At Work Treated Like a Robot, Through Metal Feeling Like a Human

Nov 05, 2023

THE GROUP OF young Indonesian metalheads holding hands whirl around in a big circle until centrifugal force tears them apart. They jump and scream, stumble, fall over, and pull each other up again. In front of an open-air stage, they are moving and shaking along the rhythm of the pounding bass and the droning guitar riffs of the metalcore band Jubah Hitam.

The scene does not really fit into the atmosphere along this excursion strip near Kaohsiung. On January 1, 2023, countless locals have come to Qijin island off the coast of Taiwan's second-largest city. They stop only briefly and check where the noise comes from. Then they head on towards the beach.

Jubah Hitam is performing that day, along with other Indonesian punk and reggae bands. The Formosa Music Fest is the first festival self-organized by this community of Indonesian migrants. Most of the organizers, band members, and the few hundred visitors are from Indonesia and work in Taiwan as factory laborers, private caretakers, and fishermen.

TAIWAN OPENED ITS borders to migrant workers from Southeast Asia in the 1990s to fill labor shortages in certain sectors. The migrant workers are expected to do the dirty, dangerous, and monotonous work for little pay. The Taiwanese migration regime resembles the German "guest worker model" of the 1960s. It also contains elements of unfree labor, such as the "kafala" system in Qatar, which was criticized in the course of the 2022 World Cup, and through which migrants are tied to the person for whom they work in the host country.

Around 800,000 migrant workers live in Taiwan today, most of them from Indonesia and Vietnam, the Philippines and Thailand. Of the 260,000 from Indonesia, about 175,000 are women and 85,000 are men. The men work in factories and on fishing boats or deepwater trawlers. Some women also work in factories, but the majority, about 165,000, work as caregivers in private households and elderly care facilities.

Migrant workers are usually hired through Indonesian recruitment agencies. Taiwanese agencies then lend them to companies and households. Most pay large sums of money to these agencies, which are often deducted from their wages in installments. The migrant workers are not allowed to change their employers or agencies without their consent. If their labor is no longer needed or if they are seen to make trouble, companies, households, and agencies try to dismiss them and have them deported.

Taiwan has created different categories of workers: workers in factories, on construction sites, in agriculture, and in coastal fishing are covered by the labor law, have social security protection, and receive the minimum wage (currently 26,400 Taiwan dollars per month, about 860 US-dollars). They are allowed to remain in the country for twelve years. Migrant caregivers in private households have social security protection but are not covered by the labor law. Their working hours are unregulated, and their wages are only 20,000 Taiwan dollars per month (about 650 US-dollar). They are allowed to stay for up to fourteen years. Fishermen on deepwater trawlers only get temporary visas when their ship is in the port. They are not protected by Taiwanese social security. Their monthly wage is 550 US-dollars.

About 70,000 migrant workers from Southeast Asia live in Taiwan without valid work visas and work in agriculture or construction, for example. If they are caught, they face fines and imprisonment before being deported.

FORCED INTO A precarious status by the state, exploited at work, and largely excluded from Taiwanese society in everyday life, Indonesian migrant workers have formed various subcultures and subeconomies: They come together in parks and at train stations, in Indonesian stores and restaurants, in Muslim prayer rooms, at self-organized meeting places, at festivals and concerts.

Music plays an important role. Most of the Indonesian migrant workers in Taiwan listen to dangdut, a popular music style with Malayan, Indian, and other influences that emerged in the 1970s. Previously considered vulgar music of the lower class, dangdut is now considered a national cultural asset in some places in Indonesia.

In Taiwan, heavy metal fans from Indonesia form a small group that stands apart from the larger dangdut scene. The people interviewed for this article say that while they collide and fall down during "moshing," the wild metal dance, they pull themselves back up and hug each other afterwards. This, they claim, is different at dangdut events. There, people would fight even before a concert starts. And if someone was bumped while dancing, that would turn into a brawl.

For several years, the Indonesian metalheads have been connected via social media and chat apps, exchanging reports, photos, and songs, and discussing trends and bands. They maintain contacts with metalheads and musicians in Indonesia, produce stickers and T-shirts, and for concerts they come together from all corners of Taiwan.

Most of them were already part of the scene in Indonesia. This scene formed in the 1970s, when Indonesian bands began to pick up hard rock and early heavy metal from Western countries. Since the 1980s, this has turned into a thriving rock and metal scene with many subgenres. On Java, Indonesia's main island, rock and metal fans can also be found in many villages where they organize local music events. The loud and hard music inspires young people with a rural or proletarian background, who can identify with the lyrics about everyday feelings, religion, and philosophies of life.

Ari* works in a vehicle assembly factory in Taiwan. During his childhood in a village on Java, he discovered rock music through a cousin. Since then, he has liked "musik keras," hard music. He says it is a kind of cure for him and gives him strength when he is unmotivated at work. "Music helps me remain myself," Ari says. His colorful dyed hair is also important to him. He dyed it pink and blond in protest after he had been criticized at the factory for being quiet and called a "wimp." When his supervisor scolded him for his dyed hair, Ari said, "It's me who works here, not my hair!" His foreman insisted that he put on a cap that usually only newly hired or interns wear. Ari tossed it aside and said, "I’ve been working here a long time." The metal community is a way for Ari to get away from the job routine and do more than just work. He recognizes like-minded Indonesian workers by their appearance: Doc Martens boots, band T-shirts, metal baseball caps, dreadlocks, or their dyed hair.

Gilang is also easily recognizable as a metalhead. He works in a small furniture factory. Like Ari, he grew up in a Javanese village. He came into contact with punk music in his youth and later with metal. Especially the style brutal death metal appealed to him. Today, Gilang can listen to music at work, which also gives him strength. Away from work, he supports the exchange in the scene via social media, organizes meetings and events. Gilang emphasizes that the metalheads are eager to support each other. In this respect, the community in Taiwan has developed much better than he and the others from the scene had expected.

THE MEMBERS OF Jubah Hitam (meaning "black robe") met in Taiwan and, in 2019, formed the band that is now the flagship of the Indonesian metal scene on the island. All but one of them are factory workers: Andy (guitar), David (guitar), Dion (bass), Feri (drums), Harits (electronics and vocals/scream) and Robby (vocals/scream).

Some of them already played in Indonesia in different bands. In Taiwan, part of the band lives and works in the north, the other part in the south of the island. They meet once a month to rehearse, otherwise they send ideas and recordings to each other, meet in video calls, and practice for themselves. The latter is not always easy, because most of the band members live in dorms, where they share a room with several people. "Our music is harder, not everyone can handle that," Robby says.

Each band member has his own musical influences: from the well-known Indonesian heavy metal band Burgerkill—which also played at the Wacken festival in northern Germany in August 2022—to the German death metal band Obscura, the U.S. deathcore band Suicide Silence, the trance and electronicore band Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas from Japan, to softer guitar music by Carlos Santana and Andra Ramadhan or the famous Indonesian singer-songwriter Iwan Fals.

Jubah Hitam's song lyrics revolve around the musicians’ emotions and thoughts, which stem from their everyday experiences and are influenced by their Muslim faith. David, who writes most of the lyrics, says he draws inspiration from Quranic verses and philosophical texts. The songs "Dosa" (sin) and "Tumbal" (sacrifice) address their own inner conflicts, "Haram" (forbidden) the pressure from outside, and "Tirakat Spiritual" (spiritual retreat) the search for support. It is natural for the musicians to express themselves as workers on such profound topics.

The content of the lyrics distinguishes Jubah Hitam from the punk band Southern Riot from Kaohsiung, which was also founded by Indonesian migrants and is also performing at the Formosa Music Fest. In their lyrics, Southern Riot members specifically name the experience of exploitation and exclusion as migrant workers by the Taiwanese state and employment agencies.

THE LIVES OF Jubah Hitam's musicians are defined by their work as migrants in the factory. The only one who does not work in a factory is Harits. He came to Taiwan in 2018 to study economics and has recently started working in an office. "My work is not as hard as the others’," he says. Some of the other band members have worked in factories in Indonesia. In Taiwan they are employed in various industries. Andy has worked in a small textile factory for six years, dyeing fabrics. He handles chemicals and operates machinery. David has been assembling fitness equipment on an assembly line in a larger factory. "The work is not that dangerous, but it's boring," he says. Dion was first in a glass factory for years and now makes furniture in a medium-sized factory. Feri is employed in a metal factory and operates a punching machine. And Robby builds furniture out of wood in a small factory.

The problems they talk about are similar to those of other Indonesian factory workers. In order to come to Taiwan, they ran up huge debts with recruitment agencies. The money to pay off the debts was then gradually deducted from their wages. At work, they are controlled by Taiwanese foremen. They put pressure on people to work faster or meet production targets. And sometimes let the migrants work when they are sick, or they order them to do a lot of overtime.

Indonesian workers usually receive the minimum wage, just like their colleagues from Taiwan. However, the locals receive higher allowances or bonuses, for example on holidays: "The Taiwanese workers get ‘hong bao’ [red envelopes with money], the Indonesian workers never get any," one of the band members describes the situation in his factory. He estimates that the Taiwanese workers there earn about 5,000 Taiwan dollars (160 US-dollars) more per month.

In the dormitories, the conditions for the Taiwanese workers are generally better, and they live with fewer people in a room. Some members of Jubah Hitam have a bed in the dormitory, but also rent rooms outside the factory with their Indonesian wives. Their partners also work in a factory or they are domestic workers doing care work for a Taiwanese family.

All band members emphasize that they are in Taiwan to earn money, that they work hard for it and do not want any trouble. They want to support their families in Indonesia and save money for later. Due to migration laws, their time in Taiwan is limited; in a few years at the latest, they will all have to go back. In Indonesia they want to start a business or do farming, but most of them do not have an exact plan, yet. Some will return to their hometowns, others to the hometown of their spouse. That means, the end of the band is only a question of time. In Indonesia, they will have to look for other bands—if they will still have space and opportunity for playing music.

ALL THE MUSICIANS in Jubah Hitam as well as in most other Indonesian metal, punk, or reggae bands in Taiwan are men, and the whole scene is also predominantly male. Codes, rituals, and dance are their special expression of masculinity and male friendships. This includes taking care of each other, mutual support, and close bonds. The male metalheads are usually open to the active participation of women in the scene—even if some of them think that the music is "too hard" for women and that women preferred to listen to "softer" music like dangdut or K-pop. Some even wear T-shirts with sexist images of women, as is common in the scene in other countries as well.

Nevertheless, various women are making space for themselves in the Indonesian metal scene in Taiwan. Some accompany their musician partners to concerts, others listen to the music and share their thoughts on social media, and a few help organize events. Elia is one of them. She comes from a village in Java and has been in Taiwan, with interruptions, for about ten years. She works as a caregiver for a family in the north of the island. Already back in Indonesia, she listened to metal, went to concerts, and came home late, she says. The music calms her down. She cares for an elderly woman who suffers from dementia. When the woman starts nagging again, Elia gets angry for a moment. Then she puts the headphones in her ears and turns up the music until the woman falls asleep.

Elia feels comfortable in the metal scene. The "aura" is much better than in dangdut, she says. Nevertheless, she does not take part in the wild dancing, even though she would like to dance in the front. Elia helped organize the festival on January 1, 2023, in Kaohsiung, and she is also involved in the preparation of other events.

Just as in the scene in Taiwan, the role of women in the metal scene in Indonesia is contested. Men dominate the scene there as well, and women are fighting for a place—in front of and on the stage. The nu-metal band Voice of Baceprot is an all-female band. Other examples are the guitarist Rissa Geez of the well-known metalcore band Aftercoma or the singer Auryn of the metalcore band Invicta. They all come from West Java.

THE SELF-ORGANIZATION of Indonesian migrant workers resembles that of migrants elsewhere. The migrants from Southern Europe and Turkey who were recruited to work in Germany in the 1960s and 1970s also created their own music scenes. This is documented, among other things, by the two samplers "Songs of Gastarbeiter" by Imran Ayata and Bülent Kullukcu (2013 and 2022) and the film "Liebe, D-Mark und Tod" (love, German mark, and death) by Cem Kaya (2022). The special role that heavy metal can play for people in difficult life situations is also highlighted by the German TV-documentary series "Heavy Metal Saved My Life" (2022): it shows how men and women, queer and trans people from Europe, North and Central America discover metal music, form bands, and find support and togetherness.

For Indonesian metalheads with their hard music, this emotional support plays an important role. Their community creates a familiar social space away from the dorms and workplaces. There they can take a breath, relax, and do what they want. However, the hardships and contradictions of the racist migration and exploitation regime in Taiwan and the daily experienced exclusion by Taiwanese society continue to dominate their lives.

The challenges they face became clear one day before the Formosa Music Fest: a musician of one band was arrested during a check and was to be deported because he no longer had a work and residence permit. When they are no longer needed as cheap labor or when they resist exploitation, Indonesian migrant workers are threatened with illegalization and deportation.

Their daily lives are made up of conflicting realities, as people and as workers. At the festival, Ari is one of those who shakes back and forth to the hard beats, laughing and dancing wildly while, on most days, he is slaving away on the assembly line. "Here and now, we are humans," he says, "six days a week we are robots."

* Only the first names are mentioned in this text since that is how Indonesian migrants in Taiwan address each other. Apart from the names of the band members, all other names have been changed.

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After studies in Berlin and London in the 1980s, Ralf Ruckus refused to start an academic career and worked in proletarian jobs instead, while staying engaged in social movements – from squatting to migrant and labor struggles. After militant inquiries on construction sites and in call centers in the 1990s, Ralf has supported workers’ struggles in factories and warehouses in Western and Eastern Europe and in East Asia since. In the 2000s, the analysis and support of struggles of workers, migrants, and women* in China became Ralf's main focus. After translating a series of books written by Chinese workers, activists, and leftwing scholars into English and German (see gongchao.org and nqch.org), Ralf recently published The Communist Road to Capitalism. How Social Unrest and Containment Have Pushed China's (R)evolution since 1949 (PM Press, 2021) and The Left in China. A Political Cartography (Pluto Press, 2023). Currently, Ralf is involved in research on the situation and agency of Indonesian migrant fishers and factory workers in Taiwan.