“I never expected life in America to be this hard,” said
Nelly Gonzales, a 55 year old Filipina immigrant caregiver. Living in the Philippines for 10 years, I
noticed that people back home view United States is a land where everything is easy to make money. Every time I talked to my relatives on
the phone, they always say how great my life is and how rich I am. People in
the Philippines do not see the hardship and the abuse that Filipino and
Filipina immigrants face in order to make money. Many Filipino immigrants face improper
treatment in a caregiver occupation. I was in a caregiver job for two years
and I experienced, heard, and seen how they were treated. Filipino and Filipina
immigrants encounter physical and mental abuse, low salaries, and lack respect from
their employers and patients in care homes in United States.
Immigrant workers from the
Philippines face violence and sexual harassment in care homes from the residents.
I saw my former co-worker being touched inappropriately on her chest. According
to her, she is putting up with it because she does not want to lose her job.
She cannot afford to stop working because of her kids in the Philippines.
Another abuse situation that
occurred was the one I was involved in.
I was trying to change my client’s diaper and I felt a deep scratch in
my forearm. As of today, the scar still
on my there and it reminds me what happened every time I looked at it. I did
not say anything because I was scared to lose my job so I kept it a secret. If
I lose my job, I will not able to pay for my apartment and my bills. I will
sacrifice my body just to not depend on my parents for financial help.
The pay in a caregiving job does not
match the labor that is required. I was getting paid $9 an hour with similar responsibilities
of a CNA. According to NursingLink.com,
a CNA in United States is able to start $14.36 an hour. Doing the same job but getting paid less does
not sound fair. In San Jose, Ca; Nelly
Gonzales works for 7 days a week and only gets paid $150 do a month. She was only getting paid $5 dollars a day in
a 30 day month.
This shows that employers only care
about their profits. They will squeeze every employee they have to get the
maximum revenue. How is this injustice happening? Why is the government letting
this unfairness happen, especially since homecare are mostly funded by
them?
Employers and patients show lack of
respect towards the caregivers. It was a warm sunny day and one of my clients
ordered me to get water for her with such a high tone of voice. When I gave her
the water, she suddenly threw the water at me because it was not cold enough. I
was thinking about the money I will get from this job to prevent me releasing
my bad temper towards her.
One of my friends who were the
manager in the homecare I worked at was disrespected. She was yelled at by the employer in front of
all the employees because of some minimal issue in the house. She burst in tears in front of her co-workers
and staff. The employer should have pulled her aside and talk about the problem
privately. Instead, she humiliated my friend in front of everyone.
Employers think that they can
disrespect their workers because he or she knows that they cannot quit their
jobs. This does not give them an excuse to treat the caregivers like slaves and
yell at them anytime they want.
Employers and patients should not abuse the caregivers. They
should provide a fair pay and show respect for their workers. The owners and the patients should think that
without caregivers, there will be no business and no one will take care of the
clients. The homecare workers are the most important people in homecare and
should be valued.
Filipino immigrants just like many other immigrants in America struggle day to day to make a living and hopefully one day reach that so called “American Dream” they kept hearing about back from their own homeland. The American Dream, as we discussed in class is nothing but an illusion and it’s socially contrasted. Not to say that nobody lives within the American Dream. Many people do, however those people tend to be White Americans. There is a substantial difference between First world feminism and Third world feminism and how their lifestyles are portrayed in our society. First world feminism is white, mostly middle and upper class, engaged in political activism, and embrace idealized individualism and independence. On the other hand, Third world feminism are racially colored, lack educational training and cultural values that tend to encourage activism, are low wage laborers, and they idealize connection, community, and interdependence. As we have learned from our readings, in “Cartographies of Struggle: Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism” and also “Cleaning Up/Kept Down: A Historical Perspective on Racial Inequality in Women’s Work”, Filipino women are treated as slaves. They are given the dirtiest jobs, which shouldn’t be the case just because somebody lacks education or is an immigrant. American society as you mentioned at the end of your blog, needs to be more aware of the way they treat their caregivers and perhaps guide them to develop a better lifestyle because after all, these caregivers don’t want to work as caregivers for the rest of their lives. I enjoyed reading your blog and I think you made a lot of clear arguments.
ReplyDelete- Karine Darabedyan
Thanks for sharing your experience, I'm sorry you had to go through that. No one deserves to be treated so disrespectfully. What makes matters worse is, as you said, they can't really do anything about it or they'll lose their jobs. But I wonder, if all the caregivers who've been treated badly all at once just stood up for themselves and said to their employers, "I'm not taking any of your shit," and just walked away from their jobs, would that accomplish anything? Would employers be more aware of how badly they treat their employees? Or would they just look for the next unfortunate minority to be taken advantage of?
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