Pregnancy a 'privilege' in the workplace? I browse one of Taiwan's largest BBS sites (PTT) regularly, and also help others with their English questions/issues. Recently I was browsing the "Salary" board on this site - where Taiwanese workers discuss job conditions and other work-related issues - and saw a lively discussion about two women who had to suffer through workplace hostility because they had the temerity to get themselves pregnant soon after beginning a new job in Taiwanese firms (before anyone asks, yes, both were and are happily married, and why should that be a concern anyway?). The issue was not that discrimination exists - I'm not so naive as to pretend Discrimination (with a capital D) is a thing of the past - but rather, that 1) in this case it was discrimination against pregnancy status? This is so screwed up I can't even think of a less awkward phrase than "pregnancy status." I mean "race", "color", "sexual orientation" etc. are all common phrases with well-defined meanings, but "pregnancy status"? 2) the people doing the discriminating were not Capital, but Labor. Or in other words, these women's peers. One woman's HR manager was openly hostile to her getting pregnant and repeatedly tried to force her to voluntarily resign or take unpaid leaves of absences, which could then be converted to a resignation. Her co-workers (male and female) objected to the fact that she could not lift heavy loads not put in the same amount of overtime as others, and once even went over the head of the woman's department manager to complain about it. When the first woman eventually delivered prematurely @ 37 weeks (perhaps due to adverse workplace pressure?) the HR manager commented, "See, I knew she got pregnant before she started working for us, and she's here just for our benefits." After the birth the woman decided to breastfeed her baby, so twice a day had to use the ladies' room to work the breast pump (this is actually written into Taiwanese Labor Law: guaranteed breast pump time, twice a day, 30 minutes each) since her office did not have a breastfeeding room; her HR manager threatened to post her to China because she was "in the bathroom all the time." The second woman also had a terrible experience despite having a female manager. She was asked to put in severe overtime at one stage despite her pregnancy (going home around 11pm-12am or so; although the overtime was on a par with other members of the department), and her manager continuously berated her for taking pregnancy-related medical absences ("I only took a half-day for a checkup when I was pregnant, why do you need a day?"). Even if the issue was only that her husband came to pick her up because she was going home late, her manager would ask that she be "more independant and less reliant on others in commuting." 3) Even on a decidedly pro-labor site, there are people justifying the treatment the two poor women received. The BBS site "Salary" is almost exclusively filled with employees (or at most mid-level managers), and dedicated to labor issues. While comments under the two threads were almost totally in support of the two women, THERE ARE PEOPLE who argued that the two womens' contribution to their companies were too small for them to enjoy the privilege of pregnancy. Well, not in so few words; they argued that they haven't made enough of a contribution to their company to justify the benefits they enjoy, and having other employees cover their duties, etc. I never knew pregnancy was a privilege rather than a right. I never knew so many of my countrymen stand ready to support a woman's right to be pregnant at the workplace. I never knew that there are working people who believe that a woman needs to "pay her dues" in a figurative sense before she can be allowed the 'privilege' of pregnancy. -- 'Cause it's a bittersweet symphony, this life Trying to make ends meet, You're a slave to money then you die -Bittersweet Symphony, The Verve --

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