Tuesday, May 09, 2023

Are Filipinos looked down on in countries where there are many Filipino maids?

Tom Aerts

I'm not sure if Belgium actually has a significant amount of philipina maids / au-pairs as compared to Middle Eastern or Anglo-Saxon countries, however I can speak to the perception of society in general towards Asians here, through personal experience.

My partner is originally from the Philippines (although she is mixed, ethnically, but not white). She came to Europe a few years where I subsequently met her in Denmark. We are currently living in Belgium.

She is a registered nurse (Bachelor in science - nursing), currently doing her 2nd and final year of Master's degree in Bioscience engineering - Environmental Science. Simply going by statistics, it is highly likely that she is (much) smarter than the average of the indigenous populous.

Moreover, upon finalising her studies and starting either her doctorate or career (depending on what she chooses to go for), she is destined to be a net-contributor to the social system we have here in Belgium, as opposed to a net beneficiary. Given the salaries in her profession and target sectors for employment (Pharma, chemical, oil and gas, research, ...), she will most likely be contributing a lot more in taxes and dues than the average local citizen, who was born and raised here. Meanwhile, she is not receiving any sort of governmental support while studying and I actually support her - despite already paying an absurd amount of taxes myself due to a relatively high income and succesful business.

And yet for some reason, people look at her on the street and see just another Asian. Without any idea about who she is or what she does, she's immediately branded as a parasite by a large section of people. While this is frustrating in itself, it becomes even more annoying when we realise that it is primarily the uneducated and perpetually lazy who seem to want to brand her lesser than they are. It is the cashier in the supermarket who feels its okay to arrogantly demand to see the content of her bag. It is the old man on the bus throwing her nasty looks when she gets on. It is the clerk at the high-end makeup store who does not give her the time of day, because of how she looks.

And honestly, it might bother me more than it does her. I'm the one who gets upset when she tells me these things. I'm even more bothered by the fact that it so rarely happens when I am there with her, as I rather do enjoy putting some people in their place when it comes to these things. I am not a violent person, but I happily cut to the bone with sarcasm and righteous indignation.

Prejudice and racism is rife in my country. Even my own government discriminates against me - a citizen - making us jump through all sorts of administrative and regulatory hoops, simply because of choosing to live my life with a non-EU citizen. This isn't exclusive towards Asians - it happens to everyone who happens to not at least look as if they are local.

Since I've been with her, I've met a lot of people from the Philippines and the one thing that stands out to me is this:

They are confronted with this racism and judgment, perceived to be taking advantage of "the rich west", but the joke is that each and every one that I have met is probably more hardworking, conscientious and diligent than the large subset of racists and assholes in my country. They do not complain about it though. They take it in stride and brush it off, continually working towards their goals no matter how disgusting the perception might be.

All of this does make us wonder whether we want to spend the rest of our lives here, though. Perhaps someday we may decide that we are sick of paying a massive amount of taxes taken from our hard work in order to feed a system that supports the lazy, good-for-nothing lifestyle of certain parasitic morons... who happen to be white, not Asian.

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