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TRANSCRIPT

Elizabeth: [00:00:00] You are listening to Smart Talks with the Elizabeth Smart Foundation. I'm your host, Elizabeth Smart. Smart Talks provides survivors and supporters with tools for healing, a sense of community, and empowerment so we can all heal and move forward together.

Welcome back to another episode of Smart Talks by the Elizabeth Smart Foundation. I am Elizabeth and today we have Sam and Kacie Malouf, and I am very excited to have them today because they are some of the best people you could ever hope to meet, and recently earlier this year, actually my foundation merged with the Malouf Foundation, which is obviously their foundation.

But I first heard about Sam and Kacie because I was searching the internet because I kept getting asked questions on how do I recognize human trafficking? How do I recognize abuse? And I had answers that I could give, but I [00:01:00] always felt like I should be able to give more. And so I started searching the internet for information so that I could give better informed answers. And I came across a program called OnWatch. And so I clicked into it and it was this whole program. It's like these little, it's like a mini course, maybe a little bit over an hour long, on how to recognize signs of human trafficking. And by the time I finished it, I remember sitting there just thinking, wow, I'm really impressed. Like, who is this? Who put this together? What has this been done by? And I don't know where, I can't remember. It's been a while now, but I came across, brought to you by Malouf Company.

And I remember thinking Malouf Company, I've never even heard of them. Who are they and found out, to my surprise that they're in Utah. I remember thinking even more, how have I never heard of them? Utah's not that big of a place. I definitely should have heard of them. Anyway, from there on out, it just kept my radar open to keeping an eye on the Maloufs and what they were [00:02:00] doing and what their company was doing.

And as time progressed, we did eventually meet and we began doing different projects together. And every single time I have always been so amazed and impressed with how they have not just built their company and foundation, but how they have taken this cause on. Because this is not an easy cause. This is not just a light cause that you take on to feel good about yourself.

This may be one of the only causes that you take on and you actually leave feeling worse than you do better because the happy stories are stories where just someone simply survived or is still living or maybe got into school. They're not typically happy stories. You see so much sadness and pain and honestly, destruction of life and loss of life even if a person is still living because of what they've experienced, it almost handicaps them to the point that they cannot live a whole life or a full [00:03:00] life. But that being said, I don't want it to make it sound like it's hopeless and that you should ever give up cuz you shouldn't. But my point is that this is a very difficult cause to take up, I mean it's hard.

I mean it's hard for me and I, I honestly, as much as I would love to say that this would've been my cause had I not been kidnapped, had I not been a victim, had I not been raped, I honestly don't know that it would. So for people to voluntarily choose to take up this cause, they have my deepest respect and admiration.

And today I have two of those very people here with me. And so thank you for taking time chatting with me, but also thank you for taking up this cause. Can I just start by asking why, how did you choose this?

Kacie: I think for us, we didn't have, a big experience where, something horrible happened to us or happened to someone that we love.

Really for us, it was just becoming aware of the issue. So we [00:04:00] started our company about 18 years ago and we were selling bedding, B E D D I N G, products. And so we started making pillows and mattresses. And then after a couple years of doing that, we started having people approach us, asking us to give away mattresses, pillows, sheets, for people in need. So we started giving away our product to women's shelters, homeless shelters, just anyone who needed the product, just 'cause it fulfilled that primary need for people. And as we started doing that, we started hearing stories. We started learning about, speaking with the people who were using the product that we were giving away and hearing their stories and just gaining that understanding that, whoa, we've lived a sheltered life and haven't had these hard things happen to us, but, starting to be educated about the fact that those things are happening around us, in our communities and right next door. And that was really disturbing to us 'cause it was something we hadn't really ever thought about. We were just living our own life. So once we learned about it, that was really just the point where we thought we needed to do something about it just because we can, we [00:05:00] have the ability, we have the resources and we wanted to do whatever we could to be advocates for the cause.

Elizabeth: I think it just says so much about who you both are. But also, I know for me, like I've lived in this sort of world of sexual violence and rape and human trafficking and kidnapping for well, since I was 15. Almost two decades. And even I get overwhelmed and sometimes I feel like maybe I've done my part. Maybe I can walk away. I think at least for me, it's, it's easy to feel overwhelmed when I just think of this cause as a whole and think of the enormity that it is. Do you ever feel like maybe we should have chosen an easier cause

Sam: Yeah, I think when you look at the spectrum, it's big. It's really wide in terms of the challenges associated with this area and the solutions as well.

And it's easy to get overwhelmed. And, we've maybe [00:06:00] had the benefit of the weakness of really taking on anything that's come in that realm. We've been pretty, we often, tell ourselves that we're being laser focused by staying in this area, but the area is a lot bigger than, than a laser focus. I think that's, what's exciting. When you look at, a long term ramp is that there's a lot of ways that you can continue making impact. It's never finished. I think it's one of those life paradoxes where it's just, it's not ever gonna be complete. It's not ever gonna be fully cured.

Our mission is to confront, but usually people say to eradicate and to, completely stop and that's a great goal, but there's a lot of good, I think that can come over, not just our lifetime, but a lot of lifetimes.

 So I think that's, what's maybe comforting is the, is that there's nonstop, scalable good that can come. It's all, we always say, it's really leveraged where it's, a little bit of effort goes a long way. And I also think the opportunity to engage other people is really high.

For us, I think one of the most spiriting things is seeing other [00:07:00] people engaged, how we engaged and we see it often and we see a lot of people wanting to jump in and, and we like that. And we like to be able to, share and hand off and be able to try to go after everything.

Kacie: Yeah, I think it is. It's heavy and it's hard and it is overwhelming a lot of times just thinking about all the things we wanna do and all the things we should be doing, and maybe some of the things we aren't doing and all those things, but I think there's a lot of people doing really great work in the space.

So just trying to bring what we can in a different way. Trying to raise awareness about it. That's one of the big things that we wanna focus on in our foundation is just education about the issue. Because like I was saying earlier, we just didn't really know about it. We didn't, we had never really been educated about it.

And so that's one of the big things that we wanna focus on. But I think just digging in where you can with the ideas that you can and recognizing that you can't do everything. And like Sam said, it's not something that probably we really can eradicate now, but it's definitely something we want to continue to work towards eradicating because even if we can help one person or [00:08:00] one child it's worth it still.

Elizabeth: Many people, I'm guessing, have probably never heard of the Malouf Foundation before. So if either of, you would basically say what it is and then what your ultimate goal for it is, that would be great.

Sam: I'll give a little intro to the Malouf Foundation. So we started about six years ago. Like Kacie mentioned, the beginnings really were contributing bedding product to people in need, and that was our platform. And there came a point where we became a lot more educated about trafficking, specifically as a result of seeing how people ended up in these different shelters and situations we're contributing to.

And we recognized that we had a big mouthpiece base with our employees, as well as a constituency in our customers and a platform, really, to speak from. And so over the years our mission still is to confront child sexual exploitation. And we do that specifically by providing education, creating awareness around what it is and what people can do to help by [00:09:00] working on the healing side. This is everything from providing those products that we did in the first place, to helping improve the restorative care process for victims and survivors. And then lastly, providing advocacy for survivors. So giving what you're doing right now, giving people a voice speak about their path to healing as well as the challenges and problems that exist.

There's a whole bunch of programs that sit under each of those three pillars that we can get into any of them OnWatch specifically is one of the education pillars. But that's basically what it is. It's a appendage of our operating company. Malouf Companies is our company that produces all these home products from mattresses to furniture. We've got an employee base of about 1600 employees and many of them get to contribute in their different ways of, what they do on a daily basis for their job.

In addition to the fact that we've got a foundation staff that all the overhead is covered by the company, and then any contributions that come in get to go toward either specific programs or directly helping survivors.

Elizabeth: And that's a [00:10:00] pretty big deal right there. Having, speaking is someone who has been in that place where you're asking for donations, but you still have employees to pay and telling the donors.

That's a really big deal. So should Giving Tuesday come around this year, when, not should, it will come. When it comes, just keep that in mind because not every foundation can say that there's a 100% flow through right to the cause and the Malouf Foundation can, so that's pretty awesome. How do you feel like you are able to measure progress?

Kacie: Well, I think that's one of the things that we're working on a lot, like Sam said, we just started our foundation five, six years ago. So we feel like we're kind of in startup phase still. Even though we have created a lot of programs and we're working really hard at the things that we're doing, but I think one of the main things that we're focused on this year is just measuring impact, making sure that the money and the resources that we're putting into everything that we're doing, that we're getting the impact out of that [00:11:00] that we want.

I think ways we've measured impact in the past has just been people telling us that the work that we're doing has changed their lives, has changed the process for them, whether that be through our Rooms Restored Program, so giving away bedding and things to create a new environment in a place where they were abused, or whether it was our OnWatch program saying we were able to identify somebody who was being trafficked and help get them out of that situation.

Things like that have helped us keep going. And we feel like our focus this year and going forward is really gonna be on measuring that impact.

Sam: Yeah, I think it was mentioned earlier by Kacie that if it's just one child or one person that's affected by the efforts, it's worth it.

And I often want to caveat that, that it's not, it's a lot that benefit and anybody involved in the work understands how, I would say a small degree of effort goes a long way and we've been able to have, get that feedback from specific individuals.

And one on the advocacy level, we work with a lot of survivors [00:12:00] and have been able to work together with them to help them tell their stories and help them create awareness. We feel really grateful to be able to just be in that observational side of that, to see how it gives them power and how it lights them up and how it really helps change their life.

One specific impact piece that we were able to be a part of recently is our local Utah Senator was, we were able to participate with them in changing a bill and legislation on making distribution and creation of child pornography in the state of Utah a first degree felony instead of a secondary felony, which even that process there was a lot of awareness and education created just in the, just in the chambers where it was discussed, where there are lawmakers that are not aware of what goes on and they're just not in that space. And that's been brought their attention, not to their fault. But seeing that change and people saying that's not okay let's do something about it.

Elizabeth: My dad and I, spent some time working on a bill years ago that had it, that was involved, that [00:13:00] was focusing on Child Sexual Abuse Material. And when we went in and we talked to these different lawmakers they're like "but it's a victimless crime." And it used to just blow my mind because I was like, you are watching someone being abused, like you were watching it happen.

And so I think that in and of itself is getting Utah to change it from a second degree felony to a first degree felony is a huge deal. We should have these predators in jail every day of the week over, marijuana dealers or petty small stuff.

Predators, they are a much greater risk. So that's a huge deal. That's a huge triumph actually.

Sam: Yeah. Even your comment on victimless crime. You still hear that and you hear that from, some general public and you hear that from lawmakers specifically that don't understand that the most vulnerable population in our society is [00:14:00] children who depend on adults to protect them and to take care of them and to make sure that the bad people don't hurt them. And they're the future, right? So if we don't protect the future, really what are we doing? So yeah that's, it's progress at least.

Elizabeth: I'm just thinking back on my own experience, I used to think that what I went through was. The worst thing that a person could go through, that it just couldn't be any worse, like the humiliation and like the degradation and everything surrounding kidnapping and rape and sexual assault. I just didn't think it could get any worse.

And then I was rescued and I came home and little by little, I became more and more involved in advocacy and I met a fellow survivor. And she had a pretty horrific story. She'd been kidnapped and she'd been tortured, she'd been raped. But he had recorded her. He had recorded himself doing that to her, and then he had threatened her saying, that if she ever spoke out, if she ever did anything, he was gonna release this on the internet.

[00:15:00] And that made me start thinking, what if everything that had happened to me had been video recorded? And then what if other people were deriving pleasure from the worst moments of my life? How much more difficult would that be to go out in public?

And Utah's a pretty friendly place. It's a pretty nice place. People smile at you and say, hi, just as they're walking by or you get in an elevator and they like, oh hi. And you're like, oh, hey. And maybe nothing more is said, but how difficult would that be to continue living your life and having people smile and wave at you or give you a little extra attention.

And at the back of your mind, have that thought sitting there wondering, are they genuinely just being kind or are they smiling and waving at me because they enjoyed watching me be raped? So the enormity of actually this bill going from second degree felony to a first degree felony is huge. Because I am so grateful I [00:16:00] did never experience that, but there are certainly are so many who have, and just the thought of having to live with that fear and honestly, apprehension to the world would be exhausting.

Kacie: Yeah. And I think it's surprising once you get into the details to learn that it wasn't already a first degree felony. You think that the laws are going to protect you.

And actually I think a lot of times they don't. And that's one of the things that we wanna work on with our advocacy part is just helping people understand the laws that are in their state and in their area. And then, getting them fired up and bothered enough that they want to change those or help change those.

'Cause, it's a long, difficult process to do that, but it's really important if we wanna hold predators accountable. So.

Elizabeth: Absolutely. And there's, there are a lot of laws that need to be changed and you're right. That it's shocking to find out that they aren't already, and I think it would be very shocking for people to find out what you would think is well, that's against the law.

Well, that's a felony to actually find out that it's [00:17:00] not. For instance, I learned recently that there is a state that has a law that it's not considered rape if you don't fight back, you have to physically fight back. Otherwise it's not classed as rape. And I just sit and think to myself, my mind is just blown.

I spend so much time talking about I'm talking about what is consent? What is enthusiastic consent? When I released my first book, I did a podcast with Lewis House on his School of Greatness and he was asking me, "well, how do you know, how do you know when someone is actually saying yes and when someone's not," because I said, " no means no, silence means no. And even yes means no sometimes." And he's like, "well, if you're telling me that, yes can mean no sometimes. How do you know that you're ever okay?" . And I see his point, but on the flip side, if you are being forced to do things against your will, against what you want, like, if you have something held over your head, like if you have a child and they're being held against you, there are so many ways [00:18:00] to manipulate people into trafficking.

We hear the stories all the time. Nobody wakes up and wants to be a victim of human trafficking. But yet, so many people find themselves in that situation and through manipulation and coercion.

On this podcast I gave that example of someone being trafficked as also a sign that even though they might say yes, that doesn't actually mean that it's okay. And ultimately, I think it does come down to your words and your physical actions need to match. Anyway, sorry, it's so easy for me to go down a rabbit hole. Taking a pretty sharp pivot, you are parents. You have, children and they're a wide range in ages, but are they all aware of what your foundation does?

Sam: It's a good question. We talk very openly with our kids about things, obviously, because we're aware of things. We want them to be aware of things. And we've got five kids ranging from 16 to nine and different [00:19:00] ages are ready for different things.

They all know that, then they've all known, I'd say for probably four or five years that we have a foundation that helps protect kids. And as they get older, we talk to 'em about sexual abuse and abuse and trafficking and different things. And we've actively been helping our older kids take the OnWatch training which is phenomenal and I'd recommend for any parent of a child, I don't know, probably 12 years or older to do all the modules of their kids, cuz it's not just the education, but it opens up dialogue. They've got cell phones. And then they can watch how sextortion happens. They can watch how camming happens, in different things and see some of those warnings.

So I think it's been great to help educate them as well as teaching them at a young age that there's a lot of people that don't live as protected as of a lifestyle as they do. And that they should care about other people. When we've gone through this over the last several years and we see the incidents and the level, the gravity of how many children don't have a safe [00:20:00] place to be.

Either in their home or maybe in some cases because of their guardians not being aware. And I think back to my childhood and fortunately had a childhood, that I didn't recognize the time that I was being protected, but my parents were smart and they were cautious. And I don't know how aware they were, but I wasn't put or allowed to be in situations that put me at risk.

And I'm grateful for that. I want to teach our children to be aware of that and to be cautious with other people as well.

Kacie: Yeah. I think with kids, there's a million things that can go wrong. They're exposed in a big way all the time, just by living their lives by, I think for us we've never been parents before, obviously we don't really know what we're doing, but I think for us just talking about it, talking about it with our kids a lot more openly with our older kids than our younger kids, but just talking about being as open as we can about those issues with them from a young age helps you be more open as they get older.

And now with our kids being, having a couple kids that are teenagers, but yeah, just starting to have those conversations about [00:21:00] consent and about more bigger topics than just being sexually abused, but just about how to navigate the world. Like you're talking about just with consent and with how to make sure that you are ready for those things and make sure that you understand what it means.

Sam: I think one other thing to add too, a close by county that has a Children's Justice Center, which is basically the intermediary between an abuse victim and the legal system, so that's where, that's the first stop least in the state of Utah and several other states they're advocacy centers that help children heal and help convict perpetrators, but one close by at our county most recently said that 100% of all cases of abuse, sexual abuse, they were dealing with, all started through digital means or through a cell phone, all of them. And so I think that's one of the biggest things as parents that we all should be doing. And it's, we have the, fortune of being exposed to all these things.

And so having that caution, but all [00:22:00] parents and all children should be aware of the risks in putting kids, not just on cell phones, but on online gaming and all the different things where they can connect with people they don't know. That they, that may purport themselves to being one thing and be something else. That's another big benefit, I think, as you're talking to kids and we've got some different programs from OnWatch to another program called Raise that talks about, like Kacie's mentioning, the communication side between parents then also just the awareness of digital exposure.

Elizabeth: It's incredible. So if you've listened to today's episode and you are looking for things to do, here are a couple things that you can do today. Go to, IAmOnWatch.org, go take the training. Go take this course on how to recognize human trafficking, and then don't just take it yourself, take it with your children and talk about it so that they know what they up against, unfortunately, for lack of better words.

People ask me all the time. Oh, have you talked to your kids? Have you told your kids what you went through? Do you tell your kids what you do? Yes and no. [00:23:00] And honestly, as those conversations have begun to happen, but I haven't gone into deep detail.

And for me, being in this space all the time, even still, it scares me to have those conversations. So having this easier way in, having this doorway into opening up this conversation is honestly a game changer. So go to, IAmOnWatch.org, take the training, have your kids take it and talk about it, discuss it and keep discussing it.

Also look into Raise, go to your app store on Apple or whatever system that you use, and look in up the app, Raise that's R A I S E, and go explore that because that is an awesome tool as well.

And finally , if you find yourself looking for an organization to help, consider getting involved at Malouf Foundation. You did just hear from Sam and Kacie Malouf, two of the most genuine people, [00:24:00] authentic people, I think I may have ever met, who are really in this cause for the right reason. Because it's not easy. It's not lighthearted, it's not fun. But it is so important. So I wanna say thank you to everyone for tuning in and listening today, and we will see you next week.

Make sure you rate us and leave us a review. And if you have any comments about what you would like to hear about in the future, be sure to message us on social media. Thanks so much.