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Comment by _fat_santa | Hacker News Reader

I don't know why Google (or really all the tech companies in SV) aren't taking this far more seriously. I feel like it opens them up to lawsuits and with the weight they hold, a company like Google can easily institute a zero tolerance policy against it. Send a message that if you do this, you're getting kicked to the curb.

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Caste is not a protected class in US employment law. Arguably there might be a basis for a suit if you could show that it reasonably projects onto an existing protected class, but it's not clear to me that you could.

Not to say that this is authoritative, but an article in the Harvard Law Review argues that "caste discrimination is a type of racial discrimination, religious discrimination, and national origin discrimination — all covered under Title VII".

Nonetheless, my hunch is that legal or not legal, this kind of discrimination would be extremely unpalatable to most Americans across the political spectrum.

https://harvardlawreview.org/2021/06/title-vii-and-caste-dis...

An ongoing lawsuit against Cisco claims that caste discrimination is a form of national origin discrimination. Cisco's attempts to throw out the lawsuit on the grounds that caste discrimination isn't illegal were unsuccessful. There's a good shot that a judge will rule that caste discrimination is covered by national origin discrimination.

I'm optimistic but that could also open the door to many more lawsuits where someone felt prejudiced because of what side of town they grew up on or what state they are from.

Having an Indian CEO makes Google a lightning rod for this discussion. You are right to suggest that it needs to be taken more seriously at all tech companies.

I am ashamed to say I did not have an appreciation for its perniciousness when one employee from India made caste-based comments about another one, a decade ago, in my presence.

>I don't know why Google (or really all the tech companies in SV) aren't taking this far more seriously

The CEO of Google being a Brahmin is a pretty good reason. Either (1) he knows there's discrimination but he won't pursue because it calls into question his own legitimacy or (2) having risen through the ranks since 2004 as a Brahmin he knows there's no real problem with discrimination.

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