@Pinga One hopes that they are protected, like all workers, from abuse ...
one can hope all they want ...
There are several categories of visas that are available to some people who want to come to Canada. Some women come to Canada with student visas and some women come with temporary workers visas. The core presumption underlying stripper visas was that there was an employment gap that was not being filled by Canadians in the world of "exotic" entertainment. To fill this gap, Canada looked to foreign-born women for help. The gap that was being filled was, in fact, a need for exploitable cheap female laborers.
The original bill to provide exotic dancers with an easier way to gain admittance into Canada was passed with little investigation of the purported lack Canadian exotic dancers. The tap was carelessly opened and floods of women, most from Eastern Europe, were admitted into Canada. CBC news.ca reveals that about 660 foreign-born exotic dancers came to Canada in 2003 alone ("Ottawa Shuts Loophole").
Parliament did little to ensure the women granted this visa were protected.
To qualify for the "stripper visa," women needed a letter stating that a job was offered to them. Frequently, this was little more than a printout of an online advertisement. Jobs were frequently arranged through agencies that taxed women's income to pay for helping them secure the job. Women also had to prove that they were qualified dancers for hire. Applicants would provide dance school certificates, videos or photos from dance classes, and various medals from dance competitions as proof of eligibility. Not much else was required.
Part of the point of the specialized category was that the threshold for acceptance was very low. It was not intended to be difficult for the club owners to get women into the country to do this work.
Women who applied successfully were granted temporary 3-month exotic dancer visas, but the club owner was the holder of the permit. The woman was the club owner's "responsibility" while in Canada. Employment contracts were flimsy and offered little protection to women. Club owners could decide when and where women worked. They could also decide when her work was no longer needed. Exploitation of these vulnerable women was inevitable.
The type of work that women were doing also made them vulnerable to exploitation.
Exotic dancing is socially stigmatized. Some of the activities that take place within clubs border on criminal. Status of Women Canada has written that "a migrant woman is not likely to ask for help if she is already a criminal by nature of her work. She may also fear reprisal from her agent or broker and may not want to be sent back to her country of origin."
Women who came to Canada on a stripper visa did not, generally speaking, have a wealth of economic choices in their home countries. Poverty and gendered violence were likely features of their lives before they came to Canada. Rather than protect the basic human rights of women, Canada allowed women to work in a marginalized employment sector and gave their employers massive control over their status, work conditions, and lives. Clearly, the government was not working to ensure that the women's basic human rights were protected.
Women were lured to Canada by advertisements promising "a well-paying job, a means of travel and the necessary documents" (Status of Women Canada). The nature of the stripping business combined with the conditions of the exotic dancer visa "lock[ed] migrant women into situations of perpetual slavery by making them vulnerable to abusive work situations and dependent on their employers" (Folson 71).
Adding to the already exploitative visa conditions and work environment, migrant women face additional challenges that perpetuate and increase vulnerability to exploitation. Many women who came to Canada did not speak English or French fluently. Barrenechea argues that "women are often unable to access and use services available to them" (227-28). Migrant women also suffer the consequences of "being separated from their original homeland, and having few ties to their place of arrival... and... exclusion from social networks and political institutions" (Folson 28-29).
Olivia Espin explains that migrant women's "struggles to adapt to the new environment may be further complicated by the gender-based cultural prescriptions" (20). Women may experience "feelings of shame and guilt created by the separation from loved ones, and ambivalence toward the sociocultural role expectations they face externally and intrapsychically may be considerably intensified by their specific circumstances as 'unattached' women" (Espin 25-26).
Many Canadians are under the erroneous assumption that immigrant women "do not bring as much value as [other] chosen immigrants to Canada, and they are costly to integrate into Canadian society" (Li 47). This is reinforced by media images that stereotype and distinguish racialized immigrants from white Canadians.
Many who initially opposed the stripper visa did not do so out of concern for the safety of the women. Instead, they argued that there was no place for strippers in moral Canadian society.
The abolition of the exotic dancer visa appears to some to protect immigrant women from human trafficking and sexual exploitation, however, it arguably does little to achieve that goal.
Under the revised law, candidates are assessed case-by-case, whether they want to work as strippers or in another occupation. Women who apply successfully receive a worker's permit much like the one a stone mason would receive. New requirements include a written contract to establish that a worker-employer relationship exists before the women arrives in Canada. Employers must apply to sponsor the candidate and demonstrate that the woman is needed to fill a position that the employer has not been able to fill with someone living in Canada.
The length of the contract has also been extended and club owners must now show that they are helping their employees access health care and other necessities (HRSDC). While it is more difficult for women to come to Canada, some argue that there is less opportunity for women to be exploited.
The changes come after a political scandal, termed "Strippergate" by the media. The scandal placed then-Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, Judy Sgro, at centre stage after she granted a Romanian woman, who had helped Sgro's campaign, a special residency permit. Sgro allegedly used the loose constraints of the stripper visa to advance the immigration status of the woman who helped her campaign. This unethical action was used as proof that the exotic dancer category was open to exploitation. The allegations of preferential treatment resulted in members of an opposing political party demanded Sgro's resignation.
The changes to the stripper visa program that resulted from this scandal leave many wondering what implications this will have for women, both women already working in Canada under the visa and women who wish to come to Canada pursuant to the visa.
Throughout this process, the Canadian government has played a direct role in the ongoing exploitation of women. Martin correctly asserts that "Canada claims innocence, a stance that is hypocritical and accepts no responsibility for this state of affairs" (71). Martin continues on to state that the "immigration system is unsympathetic to the plight of these women... because they do not have the conventional requisites to become 'productive members of society', given the moral condemnation stemming from their line of work" (72). Together, the government and the people it represents have allowed the exploitation of thousands of foreign-born women.
The elimination of the stripper visa did not involve any public statement of regret or concern for the women who will be affected by the elimination of the visa. The Canadian government, neatly avoiding a discussion of its role in the exploitation of vulnerable women, repealed the exotic dancer visa. Women who came to Canada under the exotic dancer visa and must now return to their country of origin may escape the exploitation they experienced in Canada, but face the harsh realities that they sought to escape in their home countries. Many women will face social ostracism because of their work as exotic dancers in Canada. Women may experience gender persecution or be rejected by their families and communities. A woman returning to her home country will also experience the consequences of her exploitation in Canada. She may experience diminished self-esteem and other effects. Going back and reapplying for a new immigration status is not always an option and is never as it easy it may sound or be made out to be by the Canadian government.