Involuntary Servitude

August 26, 2007

Stories of overseas Filipino workers being abused and exploited by foreigners all over the world are common. Women OFW's are particularly more vulnerable than their male counterparts—not to say that they are weaker, but they are less physically agressive and some countries are still backward in their view regarding women as inferior to men and thus, abuse and exploitation comes easier due to social tolerance. 

 

This boring Sunday morning, I Googled 'filipina' and a most interesting and cringe-worthy article from The International Herald Tribune turned up in the search. It's about a Filipina OFW who went to San Francisco in 2005 to work as a nanny for a vice consul in the Philippine Consulate General of the Philippines. When she arrived, the vice consul told her that she will be working for his in-laws in New Jersey. They took her passport and was forbidden to leave the house without any household members. She spent the next two years being paid only a small  fraction of the salary indicated in her contract until New Jersey labor officials came to investigate her case.

 
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