For most of us, we wake in the morning when we’re ready to do so. Yes, it’s true, if you work for a living, you may get up earlier than you really wish to (or maybe later, if you work evening or night shifts).

Chances are pretty good, you eat relatively well—maybe not what you would prefer to eat some of the time. Still, your diet is likely not at all a bad one.

I would bet for the majority, they get paid on a regular basis. Of course, some are unemployed, and for others, that remuneration may be meager.

And if you choose to leave a particular workplace—for whatever reason in most cases—you can do so without anyone being able to stop you.

People in the United States generally go where, and do what, they want (within reason—you can’t go on most military installations, or in many places considered private without cause and “authorization” so to do).

The long and short of things is, typically, nobody can outright tell you where you may or may not go, what you can or cannot do, how you will generally live your life.

Sure, there are specific instances where folks can prohibit activity and behavior of various types.

Furthermore, as a member of society, there are expectations surrounding how you’ll act.

Obviously, for example, a person can’t go around killing others without pretty good cause for doing it. And running one’s automobile into other cars, or people, or buildings, will generally be frowned upon.

All of this considered, most of the time, and in most ways, you’re free to do as you please.

Imagine this. You wake in the morning to somebody rousing you out of a sound sleep.

You’re pretty much never allowed to sleep until you wake up.

You were still making shoes in a dingy sweatshop, or digging out rare earth minerals in a mine in which there are often collapses that may or may not take lives, late into the evening.

Your body aches from the backbreaking labor. You can’t remember your last good meal.

Pay for your work? Why would you expect that?

Two or three shadowy figures watch constantly. They’re there to ensure you don’t try to escape.

Sounds bad, yes?

Fear not, for some it’s much worse. There are young people throughout the World—yes, that does include here in the good ol’ U. S. of A.—who are held captive for a much more insidious purpose. And when I say young, I mean young (read here: teen-aged or below).

The reason for their captivity? Sex slavery.

I’ve heard any number of people in recent days, comparing themselves to slaves—most of them living in the proverbial lap of luxury. Granted, some such are talking about other people. They want you to know those folks are very nearly (if not actually) slaves.

Those about whom they’re speaking though, come and go as they please for the most part. They’re not subject to any kind of captivity.

They’re mostly paid, they eat at least acceptably well, they wake and sleep when they choose. In short, such individuals are mostly free to do what they please, when they please.

I get it, they don’t live in castles. Every meal is not filet mignon and champagne.

By the way, that’s true for me as well.

Do I live badly, am I some sort of slave? I can make no such claim—nor would I try so to do.

If I did claim such a situation, I would be outright lying to you.

Furthermore, I would be belittling the sad and unfortunate lot of those bound in the chains of forced servitude or worse.

I’ve said many times, comparing my Moderately Autistic son to those in the Mildly Autistic camp is a disservice to him.

It would be just as great a wrong to compare him to those who’re Severely Autistic, for those folks struggle through a great deal more difficulty than does my son.

The same can be said of those who find themselves enslaved, but to an even greater degree.

When people choose to count themselves in the same situation as individuals who are far less fortunate than themselves, whether intentionally or accidentally, they make light of something they likely cannot possibly fathom.

The sheer desperation and hopelessness of being “owned by” another is not in any wise something that should be scoffed at by those in so much more fortunate “lifestyles.”

I’ve never spent any meaningful time in a hospital, I’ve not been diagnosed with cancer, or some potentially incurable ailment.

As such, I can’t know what it feels like to be in that place.

It’s fair to say the same applies to those who wake daily, to the harsh, unforgiving, reality of knowing their life may never be their own.

Would you think it appropriate if I were to laugh at your life, at your hardships, at things I cannot possibly understand? If I found myself in a difficult place, I can’t imagine I would count that proper for you to do.

I don’t believe this is particularly complicated. You don’t want others to count your suffering or difficulty unworthy of consideration. You don’t desire for someone to compare their skinned knee to your broken femur.

In like manner, others have no desire for you to consider your freedom a comparable thing to their unyielding, demoralizing, slavery.

Are you suffering hardship? Is your life far from what you desire it to be? I’m sorry to hear it. It may be my privilege to assist you in getting to a better place at some point.

Even if that’s true though, please take care to not “overstate (or understate, as it were) your case.”

I can understand my “level of life” might be considered a higher one than is yours (then again, maybe you’d be surprised to hear that may not be so), and I’m not happy or excited by that reality.

But those in even worse places lose attention when it’s given to people in better ones. As such, we must be very careful to not compare ourselves to others in far harsher circumstances than our own.

Thanks for reading. Here’s hoping you’re well and happy. If not, I pray you come to that place in the very near future.