Sad State of the Filipino Union
Ugnayan Ng Kabataang Pilipino Sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance – Ontario
Issues of Filipino identity dominated the conversation during the first State of the Filipino Union (SOFU) gathering on February 26, 2009. However, the gathering did not address the more apparent concerns that affect the successful settlement and integration of our community such as, systemic racism, violence against women and economic marginalization.
“What was it like to grow up in Canada? Did your parents teach you Tagalog? What was your experience with assimilation? Did you teach your kids Tagalog?”
These questions were directed to a panel of 16 Filipino youth and 16 older Filipino Canadians who spearhead or are affiliated with cultural, religious, media, service-oriented and university student-based organizations in the Greater Toronto Area. Many panelists responded with similar experiences and reiterations of culture clash, “just trying to fit-in” scenarios and learning Filipino culture as elements that informed their identity.
However, if Filipinos have continued to arrive in Canada since the 1960s, why has the dialogue today become so stagnant and fixated only on Filipino identity?
As the night continued, a debate based on the supposed splinter between “Bacon” (a Canadian born Filipino who can’t speak Tagalog) and “F.O.B” (“Fresh off the Boat” or newly arrived immigrant) became fodder for discussion. Anjo Pallasigui of Minerva Records was the only one who tried to raise the discussion to a higher level. He articulated in Tagalog that the issue is not a rift between first and second generation Filipinos, but a stratification of class.
Along with analyses of class, race and gender remained absent from the State of the Filipino Union forum. These absent analyses should have been present because the Filipino community in Canada is now comprised of 65-70% women. Its mention is important due to the fact that 97% of workers coming under the Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) are Filipino women. These women, who are making minimum wage or less, are not able to bring their families to Canada, upgrade their education or have their education properly accredited to continue in their chosen field while under the program. Many have to go back to school after finishing the program despite having been a professional in the Philippines. But with soaring tuition costs for post-secondary education, going back to school is virtually impossible for most women as they struggle to fend for themselves all the while sending remittances to support their families back in the Philippines. Furthermore, as an added disadvantage, after doing domestic work for the required 24 months within 36 months, Filipino women under the LCP are argued to have no “Canadian experience,” forcing them to work service sector jobs and factory jobs following the completion of the program.
Based on the foreign domestic movement and implemented in 1992, the LCP continues to show its racist, exploitative, and sexist nature. Filipino women come forward expressing their economic hardships, experiences of physical abuse, as well as their psychological and emotional trauma from becoming essentially modern-day slaves for upper and upper-middle class Canadian families. Contributors of oppression, Canadian families often believe they are doing a favour for these women and relish in the fact that the “LCP is so cheap.”
Diwa Marcelino of Migrante Youth stated some of the wage problems of the LCP and then delivered his soft politics, “. . .we have to change some policies. . .” and make the live-in caregiver program “less exploitative and more humane.” The position offered by Migrante Youth suggests that there is a level of exploitation that is acceptable and that any abuse or violation of human rights should be tolerated. The negative impacts of the LCP, rather, do not just fall upon Filipinas in the program, but the rest of the community.
The National Day of Action on January 27th is an annual event that mourns the death of 15-year-old Deeward Ponte in Vancouver, British Columbia. Deeward’s death is a grim reminder to all Filipinos of the many youth who have died or suffered because of racism: the death of Jeffrey Reodica in Toronto, Ontario by 3 plain-clothes police officers; the beating of a 17-year-old Filipino teenage girl in Cote-des-Neiges, Quebec by police; and the killing of Mao Jomar Lanot and Charles Dalde. More cases of racial profiling, police brutality and racially motivated beatings continue to emerge and yet the topic of discussion during the State of the Filipino Union focused only on the identity crisis of established and popular Filipino-Canadians. This is a complete and utter embarrassment and regression for the entire community. It is an outright denial of the social impacts of the LCP and insult to the slain and beaten youth of domestic workers who could not spend more time with their mothers.
Ugnayan Ng Kabataang Pilipino Sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance (UKPC/FCYA), the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC) and SIKLAB-Canada has always maintained the position that the LCP must be scrapped. In addition, the program as a policy needs to be terminated and the Canadian government pressured into implementing settlement and integration programs. The expansion of the Temporary Foreign Workers Program, which the government is now attempting, will only perpetuate the problems that already exist under the LCP. The call is for the LCP to be scrapped, permanent residence to be given to all Filipino migrants, proper accreditation so that they can continue in their chosen profession and universal childcare services for all women in Canada. “All Filipino migrants contribute to the Canadian economy and therefore should be recognized for these contributions,” says Qara Clemente of UKPC/FCYA-ON.
Once again the State of the Filipino Union was unsuccessful in acknowledging the shear extent of degradation the LCP has had on the community. Instead, the panelists – including youth from universities and older Filipinos representing advocacy groups – championed their collective position to be neutral and apolitical because of the fear of causing fissures in the community.
The failure of the State of the Filipino Union was not in its organization as an event, but in its content. The clear issues of systemic racism (racial profiling, police brutality, an indifferent and culturally insensitive education system), violence against women, economic marginalization and the silencing of our lesbian and gay community were glossed over or completely ignored. What the community should not fear is dialogue because of politics. It is only through struggle that we can have true unity. But dialogue alone cannot solve the problems in our community. When it is clear that our youth are being marginalized and left behind, and our women are being exploited, we must take a stand and fight for our community’s genuine development, equality and human rights.
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Statement prepared by:
Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance