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I would be interested in hearing the perspective of any HN readers who are of south Asian background and working in America. Statements that tech companies in

I would be interested in hearing the perspective of any HN readers who are of south Asian background and working in America. Statements that tech companies in the US have caste discrimination (or reverse discrimination) for South Asians who work there, are hard for me (an Anglo-American) to judge, seeing as if it were happening (either way) there's little chance I would have noticed it.

Beltalowda 4y ago
I remember a lively discussion last year (not sure which one) where several Indian developers living in the SF area said they experienced discrimination, but also many reporting they did not. I have no idea who is "right" here; I'm neither Indian nor living in the US. But I will add a general comment: experiencing discrimination is not the same thing as being discriminated. For example, let's say I – as a man – have a disagreement with a female coworker, and maybe I'm a bit of an asshole about it. She might genuinely feel discriminated, belittled, man-splained, or whatever you want to call it. It might be I'm doing this because she's a woman and that she's right, or I might just be having a bad day, or I might be an asshole to everyone I disagree with, or I might just have accidentally phrased things in a bad way. This is a big problem; there have been a few cases where this actually happened and people accused me of being racist or sexist, usually online. Sometimes I could have phrased things a little bit better maybe, but I sure didn't do it because of someone's identity. People will say it's due to "subconscious bias", but I find that's what the kids nowadays call "gaslighting". Maybe subconscious bias exists and influences people's behaviour in significant ways (not so sure it does, but that's a different discussion), but all but one of the times it happened I wasn't even aware who I was talking to until they "outed" themselves when accusing me of discrimination. To be clear: no doubt discrimination happens in various ways for various people, but in many instances it can be really hard to say if a specific incident is an instance of it, of if it's due to other reasons. This is problematic because 1) it makes it very hard to actually do something about (systemic) discrimination because you can't punish/fine people easily, but also 2) people will still genuinely feel discriminated against even if there is no actual (or very little) discrimination happening (or is no longer happening). To be clear: I'm not "accusing" those people of "making things up" or anything like that, I really believe that almost all people report genuine feelings and experiences. As one of those white male types I have it easy: if someone is an asshole to me I can fairly safely assume that person is an asshole to me on account of just being an asshole, but for some other groups this can be a lot harder, either due to current or historical discrimination. My point is that experiences aren't everything when it comes to these kind of topics, no matter how honest and genuine. They're also not worthless, and some experiences do describe clear-cut cases, but in general I'm careful.
dubswithus 4y ago
I don't know if you're aware of this, so I'm going to link it. https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/01/tech/cisco-lawsuit-caste-discrimination/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/01/tech/cisco-lawsuit-caste-...
guerrilla 4y ago
Check the comments on the last post about this talk cancellation for a lot of that [1] and then check the search, this topic has been discussed a few times before. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31593799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31593799 [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?q=caste https://hn.algolia.com/?q=caste
rayiner 4y ago
I'm Bangladeshi, rather than Indian, so I'm watching this from the sidelines. That being said, I'm of the opinion that activists suck up all the oxygen when it comes to discussions of race in the U.S. A Pew poll a few years ago noted that 90% of Indian Americans think discrimination against Indian Americans in America is a "minor problem" or "no problem at all": https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/16/miss-america-pageant-puts-indian-americans-in-the-spotlight https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/16/miss-americ.... But the 10% that think it's a big problem get the biggest platforms. In reality, it's probably impossible to understand how big or small a problem caste discrimination really is in context. The folks who don't face any negative experiences mostly aren't going to pipe up.
- kajecounterhack 4y ago
  > the 10% that think it's a big problem get the biggest platforms. Don't you think this might have something to do with the representation of low caste Indians in the US, and that they have to be their own advocates? Minorities have to make disproportional noise to get issues that affect them to be heard to the same degree as others. That's just how it is, otherwise our systems would always only advocate for the majority and every single minority would group would be systemically disadvantaged.
  - newsclues 4y ago
    - jamiek88 4y ago
      This is not engaging seriously with OP, the argument or indeed this forum.
    - kajecounterhack 4y ago
      Way to paint with a broad brush. So every climate activist is a bitter loser? Would you consider Martin Luther King Jr. to be a bitter loser?
  - 4y ago
belltaco 4y ago
I am one and I have never seen anything casteist in the US, for what it's worth. I have been friends with and worked closely with dozens of people with Indian bosses all the way up to CEOs, who would have mentioned or confided such discrimination, and have come across exactly zero instances of caste being an issue. In fact, no one even discusses someone's else caste and most of the time no one knows others' caste, except some guesses from last names or whether someone is vegetarian or not. Many lower caste people in India converted to Christianity and they've been treated really well(as friends, coworkers, being hired by other Indians) as far I as can tell. Same with Muslim Indians who are also quite a sizeable number both back home and here. The only time it ever came up for discussion is in the context of someone's parents in India preferring their own caste folks as brides/grooms for arranged marriages back home(similar to the very high rates of race discrimination in dating in the US) and even that has trended down a lot recently with everyone becoming more progressive. My sense is that there are isolated cases here and there, and that it's not systemic, and that it's also rapidly getting better with time both back home and with 2nd generation immigrants in the US.
- fartcannon 4y ago
  Anecdotally, I hear about it all the time from my Indian friends.
- kajecounterhack 4y ago
  Just curious, for your personal experience do you know the caste distribution of your indian friends? I too haven't seen much of anything casteist at work or among my friends, but I'm not discounting that it exists and potentially at larger scale than I've personally experienced especially since almost all my friends are brahmins or the caste right below that. You'd have to have a large enough sample of low-caste friends to really understand the experience of low-caste individuals.
  - javajosh 4y ago
    - 4y ago
robinsoh 4y ago
> are hard for me (an Anglo-American) to judge, seeing as if it were happening (either way) there's little chance I would have noticed it. That's an interesting comment. "little chance I would have noticed it." . I found this NYT article that pointed out we've long had our own caste system that we don't seem to notice. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/magazine/isabel-wilkerson-caste.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/magazine/isabel-wilkerson... " a caste system with ancient rules and assumptions that made such a horror possible, that held each actor in that scene in its grip. Off camera, two other men in uniform, who looked like the lighter man, were holding down the darker man from the other side of the police car as dusk approached in Minneapolis. Yet another man in uniform, of Asian descent and thus not in the dominant caste, stood near, watching, immobilized, it seemed, at a remove from his own humanity and potential common cause, as the darker man slipped out of consciousness. We soon learned that the man on the ground, George Floyd, had been accused of trying to pass a counterfeit $20 bill, and, like uncountable Black men over the centuries, lost his life over what might have been a mere citation for people in the dominant caste. "
- barry-cotter 4y ago
  If you don’t know what caste is you are under no obligation to take part in a discussion about it. You can just sit it out.
  - robinsoh 4y ago
    > If you don’t know what caste is you are under no obligation to take part in a discussion about it. You can just sit it out. It is unclear what you're trying to communicate. Would you like to clarify? Are you saying I don't know what caste is?
    - barry-cotter 4y ago
      Yes. Anyone who finds a comment analogising race in America to caste in India insightful knows nothing about caste.
      - 4y ago
bergenty 4y ago
In my opinion, publicizing the apparent discrimination does more to propagate it than get rid of it. The right way is to get successful as a group and change perceptions based on pure success numbers.
- eutropia 4y ago
  I'll make the analogy clear: systemically oppressed people should just pull themselves up by their bootstraps and stop complaining (because it just makes it worse for themselves). This is a classic American argument.
  - bergenty 4y ago
    It’s a different time. Relevant strategies now probably wouldn’t have worked at a different time in history.
- hfhdbsnsnc 4y ago
  This sounds a lot like "those guys are so lazy! That's why they got all those problems"
  - bergenty 4y ago
    Except they’re not lazy, all the Indians here in the US are very successful and the distinction all but disappears within one generation because it becomes impossible to tell apart castes when everyone starts speaking with an American accent and has American mannerisms. It’s just a matter of keeping on and letting the problems solve themselves. I don’t think you can use the same strategies that work with other minority groups in the US.
paxys 4y ago
The vast, vast majority of South Asians working in tech jobs in the USA will say that caste based discrimination isn't a real problem here. While it may be true, also remember that you are talking to the cream of the crop of Indian society. The same category of people living in India (say techies in Bangalore) would say that such discrimination isn't a huge problem over there either, but they are also the ones who have benefited from the system their entire lives. Talk to the people cleaning their toilets and it'll be a very different story.
- setr 4y ago
  …but then it still wouldn’t be a problem of discrimination in the US; it’d be a problem in India. The ultimate question is whether that discrimination gets carried forward into the US and continues to be executed here; not whether caste-discrimination happens somewhere in the world
  - paxys 4y ago
    Inherent biases don't automatically disappear when someone gets on a plane and crosses some borders. Even more so when such discrimination isn't illegal here like it is back home and isn't part of corporate policy or any training material. There are enough reports and even lawsuits of such practices in Silicon Valley: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/10/27/indian-caste-bias-silicon-valley/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/10/27/indian-... https://www.npr.org/transcripts/923736245 https://www.npr.org/transcripts/923736245 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-03-11/how-big-tech-is-importing-india-s-caste-legacy-to-silicon-valley https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-03-11/how-big-t... https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cisco-lawsuit/california-accuses-cisco-of-job-discrimination-based-on-indian-employees-caste-idUSKBN2423YE https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cisco-lawsuit/california-...
    - belltaco 4y ago
      From the WaPo article: >Devesh Kapur, a professor of South Asian studies at Johns Hopkins University, found that in 2003, only 1.5 percent of Indian immigrants in the United States were Dalits or members of the lower-ranked castes. >Dalit engineers said that most Indian workers from upper castes do not seem aware of their caste privilege and believe caste bias is a thing of the past, despite the fact that high-profile tech CEOs and board members, such as Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Amazon board member Indra Nooyi, the former CEO of Pepsi, are Brahmins, or members of the highest caste. What does this even mean? With 1.5% of Indians in the US, just with the probability of numbers, why would anyone expect a high profile CEO out of two examples to be a lower caste Indian? And also with those examples they seem to be implying that Americans are casteist? How does the ladder of managers who decide promotions look like at, say, Pepsi? Were they all Indians that are holding the other 1.5% of Indians from rising up to the level of CEO of Pepsi?
croddin 4y ago
What is the distribution of castes in South Asia vs South Asians that have moved to the United States? Are those of a higher caste more likely to be able to come to the U.S. in the first place or do people of a lower caste move to escape the caste system?
- ramraj07 4y ago
  Absolutely. At least from Tamil Nadu (which alongside its neighboring state accounts for pretty much every famous Indian tech guy you might know) 30-40% (my rough estimate) of highly skilled immigrants would be Brahmin, the high caste. It’s interesting why this happens, the people in this caste have to work harder to get Higher education due to quotas biased against them, and they’re not necessarily more well off either. It’s probably a mix of a focus on education and excellence in their families that compels the children to aspire this way, alongside a community that encourages this as well I suppose. Sad that recent decade has started to radicalize more and more of them (and other castes) due to a religious fanatic government among other things, I would have loved to understand more about what caused the extraordinary success of this community in producing this many talented individuals (like the Hungarian Jewish population did before WWII).
- thwy_castech 4y ago
  There are different immigrant clusters around geography and industry. E.g. South indians are a majority in the Tech industry in the Bay Area, Punjabi migrants from North India work in more working class jobs - as taxi/Uber drivers and 7/11 or convenience stores clerks. And the Patel caste from the western state of Gujarat are known for their presence in the motel industry. Based on my non-scientific observation of looking at the 300+ Indian origin folks in my LinkedIn profile, the upper castes are likely 60%, though they make up 10-15% of the population in India. The "middle" castes a. k. a Other Backward Castes or the so called merchant castes make up the remaining 35% and likely are 30% of the Indian population.
mogambo_khush 4y ago
Its obvious to me that the Brahmins are a fraternity and dominate office politics. They have many centuries of administrative experience to draw from. (refer historical text books Chanakya Neeti, Aarthashastra etc) If you go head to head with one of these guys in the office, expect to lose. They occupy CEO positions in Google, Microsoft, and 100 other big companies, and their inner circle of top lieutenants too. This is partly due to capabilities and partly due to 2000+ years of being the managerial class, inherited by birth.
lifeplusplus 4y ago
There is huge discrimination between upper and lower castes, I wasn't aware of it until I actually discussed this with an indian friend because of some news, he basically said society needs people to clean and labor work if they weren't to do it who would do it. I was mind blown to find out my life long friend was secretly equivalent of kkk member. And he saw nothing wrong with it. Upper caste people infact treat other religions/races better than the lower caste. Good luck preventing this discrimination in hiring if company isn't actively caring about this. Name is enough to revel what cast you are part of. Many companies take great measures in creating diversity in hiring boards/committees but completely ignore regional discriminations that can exist within same race of people based on dialect, culture, religion sect, cast, or whatever historical reasons there are. They care so much about unconscious biases yet introduce people with active biases in the name of diversity and defeating the whole point. You can see this in large offices, during lunch certain indians will hangout with non-indians than other indians it's because they are seen as inferior by their fellow country men. Biases I've noticed: Chinese have positive bias toward whites Chinese have strong positive bias toward other chinese Chinese have slight negative bias toward indian Chinese have strong negative bias toward blacks Indians have strong negative bias toward lower caste Indians have moderate negative bias toward muslims/pakistan Indians have positive bias toward white White women have positive bias toward black White women have negative bias toward white men White men have strong positive bias toward other white men White men have positive bias toward asian White men are neutral toward chinese, hispanic, indian, pakistan... White men have slight negative bias toward older women ========= not enough personal data points to tell about muslims, hispanics, black and other groups and subgroups. you can see this dynamic play out during lunch, in voting, and other various social interactions.
lettergram 4y ago
The fact you believe you can’t assess realities such as racism because your a particular race is a super strange concept. Can you assess reality? We all assume you can, sure you may not experience it directly, but you can just as easily observe. The level of sexism and racism I see on a daily basis in tech is mind-boggling. I’ve been in trainings (multiple), in fortune 100 companies (multiple), where white men were asked to apologize for the sins of other white people hundreds of years ago. I’ve been in trainings where pictures of brains were put on screens and little sections were pointed at as the “racist” part of the brain. That’s, exactly what racists did (great scene in django unchained https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2prpdjkDIO8 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2prpdjkDIO8). Is there racism against Asians absolutely, all people have bias and it’ll have an impact in particular situations. The reality, is the focus on “women in tech” and “racism” is largely unnecessary and is leading to the caste system mentioned. If you look at the office as “oppressed” and “oppressors” and do that based on race, you’re the racist. That’s what’s happening everywhere and frankly I know tens of people who have left these companies because of it.
- bobobob420 4y ago
  This is crazy if true. sorry you got downvoted for providing your experience. The way I see it is if the behaviour is possible (some people will do it). It is upto the company to ensure those people are thrown out and not allowed back in.
thwy_castech 4y ago
I'm an Indian immigrant working in a large Bay Area Tech company and caste is definitely a thing. At another tech company I worked at the CTO and everyone under him i.e 4/6 VPs was Brahmin. An anecdote - I tried to get a position in the CTO organization and the first question his underling asked me was my full name. Now, corporate email already has your first and last name but he was fishing for my "caste" name. He also wanted to know were my parents were from. Now it's possible he wanted to find some common ground, but for people who are not from the upper castes and part of the inner circle. You don't know, if this question is going to be used to give you less preferential treatment. I'm not saying the majority of upper caste folks discriminate, in fact I got my first job due to someone who was upper caste referring me. But there definitely are some bad apples. Based on my off the cuff discussion with other Indians, they've definitely noticed preferential treatment within Brahmins and certain upper castes especially when they make up the vast majority of the workforce (80%+)
- xxxyz 4y ago
  How did you know upper management caste? I find quite a few Indians have been using their fathers name as their lastname. Did you go by caste or color of skin to make the determination.
  - thwy_castech 4y ago
    In this particular case I knew because we're all from the same state. The Brahmins from the state wear a sacred thread, and on occasions will smear ash on their foreheads in a particular pattern. One would wear the thread visibly outside his shirt. You can also know based on the last name, skin tone (very light compared to other South indians) and office gossip fills in the rest. One of the VPs mentioned his caste in an after hours drinks party once, I was amused but not shocked.
    - snovv_crash 4y ago
      Just curious, what stops Indians from faking a different caste? Wear the thread, smear the ash, get a name change, use sunblock if you'll be in the sun, and suddenly by choice you are a Brahmin? What am I missing?
bobobob420 4y ago
I have never seen it. I am not suprised if it happens. Usually the same type of character that would do something like sexual discrimination or weird shit that is more common with bad white managers would be the same type to do this to lower caste. Anyways this type of mentality is on its way out anyways. The fact that is happens at google is quite suprising cause you would expect higher standards
sfifs 4y ago
Yes caste discrimination exists to various extants. You may not have seen it as most people who come abroad as professionals are "higher" castes who were historically economically and educationally privileged though this is changing slowly - not unlike how the impact of slavery and segregation is still quite obvious in people of color communities in the US. Surnames and to a much lesser extent skin color/facial features indicate caste quite easily to people who have grown up in India. Often castes / surnames were historically also linked to professions which followed down family. In fact in early medeival Europe too surnames historically indicated profession (Smith, Wright, Cooper, Ward, Chamberlain, Shoemaker...) but I believe the major labor shortage and dislocations caused by the black death and frequent warfare requiring conscription across all social classes pretty much ended any likelihood of social rigidity coming out of this. It will be interesting to see though how the capital and political power accumulation by the wealthier Americans plays out over the next few centuries. In India, the way society developed was to restrict warfare largely to be carried out by certain upper castes and for most of the society, it didn't really matter who the ruling king was - at least until late medieval periods when proselytization started with Islamic invasion. So the caste system developed into something deep rooted, pernicious and divisive. Interestingly in India, while Christianity and Islam don't have castes in theory, in practice it is commonly observed that their adherents too observe such distinctions which tells you how deep rooted the problem is. Specifically to the community of the activist, the Dalits were actually considered to be "people with no caste" historically and were treated as "untouchables". Very likely they were the people who got the wrong side of the stick during the Aryan invasion ~3000 years ago which forms the basis of much of Hindu culture though there are obvious deep rooted integrations from the pre-existing pre-invasion culture (Shiva, Durga etc..) likely from the people who were integrated into the Aryan society. You don't really see "untouchability" today especially in urban largely as a result of efforts of freedom movement era social reformers like Gandhi and Ambedkar followed by "vote bank politics" in the nascent democracy. Some communities also stopped using surnames. However i still recall when we were very young, our great grand parents generation still observed some of the discriminatory structures. So it has taken a couple of generations to get rid of untouchability - ie parents who saw discrimination as children but don't practice it raising children who understand it but haven't seen it raising kids who only know of it intellectually). It will probably take a couple more to eliminate caste discrimination but we are half way there.
sfifs 4y ago
Yes caste discrimination exists to various extants. You may not have seen it as most people who come abroad as professionals are "higher" castes who were historically economically and educationally privileged though this is changing slowly - not unlike how the impact of slavery and segregation is still quite obvious in people of color communities in the US. Surnames and to a much lesser extent skin color/facial features indicate caste quite easily to people who have grown up in India. Often castes / surnames were historically also linked to professions which followed down family. In fact in early medeival Europe too surnames historically indicated profession (Smith, Wright, Cooper, Ward, Chamberlain, Shoemaker...) but I believe the major labor shortage and dislocations caused by the black death and frequent warfare requiring conscription across all social classes pretty much ended any likelihood of social rigidity coming out of this. It will be interesting to see though how the capital and political power accumulation by the wealthier Americans plays out over the next few centuries. In India, the way society developed was to restrict warfare largely to be carried out by certain upper castes and for most of the society, it didn't really matter who the ruling king was - at least until late medieval periods when proselytization started with Islamic invasion. So the caste system developed into something deep rooted, pernicious and divisive. Interestingly in India, while Christianity and Islam don't have castes in theory, in practice it is commonly observed that their adherents too observe such distinctions which tells you how deep rooted the problem is. Specifically to the community of the activist, the Dalits were actually considered to be "people with no caste" historically and were treated as "untouchables". Very likely they were the people who got the wrong side of the stick during the Aryan invasion ~3000 years ago which forms the basis of much of Hindu culture though there are obvious deep rooted integrations from the pre-existing pre-invasion culture (Shiva, Durga etc..) likely from the people who were integrated into the Aryan society. You don't really see "untouchability" today especially in urban largely as a result of efforts of freedom movement era social reformers like Gandhi and Ambedkar followed by "vote bank politics" in the nascent democracy. Some communities also stopped using surnames. However i still recall when we were very young, our great grand parents generation still observed some of the discriminatory structures. So it has taken a couple of generations to get rid of untouchability - ie parents who saw discrimination as children but don't practice it raising children who understand it but haven't seen it raising kids who only know of it intellectually). It will probably take a couple more to eliminate caste discrimination but we are half way there
thewileyone 4y ago
I've worked with Indian nationals outside of America and I can confirm that this problem exists for them as well; I'm not Indian btw.

Beltalowda 4y ago

I remember a lively discussion last year (not sure which one) where several Indian developers living in the SF area said they experienced discrimination, but also many reporting they did not. I have no idea who is "right" here; I'm neither Indian nor living in the US. But I will add a general comment: experiencing discrimination is not the same thing as being discriminated. For example, let's say I – as a man – have a disagreement with a female coworker, and maybe I'm a bit of an asshole about it. She might genuinely feel discriminated, belittled, man-splained, or whatever you want to call it. It might be I'm doing this because she's a woman and that she's right, or I might just be having a bad day, or I might be an asshole to everyone I disagree with, or I might just have accidentally phrased things in a bad way. This is a big problem; there have been a few cases where this actually happened and people accused me of being racist or sexist, usually online. Sometimes I could have phrased things a little bit better maybe, but I sure didn't do it because of someone's identity. People will say it's due to "subconscious bias", but I find that's what the kids nowadays call "gaslighting". Maybe subconscious bias exists and influences people's behaviour in significant ways (not so sure it does, but that's a different discussion), but all but one of the times it happened I wasn't even aware who I was talking to until they "outed" themselves when accusing me of discrimination. To be clear: no doubt discrimination happens in various ways for various people, but in many instances it can be really hard to say if a specific incident is an instance of it, of if it's due to other reasons. This is problematic because 1) it makes it very hard to actually do something about (systemic) discrimination because you can't punish/fine people easily, but also 2) people will still genuinely feel discriminated against even if there is no actual (or very little) discrimination happening (or is no longer happening). To be clear: I'm not "accusing" those people of "making things up" or anything like that, I really believe that almost all people report genuine feelings and experiences. As one of those white male types I have it easy: if someone is an asshole to me I can fairly safely assume that person is an asshole to me on account of just being an asshole, but for some other groups this can be a lot harder, either due to current or historical discrimination. My point is that experiences aren't everything when it comes to these kind of topics, no matter how honest and genuine. They're also not worthless, and some experiences do describe clear-cut cases, but in general I'm careful.

dubswithus 4y ago

I don't know if you're aware of this, so I'm going to link it. https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/01/tech/cisco-lawsuit-caste-discrimination/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/01/tech/cisco-lawsuit-caste-...

guerrilla 4y ago

Check the comments on the last post about this talk cancellation for a lot of that [1] and then check the search, this topic has been discussed a few times before. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31593799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31593799 [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?q=caste https://hn.algolia.com/?q=caste

rayiner 4y ago

I'm Bangladeshi, rather than Indian, so I'm watching this from the sidelines. That being said, I'm of the opinion that activists suck up all the oxygen when it comes to discussions of race in the U.S. A Pew poll a few years ago noted that 90% of Indian Americans think discrimination against Indian Americans in America is a "minor problem" or "no problem at all": https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/16/miss-america-pageant-puts-indian-americans-in-the-spotlight https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/16/miss-americ.... But the 10% that think it's a big problem get the biggest platforms. In reality, it's probably impossible to understand how big or small a problem caste discrimination really is in context. The folks who don't face any negative experiences mostly aren't going to pipe up.

kajecounterhack 4y ago
> the 10% that think it's a big problem get the biggest platforms. Don't you think this might have something to do with the representation of low caste Indians in the US, and that they have to be their own advocates? Minorities have to make disproportional noise to get issues that affect them to be heard to the same degree as others. That's just how it is, otherwise our systems would always only advocate for the majority and every single minority would group would be systemically disadvantaged.
- newsclues 4y ago
  - jamiek88 4y ago
    This is not engaging seriously with OP, the argument or indeed this forum.
  - kajecounterhack 4y ago
    Way to paint with a broad brush. So every climate activist is a bitter loser? Would you consider Martin Luther King Jr. to be a bitter loser?
- 4y ago

belltaco 4y ago

I am one and I have never seen anything casteist in the US, for what it's worth. I have been friends with and worked closely with dozens of people with Indian bosses all the way up to CEOs, who would have mentioned or confided such discrimination, and have come across exactly zero instances of caste being an issue. In fact, no one even discusses someone's else caste and most of the time no one knows others' caste, except some guesses from last names or whether someone is vegetarian or not. Many lower caste people in India converted to Christianity and they've been treated really well(as friends, coworkers, being hired by other Indians) as far I as can tell. Same with Muslim Indians who are also quite a sizeable number both back home and here. The only time it ever came up for discussion is in the context of someone's parents in India preferring their own caste folks as brides/grooms for arranged marriages back home(similar to the very high rates of race discrimination in dating in the US) and even that has trended down a lot recently with everyone becoming more progressive. My sense is that there are isolated cases here and there, and that it's not systemic, and that it's also rapidly getting better with time both back home and with 2nd generation immigrants in the US.

fartcannon 4y ago
Anecdotally, I hear about it all the time from my Indian friends.
kajecounterhack 4y ago
Just curious, for your personal experience do you know the caste distribution of your indian friends? I too haven't seen much of anything casteist at work or among my friends, but I'm not discounting that it exists and potentially at larger scale than I've personally experienced especially since almost all my friends are brahmins or the caste right below that. You'd have to have a large enough sample of low-caste friends to really understand the experience of low-caste individuals.
- javajosh 4y ago
  - 4y ago

robinsoh 4y ago

> are hard for me (an Anglo-American) to judge, seeing as if it were happening (either way) there's little chance I would have noticed it. That's an interesting comment. "little chance I would have noticed it." . I found this NYT article that pointed out we've long had our own caste system that we don't seem to notice. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/magazine/isabel-wilkerson-caste.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/magazine/isabel-wilkerson... " a caste system with ancient rules and assumptions that made such a horror possible, that held each actor in that scene in its grip. Off camera, two other men in uniform, who looked like the lighter man, were holding down the darker man from the other side of the police car as dusk approached in Minneapolis. Yet another man in uniform, of Asian descent and thus not in the dominant caste, stood near, watching, immobilized, it seemed, at a remove from his own humanity and potential common cause, as the darker man slipped out of consciousness. We soon learned that the man on the ground, George Floyd, had been accused of trying to pass a counterfeit $20 bill, and, like uncountable Black men over the centuries, lost his life over what might have been a mere citation for people in the dominant caste. "

barry-cotter 4y ago
If you don’t know what caste is you are under no obligation to take part in a discussion about it. You can just sit it out.
- robinsoh 4y ago
  > If you don’t know what caste is you are under no obligation to take part in a discussion about it. You can just sit it out. It is unclear what you're trying to communicate. Would you like to clarify? Are you saying I don't know what caste is?
  - barry-cotter 4y ago
    Yes. Anyone who finds a comment analogising race in America to caste in India insightful knows nothing about caste.
    - 4y ago

bergenty 4y ago

In my opinion, publicizing the apparent discrimination does more to propagate it than get rid of it. The right way is to get successful as a group and change perceptions based on pure success numbers.

eutropia 4y ago
I'll make the analogy clear: systemically oppressed people should just pull themselves up by their bootstraps and stop complaining (because it just makes it worse for themselves). This is a classic American argument.
- bergenty 4y ago
  It’s a different time. Relevant strategies now probably wouldn’t have worked at a different time in history.
hfhdbsnsnc 4y ago
This sounds a lot like "those guys are so lazy! That's why they got all those problems"
- bergenty 4y ago
  Except they’re not lazy, all the Indians here in the US are very successful and the distinction all but disappears within one generation because it becomes impossible to tell apart castes when everyone starts speaking with an American accent and has American mannerisms. It’s just a matter of keeping on and letting the problems solve themselves. I don’t think you can use the same strategies that work with other minority groups in the US.

paxys 4y ago

The vast, vast majority of South Asians working in tech jobs in the USA will say that caste based discrimination isn't a real problem here. While it may be true, also remember that you are talking to the cream of the crop of Indian society. The same category of people living in India (say techies in Bangalore) would say that such discrimination isn't a huge problem over there either, but they are also the ones who have benefited from the system their entire lives. Talk to the people cleaning their toilets and it'll be a very different story.

setr 4y ago
…but then it still wouldn’t be a problem of discrimination in the US; it’d be a problem in India. The ultimate question is whether that discrimination gets carried forward into the US and continues to be executed here; not whether caste-discrimination happens somewhere in the world
- paxys 4y ago
  Inherent biases don't automatically disappear when someone gets on a plane and crosses some borders. Even more so when such discrimination isn't illegal here like it is back home and isn't part of corporate policy or any training material. There are enough reports and even lawsuits of such practices in Silicon Valley: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/10/27/indian-caste-bias-silicon-valley/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/10/27/indian-... https://www.npr.org/transcripts/923736245 https://www.npr.org/transcripts/923736245 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-03-11/how-big-tech-is-importing-india-s-caste-legacy-to-silicon-valley https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-03-11/how-big-t... https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cisco-lawsuit/california-accuses-cisco-of-job-discrimination-based-on-indian-employees-caste-idUSKBN2423YE https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cisco-lawsuit/california-...
  - belltaco 4y ago
    From the WaPo article: >Devesh Kapur, a professor of South Asian studies at Johns Hopkins University, found that in 2003, only 1.5 percent of Indian immigrants in the United States were Dalits or members of the lower-ranked castes. >Dalit engineers said that most Indian workers from upper castes do not seem aware of their caste privilege and believe caste bias is a thing of the past, despite the fact that high-profile tech CEOs and board members, such as Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Amazon board member Indra Nooyi, the former CEO of Pepsi, are Brahmins, or members of the highest caste. What does this even mean? With 1.5% of Indians in the US, just with the probability of numbers, why would anyone expect a high profile CEO out of two examples to be a lower caste Indian? And also with those examples they seem to be implying that Americans are casteist? How does the ladder of managers who decide promotions look like at, say, Pepsi? Were they all Indians that are holding the other 1.5% of Indians from rising up to the level of CEO of Pepsi?

croddin 4y ago

What is the distribution of castes in South Asia vs South Asians that have moved to the United States? Are those of a higher caste more likely to be able to come to the U.S. in the first place or do people of a lower caste move to escape the caste system?

ramraj07 4y ago
Absolutely. At least from Tamil Nadu (which alongside its neighboring state accounts for pretty much every famous Indian tech guy you might know) 30-40% (my rough estimate) of highly skilled immigrants would be Brahmin, the high caste. It’s interesting why this happens, the people in this caste have to work harder to get Higher education due to quotas biased against them, and they’re not necessarily more well off either. It’s probably a mix of a focus on education and excellence in their families that compels the children to aspire this way, alongside a community that encourages this as well I suppose. Sad that recent decade has started to radicalize more and more of them (and other castes) due to a religious fanatic government among other things, I would have loved to understand more about what caused the extraordinary success of this community in producing this many talented individuals (like the Hungarian Jewish population did before WWII).
thwy_castech 4y ago
There are different immigrant clusters around geography and industry. E.g. South indians are a majority in the Tech industry in the Bay Area, Punjabi migrants from North India work in more working class jobs - as taxi/Uber drivers and 7/11 or convenience stores clerks. And the Patel caste from the western state of Gujarat are known for their presence in the motel industry. Based on my non-scientific observation of looking at the 300+ Indian origin folks in my LinkedIn profile, the upper castes are likely 60%, though they make up 10-15% of the population in India. The "middle" castes a. k. a Other Backward Castes or the so called merchant castes make up the remaining 35% and likely are 30% of the Indian population.

mogambo_khush 4y ago

Its obvious to me that the Brahmins are a fraternity and dominate office politics. They have many centuries of administrative experience to draw from. (refer historical text books Chanakya Neeti, Aarthashastra etc) If you go head to head with one of these guys in the office, expect to lose. They occupy CEO positions in Google, Microsoft, and 100 other big companies, and their inner circle of top lieutenants too. This is partly due to capabilities and partly due to 2000+ years of being the managerial class, inherited by birth.

lifeplusplus 4y ago

There is huge discrimination between upper and lower castes, I wasn't aware of it until I actually discussed this with an indian friend because of some news, he basically said society needs people to clean and labor work if they weren't to do it who would do it. I was mind blown to find out my life long friend was secretly equivalent of kkk member. And he saw nothing wrong with it. Upper caste people infact treat other religions/races better than the lower caste. Good luck preventing this discrimination in hiring if company isn't actively caring about this. Name is enough to revel what cast you are part of. Many companies take great measures in creating diversity in hiring boards/committees but completely ignore regional discriminations that can exist within same race of people based on dialect, culture, religion sect, cast, or whatever historical reasons there are. They care so much about unconscious biases yet introduce people with active biases in the name of diversity and defeating the whole point. You can see this in large offices, during lunch certain indians will hangout with non-indians than other indians it's because they are seen as inferior by their fellow country men. Biases I've noticed: Chinese have positive bias toward whites Chinese have strong positive bias toward other chinese Chinese have slight negative bias toward indian Chinese have strong negative bias toward blacks Indians have strong negative bias toward lower caste Indians have moderate negative bias toward muslims/pakistan Indians have positive bias toward white White women have positive bias toward black White women have negative bias toward white men White men have strong positive bias toward other white men White men have positive bias toward asian White men are neutral toward chinese, hispanic, indian, pakistan... White men have slight negative bias toward older women ========= not enough personal data points to tell about muslims, hispanics, black and other groups and subgroups. you can see this dynamic play out during lunch, in voting, and other various social interactions.

lettergram 4y ago

The fact you believe you can’t assess realities such as racism because your a particular race is a super strange concept. Can you assess reality? We all assume you can, sure you may not experience it directly, but you can just as easily observe. The level of sexism and racism I see on a daily basis in tech is mind-boggling. I’ve been in trainings (multiple), in fortune 100 companies (multiple), where white men were asked to apologize for the sins of other white people hundreds of years ago. I’ve been in trainings where pictures of brains were put on screens and little sections were pointed at as the “racist” part of the brain. That’s, exactly what racists did (great scene in django unchained https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2prpdjkDIO8 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2prpdjkDIO8). Is there racism against Asians absolutely, all people have bias and it’ll have an impact in particular situations. The reality, is the focus on “women in tech” and “racism” is largely unnecessary and is leading to the caste system mentioned. If you look at the office as “oppressed” and “oppressors” and do that based on race, you’re the racist. That’s what’s happening everywhere and frankly I know tens of people who have left these companies because of it.

bobobob420 4y ago
This is crazy if true. sorry you got downvoted for providing your experience. The way I see it is if the behaviour is possible (some people will do it). It is upto the company to ensure those people are thrown out and not allowed back in.

thwy_castech 4y ago

I'm an Indian immigrant working in a large Bay Area Tech company and caste is definitely a thing. At another tech company I worked at the CTO and everyone under him i.e 4/6 VPs was Brahmin. An anecdote - I tried to get a position in the CTO organization and the first question his underling asked me was my full name. Now, corporate email already has your first and last name but he was fishing for my "caste" name. He also wanted to know were my parents were from. Now it's possible he wanted to find some common ground, but for people who are not from the upper castes and part of the inner circle. You don't know, if this question is going to be used to give you less preferential treatment. I'm not saying the majority of upper caste folks discriminate, in fact I got my first job due to someone who was upper caste referring me. But there definitely are some bad apples. Based on my off the cuff discussion with other Indians, they've definitely noticed preferential treatment within Brahmins and certain upper castes especially when they make up the vast majority of the workforce (80%+)

xxxyz 4y ago
How did you know upper management caste? I find quite a few Indians have been using their fathers name as their lastname. Did you go by caste or color of skin to make the determination.
- thwy_castech 4y ago
  In this particular case I knew because we're all from the same state. The Brahmins from the state wear a sacred thread, and on occasions will smear ash on their foreheads in a particular pattern. One would wear the thread visibly outside his shirt. You can also know based on the last name, skin tone (very light compared to other South indians) and office gossip fills in the rest. One of the VPs mentioned his caste in an after hours drinks party once, I was amused but not shocked.
  - snovv_crash 4y ago
    Just curious, what stops Indians from faking a different caste? Wear the thread, smear the ash, get a name change, use sunblock if you'll be in the sun, and suddenly by choice you are a Brahmin? What am I missing?

bobobob420 4y ago

I have never seen it. I am not suprised if it happens. Usually the same type of character that would do something like sexual discrimination or weird shit that is more common with bad white managers would be the same type to do this to lower caste. Anyways this type of mentality is on its way out anyways. The fact that is happens at google is quite suprising cause you would expect higher standards

sfifs 4y ago

Yes caste discrimination exists to various extants. You may not have seen it as most people who come abroad as professionals are "higher" castes who were historically economically and educationally privileged though this is changing slowly - not unlike how the impact of slavery and segregation is still quite obvious in people of color communities in the US. Surnames and to a much lesser extent skin color/facial features indicate caste quite easily to people who have grown up in India. Often castes / surnames were historically also linked to professions which followed down family. In fact in early medeival Europe too surnames historically indicated profession (Smith, Wright, Cooper, Ward, Chamberlain, Shoemaker...) but I believe the major labor shortage and dislocations caused by the black death and frequent warfare requiring conscription across all social classes pretty much ended any likelihood of social rigidity coming out of this. It will be interesting to see though how the capital and political power accumulation by the wealthier Americans plays out over the next few centuries. In India, the way society developed was to restrict warfare largely to be carried out by certain upper castes and for most of the society, it didn't really matter who the ruling king was - at least until late medieval periods when proselytization started with Islamic invasion. So the caste system developed into something deep rooted, pernicious and divisive. Interestingly in India, while Christianity and Islam don't have castes in theory, in practice it is commonly observed that their adherents too observe such distinctions which tells you how deep rooted the problem is. Specifically to the community of the activist, the Dalits were actually considered to be "people with no caste" historically and were treated as "untouchables". Very likely they were the people who got the wrong side of the stick during the Aryan invasion ~3000 years ago which forms the basis of much of Hindu culture though there are obvious deep rooted integrations from the pre-existing pre-invasion culture (Shiva, Durga etc..) likely from the people who were integrated into the Aryan society. You don't really see "untouchability" today especially in urban largely as a result of efforts of freedom movement era social reformers like Gandhi and Ambedkar followed by "vote bank politics" in the nascent democracy. Some communities also stopped using surnames. However i still recall when we were very young, our great grand parents generation still observed some of the discriminatory structures. So it has taken a couple of generations to get rid of untouchability - ie parents who saw discrimination as children but don't practice it raising children who understand it but haven't seen it raising kids who only know of it intellectually). It will probably take a couple more to eliminate caste discrimination but we are half way there.

sfifs 4y ago

thewileyone 4y ago

I've worked with Indian nationals outside of America and I can confirm that this problem exists for them as well; I'm not Indian btw.