Prejudice & Discrimination continues
Bullying, Harassment, and Intergenerational trauma — part 2
This year on July 1st marks the 100th anniversary of Canada’s Chinese Exclusion Act (1923 to 1947). This Act significantly contributed to the discrimination my grandparents and parents endured when immigrating to Canada (see Afterword). One would think this would be history and the past. However TODAY in 2023, discrimination continues (even escalating) with the rhetoric and actions against Asians especially the Chinese since the pandemic. Prejudice and discrimination continues within our communities, our governments, even our workplaces.
I accepted the offer to join a global firm for career opportunities and brand recognition. I joined believing the global firm’s Executive Leaders would include women who looked like me. The reality over my tenure was not the case. I had access to continuous learning, pivoted to client delivery roles (given poisoned internal work environment), travelling assignments, progression in various job roles, but I would not succeed in closing a significant gap of Chinese women in Executive leadership especially as Partners or Senior geography roles.
I also learned there was distinct career paths and supports for some practitioners leading to Senior leadership. Four buckets of talent of post-secondary Associates, professional hires, re-skilled, and acquisitions.
I joined from an acquisition and the subsidiary’s senior leadership roles were in duplicity of the parent company. Our whole C-level team all left before being amalgamated into the firm.
I was excited to be hired into a leadership role responsible for Western Canada. I was paired with Senior leaders who did not look like me and definitely no other Chinese or East-Asians were represented within the Executive leadership teams.
The more I navigated through the firm the more it became very apparent, Chinese women were not considered for roles at the table. This changed in 2018 when the first Chinese Client Partner was promoted and the second in 2021.
Only the privileged practitioners who looked like the existing Senior leaders (caucasian men) were being considered as future Executives. Women altogether was a minority in Partnership roles. The Associates on an accelerated path to Partnership with apprenticeship in rotational roles. Achieving Partner within less time than others in the firm with well over 20 years of experience.
Even newly hired Partners having to learn the firm’s ecosystem, tools, processes, and procedures were considered for Executive roles before others with professional currency within the firm. The lack of a progression pipeline for mid-senior leaders has always been non-existent. Thought provoking explanation and actions were epiphanic moments for tactical correction. You’re welcome.
The firm has more than a century of history and brand recognition for breaking barriers in advancing innovation and technology. However to become a Partner or Senior Executive within the firm, especially a Chinese woman nearing her 50’s, is heavily guarded and gated with prejudice and discrimination. Tenured practitioners who deliver results, multiple achievements, and experience are not seen as advantages in supporting the firm’s ongoing strategic initiatives.
Clearest signal from the firm Chinese women do not belong. The lack of supports or sponsorship and blatant exclusion for women of colour to become Executives is comparable to the measure of the Chinese Exclusion Act.
Qualitative and quantitative data exists to support Human Rights violations of discrimination under the protected area of employment practices and protected grounds of gender, race, and age. The firm adamately denies these violations and continues to support the intergenerational racism and quid pro quo actions of their leaders. Diversity and inclusion objectives and campaigns are disingenuous when the workplace clearly does not walk the talk.
Prejudice and discrimination continues for myself and most likely for my children. Barriers my grandparents and parents endured immigrating to Canada, one would think should no longer exist. It should not take another century for workplaces (or society for that matter) to actively solve these problems of ongoing exclusion and employment limitations imposed by the privileged élite.
AFTERWORD — The 100th anniversary of the Chinese Exclusion Act will be commemorated on July 1, 2023 Canada Day. The Exclusion Act fostered prejudice and discrimination, restricting all Chinese immigration (except designated categories) from 1923 to 1947. Chinese Canadians faced many barriers socially, economically and politically.
The Act significantly limited the opportunity for the community’s natural growth. Wives and children of Chinese men already in Canada were not permitted to immigrate to reunite their families. The lack of Chinese women in Canada caused many men to remain single and others to return to China to find partners.
For many Chinese Canadians, the Exclusion Act was the clearest signal from Canada that they did not belong.
The impacts of the Exclusion Act caused intergenerational trauma within my family and many others within the Chinese Canadian community. My Grandfather (Yeh Yeh 爺爺) paid a head tax to enter Canada. My Grandmother (A-Ma 嫲嫲) and Dad were prohibited to immigrate to Canada because of the Exclusion Act. Yeh Yeh never returned back to China. He died in Canada alone, without his family.
Dad followed Yeh Yeh’s footsteps and immigrated to Canada for work and to support my A-Ma. The lack of Chinese women in the community during the Exclusion Act period, caused a ripple effect and Dad had to return to China to marry. Once racial restrictions were removed from the Immigration act in 1967, Dad went back to Hong Kong and met my Mum. Both Mum and A-Ma immigrated to Canada in the early 1970’s. My family and the Mah clan have been providing opportunities and supporting local economies in Canada for generations.
“…injustice of the Chinese Exclusion Act acknowledging its xenophobia, human rights violation, racial discrimination, and systemic racism.”, Dr. Lloyd Wong and Ms.Teresa Woo-Paw
In 2006, former Prime Minister Stephen Harper apologized for the Head Tax imposed on Chinese immigrants and for the Exclusion Act period in preventing the Chinese people from immigrating to Canada. OK apology accepted, but the ex-gratia payments of $20,000 to living Chinese Head Tax payers and living spouses of deceased payers was insufficient. The Head Tax fee of $100 or $500 was more than 2 years salary for many immigrants. The ex-gratia payment does not compensate what was ensured, if any were still alive to receive these payments. The years of separation from their families, some even buried separately in China and Canada, contributed to intergenerational trauma.
** Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer **
#discrimination #humanrightsviolations #racism #ageism #bulliedtoo #metoo #bullying #harassment #workplacesafety #aapi #chinesecanadian
Quotation credit and references:
- Chinese Legacy BC, Discrimination: Federal Head Tax and Federal Exclusion Act — Province of British Columbia
- Prime Minister Harper Offers Full Apology for the Chinese Head Tax — Government of Canada, News Release June 22, 2006
- Government of Canada recognizes the national historic significance of the Exclusion of Chinese Immigrants — Parks Canada, News Release May 30, 2023
