7 ms·

From what I hear from my Indian friends, this behaviour is quite ingrained. Like other racism, it will be challenging to prove.

dimitrios1 4y ago
I work predominately with Indian coworkers. You are exactly correct in my view. Racism has technically been banned in the United States wholesale since the Civil Rights act, yet we struggle with the effects still today. This is a step in a right direction, but it should be seen as only as the beginning.
- ummonk 4y ago
  Casteism, while bad, is not racism. Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism.
  - dimitrios1 4y ago
    The Caste system is as old as India itself, from ancient India: the varna, and the joti. The Indian Government itself recognizes how deep it goes, and based their Affirmative Action program upon it. To say it's not ingrained is simply choosing to ignore the problem is there. It's not saying "all Indians are casteist" but recognizing, much like the American South pre-Jim Crow, it was ingrained in society. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - ummonk 4y ago
      I’m from what would be considered a backwards caste in my ancestral state in India, and thus qualify for affirmative action quotas. So I’m actually very qualified to say so when I say that casteism isn’t ingrained in the diaspora.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > Casteism, while bad, is not racism Open to this argument. But every definition of race I’ve seen constructed to exclude caste seems contrived. The system has imprinted itself as far down as hair shaft diameter [1]. > Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism Sympathetic to this. It’s like saying all white people are racist. It’s ingrained in the Indian culture, and I think anyone coming from India should be sensitive to the issue, but e.g. their kids born and raised here are obviously less susceptible. (This is true of all immigrants and their biases, though.) [1] https://www.jstor.org/stable/29542824 https://www.jstor.org/stable/29542824
    - ummonk 4y ago
      There are some correlations between phenotypes and caste (and there is a lot of genetic stratification when you look at ancestry), but caste really cuts across race - there are lower caste groups in North India that look more "white" than upper caste groups in South India.
      - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > there are lower caste groups in North India that look more "white" than upper caste groups in South India Definitions of race don’t require a skin-color gradient. Plenty of Asians are lighter skinned than white Mediterraneans.
        ummonk 4y ago
        I'm not just talking about skin color.
        JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > not just talking about skin color Steve Jobs is ethnically Syrian. Most people would call him white. The fact that some e.g. North Africans may fit the classic conception of whiteness better than many Europeans doesn’t dissolve every racial boundary therebetween.
  - NikolaNovak 4y ago
    >>Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism. This is always fascinating to me. I would call it "culturalism", though I'll agree it does depend hugely on how the author meant it, and thus is open to interpretations. (I live in Canada now, and though I consider myself 99% "a Canadian" culturally, and very intentionally so, I'm still amused seeing people get Up in the arms when somebody makes a generalist comment about culture or societal norms of my country of birth, while I chuckle and say Yup. That is indeed the general culture and societal norm of that region.:) I cannot change my race, or ethnicity, or country of birth (and "Indian" may refer to these immutable qualities) . But I can change my values and moral framework, my culture (and I have; consciously and determinedly so), and sometimes "Indian" or "Bosnian" or whatever is meant to refer to culture and dominant societal framework of that country. I don't believe I don't have right to judge other people's value framework, i.e. their culture. It is within each of our purview and ability and mandate to consider and evaluate and choose and as needed change our own value frameworks. If somebody's cultural values and habits say "it's ok to throw acid in girls eyes", or "people in this randomly selected immutable group are bad" I will judge that value framework or moral axiom or culture/society negatively and strive to change it and convince them otherwise.
  - tomrod 4y ago
    This doesn't sound right. Weren't castes based on race and conquering populations initially? How would you describe casteism's status among expatriated Indian populations at a population level? Or is the fact one refers to a population at all to be help in contempt as "racism"?
    - FlyingSnake 4y ago
      > castes based on race and conquering populations initially. No. Varnashram and Jati system were not formed due to any imaginary invasion from the outside, that’s the discarded Raj era AIT speaking.
      - tomrod 4y ago
        Oh, the Indus valley was always Indian and never had external population migrations or conquests that left an impact on culture and dynasties analogous to England's Norman conquest of 1066 and earlier Saxon migrations that impacted the culture to the present day, reflected in socioeconomic class distinctions? Man, guess history is completely wrong.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_India
        FlyingSnake 4y ago
        How is all this diatribe related to the fact that AIT (not AMT) is a discarded theory, and jati vyavastha has nothing to do with imagined external conquests?
        yywwbbn 4y ago
        So you’re claiming that the Indo-European migration/invasion of Northern India is “imagined”?
        ummonk 4y ago
        No. They're saying that an invasion that came and imposed a caste system is imagined. It was a reasonable hypothesis a hundred years ago but has long since been discredited. Migration on the other hand is the current consensus theory.
  - tablespoon 4y ago
    > Casteism, while bad, is not racism. Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism. Doesn't caste have some deep origins with race? I'm under the impression that thousands of years ago Indo-Europeans invaded an India populated by darker-skinned natives, and formed an elite that now finds some expression in caste. I could be wrong, though.
    - ummonk 4y ago
      No that's mostly wrong. A group of Indo-Europeans did enter India, but North Indians were likely relatively lighter-skinned at that point already. It's true that Brahmins (the priestly caste which had the most privileged status in the ritual hierarchy, though they lacked the economic wealth of business-oriented castes) have the most Indo-European steppe ancestry (controlling for region, as North Indian lower castes have more steppe ancestry than South Indian Brahmins), but beyond that the correlation is much more complex. Many tribals and untouchables in North India have more Indo-European ancestry than the wealthy business castes for example.
  - margalabargala 4y ago
    > Casteism, while bad, is not racism. This relies on a fairly narrow view of what constitutes "race" or "racism". The caste of a person is fundamentally based on their ancestry. Thus, discriminating based on caste is discriminating based on a person's ancestry. I think a lot of reasonable people would consider that to fall under the definition of "racism". Yes, it's true that there is a lot of diversity of ethnic groups and e.g. skin color within castes in different regions of India. But just because people discriminate on certain aspects of race (ancestry) and not others (skin color) doesn't make it not racism.
  - resoluteteeth 4y ago
    > Casteism, while bad, is not racism. Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism. There is literally no difference. They are both arbitrary categories of people based on ancestry that are used for discrimination.
cmonnow 4y ago
- istjohn 4y ago
  You've spammed this comment 7 times now. My reply: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32494149 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32494149

dimitrios1 4y ago

I work predominately with Indian coworkers. You are exactly correct in my view. Racism has technically been banned in the United States wholesale since the Civil Rights act, yet we struggle with the effects still today. This is a step in a right direction, but it should be seen as only as the beginning.

ummonk 4y ago
Casteism, while bad, is not racism. Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism.
- dimitrios1 4y ago
  The Caste system is as old as India itself, from ancient India: the varna, and the joti. The Indian Government itself recognizes how deep it goes, and based their Affirmative Action program upon it. To say it's not ingrained is simply choosing to ignore the problem is there. It's not saying "all Indians are casteist" but recognizing, much like the American South pre-Jim Crow, it was ingrained in society. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - ummonk 4y ago
    I’m from what would be considered a backwards caste in my ancestral state in India, and thus qualify for affirmative action quotas. So I’m actually very qualified to say so when I say that casteism isn’t ingrained in the diaspora.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > Casteism, while bad, is not racism Open to this argument. But every definition of race I’ve seen constructed to exclude caste seems contrived. The system has imprinted itself as far down as hair shaft diameter [1]. > Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism Sympathetic to this. It’s like saying all white people are racist. It’s ingrained in the Indian culture, and I think anyone coming from India should be sensitive to the issue, but e.g. their kids born and raised here are obviously less susceptible. (This is true of all immigrants and their biases, though.) [1] https://www.jstor.org/stable/29542824 https://www.jstor.org/stable/29542824
  - ummonk 4y ago
    There are some correlations between phenotypes and caste (and there is a lot of genetic stratification when you look at ancestry), but caste really cuts across race - there are lower caste groups in North India that look more "white" than upper caste groups in South India.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
      > there are lower caste groups in North India that look more "white" than upper caste groups in South India Definitions of race don’t require a skin-color gradient. Plenty of Asians are lighter skinned than white Mediterraneans.
      - ummonk 4y ago
        I'm not just talking about skin color.
        JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > not just talking about skin color Steve Jobs is ethnically Syrian. Most people would call him white. The fact that some e.g. North Africans may fit the classic conception of whiteness better than many Europeans doesn’t dissolve every racial boundary therebetween.
- NikolaNovak 4y ago
  >>Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism. This is always fascinating to me. I would call it "culturalism", though I'll agree it does depend hugely on how the author meant it, and thus is open to interpretations. (I live in Canada now, and though I consider myself 99% "a Canadian" culturally, and very intentionally so, I'm still amused seeing people get Up in the arms when somebody makes a generalist comment about culture or societal norms of my country of birth, while I chuckle and say Yup. That is indeed the general culture and societal norm of that region.:) I cannot change my race, or ethnicity, or country of birth (and "Indian" may refer to these immutable qualities) . But I can change my values and moral framework, my culture (and I have; consciously and determinedly so), and sometimes "Indian" or "Bosnian" or whatever is meant to refer to culture and dominant societal framework of that country. I don't believe I don't have right to judge other people's value framework, i.e. their culture. It is within each of our purview and ability and mandate to consider and evaluate and choose and as needed change our own value frameworks. If somebody's cultural values and habits say "it's ok to throw acid in girls eyes", or "people in this randomly selected immutable group are bad" I will judge that value framework or moral axiom or culture/society negatively and strive to change it and convince them otherwise.
- tomrod 4y ago
  This doesn't sound right. Weren't castes based on race and conquering populations initially? How would you describe casteism's status among expatriated Indian populations at a population level? Or is the fact one refers to a population at all to be help in contempt as "racism"?
  - FlyingSnake 4y ago
    > castes based on race and conquering populations initially. No. Varnashram and Jati system were not formed due to any imaginary invasion from the outside, that’s the discarded Raj era AIT speaking.
    - tomrod 4y ago
      Oh, the Indus valley was always Indian and never had external population migrations or conquests that left an impact on culture and dynasties analogous to England's Norman conquest of 1066 and earlier Saxon migrations that impacted the culture to the present day, reflected in socioeconomic class distinctions? Man, guess history is completely wrong.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_India
      - FlyingSnake 4y ago
        How is all this diatribe related to the fact that AIT (not AMT) is a discarded theory, and jati vyavastha has nothing to do with imagined external conquests?
        yywwbbn 4y ago
        So you’re claiming that the Indo-European migration/invasion of Northern India is “imagined”?
        ummonk 4y ago
        No. They're saying that an invasion that came and imposed a caste system is imagined. It was a reasonable hypothesis a hundred years ago but has long since been discredited. Migration on the other hand is the current consensus theory.
- tablespoon 4y ago
  > Casteism, while bad, is not racism. Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism. Doesn't caste have some deep origins with race? I'm under the impression that thousands of years ago Indo-Europeans invaded an India populated by darker-skinned natives, and formed an elite that now finds some expression in caste. I could be wrong, though.
  - ummonk 4y ago
    No that's mostly wrong. A group of Indo-Europeans did enter India, but North Indians were likely relatively lighter-skinned at that point already. It's true that Brahmins (the priestly caste which had the most privileged status in the ritual hierarchy, though they lacked the economic wealth of business-oriented castes) have the most Indo-European steppe ancestry (controlling for region, as North Indian lower castes have more steppe ancestry than South Indian Brahmins), but beyond that the correlation is much more complex. Many tribals and untouchables in North India have more Indo-European ancestry than the wealthy business castes for example.
- margalabargala 4y ago
  > Casteism, while bad, is not racism. This relies on a fairly narrow view of what constitutes "race" or "racism". The caste of a person is fundamentally based on their ancestry. Thus, discriminating based on caste is discriminating based on a person's ancestry. I think a lot of reasonable people would consider that to fall under the definition of "racism". Yes, it's true that there is a lot of diversity of ethnic groups and e.g. skin color within castes in different regions of India. But just because people discriminate on certain aspects of race (ancestry) and not others (skin color) doesn't make it not racism.
- resoluteteeth 4y ago
  > Casteism, while bad, is not racism. Saying casteism is ingrained in Indians on the other hand is racism. There is literally no difference. They are both arbitrary categories of people based on ancestry that are used for discrimination.

cmonnow 4y ago

istjohn 4y ago
You've spammed this comment 7 times now. My reply: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32494149 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32494149