What Ken chose to do is to use the legacy with which the Universe has bequeathed him to advance the causes of abolition and education. To that end, ken, along with his colleague, Robert Benz, and his mother Nettie Washington Douglass, is a co-founder of the Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives (FDFI), an organization dedicated to the end of human trafficking or modern day slavery. The mission of FDFI is to advance freedom through knowledge and strategic action.
Most people may not realize that slavery isn't some antiquated occurrence that one can read about in history books. It still exists throughout the world today. I know that I wasn't fully aware of this until recently. Slavery could well be happening in neighborhoods and in local businesses, like restaurants, nail salons and hair braiding shops, all around the country -- literally right under our noses.
Ken, through the work of FDFI, educates about the injustices that are happening against women, children, and men in the United States and all over the world. And, if one thinks of it, who better to speak for modern-day slaves that the descendants of former slaves, of survivors of slavery, of abolitionists, and of freedom fighters?
I had a chance to speak with Ken on a Saturday afternoon telephone call. I find him to be a witty, intelligent man who is proud of his families of origin, passionate about educating people, and a caring family man in his own right. On a side note, one thing that people may not know about Ken is that he used to sing professionally. Most notably, he was a background singer for Howard Hewett of Shalamar fame.
The very first concert I ever went to featured Shalamar! And yes, I'm wearing a big ol' cheesy grin at this since I'm sure now that the cosmos caused Ken and me to meet.
My fan-girl moment now out of the way, I will say that my conversation with Ken was indeed an education.
"Being in entertainment helped me to be comfortable being interviewed," Ken said. "It's important to be able to communicate and connect with an audience. Not that talking about human trafficking is a performance, like singing, but the same techniques can be used to entertain to communicate, and to inform."
In a previous life, while trying to make money to survive his foray into the music business, ken found himself working in hotel and resort marketing as well as the travel industry. Resorts, hotels, cruises...Royal Caribbean, here comes Ken! Hosting corporations and creating shows around a company's product(s) on cruise ships "was a lot of fun. And cruise ship spaces were already set up for shows. Not a lot of work to do because the lighting and staging were already there, versus a hotel ballroom space. All that had to be set up."
Of course, going on cruises and creating shows isn't a bad way to earn a living. I bet none of his friends and family felt sorry for him. And working in the hotel and travel industry is where he met his business associate, friend, and future co-founder, Robert Benz.
Fortunately for Ken, as well as the rest of us, his business partner, Robert Benz, happens to be a history buff. Robert eventually became aware of Ken's legacy, and believe it or not, began to actively embarrass our friend, Ken.
How?
Imagine riding on an elevator with your co-worker and business partner and if someone else happened to be on the elevator with you, you would turn to the person and say, "How does it feel to be riding on an elevator with the great-great-great-grandson of Frederick Douglass?"
This legacy is one of pride and one of burden of great expectations. The Bailey (Frederick's actual last name) and the Washington families have been looking for the "Next One." Imagine thinking that you have to live up to Frederick Douglass AND Booker T. Washington? Who could walk in those shoes?
In a previous life, while trying to make money to survive his foray into the music business, ken found himself working in hotel and resort marketing as well as the travel industry. Resorts, hotels, cruises...Royal Caribbean, here comes Ken! Hosting corporations and creating shows around a company's product(s) on cruise ships "was a lot of fun. And cruise ship spaces were already set up for shows. Not a lot of work to do because the lighting and staging were already there, versus a hotel ballroom space. All that had to be set up."
Of course, going on cruises and creating shows isn't a bad way to earn a living. I bet none of his friends and family felt sorry for him. And working in the hotel and travel industry is where he met his business associate, friend, and future co-founder, Robert Benz.
Fortunately for Ken, as well as the rest of us, his business partner, Robert Benz, happens to be a history buff. Robert eventually became aware of Ken's legacy, and believe it or not, began to actively embarrass our friend, Ken.
How?
Imagine riding on an elevator with your co-worker and business partner and if someone else happened to be on the elevator with you, you would turn to the person and say, "How does it feel to be riding on an elevator with the great-great-great-grandson of Frederick Douglass?"
This legacy is one of pride and one of burden of great expectations. The Bailey (Frederick's actual last name) and the Washington families have been looking for the "Next One." Imagine thinking that you have to live up to Frederick Douglass AND Booker T. Washington? Who could walk in those shoes?
Yeah, no pressure there!
Even more, when Ken told people he's a descendant of both Douglass and Washington, no one would believe him. And why argue?
However, Ken came across the September, 2003 issue of National Geographic (Vol. 204, No. 3), by Andrew Cockburn, in which he read an article about young girls being trafficked into slavery, including sex slavery. As he read this, he heard his daughters who were then 12 and 9 years old, talking and giggling, as young girls will sometimes do, as they were getting ready for bed.
"It was tough for me to envision little girls the same age as my daughters, little girls who should be laughing and enjoying themselves, being trafficked for their labor and their sex," Ken admitted.
Even more, when Ken told people he's a descendant of both Douglass and Washington, no one would believe him. And why argue?
However, Ken came across the September, 2003 issue of National Geographic (Vol. 204, No. 3), by Andrew Cockburn, in which he read an article about young girls being trafficked into slavery, including sex slavery. As he read this, he heard his daughters who were then 12 and 9 years old, talking and giggling, as young girls will sometimes do, as they were getting ready for bed.
"It was tough for me to envision little girls the same age as my daughters, little girls who should be laughing and enjoying themselves, being trafficked for their labor and their sex," Ken admitted.
That article and the weight of that knowledge stayed with him. He felt compelled to address this issue of human and sex trafficking in some way. How could he not? How could he think about little girls, who were in the same age range as his own daughters, being prostituted?
"How could I look at my daughters in the eye as their father if I have this knowledge and do nothing to help combat it?"
As Ken began researching human trafficking and sex slavery, it was easy to see the parallels between the human trafficking going on today and the slavery of our ancestors. Slavery was, and still is, and will always be about money, power and the availability of vulnerable populations. And it is still human circumstances, whether economic, social, or psychological, that makes people vulnerable to be preyed upon by those who would exploit.
We know by now that education is the key to opening all kinds of doors. Ken's ancestors, Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington, among many others, taught us this. Ken reminds us that , in Douglass's book, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, "Mrs. Auld, the kindly slave mistress who began to teach young Frederick to read, learned from her husband that teaching young Frederick to read would make him unfit to be a slave."
It's the same way that educating children about human trafficking will make them unfit to be exploited. Making a person unfit for exploitation is Ken's goal.
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.
Frederick Douglass
The universe has a way of lining things up for a person to find his or her purpose. Every year, there is an event to honor Frederick Douglass in Washington DC. Every year, Ken had been invited to speak and every year, her turned down the invitation. That year, 2004, Ken went. While he was in Washington, he ran into a friend who was an appointee of George W. Bush. He still had the National Geographic article on his mind. He had lunch with his friend and the discussion turned to what he read in National Geographic.
Enter his Douglass-Washington legacy and his business associate, Robert Benz, who tends to embarrass Ken in elevators. Together, they began to formulate a way to leverage the legacies of the Great Abolitionist and the Great Educator to address and educate people, especially children, on human trafficking.
The Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives was born in 2007. And the Frederick Douglass Dialogues Tour was launched in 2008.
To paraphrase as saying, our children are our ancestors reborn. And Kenneth B. Morris, through his work with the Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives, has in a way, been reborn.
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