Melvie: Women are treated badly in the Philippines. Women are looked down upon by men, and many women see themselves as being much lower status than the males. Cecilia: One of the indications of how women fare in the Philippines is in the large numbers of Filipino women who work abroad - about a quarter of a million leave the country every year to look for work - which tells us that there are not many good jobs, not too many options for women in the Philippines.
The poor treatment of women is graphically demonstrated when you review the cases of violence against women - the numbers of which are very high. There are lots of battering of women in intimate relationships, lots of rape cases, every few hours there's a rape case, lots of incest cases. These are just some indications. Anthony: Does the way that women are viewed in Philippine society relate to the fact that many Filipino women end up in prostitution?
Cecilia: Very often in the Philippines if a women has experienced sexual violence, it will so shatter her sense of self worth that she will be very easy prey for people who say, "Come and work in this club," or a pimp who says, "You might as well earn money on the streets, you're damaged goods anyway. Anthony: So, many women are forced into prostitution because of socio-economic factors? Melvie: Yes, in the Philippines that is true because, as Cecilia said, there's no work opportunities for women.
There is also discrimination in wages. Women receive only 47 cents to a peso of what men earn for the same work done. Cecilia: A lot of women are underemployed or unemployed. And there are a lot of women in the informal economy - which means that they are taking in laundry, cooking food and selling, doing a lot of vending, working as household help - very poor jobs.
For prostitution not to be an option there have to be attractive jobs offered to women, and that's not happening in the Philippines. Anthony: Melvie, you work with women involved in street prostitution in Quezon City in Manila. Could you describe what you do?
