However, there are signs of people being trafficked at the local mamak shop or at petrol stations, where consumers’ needs and privileges are indirectly feeding the illegal trade of human labour.
This is the ugly reality that Govin Ruben, 40, co-founder of theatre company TerryandTheCuz, wants to shed light on through the launch of an interactive website called theSK!Nproject. The site is an adaptation of the group’s social justice theatre performance called SK!N.
FMT Lifestyle caught up with Govin after the launch of theSK!Nproject on July 20 to learn more about it.
“The website is developed in this pathfinding way of answering questions, navigating through the site and the user’s answers. We find out how they are culpable for human trafficking in Malaysia because if there’s no demand, there’s no supply, so we’re trying to raise awareness,” he said.
Taking on a thematic approach, site users explore the many facets of human trafficking through quizzes that identify which industry contributes most to the trade and which the site users have unknowingly become a part of.
Meanwhile, the “Choose-Your-Own-Adventure” games allow site users to decide their fate.
The site also features a gallery and video clips of how the original SK!N theatre production, performed in 2016, used a variety of mediums to allow the audience to step into the “skin” of debt bondage, forced labour, and sex trafficking victims.
To build the site, TerryandTheCuz worked closely with artists like new media art collective Filamen and Australia-based artist Laetitia Um, as well as its partner organisations Tenaganita, North-South Initiative, Project Liber8, and Persatuan Sahabat Wanita Selangor.
While pop culture often focuses on sex trafficking, Govin said he hoped theSK!Nproject site will spread awareness on how human trafficking also happens in other industries such as construction and retail.
When SK!N was initially performed in Kuala Lumpur, the theatre company invited the victims they had spoken to during their research, to attend the show.
“It was quite funny because we had to smuggle them out of their construction site to see the theatre shows and bring them back in,” he shared.
He recalled how one victim he worked with for over six months, showed him the mental impact trafficking had on victims.
“I asked: ‘How did you find the show?’ He enjoyed the show. ‘Did you have a favourite moment in our collaboration?’ He said: ‘You remember that one time when you came after a few times and we went for makan? And then we ate and you forgot your wallet, so I had to pay. That, for me, was my favourite part. This was the first time in 15 years, I felt like a human being.’
“That was something that I learnt: that to be able to buy someone a meal, it’s all about self-value and what trafficking does to people. It’s not about pity, it’s actually about uplifting people so that they have a sense of pride and self again,” Govin said.
Wishing to take the performance and the interactive site abroad, Govin admitted that collaborating with international groups that deal with human trafficking has not been easy.
“The biggest challenge is that a lot of human rights organisations deal with real issues. Convincing them that this was a worthy cause, to create awareness, that was very hard. It even took some time to convince Tenaganita.”
He explained that it was similar in Australia, as replicating a genuine kind of collaboration with human rights organisations took considerable time.
There are active discussions for SK!N to have its European premiere in the Netherlands in 2025, and for a global hub to be created for the work in New York City.
The group is also in talks with the United Nations to endorse theSK!Nproject and have it redirect the website to related-NGOs globally.
“The idea is that we want to create a place in which the work, the gallery, and the website can exist as one unit. We want to do that in New York because that’s where a lot of the global conversations about human trafficking happen,” he said.
Check out theSK!Nproject here.