Why
Filipinas Sign Up for "Mail Order Bride
Sites," or "International Introduction
Services," How Many Are There and More
"Life is hard here in the Philippines,"
Rosalyn wrote in one of the Internet
matchmaking sites for Filipino women, or
Filipinas, that have sprouted in recent
years.
"I don't care how my partner looks, but
he should care for me."
The 22-year-old is among an estimated
50,000 to 100,000 Filipinas who have
signed up to matchmaking sites, seeking
romance and more importantly a ticket
out of poverty.
It was a ticket that was banned under
the country's 1990 Anti-Mail Order Bride
Law, but anti-trafficking activists say
the Internet has effectively bypassed
that law despite a revision in 2003 that
sought to ban e-mail order brides.
Marketing themselves as "dating sites"
with exotic names such as "Asian
Beauties", "Filipina Passion" and
"Pacific Romance", the firms usually
charge users $2 to $5 to access the
profile of a woman that catches their
fancy.
For an extra $30 to $50, they can become
full-fledged members, and choose from
hundreds, even thousands, of women.
Operators of the sites say they are
providing a harmless match-making
service.
"There is no such thing as a mail-order
bride or mail-order bride company," said
one operator who asked not to be named.
"We are a certified dating service.
Women who sign up on our site do so
voluntarily because they seek love
abroad. We do not force them, we help
them."
"SHOPPING CART"
But anti-trafficking activists say the
sites represent thinly veiled
exploitation of poverty, with the power
dynamics favoring the men from the
start.
Some sites feature links titled "Order
Now", "Check Out" or "Shopping Cart".
They generally cast Asian women as
submissive, obedient and loyal.
Mailorderbrides.com says of its women:
"possessing useful housekeeping skills
is a major source of self-satisfaction
for them."
The very process of allowing men to
hand-pick their partners from a sea of
faces and measurements is built on the
commoditization of women, said local
officials from the international
Coalition against Trafficking in Women (CATW).
"The term 'mail-order bride' refers to
the recruitment of brides through a
third party, however it is done," said
Aurora De Dios, CATW executive director.
"We used to do it through mail, and
nowadays you do it through the
Internet".
Exploitation or not, more and more
women are signing up.
In a recent report, the U.S. Immigration
and Naturalization Service estimated
that the number of marriages between
Filipinas and American men through
Internet services had doubled in the
past decade, now totaling nearly 6,000
annually.
Based on a survey of different sites, it
said about 70 percent of women listed in
southeast Asia were Filipinas, making it
one of the world's hotspots for
mail-order brides along with Eastern
Europe and Russia.
EXOTIC DREAMS
Activists say men who use the sites tend
to fall into a predictable category,
chasing the dream of an exotic Asian
bride.
Many are divorced, and say that Western
women are too career-focused and lack
"traditional values".
"Mature men, often isolated, separated
or divorced, look for companionship --
all those features of women that they
could not find in their own country
because they were too shy or not
good-looking enough," said De Dios.
"The invisibility of the Internet is
very attractive to those with money."
Money is certainly flowing in the
business, judging by the 200 or so sites
now devoted to matching men with
Filipinas. "I think people have realized
it's an extremely lucrative business,"
says Lucille Vonda of the Commission on
Filipinos Overseas.
ABUSE
Although many mail-order marriages are
successful, some are unhappy or even
abusive, often as a result of language
or culture barriers, says Mary Soledad
Perpinan of the Third World Movement
against the Exploitation of Women.
Perpinan gave the example of one
Filipina who was abused by her German
mother-in-law.
"She missed Filipino food, but couldn't
cook it in her new home. The one time
she tried, her mother-in-law hit her on
the head with a pan -- she didn't like
the way it smelled."
But for many women, the risk and
adventure of online match-making may be
part of the appeal.
"I didn't know what to expect when I
signed up," said Angelie of Butuan City
on the troubled southern island of
Mindanao. "But it was exciting to get
mail and flowers from men I had never
seen."
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