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1994 Report
on the
Sexual
Exploitation
of Latina
Women &
Girls in
Montgomery
County,
Maryland
workplaces
and
communities. |
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Our first report on these issues - from 1994 |
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In response to repeated failures to get the legal
and press establishment of Montgomery County and the
greater Washington, DC area to respond positively to
the urgent needs of Latina victims of workplace and
community sexual assault, the author wrote the below
report and has distributed it to many local police,
press and advocacy organizations during the past 9
years. -
Chuck
Goolsby |
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Montgomery
County,
MD
-- 1994
Charles M. Goolsby,
Jr.'s 1994 Report on the
Sexual Exploitation of
Latina immigrant Women
and Girls in Montgomery
County, Maryland
EXCERPT
...All
of
my
work
in
Latin-American
immigrant
victim-advocacy
has
resulted
from
victims
having
approached
me
seeking
help.
Repeatedly,
the
official
reaction
of
cleaning
contract
companies
working
within
Montgomery
County
to
my
polite
raising
of
these
issues
has
been
to
do
the
following:
1)
silence
any
discussion
of
these
issues
by
the
use
of
gross
intimidation
against
the
victims
and
myself,
2)
fire
or
force
the
victims
out,
and
3)
back-up
the
actions
of
the
perpetrators,
protecting
them
from
legal
trouble.
Latin-American
immigrant
women
have
thus
gotten
the
message
loud
and
clear
on
many
occasions
that
they
have
become
a
cheap,
disposable
resource
in
the
American
work-place,
underpaid,
overworked,
and
often
forced
into
sexual
submission
while
government
and
commerce
knowingly
turn
their
backs.
At
this
time
I
have
found
it
necessary
to
write
this
report.
Since
1988
I
have
formally
presented
this
information
to
many
persons-in-authority.
Time
after
time,
these
well-educated,
well-paid
officials
of
public
and
commercial
organizations
have
said
"SO
WHAT!"
This
report
is a
substitute
for
the
muffled
CRY
OF
RAPE
from
victims
who
are
tired
of
having
become
the
sexual
'cannon-fodder'
of
America...
-
Charles
M.
Goolsby,
Jr. -
February,
1994
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Also see
our page on
U.S. Workplace Exploitation
focusing on workplace abuse in Montgomery
County, MD, and specifically on cases found in
this report.
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Perspective on why the below report needed writing:
From: Chuck Goolsby's Advocacy Newsletter
- 1999-2000: Detailed
information on Latin Women Worker/Harassment & Other Exploitation
Issues. |
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True Cases from the Frontlines of
Impunity
The below three workplace sexual and
physical abuse cases are all 100%
factual. These cases, which are
detailed accounts from the 1994 report,
speak for the many victims involved.
These cases also document the voiceless
cries of tens if not hundreds of
thousands of working women and girls
across the United States who face rape
and coercion with impunity largely
because anti-immigrant hostility and
apathy from government agencies
allows it to happen. That must change!
Only public awareness and public
expressions of outrage to elected
officials, police administrators and
local prosecutors will lead to
improvement. Nothing else seems to
motivate change.
Deliberate
Inaction was the official government and
corporate response in all of these
cases. |
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Workplace Rape:
Rockville, Maryland - Case 1 |
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Workplace Rape:
Rockville, Maryland - Case 2 |
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Workplace Rape:
Rockville, Maryland - Case 3 |
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"Each of them
[the foremen] had made it a practice to sleep with the Indian
women who were in his work-force, if they pleased him, whether
they were married women or maidens. While the foreman remained
in the hut or the cabin with the Indian woman, he sent the
husband to dig gold out of the mines; and in the evening, when
the wretch returned, not only was he beaten or whipped because
he had not brought up enough gold, but further, most often, he
was bound hand and foot and flung under the bed like a dog,
before the foreman lay down, directly over him, with his wife." |
Comments by Franciscan
priest Bartolome de las Casas to Spain's King Charles-I in
1519, regarding the abuse of Enslaved Indigenous-peoples of the Carib
Nation in the Caribbean Islands under Spain's control.
In 1994 in Montgomery County, Maryland
and nationwide, Latin-American immigrant women and teen-aged girls are being
subjected to work-place exploitation that differs very little from the nightmare
suffered by these enslaved Native-Caribbean women in 1519. Many low-wage
immigrant workers are routinely subjected to sexual and physical assault, sexual
harassment, wage abuses, and the use of illegal threats, reprimands, and firings
to silence them.
Would you allow yourself or a loved-one
to submit to these outrages?
This hidden sub-culture of crime and
human-rights violations affects the daily lives of many immigrant women and
teens in our community.
They want and deserve our help!
Surprisingly, local corporations and
government entities have at times engaged in intimidation and bureaucratic
foot-dragging to deliberately silence this issue. Silence protects the guilty
and allows these abuses to flourish. This silence and government inaction sends
these victims a very strong message:
They have no rights under law!
Written in honor of human rights
activist Ms. Rigoberta Menchu,
the first Nobel Peace Prize winner
of Mayan nationality,
whose family perished in the
Guatemalan Holocaust during the 1980's.
Table of Contents:
Definitions used within this document.
About the Author.
A. Latin-American background:
1: Degrees of the exploitation of women.
2: Urban employment and the rights of women.
3: Rural women and the modern plantation.
4: The five-century oppression of Native-Peoples.
B. U.S. American background:
1: Intervention and investment in Latin-America.
2: The 1980's wave of immigration and reaction to it.
3: Government relations with the immigrant community.
C. The present and future
1: A turning of one's back on innocent victims of abuse.
2: The nature of contract office cleaning work.
3: The criteria used in relating this chronology of incidents.
4: A chronology of actual cases within Montgomery County, Md.
This report proposes to demonstrate the following
premises:
There is a real, widespread epidemic of criminal and
civil-law violations being perpetrated against innocent adult-women and minor
teen-aged girls in many work-places in Montgomery County, Md., in the
Washington, D.C. area, and nationally.
The targets-of and the victims-of this illegal
activity are Latin-American women and minor teen-aged girls who work within the
low-wage service-business economy, especially within the commercial office
cleaning, hotel, and restaurant industries.
The perpetrators of these illegal acts are mostly
male supervisors in these industries.
The many victims of these illegal activities are
subjected to sexual assault (which often includes rape), physical assault, and
very coercive forms of sexual harassment.
The victims are also subjected to a condoned but
illegal system of reprimands, wage abuses, and firings, often for refusing to
accept the sexual demands of supervisors.
The victims of these illegal acts are usually
Central-American immigrant refugees from war and poverty. Salvadorans and
Guatemalans are the most frequent victims.
Native (Indigenous), and Mestiza (mixed
Spanish/Native) women are often targeted.
The victims do not want these horrible abuses to
continue, but they are absolutely dependent on these low-wage service jobs for
the very survival of their children, themselves, and their families back home.
Many of the victims are single mothers.
The victims and their coworkers are subjected to many
forms of coercion and intimidation by these supervisor/perpetrators, which has
the deliberate purpose of silencing the victims to protect the perpetrators and
allow these abuses to continue.
Latin-American social patterns rooted in the
philosophy of machismo, modern forms of agrarian feudalism, anti-Native (Indian)
abuses, as well as patterns of violence from Central and South America's many
civil-wars all contribute both to the abusive actions of the perpetrators and
also to the often submissive behavior of the victims.
This true epidemic of criminal and civil illegality
is very-well entrenched in the daily business life of Montgomery County, Md.,
which is the focus of this report.
The victims encounter American indifference to
stopping this epidemic of crime, due in part to anti-Latin-American racism,
anti-immigrant hostility, fear of job competition, anti-women hostility, and the
view that low-wage workers are inferior.
The victims encounter indifference to their plight
from American business managers and owners who run low-wage service-based
businesses, due to the above attitudes, due also to the use of intimidation as a
legal strategy to protect the business from employee lawsuits, and sometimes due
to a bond of common interest (participation in the exploitation of these women)
between the perpetrators and their management.
The perpetrators of these illegal acts have tended to
receive strong backing from the management and ownership of these service
businesses, including some very large local corporations. This support includes
the calculated management approval of the use of illegal intimidation tactics
against the victims, such as issuing unjustified reprimands, threatening the
victims with firing, verbally ordering victims to keep quiet about abuse, and
demands that victims not file formal government complaints.
The perpetrators have also received strong backing
for this illegal activity from their business clients. In the commercial
office-cleaning industry, for example, cleaning companies contract with building
owners, management firms, or tenants. The author has witnessed both a local
federal agency and one of the largest corporations within Montgomery County, Md.
(both were cleaning contract clients) participate actively in deliberate
intimidation aimed at stopping victims from filing legal complaints.
The victims have a fear of law-enforcement and
government agencies based upon the very-real history of the use of public,
police, and military forces in Latin-America to enforce the will of land-owners,
corrupt public officials, and dictators.
Very little government informational literature,
electronic media and public speaking is effectively targeted at our vast,
tax-paying Latin-American immigrant public regarding their rights to be
protected by civil and criminal law from victimization.
The victims have at-times received 'the brush-off'
from the Montgomery County agencies charged with enforcing civil and criminal
laws which should protect them.
One victim was told to "wait for more abuse [sexual
harassment and retaliation] to occur before filing a complaint", one assault
victim was laughed at in a County Police Station in 1988, and one VERY serious
complaint was declared by the Human Relations Commission to be lost,
after it foot dragged for 13 months.
Introduction:
The rapid growth in the Latin-American immigrant
population in the Washington, D.C. area and within Montgomery County, Maryland
has brought about a set of social and economic conditions which allow for the
widespread work-place abuse of Latin-American women and teen-aged girls within
our community. These conditions exist at a crisis level, in the opinion of the
author, and require urgent action by government and private organizations to
stop them. All who read this report can help end this abuse.
Urgent action is needed by our elected officials and
others to restore the full, basic rights of all immigrant women and children
within Montgomery County to live in peace and to enjoy the same rights which
other residents of Montgomery County enjoy. These include the right to the
dignity of the unquestioned ownership of one's own body, the right to live and
work within Montgomery County without being subjected to sex-on-demand and other
blatant and unpunished forms of sexual harassment and assault by persons in
positions of authority, and the right to job security without being subjected to
a widely condoned system of random and arbitrary punishments and firings in the
low-wage service sector, which are both illegal and widespread within Montgomery
County. These abuses are very real, every-day threats to the lives and the
dignity of many Latin-American immigrant women and teenagers.
The analysis of the issues covered within this report
may introduce the reader to some new and eye-opening perspectives on an urgent
problem which literally affects the daily-life of thousands of working women and
teen-aged girls who are your neighbors, who may go to, or whose children may go
to your children's schools, and who cross paths with you every day. The women
and teen-aged girls who are the subject of this report have come to the United
States seeking the opportunity to escape war, live in peace, work hard (which
they are well-known for), and contribute their many talents to this society.
Unfortunately, a combination of the historical legacy
of the oppression of women within Latin America, (which has migrated here with
the immigrant population), the serious post-traumatic stresses affecting many
Latin-American war refugees, illiteracy, a lack of English skills, poverty, the
tight job market, employer exploitation and job-discrimination, immigration
reform, racial hostility, and government's inexplicable deaf-ear on these issues
have all converged upon the immigrant community.
The convergence of these complex factors has resulted
in a very simple reality in Montgomery County, Maryland and by extension
nationwide. That reality is that unlike her African-American, European-American
and other native-born American sisters, who generally have a much better
understanding of criminal and civil laws and usually know something about the
legal process and how to access it, poor, tax-paying Latin-American immigrant
women and teen-aged girls have been left virtually abandoned when it comes to
getting local government and the business community to protect them from being
routinely subjected to the most severe forms of sexual harassment and sexual
assault within the modern American work-place. The history-of and the reality-of
this crisis is the subject of this report.
While Montgomery County prides itself on being
a place where the respect for human-rights is a top priority, the
reality is very different. Minorities in general, women, and especially
immigrants are subjected daily to abuses that few other residents ever
face. When they complain, they are stepped on.
Definitions used within this document.
This paper attempts to bring about a cross-cultural
communication with the objective of resolving a serious crisis within our
communities. Several terms used within this document require clarification.
As this paper investigates working conditions for
women, that term is defined. American is also described. Latin-American, Latino,
Hispanic, Hispanic-American, Native-American, Indigenous-American and Indian are
all debatable terms. Not all Spanish speakers from the Americas accept any one
of these terms to describe themselves. Some reject the above terms in favor of
identification by national origin.
A similar argument on semantics exists within the
community of the original, indigenous (Native) inhabitants of all of the
Americas. I have made an effort within this paper to settle on a set of standard
terms which are clearly understandable and which respect the dignity of each of
these ethnic communities.
The term 'Women', and also the phrase 'Women and
Teen-aged girls' for the purposes of this report refers to both adult-women and
teen-aged girls within the work-force in the United States.
The term 'Native' is used within this document to
refer to the original inhabitants of the western hemisphere (indigenous
inhabitants). Many Native-Peoples view all of the original inhabitants of the
Americas as having a common identity, and others prefer tribal or nation-state
based identity.
The Native nations mentioned within this paper
include the Mayan Native-People resident in the modern nation-states of El
Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico; the Inca Native-People from the
Aymara and Quechua speaking groups resident in Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, and
Peru, and many smaller nations of Native-Peoples inhabiting the Americas,
totaling 80 million people.
The term 'Mestizo' refers to people of combined
Spanish and Native-Latin-American heritage. Within countries in Latin-America,
the great majority of the population is of Mestizo heritage.
The term 'Latin-American' is used in reference to all
residents of those American countries where Spanish is the national language.
This includes residents of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica,
Cuba, The Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico,
Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Uruguay, and Venezuela.
The term 'U.S. American' is used within this document
to refer to the United States of America. This term is used to distinguish
between the U.S. and the rest of the Americas. Latin-American school history and
geography courses as well as daily conversation all refer to 'America'
(North-America, Central-America, The Caribbean, and South-America) as a single
multi-state entity.
The term 'Machista' refers to men who follow the
social philosophy of 'machismo' (macho-ism). Machismo represents a lifestyle
which involves a view of women as human-beings who are literally inferior to
men. Machismo impacts heavily on social-justice for women in Latin-America.
Neo-Feudalism refers to modern survivals of the
medieval European agrarian-based social-system of feudalism. It enforces the
strict separation-of and exploitation-of women and 'lower-classes.'
About the author
-
Before I expand on this topic, I will detail some of
the qualifications and life-experiences which I believe allow me to speak out
with accuracy and authority on these very charged legal and social issues.
I, Charles M. Goolsby, Jr. have made the defense of
basic human rights a cornerstone of my life work for over 20 years. A am a man
of African-American, Muskogee Native-American, and European decent who respects
and intensely celebrates ALL of those ancestral heritages. I thank my parents
for providing me with a good basic education and a good compass of moral common
sense in this life. Professionally, I am a computer systems engineer with a very
large federal computer services contractor in Rockville, Md. I have worked
part-time for the Montgomery County Government since 1987. I am currently a
part-time civilian information systems support specialist with the County Police
Department.
I speak to these issues from the point of view of a
veteran of over fifteen years of both paid and voluntary community service work
within the Latin-American community of Washington, D.C. and Montgomery County,
Md. During the period from 1978 to 1981 I worked actively with many community
service organizations, including: Centro Adelante - working with housing and
immigration issues; the Latin-American Youth Center - involved in on-the-job
training for young people; the School of Rumba -the area's first Latino music
school teaching Afro-Caribbean traditional and modern music, where I was a
student and then an instructor; and El Centro de Arte, a long-existing
focal-point of Latino folkloric music, dance, and theater in the D.C. area. In
addition, I have performed with over two dozen folkloric and popular music
ensembles in the Latino community. My work with these and other community groups
and the many friendships that grew from that work gave my life focus during my
twenties, allowed me to serve my community in many ways, and gave me complete
fluency in written and spoken Spanish.
During 1980 and 1981, I worked in the production and
announcing of radio news and Latin-music programming on one of the D.C. area's
first bilingual programs, Salsa De Las Americas on WPFW-FM, 89.3. The "Sauce of
the Americas" program combined popular Spanish language music with weekly
discussions of issues covered infrequently elsewhere, such as news about
Central-America's civil wars.
During this same time period I assisted in
coordinating the public-relations, musical entertainment, and logistics for over
30 public cultural events, mostly benefit fundraisers for non-profit Latino
community groups. I provided calendar of events information for the Spanish
language newspapers El-Barrio and EL-Latino, and for the radio show Salsa De Las
Americas. I also produced my own calendar of events newsletter called 'What's
Happening This Week,' which publicized non-profit fundraiser events.
Also during the early 1980's, I personally identified
over ninety non-profit organizations within the Dupont Circle to Columbia
Heights 'Columbia Road corridor'. Seeing a lack of public access to these
services, I assisted many organizations, such as El Hogar De La Familia (The
Family Place, providing support to teenage mothers), the Ayuda legal services
agency, and the Andromeda mental health center by providing more effective
distribution for their public-service literature and public calendars-of-events.
My voluntary work with folkloric groups has included
those representing the cultures of Bolivia and Chile: with the Andean quartet
Rumisonko ['Heart of Stone' in Quechua, an Incan Native language]; Colombia:
with Grupo Tyrona, of which I was musical director in 1984, with El Ballet
Folclorico de Patricia Medina, and with Colombianos Unidos, a thirty member
folkloric dance ensemble of mostly teen-aged members, with whom I performed many
times at the Expo '92 world's fair in Seville, Spain; the Dominican Republic,
Cuba and Puerto Rico: with the folkloric Quintet 'Esto No Tiene Nombre' [This
Group Doesn't Have a Name]; and also Ecuador: with the folkloric-dance and music
troupe Ruminahui ['Face of Stone' in Quechua]. I have also performed with and
promoted many commercial Latin bands.
Since the mid-1980's I have focused on
putting-to-work the social-service advocacy skills which I learned in the
Adam's-Morgan community of Washington, D.C. to assist Latin-American immigrants
within Montgomery County, Md. As a well-known local musician, as a person fluent
in written and spoken Spanish, and as a concerned community resident who knows
about Maryland human relations and employment law, I have worked hard to help
fill a growing void within the local immigrant community.
The void which I try to help fill involves doing my
share to improve the quality of life and defend the dignity of a segment of our
community who are currently suffering severely under the strains of
mass-joblessness, are being locked out of the job-market due to racism,
increased immigration law enforcement and other factors, are abused on the job
without redress, and have a real lack of access to the legal and social services
which they pay for with their taxes just as much as any other ethnic group in
our County.
Since 1988 I have assisted six Latin-American
immigrant women in beginning formal complaints of race and sex discrimination
related sexual harassment and assault before the Human Relations Commission of
Montgomery County, Md. I have intervened for, sought legal assistance for, and
advocated for victims of sexual assault, sexual harassment, non-payment of
wages, and against the widespread use of arbitrary and discriminatory work-place
punishments and firings of Latin-American immigrant women injanitorial jobs.
These illegal acts have occurred, and still continue to occur, within many
private, federal, and local government office buildings located within
Montgomery County, Md.
All of my work in Latin-American immigrant
victim-advocacy has resulted from victims having approached me seeking help.
Repeatedly, the official reaction of cleaning contract companies working within
Montgomery County to my polite raising of these issues has been to do the
following: 1) silence any discussion of these issues by the use of gross
intimidation against the victims and myself, 2) fire or force the victims out,
and 3) back-up the actions of the perpetrators, protecting them from legal
trouble.
Latin-American immigrant women have thus gotten the
message loud and clear on many occasions that they have become a cheap,
disposable resource in the American work-place, underpaid, overworked, and often
forced into sexual submission while government and commerce knowingly turn their
backs.
At this time I have found it necessary to write this
report. Since 1988 I have formally presented this information to many
persons-in-authority. Time after time, these well-educated, well-paid officials
of public and commercial organizations have said "SO WHAT!" This report is a
substitute for the muffled CRY OF RAPE from victims who are tired of
having become the sexual 'cannon-fodder' of America.
A Latin-American Background - 1: Degrees of the exploitation
of women.
The topic of women's rights relative to the
'third-world' generally brings to mind the outrageous practices of
'bride-burning' and the murder of baby-girls in rural India, wife-murder without
penalty in Brazil, and the sexual enslavement of girls and women in the
sex-for-sale industries in The Philippines and Thailand. The above issues cover
perhaps the most gruesome and vile aspects of the exploitation of women in
poverty. The U.S. American press has covered these issues as being typical of
the third-world.
Sex-based oppression within the Americas is, we like
to believe, much less severe than the above examples. Civil and criminal laws
protecting women from exploitation are well-developed, if not even close to
perfect, within the United States. While a whole range of social and economic
relationships between men and women within the U. S. give wide latitude for the
continued exploitation of women by men, the law as written, and the increasing
economic and political power of women does give some degree of control over
one's options and alternatives. The recent appointment of the Honorable Ruth
Bader-Ginsburg as the second woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court will
probably speed that trend.
Latin-American cultures are diverse and dynamic. Many
positive things may be said in relation to Latin-American concepts of family
interaction and personal interactions within communities. These cultures, when
compared to cultural norms within the United States, may be said to be
spiritually healthier than our own in many respects. The importance of religion,
the intense celebration of cultural heritage, the very close interaction between
parents, children, extended family, and friends, the minimal importance of
racial difference in most Latin countries, and the nearly open inclusion within
many Latin-American countries of African, Native-American, Spanish, and other
world traditions within the common national culture are mostly very positive
lessons which U.S. Americans can and should learn more about.
Having said that, Latin-American cultures also have
many deeply-rooted traditions which expose women to severe exploitation in daily
life. The heritage of European agrarian-feudalism, the (related) exploitation of
people based on their social status and position in society, poverty, and the
(ongoing) violence and abuses surrounding the conquest of Native-peoples have
all worked against women's rights.
Also, the philosophy of machismo, a widely followed
male code of honor and conduct, (especially in rural areas) places strict limits
on, and very clearly defines, the 'correct' behavior of men and women. Machismo
legitimizes the domestic abuse of women and work-place economic and sexual
exploitation.
In addition, while Latin-American countries do accept
many Native-Peoples and heavily Native mestizos (mixed-bloods) into it's
cultural folds, the reality is that Native-Peoples are the most exploited and
impoverished social class/ethnic-group in all of the Americas. The Native and
Mestizo rebellion which is occurring in Chiapas, Mexico at the time of this
writing affirms that reality. That reality holds true in regard to the sexual
and economic exploitation of rural and urban Native-Latin-American women.
It would be unfair to single out Latin-America
regarding these problems, My purpose here is to explain the historical roots of
the exploitation of Latin-American immigrant women as a background for
understanding why that group, as immigrants to the U.S., are vulnerable to such
widespread exploitation.
A Latin-American Background - 2: Urban employment and the
rights of women.
It has only been within the last ten years that
(mostly urban) women have entered the work-place in large numbers in
Latin-America. Expanding economies, huge rates of inflation, single parenthood,
and poverty-driven need all affect that trend. Within Latin-America, business is
based on trading favors for favors. What favors do you think Latin-American
women are expected to trade in the urban work-place?
Two personal friends from South America have related
to me stories of their being subjected to attempted rape by potential employers
during their first job interviews as teenagers. A friend from Peru stated that
she had to break a lot of furniture to get out of that situation. She also
stated that denouncing the assailant to the police would have been impossible,
as he was a wealthy member of the community, capable of buying-off the judicial
entities involved. A friend from Ecuador also made a super-human effort to
escape her first job interview/attempted rape. She did not report this violent
assault to anyone.
I have had casual conversations with several
Latin-American men regarding this topic. Conversing with an Ecuadorian
accountant and businessman during a visit to Quito, Ecuador, he stated to me
that "well, of course, any woman who applies for an office job must also 'like'
the boss." Literally translated, a female applicant for office employment is
expected to sleep with the boss. In a recent conversation with a Colombian
friend, I explained to him the nature of a sexual abuse case involving
Latin-American women workers in Maryland. He stated unsympathetically that "If a
male supervisor has several female workers working under him, he has the right
to sexual privileges from them". This man regards himself as a "Machista"
(macho-ist). A Salvadoran cleaning supervisor, who is a party to a severe
incident of sexual exploitation of women workers under his control, was heard
stating that 'America gives too much freedom to women, that's what's wrong with
it'. This cleaning supervisor also calls himself a 'Machista'.
In December, 1993 I asked a Guatemalan friend of mine
to describe any incidents known to him of the sexual-economic coercion of
working women within his home country. My friend proceeded to explain to me how
a major retailer, which he described as being like a Sears and a supermarket
combined, traditionally advertised during the winter holidays for temporary help
(as is done here, of course). According to my friend, this large retailer
systematically accepted job applications only from women, and then only from the
young women whom they regarded as being the prettiest. The male managers would
make it known to these high school girls that permanent employment was available
to them in the company after their graduation. The only requirement was
accepting a sexual relationship with those managers now! My friend noted that
these managers could buy everyone's silence if needed.
My Guatemalan friend mentioned in the above paragraph
related to me a second incident in which a female high school friend, who was
tall, blond (uncommon in Guatemala), and was 'beautiful' by Guatemalan
standards, was asked by a Chief of Police to come work for him. This
teen-aged-girl soon became pregnant with the child of her boss. An abortion was
arranged for by the girl's employer to hide the situation from the Police
Chief's wife. The sexual relationship apparently continued after the abortion.
Throughout Latin-America, and in many other countries
of the world, women and teenagers who enter the urban work-force are forced to
submit to sexual pressures that are (in theory) illegal in the U.S.
A Latin-American Background - 3: Rural women and the modern
plantation.
The agrarian-based social system of feudalism as it
existed in Europe still has followers within atin-America. Feudal society is
heavily dependent upon the differential treatment of various social classes, and
women are one social class which faced and faces major disadvantages under
feudalism and it's modern spin-offs. Regardless of one's personal politics, few
can deny that the last half century of civil wars in Latin-America have been
movements of whole societies away from agrarian feudalism and toward democracy.
Women have experienced many improvements in social and economic power and status
with these changes. These societal changes have not caught on as fast in rural
areas as they have in the cities.
During conversations with friends in Quito, the
capitol of Ecuador, South America, I learned that some of the sexual practices
common under European feudalism still exist today. While the country of Ecuador
is one of the most stable and well educated in South America (the 'Switzerland'
of South America), it's rural provinces are dotted by plantations. Ecuador's
population is 40% full-blooded Native Americans, and 50% mixed Spanish and
Native-American, 5% African-descended, and about 5% full-blooded European. On
most of these plantations the descendants of the Spaniards and mixed-blood
Ecuadorians manage their operations with cheap Native labor, who (oddly enough)
are the original owners of that land. These farm workers usually live on the
landowner's property. It is common in daily conversation to hear talk of how
such-and-such a plantation owner is the father of many of the children of the
Native-women on his plantation. The lighter complexion of these children is one
barometer of the extent of this behavior on a given plantation. In 1992, 1
million Native-Ecuadorians held a strike to demand an end to this plantation
system. These social practices exist in many Latin-American countries.
This custom, oddly enough, is exactly the topic of a
Spanish language video-cassette available at Montgomery County, Md. Public
Libraries: 'Sol en Llamas', (Sun In Flames) which relates how the debutante
daughter of a wealthy 'White' Mexican plantation owner goes through a spiritual
crisis as she comes to find out that she is the half-sister of many of the
Native-Mexican children of the plantation's farm workers whom she grew up with.
This film takes place during the 1960's in Mexico. Mexico produces the majority
of films for the Latin-American market. I have also seen the theme of the sexual
demands on female job applicants related on-screen in Mexican films. It is
treated as a mere fact of life.
On February 1, 1994, a National Public Radio news
piece about the Chiapas, Mexico rebellion stated that the (now waning) feudal
plantation system there treated Natives as a mere natural resource, like lumber.
They were expected to work hard from infancy till death in exchange for basic
provisions!
From the time of the Roman emperor Caligula
(according to Fellini's film about him), in which he got, by way of his power
relationship with his peons, the first sexual experience with just-married
brides, to medieval Germany, where the local baron also got first dibs on new
brides, to the southern U.S. American plantation, where (according to 'Roots')
the overseer got to sleep with the slave girl (one more time) the night before
her wedding, to the modern neo-feudal plantation in parts of Latin-America, the
story is the same. Women were and are treated as property, and in the feudal
plantation system, the plantation owner AND HIS SUPERVISORS had and have the
right to use his 'property' the way they see fit. The rural and urban work-place
abuse of Latin-American women has it's roots in this history.
A Latin-American background - 4: The five-century oppression
of Native-Peoples.
As if this mix of social chemistries weren't enough,
consider the effect that civil war and wars of Native- American genocide have
had on the exploitation of Native-American women within Latin-America. As a
person of African and Maskoke Native-American decent, the exploitation and
modern-era genocide of Native-People in all of the Americas is a subject I've
followed for twenty years, and which I have worked actively to stop. Of the
Native-Americans within my family, I will relate that one of my
great-grandmothers, who was Native-American, was 'married to?' a Caucasian man
when she was 13 and he MUCH older. Does one get the picture? This story has
repeated itself across the Americas for 500 years.
The 'Native-wars' within Latin-America were carried
out differently than the methods of whole-sale extermination and
'reservationization' (sic) carried out against Native tribes within the United
States. The English colonists tended to migrate to America in family groups, and
progeny tended to also be European. Within Latin-America, the male conquistador
migrated by the thousands to Latin-America seeking fame and fortune. Men vastly
outnumbered women among the Spanish colonists. Intermarriage with
Native-American and African women was commonplace, and the uniquely U.S.
American concept of segregation never even came close to stepping foot in
Latin-America. Also, the Inca empire in western South-America, the Maya Empire
in Central-America, and the Aztec Empire in Mexico were all technologically
close to the conquering Spaniards. Despite the violent Spanish overthrow of
these empires, mass-murder of Native-Peoples had tended to be restricted to
rebellion (liberation) control. This general 'policy' towards Native-Peoples
changed during the early 1900's, and mass-murders of innocent Native-People have
occurred with frequency in a number of Latin-A |
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