Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system
wired.com
wired.com
I would like to take this opportunity to point out that everyone of us needs to be vigilant about this type of racism. One thing I recommend to my hiring managers is to not allow people from frictioned backgrounds to manage and interview people from the other side. Example problematic pairs for candidates/interviewers (not including the cast situation) include: Indians and Pakistanis, Serbians and Bosnians, Greeks and Turks, Chinese and Japanese.
One way I solve this is by introducing an independent observer/participant when situations like this emerge. This is costly but it has really worked to not only address this problem but also created an amazing diversity in my teams because it takes care of some of the implicit bias we all have to some degree.
What? This is racist in and of itself and would be blatantly illegal for any number of reasons.
Also the problem is not necessarily limited to Pakistani and Indians. It's Indians and Indians. Not sure what you want done there. I freely believe that the caste system of the host country carries over to the United States, but attempting to subvert that via "good" racist methods is not going to fly, especially if documented.
Often having darker skin, Black Americans are even prone to more discrimination domestically. Any editorial that doesn't recognize that fact as a truth has no legs to stand on in my opinion. The fact that people still hang on to caste ideology in any way, and treat it as a continuing reality should disqualify them from any role concerning equal opportunity. "Gradual change and understanding" is not a reasonable discussion in America, or we're all coddling the same violent and hateful past that America was born from.
I write this as someone who has lots of Pakistani and Indian friends, and has regularly struggled to get them to understand how different each of the dynamics are on this matter, but zero tolerance is essential to get people to understand that the issue is more serious and damaging than they could ever know.
Not just for this issue. If everyone hires friends and family, people from the hometown, place of worship, etc you run into other conflicts of interest. It’s always good to have disinterested parties involved in the hiring process.
And, as a half-Croat, needed. The ethnic tensions between former Yugoslavian countries have never been resolved, and many emigrants took the unresolved issues with them. The youngest generation is one thing, they grew up without having to live through all that bullshit, but a lot of people 35 and older have lost relatives and friends in one of the wars.
FFS Bosnia is at the moment creeping into the breakout of yet another conflict.
It would because it did and it does: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Steelworkers_v._Weber
Not going to touch the moral implications here, but _is_ that actually illegal discrimination? Is there any benefit for interviewing a particular candidate than an employee would miss out on? Again, not picking a side here; just curious.
Until relatively recently, the United States has always had a very strong strictly enforced caste system, even written into law, still the case in some Southern states. Some people were even allowed to buy and sell other types of people! As we can see some people are still allowed to kill certain types of other people with no consequences.
Fifa has often rules for this, where it avoid drawing to teams to play together when they are in constant/active conflict.
So, if there are some national tempers flaring, or a war somewhere, it is a better idea to have some boundaries.
Why we hope most people are good natured, we don't live in a perfect world, and it would be insane, or completely naive to believe that 'biases' do not exist.
The other side of it is 'ethnic nepotism', where people hire and favor people from their own countries, creating this pools of mono-ethnic teams in a company which statistically are not probable. This is actually a very common sight in Tech companies and we all know it.
In addition, you would have to ask extremely invasive questions of everyone. So is your proposal that you require that your company ask for the detailed ethnicity of everyone? What happens when people refuse, do you just not allow them to interview or manage?
What about people who were born in the US, do you assume that if they are of Japanese descent they can't interview someone of Chinese descent?
I happen to be Greek and have worked with 2 Turkish colleagues without any issues. On top of that, during my many travels across Europe, Turks (along with other Balkan nationalities) are by far the most welcoming people I meet once they learn that I come from Greece and I befriended a few of them.
Do you have any different experiences to share?
Edit: corrected cypress misspelling. Thanks repliers!
Just because your experience was fairly positive, that does not negate the general trend of such occurrences in hiring decisions among such pairs ( Greek-Turk, Indian-Pakistani, Japanese-Korean, Japanese-Chinese, Russian-Polish, Serb-Bosniak, Serb-Croat French-Algerian and countless other pairs in the Middle East & other parts of the world )
Theres surely some information that can be gleaned from anecdotes & oral histories. But we need data & objective studies to back them up if we are to make any progress on these issues.
Furthermore, I live in the Balkans area (Croatia) and it so happens that companies from this area do employ people of varied ethnicity, and those do work on the same teams.
You'd think that a nation as varied as the US would know that.
Do you believe that's just the way "they" are? Is that the way you are?
Remind me never to apply for a job at your company. JFC.
Great - as a British person, this gets me out of conducting interviews entirely!
As a practical matter within US companies it's not feasible to assign team members based on avoiding those potential conflicts. Nor can we afford to hire independent observers. I can't imagine trying to justify that additional headcount request to Finance and HR, they would laugh me out of the room! Instead employees are expected to act professionally regardless of their personal feelings and if they can't do so then manage them out.
The biases don't even have to involve people to throw off the results. They could be against the usage of a particular API, for example, which I find insane, but I've seen it happen.
These things are real, and discrimination based on them can be concealed and is often as the very fascinating article says, invisible to outsiders. I'm with you on the way to address this is by bringing more attention to it than with other commenters who suggest that it's actually racist or discriminatory to acknowledge and address this. It's hard to refute the line of the other commenters cuz on the face of it it is racist and discriminatory to provide affordances for these types of issues because you're assuming someone faces them based on their background. But let's remember something important which is that the words racist and discriminatory in their essence are actually neutral... they simply mean discernment based on something, in one case race.
That can be used negatively but it can also be used to try to write the wrongs that were done by the inverse of that. So sometimes to address a specific wrong you have to deal with the same parameters as created the wrong but invert the effect. Otherwise you're basically giving all the power for the use of racial and discriminatory actions to the side that wants to use them for bad. You have to be able to use them for good too but obviously you need to be careful in how you go about this but I don't think that less attention on this issue is the solution, so I like to jump behind the point that this person is making because it seems like a very brave point that they're making but it sounds like a good idea to me.
I mean I have no idea how these observers would work in practice but maybe one way to do this is to sort of have like a pre hiring congress where all parties meet and have a chance to discuss their background and any bias and how they feel about people from another place. But saying it, I don't think that would really work so easily, tho it might. Every group of people is unique to some extent...I think it's a very tricky thing to do... But closing one's eyes and not talking about is probably not the way to get progress on this.
This caused a lot of anxiety in me and it still does. I suppressed the anxiety through abject narcism.
Once I was able to leave school and eventually move away I was assumed to be of the same class as my other white peers. Privileged, university educated etc. There was constant paranoia of being asked about my background and having to see the look on peoples faces when they asked where I got my degree from.
Again, I mostly floated through life benefitting from the implicit bias of my peers and others. Luckily I was smart and gravitated to tech at a very young age.
To this day I'm still wracked with anxiety at the possibility of discussing my financial situation, upbringing, or education.
Seeing this described as a denial of basic human rights in the article shocked me. I had never even thought about the anxiety objectively, until recently.
I'm Serb, I've hired and worked with Croatians. I've had colleagues who were Lebanese and worked along side Israelis. I've had a Palestinian coworker report to a Jewish manager. I have seen an adjacent team's Japanese manager rely on their Chinese report as their right hand.
Maybe it's because I live and work in Canada where there is absolutely zero tolerance for this kind of garbage thinking.
You’ll be quite disappointed if you read about your new country’s history. Even the recent one (the last residential school where natives children were forced to attend and where children unmarked graves were found was closed in … 1998). Or about the province that tried to gain independence twice. Or what happened to the Metis people or the French speakers to the east..
Or just what happens when the dogma of multiculturalism takes over [0].
[0] https://www.thestar.com/vancouver/2019/01/15/as-ndp-leader-j...
What do you do with Bangladeshis. :D
I think you might be mistaken with this, even lower class people from these nationalities (the least educated ones) have no problem working with each other. Especially untrue for those with higher education (high school and above).
When I interviewed last time; the only company i did not make through phone screen was by a Japanese interviewer. I gave a three viable solutions to an easy question. Had no idea why I failed but probably because of racism
How Big Tech Is Importing India’s Caste Legacy to Silicon Valley - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26435117 - March 2021 (195 comments)
Caste discrimination in some of Silicon Valley's richest tech companies - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24952698 - Oct 2020 (322 comments)
How India's ancient caste system is ruining lives in Silicon Valley - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24555492 - Sept 2020 (47 comments)
Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24552047 - Sept 2020 (613 comments)
Silicon Valley Has a Caste Discrimination Problem - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24065132 - Aug 2020 (14 comments)
California sues Cisco alleging discrimination based on India’s caste system - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23798922 - July 2020 (56 comments)
California accuses Cisco of job discrimination based on Indian employee's caste - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23697083 - July 2020 (592 comments)
In a set up where there is such low/non-existent value going around and nothing much to show for, I'd expect toxic politics for every little thing.
There are quite a few places like this in this industry, and it can be very hard to achieve anything of value both personally and professionally at such places. And its all about identity politics, and cartel behaviour at the end.
I work for Cisco. Best place to work for, best salary in the market, the smartest people I've ever come across. Best work life balance.
I'm not Indian though, so maybe I'm not aware of all the details.
Cast based discrimination exist in India, but in my experience the issue is overblown in the knowledge industry.
A thing to keep in mind is that the Tech industry is very large. Even within organizations culture can be really different; cue Amazon engineers sharing horror stories while others paint it as the best place they’ve ever worked at.
I never saw this negative behavior out in our day to day, so it surprised me. This might be how the discrimination happens.
Is there a way to tell an Indian's caste? I'm guessing it's impolite to ask.
Let me hazard a guess: You're "not lower-caste" (and that's how you can then dismiss your own assertion).
You have a choice: you can assume you're correct that this is "overblown" and do nothing, or you can recognize that it clearly does happen (even if it really is rare) and make sure you're actively watching for it and reporting it when you see it.
It usually doesnt extend beyond that, since HR will be all over it. Often they will even go out of their way not to hire Indians as their directs, so as to deny any discrimination based hiring. But its rampant.
I even asked a senior manager if I needed to be Indian to excel at the company. He said the very fact I asked that question is a problem, whether or not it is true.
;)
It's effectively a French guy hiring another french guy or a German guy stacking their team with other Germans. It's a bit more complicated than that because if you look at things like power distance index (PDI), India measures way higher in the chart than any western country (i.e., culturally Indians are more accepting of hierarchy than their western counterparts, so an Indian subordinate is more deferential to their boss than an American one for example)
There was also a son of a bitch who was an aggressive baptist. He though I was a baptist because I had dated a baptist once, and knew some of the lingo. I really liked him until I saw him treat a Chinese person like crap for no reason. He treated anyone who wasn't a Christian like garbage.v
Just because people are from the same part of India doesn't mean they have the same caste.
being from the same part of India does not mean they will be of the same caste.
I'm a non-dalit Indian working in silicon valley. I know that caste based discrimination is still prevalent in India and not surprised that it continues in here in silicon valley as well amongst Indian community but I'm surprised to read this part in the article. I have never heard of someone doing a scan for sacred thread. Also, it's worth noting that most non-dalit people also do not wear this sacred thread so whoever is doing this scan isn't familiar with India or probably this part is made up in the article.
That said, I know that it's much harder for a dalit person to progress in India as the society still tries to pull them behind. Indian govt has reservations in colleges and jobs for dalit community, which I believe has helped the community a lot in last 50 years or so, helping many to bring their families out of poverty. But, still there's a long way to go. Also, a long way to go for non-dalit community to abolish this discrimination.
My heart goes with our dalit brothers & sisters and glad to hear that their issues are being discussed in silicon valley as well now.
So much of it has to be taken with a boatload of salt. Since it is politically incorrect to challenge the established views, one simply has to rely on ones own observation. Especially if they are missing the woods for the trees on these debates.
It is very much in line with the western debates on race inequality, feminism or gender pronouns. Those claiming to fight these inequalities, intentionally or unintentionally create more fissures and distrust.
And unlike the western world where there has been a systemic slavery or persecution of indigenous population, in India there are literally thousands of castes and not always a clear idea of hierarchy. The hierarchy was mostly an academic theory built on flimsy propaganda.
Also the very same people who see privilege among sections of the Hindus are completely blind to the privilege of Christians or Muslims, considering that large parts of India have been under Islamic and Christian colonisation for several centuries. And Hindus have faced the same kind of violence from these two groups as much of the rest of the world.
In a way caste might have been the social glue that allowed the indigenous people to put up a fight and maintain their Hindu identity.
There is a strong correlation between caste and economic mobility & urbanisation. The ones who preserve their caste the most are ones who can gain some privileges in the form of vote banks, social security or class benefits, this easily excludes 90% of the urban educated masses.
In a country of 1.4 billion, sure there are large swathes of population still behest with the caste problem, but also in a country where 1/3 of the people are malnourished and have stunted growth, caste is hardly the biggest problem and might actually be a evolved social survival mechanism.
Caste and class divisions run very deep in South Asian culture. I’m disappointed that even in tech where workers are generally highly educated this is something that continues to exist (please: I’m not talking about the necessity of a college education to be a good engineer, that’s another conversation. I’m pointing out that most tech jobs require a college education, in many cases Grad School education).
Unsuprising that the Western press and academia has the nuance of a brick, perhaps because their own history is so grotesquely checkered.
I wouldn't trust Sai Deepak with anything, he's a nut job who for some reason sounds eloquent to the upper class Hindus.
There will always be an element of the intangible in any effort by the Western mind to understand India. The experience is one of irreducible complexity, the subject receding from attempts to form a mental framework that permits nuanced understanding.
This documentary is 50 years old. Nothing has changed.
btw in my experience internet dating & marriage sites have done more to break cast barriers in india than any social or affirmative action movement. I do think that it would take another generation for serious damage to happen to the caste system because towns & villages are still very much ingrained in this shit.
I didn't hear of it either until I noticed large groups of Indian-origin devs and managers (mostly at older companies such as IBM, Oracle, etc), and somehow only the 'upper caste' folks would get promoted and be invited to happy hours and such. How much that can be attributed to inter-personal relationships and professional competence as opposed to outright discrimination, one will never know but a pattern does emerge. It's never in your face discrimination, just subtle favoritism towards one's group.
Mind you, this happens with people from the same Indian state as well. They'll often speak in their regional language during meetings even though not everyone speaks that language, which simply goes on to alienate that team member. (This has happened to friends of mine at T-Mobile and Intel)
"marriage sites have done more to break cast barriers in india"
Not sure if I agree with you there. It has brought to light just how prevalent that kind of thinking is. It's a common trope on Indian matrimonial websites how users have a list of requirements (Looking for fair skinned, Hindu upper caste, etc). Maybe that has helped break cast barriers by bringing it to light, I don't know, but it was really surprising when I came upon it for the first time.
I was thinking the problem is limited to India and will not get carried over to US or tech industry in India.
Was not expecting to see caste system in US too and was doubting if it was real. I had heard one story where adults in US were introducing themselves with caste. This story talks about even the kids are introducing with their caste. What are we teaching kids?
Every Indian should read this. It doesn't matter if you discriminate or not, the person suffering is not dealing with just you but lots of people. Even if a small percentage discriminate that is bad enough for that person to feel vulnerable for long time.
Counter-point: many cases of sexual harassment seem to occur over a long time, where the problematic behavior is known or suspected widely -- it's just that nothing is done.
Consider: I don't care for celebrities or Hollywood, I'm not American, but I knew Weinstein for being a pig long before he got cancelled, mostly through offhand jokes from comedians. I didn't really know how big of a deal in his business he was, I just knew that everyone seemed to know that he was a pig. So when he finally got cancelled, what surprised me is that I sort of thought that he already had been.
I've known of few instance of much less prominent harassment (sexual or otherwise for that matter) at the periphery of my social circle, and it was a similar phenomenon. I believe there is a type of people that does that kind of things (narcissists), the problem I suspect is that they tend to also be good at manipulating people so that they can keep doing damage for a long time.
I do not recall ever seeing casteism at workplace. So reading these reports have been surprising to me, since these are not subtle, but rampant. I can only attribute it to my privilege driven echo chamber. Or the fact that I never worked in US. (only briefly in India).
What I read in media disgusts me. I am very motivated to make sure nothing like this happens in my zone of control / influence, at work.
I know casteism is deeply rooted in Indian society. I do not relate with it. Many folks I know, don’t either. On optimistic side, I hope that means with newer generations, casteism will dilute and wither away.
This scene from an Indian movie I saw recently made me realize that the caste system is not just prevalent and absurd but also has a very complicated hierarchy built into it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4N98tQsp64 (<2 min, with subtitles)
I'm sorry but this makes no sense to me whatsoever. Reservations in India follow a formal documented process and do not apply to private enterprises. Changing one's surname will make zero difference.
I am also familiar with many upper-caste people who have changed their surname to something generic (like Kumar) to avoid revealing their caste. This doesn’t just apply to job seeking in private enterprises. They do this to avoid any kind of attention drawn to their surname, and hence caste. This attention can then play out differently in different scenarios.
The parents feel like their child has been taken over by some weird agenda to make such a big deal out of normal stuff!
Outrage, I would say.
I wondered about that right away - is any of this just sour grapes from lower caste folks taking it out on higher caste folks now that they're in an environment where the playing field is suddenly level?
<preachy> The challenge is to transition into equal rights mode, rather tribal one. Sooner the better. </preachy>
My parents changed my, and their names, and surname to Slavic sounding for reasons you can understand. Out of many, lower risk of being drafted (being non-white, and living in far-east increases likelihood of draft 10x,) ease of getting into a good school, or university for me, and simply lower chances of getting into random troubles with officials.
At the same time, knowing this, I am as much as discomforted by practice of meritless "diversity hire" just for the sake of putting people of colour to pass the diversity checkbox.
Pretending to play a role of "smart south Asian" while yes-manning, and knowing you being a decoration is as bad as discrimination, if not worse.
Sometimes, it could be an advantage, but using it that way just feels wrong given I know what it's like to lose out on things due to my sex/sexuality/disability. Why would I ever want anyone to lose to me because they're male/straight/not-disabled?
I do wonder if I'm hampering myself, because those aspects of myself have presented some difficulties, but who's to say a straight white man didn't have difficulties of a similar level that were ignored because they didn't tick the diversity box? (Good luck to impoverished straight white men or straight white men who are autistic or have mental health problems).
And I don't know about your experience, but mine is that a lot of the diversity checkbox people are in this for their personal brand/career and they're just as slimy and backstabby as any white men have ever been. At least the straight white dudes just call me a bitch to my face. I can respect that.
In tech these days there's enough racial groups that you are as likely (or more, in my experience) to end up with blatantly racist behavior from minority groups who either only hire their own or explicitly do not hire specific minorities they dislike.
I remember working at a bank where the portfolio trading team was all racial group X, algo team racial group Y, and OMS racial group Z.. because the managers were...
The white guys were like the generic neutral glue that could sometimes be hired into the X/Y/Z group teams.
My previous fund I recall a friend telling me he started looking for a new job as soon as our new boss started as he was grilling him in their native language trying to figure out which specific racial/caste/regional sub-group he was from..
This fits with a saying I've seen thrown around about our modern times, which is basically that "Class is the only remaining non-taboo bias in American polite society".
Living in a very blue city in a very blue state surrounded by highly educated, "social justice warrior" types .. you'd be surprised how quickly the same people who have every type of window decal/bumper sticker/flag, march in every sort of rally you can imagine, and earnestly support every anti-racism/DEI initiative under the sun.. are willing to "punch down" class-wise, as long as the lower class people are white.
But the more I got to know Indians who were more privileged than I have been, the pattern started to clearly emerge. I distinctly remember thinking - "people who are better educated than I am tend to be richer or from an upper caste background, usually both".
I try to not let it get to me - I'm in a more "esoteric" position as I'm neither one of the privileged castes nor the downtrodden. My last name is still a dead giveaway to people who know. And I wonder how many opportunities I've missed because I've never been part of these subgroups (any subgroups really). I'm lucky enough that I have friends and a partner who recognise their historical privilege very well.
It's why diversity is important. I love working with my Dutch, Indian, German, Turkish, Chinese, American, Brazilian etc... colleagues. When I'm in a diverse group, those feelings tend to fade away - because I know there isn't a large group that I might need to be closely aligned with.
Of course, living in another country (not USA), the higher up I look at management, the less diversity I see. Same problem in a different form, I suppose. :)
All of the above is just an individual experience. But data seems to confirm it.
Can you share this data. I am curious.
I'll edit this with more links later, it's 3am in my TZ atm.
I have just begun to notice, but I have no idea about the identity politics. I recall in college that some of my friends from India would fawn over certain last names, and I felt it was something to do with the caste system, but I had concluded that the people I was around in universities and in the workforce were mostly from a level of privilege that it wouldn't be possible to learn more. I always found Indian nationalism to be strange, where so many people would interject that everything is perfect. Makes it easier for me to avoid my own US nationalism, because it must be just as comical to others.
In this article it mentions Dalit. How many people from that group would be in Silicon Valley, is it impossible to know since it is insensitive to ask and disastrous for them if people did know?
Seems like there is a potential for solidarity amongst more vocal groups pushing for representation.
Less that 10%
Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24552047 - Sept 2020 (613 comments)
^ Seems like there is a potential for solidarity amongst more vocal groups pushing for representation.
Good luck, but I don't believe that's happening anytime soon considering that SV is upper-caste dominated also no politician really gives a damn unless your group has the population significant enough to win the elections.
Also, do you know prop-16 was rejected by Cali, the most progressive state in the US. see https://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/prop-16-failed-in-californ...
Can you really tell if someone is from India and not from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka or Bangladesh? Because I can't and I am from India.
These things are rarely as simple as looking at someone visually from afar or in a lineup and making a complete decision.
India is like 3 different countries when sliced by caste. The highest castes are about as privileged as the typical Chinese. The middle are at sub saharan Africa levels. The bottom 25% constitute probably the most deprived population in the world. Better off than the Rohingyas but not by too much.
"Jay Bhim" is a great movie based on a real incident. Bhim refers to the social reformer profiled in the article Bhimrao Ambedkar.
The perpetrators in real life were Christians but portrayed as Hindus.
The Hindu villagers who in real life helped the victim seek justice are portrayed as casteists who hinder justice.
A lot of literature, news articles and movies are made to exacerbate the problem and create problems where none exist.
Not true, at all. It depends on your state of birth and the caste. A Dalit from a poor state like Bihar is underprivileged than a Dalit of Kerala or Tamil Nadu.
Is it not racist?
But when I read stuff that is so clearly nonsensical, I start questioning what embellishment factor I should I account for.
> Questions about a person’s last name or home village can be seen as invasive attempts to identify caste. A pat on the shoulder might be a friendly greeting—or a search for a sacred thread that some dominant-caste Hindu men wear beneath their shirts.
There is simply no way to figure out someone's caste by their home village. The overwhelming majority of Hindu men from dominant castes do not wear a sacred thread. If someone believes that a pat on the shoulder might be checking for a caste marker, it's very likely that they'll be seeing caste discrimination where none exists.
Stop pretending like you don't know what I'm talking about. You're either lying to yourself or being ignorant. I'm sure many things in the article are embellished, but stop reducing other people's experiences.
A village is next to useless in terms of identifying one's caste.
> I've seen it happen to my dad all the time when we're in another city or country.
How? There are more than six million villages in India. Do these people maintain a distributed database of some sort?
> I'm sure many things in the article are embellished
How much of it is embellishment is exactly what I'm wondering.
> but stop reducing other people's experiences.
Maybe come up with a convincing argument rather than ask people to take your word for it.
Most Indian villages will have multiple jatis (sub-caste groups) and it’s perfectly normal for endogamy to be so complete that people’s families speak exactly the same language and the genetic distance between them is on the order of that between Swedes and Sicilians. Indian genetics is fascinating.
I guess that I should explicitly add that I am not from India. Cross-cultural communications can be a bit difficult at times and I'd rather not make blunders like that.
> Do you feel threatened when a coworker asks about where you are from? It's something I do ask from time to time (not during interviews obviously, but during lunch for example) out of pure curiosity. Should I stop?
I think its a fair question. Its not as much about where a person is from but "what caste they belong to" type of stuff that might be offensive.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/mumbai/matrimonial-ad-s...
I don't think you should stop asking people where they are from. But perhaps don't interrogate them (we get enough of that at airports), implying that they're obstructing their true origin from you. Also, tone matters, whether you like it or not. Saying "where are you from" can sound genuinely curious, but it can easily sound disgusted and derogatory.
On any implied caste system, I can speak for the London tech startup world in which I've worked for several years. I've probably had dozens of (South) Asian colleagues and have never noticed the slightest hint of intra-Asian racism or classism.
Based on the fact that you took some (minor) offense to the followup questions, I'm assuming you're middle-class or higher?
I've spent a decent chunk of my adult life living in working class, high-immigrant areas (Noble Park and Sunshine, to any other Melbournians - both actually really nice places).
What struck me as interesting is that in these environments, probing about one's ethnicity is nothing more than smalltalk. Everybody has one; they're curious about yours and will ask directly.
In more upper-middle-class environments, though, it can be really taken the other way as ethnicity is something semi-taboo that needs to be treated far more carefully.
California withdrew it's Cisco case but you wont' see any coverage of that here.
https://thewire.in/caste/california-drops-caste-discriminati...
I am from India and have been in the US for more than a decade.
I come from a low caste. The only folks who have asked about my caste and asked if I am from a higher caste are white Americans due to my vegetarianism (voluntary for ethical reasons).
> Do you feel threatened when a coworker asks about where you are from?
No, not at all.
But I did get upset when my PhD advisor (a white American) wanted to know if I was from the priestly class.
There is definitely casteism in India, but I have not seen it in Silicon Valley.
Casteism is there in India and is unfortunately widespread but steadily disappearing. India's PM and President are from lower castes but you won't see coverage of that in Western news.
For this reason, my state got rid of surnames ~50 years ago. It sure is inconvenient in some places: I have to explain that I don't have a last name and that they're calling me by my father's first name. But given the pros, I don't know why the other states haven't followed suit
I don't think any one would be threatened by asking where they are from, even in India unless you grew up around in the same state or region, location is not a nuance (in the caste sense) you would be able to easily get. For example some one from the south, won't know anything about punjabi castes or where they hail from, even one state over it is hard to know they would usually speak a different language after all.
A foreigner asking is generally not considered threatening, they however might be worried you would say something to another indian colleague without understanding the implication and that can be difficult for them.
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Most of the article is certainly true, it is important to note that all groups discriminate not just ones on top, disproportionately high representation of forward communities among the Indian diaspora makes it seem it similar to black racism here it is more complex than that [1]
There many groups collectively known as dalits, form one end of the spectrum, other castes form the middle, and forward/dominating castes a the end, every group discriminates against everyone else, and there are sub groups within groups. family, lineage, language, color, religion[2], region and dozen other factors to break into further sub groups.
It shouldn't be that surprising, India as country has as much or more diversity and double the population of Europe. You find similar discrimination of Europeans too, by country (Poland,Serbia etc), region of a country, language (Catalans), groups (gypsies) race/skin, religion (even with Christianity: Catholic, orthodox, Protestants etc ) and so on and on.
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[1] This happens because these groups have access to more funding/ education, relatives already living give a boost and so on
[2] Caste is not limited to Hindus, there are plenty of communities where you will find mix of Hindus and Christians, or Muslims , depending who is dominant the others would be discriminated
In some cases the village might indicate one's caste. In most cases, it does not.
If two Indians are from the same region, they know the demographic of that region pretty well.
So, that might be revelatory. But this is only true for some regions in India where villages are segregated.
Most villages in India are not segregated, i.e. Brahmins, upper-caste (they call themselves that), general castes, Dalits live together. But the neighborhoods are often segregated. But they do go to the same schools.
But as you are not an Indian, whether the one being asked is a Brahmin or a Dalit, will not tell you his village name- simply because you will not know it.
And in megacities, people from every caste are there.
As someone from outside India, you can safely ask where someone is from. They will probably tell you- "Mumbai" or "a small village near Delhi". No risk there.
Never ever ask people their caste.
As such I don't really feel particularly threatened by being asked where I'm from. I do have a bias towards groups with more diverse teams (ie not just Indians) but that's more about enjoying the cultural exchange that comes with that instead of the homogeneity and conflict that can come from staying within one's own cultural influence.
If anything I've seen much more nepotism than casteism.
- Have found regional identities to be stronger than others. Some regional identities based on languages and ability to form together as a group are much stronger than others (Punjabis, Gujaratis and last decade or 2, Telugu people)
- Some communities in India like business communities of Jains and Marwaris are quite closed like Jewish folks in some instances. They do not allow other folks inside their sanctum
- Fights are mostly a symptom of other issues - limited resources, significant population and a lot of it are kept alive by the democratic nature of the country where politicians exploit the divisions
- Affirmative action has made it much easier for people for downtrodden communities (SC, ST) to get Govt jobs, promotions etc. However a lot of these benefits are only accruing to second and third generation of privileged people from their caste and festers resentment in middle class whether urban or otherwise including myself who is classified as OBC (Other backward classes) which is one of the most illogical way of grouping people as any. A lot of OBCs have a lot of land and wield a lot of power
I just want to say that the issue is very complicated and also has a lot of colonial influence still hanging around it to this day. Having said that, things are so much better than what they were 3-4 decades ago based upon my conversation with family elders.
PS. - Anecdata. I was rejected by many SC/ST i.e. women from backward castes in arranged marriage website because they did not want to lose the "privilege" affirmative action will bring to their children. Ultimately I had to find someone from my own caste. My attempt to be open minded and different fell flat on its face.
This is true with European names too (masson, taylor, carpenter, miller ....), and has the exact same origin.
However, today due to the politicization first by the colonialists and the church, and now mostly by a leftist-church nexus it has become politically incorrect if it feels like they have an agenda behind it.
Strangely at least among the current generation, I have experienced probing questions about my diet as well as probing hands (pretending to be a friendly shove or pat) not from Hindus but from Christians.
In my understanding it is a way for them to ensure that I am not an "evil Brahmin" and can be trusted enough to part take in what every gossip they have and an assumption I would have to submissively accept their "righteousness".
There are plenty of folk superstitions in both Hinduism and Buddhism, so it's not impossible that some folks may have believed what you wrote above at some point. But the actual agreed-upon views are pretty clear.
https://www.learnreligions.com/reincarnation-in-buddhism-449...
Buddhism has a similar concept, named and understood differently.
But when people leave a religion, they're not just leaving what the religion is on paper, because that's not what anyone engages with. They're leaving how the religion operates in practice, and that includes how people practice that religion day to day.
Western media is extremely India phobic and Hindu phobic.
The caste system, as per scriptures, is just a categorization of work that people do. Every one is prescribed their duties and jobs as per caste. However, there are innumerable instances in the scriptures when people have taken up jobs of other castes, as per situation demands.
The discrimination of people based on castes, is an invention of society and its degradation.
However, I often find that an ingrained sense of "my religion is holier than thou" leads to a subtle thread of anti-Hindu outputs.
Some publications are blatant. Some are not.
This is blatantly false. Can you cite me some?
Even the Lord Rama killed Shambuka because he wanted to learn the Vedas as a Sudra.
Another incident I don't remember from the Mahabharata where one person was keen for reaching brahminic status. And that was denied. And was said as an example.
> there are innumerable instances in the scriptures when people have taken up jobs of other castes, as per situation demands.
Cite me two or three.
And please don't say Parshuram being a warrior or Viswamitra being a sage. Both were upper caste Brahmin or Kshatriya.
All religions are bad. Degree varies.
Not sure that applies to any religious text ever. Regardless, it is clearly not clear, since people are misinterpreting it.
Read Manu Smriti, Yajnabalka Smriti, or Parashara Smriti.
You can find them online.
In Bhagavad Gita, there are no verses that directly say bad things about so-called lower castes, but liberation is offered to people "even if" the seeker is a woman, a son of a prostitute, or a "dog-eating lower caste".
The Hindu scriptures themselves are casteist and sexist.
I have read many verses from Manu Smriti, Parashara Smriti, and Yajnabalka Smriti.
They are ripe with casteism.
In Vedas, too, it is mentioned that Sudras are created from the feet of Purusha, and Brahmins from the head.
And also, Mahabharata mentions that brahmins can't face capital punishment. The most that can be done is banishing them.
Indian scriptures are deeply casteist and sexist, too.
Hinduism itself should be blamed for casteism.
Even Buddha fought against casteism.
That is the varna system. There is no caste system in Vedas or in Hinduism.
The same verse from Purusha Suktam also appears in Zoroastrian Avesta Yasna and the Pahlavi Denkard.
‘Caste’ comes from ‘Casta’, a Portuguese word.
Now…what does it mean by allocating different parts of the body to different categories of people?
‘Purusha’ is the cosmic man. Before the gods were created, there was Purusha. The gods themselves came from the sacrifice of Purusha. The immortality of gods was granted to them because they were willing to sacrifice themselves for the mortals/humanity. So every time they perished, they were resurrected.
The concept of yagna in Hinduism symbolises the sacrifice of the gods. Vedas say that our lives too are a sacrifice. We live and we die. We merge with a universal consciousness. When we are no different from this universal consciousness, we are resurrected too. That is the principle of reincarnation. In sacrifice, we will find our resurrection.
The sacrifice of a god and the resurrection of said god is a recurring theme in many faiths and religions.
The Purusha Suktam is a poem about sacrifice of The Cosmic Man. He has a thousand heads and a thousand limbs. And how his sacrifice comes down as the five elementals of fire, air, earth, water and space. From these, all of creation is born..as earth and skies, planets and stars, forests, oceans, land forms. This disembodied Cosmic Man enters as sunshine and rain. Plants, mammals, birds and insects are created. And then so is man..sun becomes the soul and moon becomes the mind. Seven sheaths of gross matter is formed as the physical bodies..from his body, the four varnas are created so man can create division of labour. Nowhere is caste mentioned. Nor do the Vedas ask people to discriminate against each other.
A Brahmin lives on charity and studies Vedic knowledge for teaching and for the world benefit. A Kshatriya takes that knowledge and implements it as a ruler. A Vaishya takes care of the material needs that fuels the system. The Shudra works and creates what society needs.
The varna system reflects the four purusharthas: dharma, artha, kama, moksha. The Brahmin has to uphold Dharma(divine law). The Kshatriya has to deliver artha(material goals) according to Dharma. Vaishya and Shudra are motivated by artha and kama(material goals and desires). Moksha is for anyone who seeks it..and hence for everyone.
Brahmin lives on charity but is bound by religious rules and regulations. Kshatriya has power, but also has duty. Should be ready to fight and die to protect his people. Vaishya is free to accumulate wealth but also has responsibility to fund the entire society. Shudra only needs to work to take care of his desires, has to bear burden of labour and owes nothing to anyone. This system worked as there were many small manageable kingdoms and there was conformity. Conformity means less conflict. There was mobility between small kingdoms that if one was allergic to the homogeneity, there was another place to belong to..until the Muslim invaders came first abs then British raj came and got rid of the kingdoms.
Now Brahmins had to work and Kings were useless. Merchants were burdened to pay dictators and invaders and colonial masters. Resources were diminished and there was no more fair redistribution of available resources. It was a survival game now. The solid foundation and implicit safety net was gone. Every one of the varnas has one benefit and one handicap. So each one depended on the other three and peaceful balance was easier to maintain.
It’s like a game of Jenga. Take away one piece and everything comes crumbling down. Invasions and colonialism keep pulling pieces all the time but the system was self healing. Until it wasn’t.
You are mistaken. There is no caste in Hinduism. Purusha suktam is about the sacrifice of The Cosmic Man. It appears in the Rig Veda and also in other religions of that time. Hinduism is the only surviving polytheistic religion. It draws ire because of it’s very existence. It’s a threat abs irritant to the monotheistic faiths because of its foundational difference of opinion wrt individual soul, consciousness and it’s place in the universe.
Monotheism cannot erase Hinduism although there has been efforts to tarnish its core. Yes..Purusha Suktam is part of Hindu scriptures. Varna is mentioned. Caste isn’t. Social edits to a religious text is someone else’s responsibility. That is collateral damage due to civilizational pressures.
Hinduism is not for everyone. And that’s ok. There are many religions in the world. And different faiths. As well as atheism and agnosticism and ignosticism. But I don’t think a casual assassination of the Hindu faith that is followed by approximately one billion people is warranted or should be condoned due to incomplete religious literacy.
Dalits are even outside of these four varnas.
Most Indians who claim racism here in US usually come from upper/mid caste and lived decent lives in India and have seen their families and neighbors treat lower caste people like dirt.
Not just caste but discrimination based on the state-of-origin/language are often committed by identifying your group based on your last name.
There are often groups in offices from some states that will ensure that folks that are not from their states don't succeed and are coerced into resigning.
Folks from relatively developed states in India don't want to admit students from underdeveloped or poor states, which breeds another form of caste-language-based discrimination in India.
Does caste-based discrimination exist? Yes, it does. But it depends on where you live. In rural India, it is more prevalent than in California.
Is the Indian government doing anything about this menace? Yes, India has a positive discrimination system for these oppressed castes in all government universities and all governmental jobs. Today 65-75% of all seats in top Indian universities are for oppressed, underprivileged, and poor people.
Is it better than now compared to when we got independence? Yes, but many want their kids not to marry into other castes, mainly lower caste.
https://theprint.in/india/governance/57-of-indias-teaching-f...
Also, this is the reason students in their board exams (+2 / Twelfth-grade
tests) were forbidden from writing their last name in the answer sheets.
Teachers in India openly discriminated against students from other
castes/jatis/varnas by giving them lower marks.
How can a school teacher ask kids about religion and caste? How does this not contribute to discrimination based on <religion, caste.. >?
The telling part is the kids assuming the most important part of their background is religion, region, and caste.
The Indian Ministry of the Exterior has his work up for free [1], but I’d suggest the printed US edition of Annihilation of Caste with Arundhati Roy‘s introductory essay.
I know its something that exists though, its mind boggling that people still adhere to it. Hopefully it goes away though.
Here is an interesting interview type video on it.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BSN-3nmMyM
[2] https://theprint.in/opinion/indias-muslim-community-under-a-...
It takes time for any historical pattern to be reversed. Centuries, maybe even millennia. Even among people who actively reject the caste system it won’t be so easy for it to go away. Maybe technology can help.
Hiding is not the answer. By hiding, people signal that there is something to hide. I would even say that hiding makes it worse. It tells everyone that there is something to hide even the people uninterested in the situation. But when viewed objectively we can all see that there is nothing to hide. That it's just a bad idea that persists.
How do you fix it? I suspect that by uniting and fighting against the very idea that it's a valid system is the way to fix it. In time, the whole system would eventually collapse. Bad ideas can disappear over time but people have to fight to make them go away. Specially the oppressed set. You don't fight the idea that it's an unfair system. You fight the idea that it should even exist. I know. It's easier said than done. But by fighting the very idea of its existence. It will eventually make the whole idea go away.
The best example, I can think of, that is winning against a bad idea is the use of Queer in the LGBTQ community. 20 yrs ago "queer" was a horrible thing to say to an individual. The community has fought hard to change the word's meaning and now it has become a word that people like to hear. A word of pride. The whole idea has been turned on its head. Sure there are still people that use it as an insult but it's going away. 20 years from now it will just be a bad memory. Queer is and will be a point of pride. It was a genius idea in its simplicity and its effectiveness.
Well…not exactly. There's plenty of situations where being of a certain caste, whether it's high or low, can confer you no benefit and sometimes even a disadvantage. So besides the general thing of people generally trying to move away from discrimination, it's not necessarily a thing everyone wants to perpetuate.
Caste is like religion if you are brainwashed when you are kid, its almost impossible to let go even if you change countries. Hopefully the kids of these immigrants who grow up in the host country will not have the same hatred.
As non-Indians, it seems we exist outside the system, which could be ambiguously interpreted to either have no connotation at all, or to exist at the bottom of the social strata. [1]
Anecdotally, the kind of treatment you'll get in practice depends a lot more on your race and national origin. [2]
1: https://hinduism.stackexchange.com/questions/3898/what-caste... 2: https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/let-s-talk-about-r...
An analogy might be black Brits getting discriminated by Jim Crow laws in the old American South. That was simple racism based on skin color and it didn't matter if you were American or not.
comon this is a bit over the top. Is this for real??
edit: I guess this is as good as it gets https://ambedkarinternationalcenter.org/join-the-mission/aic...
Sounds like he went from the bottom 1% to the top 1%. That's impressive.
Any Indian that comes to mind, and you could bet that he/she is from an upper caste. It is hidden only because it is sort of accepted, and thats not a good thing.
It has been a part of Indian society for a very long time, going back millennia, but it was codified in its modern form by the British. For instance:
"Nicholas Dirks has argued that Indian caste as we know it today is a modern phenomenon as caste was fundamentally transformed by British colonial rule. According to Dirks, before colonial rule caste affiliation was quite loose and fluid, but colonial rule enforced caste affiliation rigorously, and constructed a much more strict hierarchy than existed previously, with some castes being criminalized and others being given preferential treatment." [1]
Preferential treatment in this case means educational opportunity, administrative jobs, etc - essentially avenues of upward socio-economic mobility. Since then, it has almost become ingrained in Indian culture. So much so, that people think that one caste is "better" than the other, marrying into another caste would bring disgrace to the family and community, and so forth.
Another factor to consider is affirmative action. There are few good public universities and jobs in India, and a certain percentage of them are reserved for groups who have been historically discriminated against. This kinda rubs upper-caste people the wrong way since some of them believe casteism no longer exists and that even if reservations are required, they should be based on the socio-economic status as opposed to one's caste.
Overall, as you can tell by now, it's a pretty tense matter. Things are improving but by no means is it a non-thing.
Caste is a very complex topic that spans back thousands of years — including the exploitation of the Manusmriti [1] by British colonists to wield their own power while colonizing South Asia — and is really not at all comparable to, say, being an “ethnic” white person like an Italian in early 20th century America (half-Irish here myself).
Brown skin + studied in a top government college. backward caste. got in via reservation
Fair skin + College(non-goverment quota) - probably from upper caste
All these can be known from an interview by looking at the person and resume.
To me this is one of those things people really care about when they're involved and slightly better off - so someone in the upper-middle class, someone from a good school, etc - but the majority of people don't really care. The only people who care about what school they went to or what class they identify as are those slightly above average without other notable accomplishments yet. Professors at Harvard care less about their school prestige than the fresh undergrad entering the job market. So, to take this as an example, I'd assume the only people who care about the Indian caste system are young, in a caste slightly above average whatever that means, and yet to really progress in their career to have more notable accomplishments to base their identities around.
The article is more Paranoia than Fact in today's context.
What may have been true is earlier generations has largely disappeared in Urban areas and in particular; in the IT industry. Everybody just wants a good paying job and a decent life, nobody bothers much about Caste.
I see people directly referring to a candidate who didn’t do well in an interview “must have gotten admission to IIT/NIT via reservation” (reservation is something of American affirmative action; but I’m not really sure). Passing remarks behind the back of other colleagues. And then saying things like, apparently being generous, “wow, doesn’t seem like you’re from that community!” (implying as if that community is inherently weak and dumb and the individual is an exception).
My name is as caste neutral as it gets. They still somehow figure it out - thousands of miles from my native place.
When you tell them you never used reservation even though you were eligible - you become kinda of like them, a little. But the moment you say you didn’t use it because you didn’t need it and you wanted to leave the college seat for someone more needy and that you support reservation system - you’re thrown back away from being somewhat like them.
Yes, the them and us are clear distinctions here.
It comes in many shapes and forms. Landlords asking “we’d prefer vegetarians” that’s asking “we’re Brahmins and prefer Brahmin or upper caste tenants”. My friend just lied as he really liked a flat overlooking a lake and trees next to the balcony in a quiet area, he said “well, even though I’m a Brahmin I eat meat once in a while” (he wasn’t a Brahmin) and the landlord was soon saying, “of course, of course, food is a personal choice”. He left soon as the landlord politely but slyly kept trying to glean the confirmation out of his visitors including me, also tried setting him up with his niece assuming his caste.
This will end up being a poorly written extremely long essay if I keep giving examples.
It was very early in my pre teens that I was made aware of my caste and place in the social hierarchy. I was fully aware that I sit somewhere in the middle of the caste hierarchy and there are people above me and also below me.
The power imbalance is so staggering and oppression is so deep rooted in such pervasive manner that all things might get consumed by the simmering anger and hatred one day. People who have lived mostly in cities easily fail to see this. They brush it aside saying we have jobs, we are moving on, we are getting educated.
This is so ignorant and blinding that they not only miss that a far greater number that lives in villages and towns and smaller cities are unseen by them, they are not seeing what’s right in front of them in the same larger cities as well. And yes, a lot of them deliberately do not acknowledge such divides and inequalities - some with a desire to fit in, others with vested interests of historical social power.
PS. Also, it’s so so different from the western notion of racism. So different.
Wow, the article really called it when it comes to deflections like this.
We learned about it in middle school. Maybe that’s not common elsewhere in the US?
What, besides Bollywood, should a US (tech) company do? Remove the surname field on the internal company address book? Prevent Indian nationals hiring / interviewing /managing other Indian nationals?
I do ask seriously - my utterly uninformed instinct says that we are close to the equivalent of 1950s US - southern blacks left the USA to fight and came back with tales of drinking warm beer in British pubs and people being amazed by their accents not their skin colour. India is seeing a second generation leaving to work in global markets and there will be an effect.
So - how do we get on the right side of history?
I will preemptively apologize for my directness. Euphemisms dilute.
I have written about it in some capacity on HN before. [1] But, I'll give you the 1 pager:
1. There are Indians and then there are Indians. The average undergrad at a UC is one of highly privileged 1st gen immigrant or 2nd gen Indian-American, both of who have no clue what caste even is. It is like trying to solve malnutrition in India, by feeding burgers to your fellow FANG engineer. In my 27 years surrounded by Indians, I have never been asked my caste, nor have my upper-caste peers made questionable comments in confidence.
2. Caste issues persist among those who pursue the hardest paths to success (eg: L1 sweat shop route) in the US. However, over the years, I have seen it develop into a 'crabs in a bucket' style circular firing squad. The more they believe in the 'zero sum nature' of an engagement, the more willing people are to stifle someone from the outgroup in an effort to get ahead. It is a dog-eat-dog world out there.
3. In truly poor communities in non-urban India, caste is a reality of life. India is a shit-hole nation (as a famous man once said). Desperate times in shit-hole places nudge good people into vile behaviors. Even past the explicit discrimination, generational poverty is crippling. On the bright side, things are getting less worse as a fast pace. But, to paint any rosier picture about this would amount to lying.
4. Sloppy affirmative action breeds resentment. (America, take notes) It hurts me to say this, but the proof is in the pudding. At my moderately-prestigious-Indian-university, I saw liberal 'general'(upper-ish caste) students turn resentfully anti-affirmative-action as they saw the bar be dropped so lower every year, in the Indian zero-sum career market. People are not judged for their caste. They are judged because their caste reveals that they got an easier path within a narrow academic structure. (This ofc, ignores the crippling poverty and social barriers these people also have to overcome. But, sociology 101 is not in our gen-eds).
5. Caste is dead, long live caste - Caste is so 1990s. The entire societal hierarchy shifted under the feet of sub-par social commenters and they never even noticed. A decent portion of 2nd generation American-Indians don't fraternize with 1st generation Indians. IITians stick to IItians. Masters H1b-OPT candidates look down on those who came through the L1 consultancy sweat-shop grind. I could write an entire book on this. It is a brutally merit status system, where merit is defined within a narrow academic context. (Indians are not unique in this phenomenon. I frequently see this among urban american communities too. Sorting into groups based on internal perceptions of status happens whenever a community reaches size threshold. If anything, it is a rather familiar social stratification)
Shoe-horning the caste issue into hyper-polarized and shallow american power struggles is worsening the issue. India has been making rapid progress in terms of helping lower-caste communities. From representation in every local + national body to economic assistance to educational assistance to a harsh anti-discrimination law. In 70 years of independence, we have come a long way. The progress may be on a low base, but the delta is huge. UCs and California Liberals (with all connotations it carries) are wielding caste as a weapon for political means. Leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Let's take an example of an upper caste manager and a lower caste IC reporting to him. If the manager rates the IC poorly because of genuine performance reasons, the IC may still feel it is because of caste, instead of his poor performance
Let's take an example of a Lower caste manager and an upper caste IC reporting to him. If the IC disagrees with the manager about something, the manager again may think it is because of caste.
In this way it becomes hopeless.
In cities like Kolkata, Chennai, and Mumbai- the problem is non-existent.
The problem is much more rampant in Northern parts of India. This region is the American south without the good parts.
This region ranks the highest in the country for foeticide of girl children. Because the society is deeply patriarchal.
Honor killing, i.e. killing your own daughter or sibling for marrying outside caste is rampant.
This region also votes in high numbers for divisive-policy holders.
In other regions of India, the problem is much less visible.
In Bengal, where I come from, I have never seen casteism. Inter-caste marriage is rampant. Yes, castiest assholes exist everywhere. But many don't care- or care only when it comes to marriage.
I belong neither to a so-called "upper caste" nor I am a Dalit.
Caste-based discrimination is minimal in here.
Ambedkar is a venerable intellectual even if you completely disregard his caste identity and fights for Dalits. As a non-Dalit, I have deep respects for him- just as an intellectual, a nerd.
What did away with caste mostly is colonialism. Colonialism attacks your way of living, and casteism is an Indian way of living. The places where British rule was consolidated, you will see much less casteism in those places.
Casteism is not a new problem. Buddha faught against it two millenias ago.
Do NOT listen to Hindus who say that casteism has nothing to do with Hinduism. Hindu scriptures such as Manu Smriti, Parashara Smriti, Yajnabalka Smriti are ripe with casteism.
Even in the Mahabharata, it is said that capital punishment or holding is not apt for a Brahmin criminal. The most that can be done is banishing them.
In Magadha Empire of the Mauryas, Kautilya suggests death penalty for Dalits who go to bed with a Brahmin woman. The opposite carries little punishment.
And many foreigners are wondering whether asking about one's village is risky. I will say that it depends.
In colonial strongholds, the villages are less segregated. And history takes place.
Bengal was a stronghold of Buddhism during the Pala Empire. The staunch Brahmin Sen kingdom brought Brahmins from other Indian places and sent them to each village to "save" the masses.
So, in a Bengali village, there are Brahmins as well as other people.
And also local identity. Suppose, there is a village called "Mohanpur" or "Krishnagunj"- nobcaste identity here. But if there's a village called "Mahargaon", you know that it consists of Mahar sub-caste. That gives the identity away.
It is also not true as many claim that most Brahmins do not wear threads. Only modern-minded, reformist kind of people give up thread. I have at least three Brahmin friends who gave up the thread. One of them is a Communist. So you get the picture!
There is also a modern form of casteism due to the affirmative action policy.
An SC person, no matter how rich or privileged, gets lucrative benefits. That draws hatred towards them. For example, to get in a Chemistry major course of a very prestigious college, an Unreserved caste person needed 94 in chemistry. But an SC person needed only 59 (out of hundred). That college is very expensive though. Frustrated mediocres of Unreserved caste hate on the reserved people for this. (The very good ones get in despite the reservation).
In government employment or higher education, an SC person gets five fold advantage-
1. Age relaxation for five or more years. Say, 25 is the ceiling for others, but 30 for SC.
2. Cutoff marks in qualifying test is much lower.
3. Eligibility is marked off at 60% in college/HS for others, but 45% for SC.
4. Number of attempts is uncapped or much higher.
5. Even if you get through reservation, your reservation again applies when promotion is sought.
All this, no matter how rich you are.
This irks people. I had no such issues since I never suffered from reservation personally. But I know people who have. E.g.- a friend could not qualify for medical school despite getting 500+/720 in the entrance, but a much richer SC person got in a very good one at 400+/720. The former would need 650+/720 to get in the same school.
This fuels modern casteism that I see in Bengal.
I absolutely abhor the idea of caste. And just like the person in the article, I am no longer a Hindu. I despise all systems where you are marked off at your birth. Became an athiest at 16, and gave up Hinduism at 19.
Many households do not care about casteism now.
Many are hopeful, that with younger generations, casteism will automatically die out. But I am not so hopeful. I regularly meet young casteists.
You should know that the Hindu Nationalistic BJP/RSS cabal has been trying very hard to get Dalit votes by calling them Hindus and forming a pseudo-unity against Muslims.
Mass converting out of Hinduism to Christianity, Buddhism, and even Islam is common to irk the Brahmin overlords of society.
You should also know that casteism is common in SC people and OBC (Other Backward Classes- a government term to classify people who are higher than Dalits in Hindu hierarchy but "lower" than upper castes). They do not like people marrying outside of their caste.
You should also know that casteism is designed rather than natural.
And these people in the SV are lucky. Their counterparts in North Indian villages suffer a much worse fate.
I will monitor this thread, and ask me questions if you want.
Another thing is that casteism is _not_ limited to Hinduism in India. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
Look at the matrimonial sections of Indian newspapers -- there are Christians who explicitly look for a Nadar (a caste from Tamil Nadu which has become prosperous in the past century), a Christian Saraswat Brahmin (a caste from Western India including Goa, where the Portuguese only allowed native Christians of Brahmin origin to be Roman Catholic priests).
Sikhs have castes mirroring Hindu castes, even though their religion is explicitly against the caste system.
Indian Muslims have a different caste system, with people claiming an Arab, Persian and Turkish ancestor (and sometimes people of high-caste Hindu origin), at the top, and people of Dalit origin at the bottom.
I'm not Indian so can't speak to that experience but discrimination masquerading as "culture fit" is just as rampant in Silicon Valley as it is in the rest of the US. This includes racism, ageism, misogyny and classism. If you don't think MIT/Stanford grads in their mid 20s at Big Tech companies have more doors open to them you're crazy.
There is a tendency in the West to view all minorities as somehow being the same. Like all Africans are somehow viewed the same in many ways despite their being significant cultural, religious and language differences that go back centuries. The same is true in Asia (eg a lot of Chinese in Malaysia face significant discrimination such that they end up going to university overseas because they can't locally).
So a deeply ingrained caste system like India's I can totally believe doesn't magically disappear because those raised in that system now happen to live and work in the United States.
Is unique to the West? Do people in Asia distinguish one European from another? How about in Africa?
Of course they have more doors open to them. They went to a good school and worked at a well known company.
This is why remote work is so important, the politics of the office and "culture" is more about delivery with remote over internal politics. Remote work emphasizes the external view over the internal view which is always skewed in office environments. Remote work opens up a broader market of workers and can flow with life changes of employees easier like a move, families or travel.
We all do lots of remote already to everyone outside the office. Most communication is virtual now even within the same company, across offices in different areas and most importantly, to the customer of the product. The external view is most important, always. Remote can help automatically focus on external perception over internal perception. Remote work can minimize the weight of office politics and "culture".
Another legacy area we need to change is removing health insurance from the job. We don't get our home/auto/life insurance through work and it would be a pain if we did, imagine changing all that on jobs. Contracting or entrepreneurship helps to get your own benefits for healthcare and it is truly a better way. Health insurance removed from the job will help businesses compete with countries that do have public options or private markets not connected to the employer, allow workers more freedom to change jobs, allow people to start jobs easier and isn't constantly a hassle. Getting healthcare on your own or not requiring it to be business level is both pro-business and pro-worker. It also can fix pricing as the customer is now individuals/families not employers, all we need to do is group similar to Medicare groups. Right now grouping is based on the company and this puts sole/small/medium companies at a disadvantage in pricing.
Is there? While my experience comes from living in a cosmopolitan border town, it is hard to imagine anyone seriously lumping Asians in with Africans, short of the outright rascists raging against "immigrants"
This is not true (very easy to prove it’s false) and I’d question the intent of who taught you this - it’s the kind of method religions/cults/political parties use to indoctrinate.
I think it's because the news and the politicians view them in categories of demographic, then report on that demographic. I've lived in the South and always think it's funny when people say they should "punish the South," by withholding funds for whatever reason, apparently not realizing the South has the largest Black population in the US by far. Of course if funds are ever withheld, that large black population would also be punished, because they are also southerners. This is pertinent because southerners and blacks are pretty large minority demographics in the US that politicians try to garner favor with.
Societies are complex. It seems like a lot of people want to blurt out the first simple answer that comes out of their noggin.
I've always said, when you see some kind of "obvious" discrimination going on in an organization -- sex, age, race, caste, whatever -- I almost guarantee that's manifesting in some other ways as well.
By that logic, bigfoot, UFO's and the Loch Ness monster all exist.
Now, the resentments on this affirmative action (Ambedkar, who is highlighted in the passage, originally wrote that the AA will be for a period of 5 years, but has since been used as a vote bank tool) are plenty and some, IMV, are justified.
One is that the current and previous generations, have seen very limited caste discriminations. Sure, events happen in a country as big and varied as India, but generally, caste based discriminations have been subdued, and mostly pushed back to silent and invisible forms (social interactions, marriages, friendships, etc). The current and previous generation kids, have hardly seen any caste based discrimination due to various reasons. It also helps that a section of political leaders are from the backward and other castes.
What this brings about is the feeling of unfair punishment. A kid who is in high school now, who has friends from all walks of life, of many castes and religions (In my schooling, with high school ending in 2003, I never once bothered about caste and religion, as it was never a point of discussion) will write an exam for bagging a seat in a good college or university. Then he will discover, that the same friend who has been with him for all these years, has a similar lifestyle as him, goes everywhere he goes, does everything he does, is eligible for a seat with a lower cut-off score, buoyed by additional mandatory allotment of seats.
From the perspective of the kid, he works hard and sincerely, only to be snubbed because his forefathers have insulted some castes in their days.
What would you tell him?
Two, the benefits of AA have not percolated throughout the society. Those who have benefitted from the initial steps, have risen to wealth and power, and continue to get the benefits, while those who really need help, often do not get it.
Also, after 200 years of British occupation, India was left penniless. Couple that with decades of socialist policies, wealth generation was low and slow. This results in a huge section of population being poor. And this includes all castes and creeds.
I often see negative and insulting remarks on Brahmins (considered the "highest" caste), and often they are blamed for all evils of caste discrimination (whereas, discrimination has been in the society from all sections and even within castes). However, presently, a majority of brahmins are poor or middle class.
In this scenario, the only escape those who do not belong to the AA castes, is to move abroad in search of better opportunities.
All this caste based drama in SV and elsewhere is the result of that feeling of unfair punishment.
Romania has a considerable group of such people. The Gipsy (also know as Romani) are an Indian people that are thought to have been part of a caste and fled India hundreds of years ago. To this day they cant lift themselves up, and frankly the government of Romania is not doing much at all. To call it an injustice it would he an understatement.
There is a strong evidence that they might have been driven away by the Islamic invasions, because their timelines coincide.
I'm an upper caste indian and here's my experience looking for an apartment to rent in Chennai, India, in around the year 2000. I was repeatedly asked by potential-landlords if I was a brahmin (I'm not), and told they couldn't rent to me if I wasn't. It was my first trip to Chennai (I'm from the north), and I am pretty sure it's illegal to openly ask a potential tenant if they're a brahmin. But there was simply nothing I could do about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._R._Ambedkar
Jurist economist academic politician social reformer anthropologist writer
Sorry if it is an unsatisfying critique of America but its obvious. Go look at the wealth data, look who is thriving and has net worth or success in business.
Carry down that line of thought and you might fall into all sorts of nonsense. Note things like Pope Gregory (n?) saw a pair of slaves in a market in Rome in the n00s. These two were picked up from somewhere that would eventually become part of England/GB. He was told they were Angles. The story goes he quipped that they were "surely Angels" due to their physique and long blonde hair. Part of England is known as Anglia still and of course England itself is "Angleland".
It seems a bit odd that, that anecdote and play on words survives a good 1500 years during which time English has gone through three major stages (old/middle/modern). However you can easily posit from that story that Britons were also enslaved, if you very carefully define "Briton"!
Anyway, my point is that you can't really use terms like american slavery. History can't be stuffed into boxes like that with pejorative terms scattered like confetti.
The caste system being discussed here is nominally an indian sub continent thing and way older in origin than the slavery employed around C17th onwards with the horrendous triangle of trade.