The Romania connection seems very flimsy. The video just says that she owned a ministry in Romania. Then it says that human trafficking happened in the same town of Romania, but the video displays an article of a different town than the charity.
My novice understanding of Romania is that it was a socialist state until 1990-ish and after transitioning from being a socialist state, suffered from a lot of problems. A lot of human trafficking happens in Romania.
The video mentions that Erika was Miss Arizona 2012. Miss USA Pageant isn’t just about looking pretty, it also involves a bunch of performative community service. Erika’s connection to the military is that she was doing some performative “respect the troops” type shit. Her website doesn’t say that she owned a ministry in Romania, it says that she mailed Christmas presents to orphans in Romania. This type of charity work was also performative as part of the Miss USA Pageant.
On one hand, yeah the human trafficking angle here is a stretch. However, ministry work and international adoption tend to go hand in hand and international adoption, especially within the evangelical realm, has a big human trafficking problem. So it wouldn’t surprise me if she’s at least rubbing elbows with the people doing the human trafficking.
The Romania connection seems very flimsy. The video just says that she owned a ministry in Romania. Then it says that human trafficking happened in the same town of Romania, but the video displays an article of a different town than the charity.
My novice understanding of Romania is that it was a socialist state until 1990-ish and after transitioning from being a socialist state, suffered from a lot of problems. A lot of human trafficking happens in Romania.
The video mentions that Erika was Miss Arizona 2012. Miss USA Pageant isn’t just about looking pretty, it also involves a bunch of performative community service. Erika’s connection to the military is that she was doing some performative “respect the troops” type shit. Her website doesn’t say that she owned a ministry in Romania, it says that she mailed Christmas presents to orphans in Romania. This type of charity work was also performative as part of the Miss USA Pageant.
https://web.archive.org/web/20120111120942/http://www.everydayheroeslikeyou.com:80/Everyday_Heroes_Like_You/Events_Now.html (her website, January 2012)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eNr7stpNwM (she mentions that website in this video, February 2012)
e//
https://xcancel.com/RealHeroesLikeU (this is the twitter account of her charity work)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeuIbmKtzNg (okay I found a video of the Romania Charity, uploaded June 2013, 1400 views. filmed december 2012 I think)
On one hand, yeah the human trafficking angle here is a stretch. However, ministry work and international adoption tend to go hand in hand and international adoption, especially within the evangelical realm, has a big human trafficking problem. So it wouldn’t surprise me if she’s at least rubbing elbows with the people doing the human trafficking.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy: