it's about the new consumer protection bureau and the role and importance of the work that engages and to protect people across america. >> sunday at 12:30 p.m. eastern hr mcmaster, former trumper administration national security advisor. >> the united states and free and open societies to do everything we can to protect ourselves against for the chinese communist party or free economic systems or the democratic governance. >> at 6:20 p.m. ruth gilmore, author and city university of new york professor on mass incarceration in the u.s. >> the fact that most people leave prison do a little bit about analysis to see we can be

closing prisons already in jails already if we just cut by two weeks in three weeks and four weeks, much less years in the kinds of sense of people are serving. >> watch tv this weekend on c-span2. >> the president from public affairs available now and people brokengine paperback and e-book. every president organized by the ranking by noted historians from best to worst. in features perspectives into the lives of the nation's chief executives and leadership styles. visit our website c-span.org/president to learn more about each president and historian features. in order your copy today, wherever books and e-books are sold.

>> television has changed and c-span began 41 years ago but our mission continues to provide an unfiltered view of government, already this year we brought your primary election coverage, the presidential impeachment process and now the federal response to the coronavirus. you can watch all of c-span's public appeared programming on television, online or listen on every radio app and be part of the national coverage the entry conversation to the daily national program where the social media fee, c-span created by private industry, america's cable television company as a public service and brought to you by your television provider. [applause] >> good evening, everyone and welcome to the george washington