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They would be the only group “exposed” to this law. The vast majority of non-Indian people in California have very little idea how caste works, and how to ident

They would be the only group “exposed” to this law. The vast majority of non-Indian people in California have very little idea how caste works, and how to identify membership, etc. So now there’s this new law that de facto only applies to a specific ethnicity of Californians. I guess you could argue that all Californians—regardless of their ethnicity—are prohibited from discriminating on the basis of caste. But to me that sounds a lot like “all Californians, both rich and poor, are prohibited from sleeping under a bridge.”

bradleyjg 3y ago
But to me that sounds a lot like “all Californians, both rich and poor, are prohibited from sleeping under a bridge.” In the saying (by Anatole France) the point is not so much that the poor get arrested while the rich don’t, it’s that the poor need to sleep under the bridge because they have no where else to sleep. If non South Asians aren’t being targeted by the law because they aren’t discriminating—-that’s a good thing. No one wants more discrimination so that laws against it can be fairer.
catlover76 3y ago
> I guess you could argue that all Californians—regardless of their ethnicity—are prohibited from discriminating on the basis of caste. The law would literally prohibit everyone from discriminating on the basis of caste. There's nothing arguable or debatable about that. As I posted above, I think it's a valid point for Hindus to make that they feel kind of targeted, but the flip side of that is that they feel that way because they are the only major religion where this is a pervasive problem. The rest of us are known for other problems and faults lol...
- function_seven 3y ago
  > The law would literally prohibit everyone from discriminating on the basis of caste. There's nothing arguable or debatable about that. I'm not debating the literal law, I'm debating the effects of the law. Harsher sentencing for crack cocaine literally applied to everyone of all races. But... yeah, it was done that way to target Black offenders, sentencing them more harshly for a couple rocks than White stock brokers got for a kilo of powder. Just because a law technically applies to all, doesn't mean it does so in practice. This law does target Hindus. They may have a pervasive problem, but I'd prefer the solutions to be neutral to nationality or religion, like the ones we have now. Step up enforcement of existing laws so you can deal not only with caste-ism, but also sectarian strife among other groups. Shia or Sunni, Catholic or Protestant, Orthodox or Reformed, etc.
  - catlover76 3y ago
    > Step up enforcement of existing laws so you can deal not only with caste-ism, but also sectarian strife among other groups. Shia or Sunni, Catholic or Protestant, Orthodox or Reformed, etc. That's a pretty good point that nobody here has raised yet If there was a way to ensure basically that people didn't discriminate against people of their own broad religion who were of a different sect, and that such a law would automatically cover caste discrimination by people of upper caste background against people of lower caste background (whether or not either claim to profess any specific religion termed Hinduism), that would certainly be better. There are a couple issues with this in practice, however, and this suffers even more strongly from the conceptual problem that discrimination between a Shia and Sunni or between a Catholic and Protestant, etc., is almost certainly already covered under religious discrimination, whereas caste apparently isn't. A big part of the problem with this bill is that we actually don't seem to have a clear answer on the latter question--it seems like almost everyone is kind of just assuming that caste is or isn't already covered by existing law based on their preferences. Doesn't seem to be a lot of definitive caselaw either way. From that perspective, it's pretty reasonable for Newsom to veto it for now until the situation becomes more clear (though it's probably the case that his move was driven more by political calculation than wise leadership).
huytersd 3y ago
Indians can’t even tell castes unless they are from essentially the same county/local cluster. This is only really a problem because you have a lot of people from the same part of Andra pradesh coming and working in the tech sector.
- theogravity 3y ago
  I thought they can also sometimes identify via last name?
  - miscaccount 3y ago
    not really, many of the states does not use last name and many take up their fathers name as last name. It also varies from state to state, so the probability of you identifying another person caste from their last name is very small. With many people taking different names that are modern from parents ,its really hard to know .
    - theogravity 3y ago
      My wife has her father's name as her last, so what you say definitely tracks.
- nitwit005 3y ago
  You can always ask about someone's background, or look it up. Google suffered a backlash in Japan when they made ancient maps easy to find, as people feared it'd make it easy to connect them to frowned upon ancestry: https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=7514420&page=1 https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=7514420&page=1
  - huytersd 3y ago
    You can’t look up this stuff, it’s too local and none of it is written down or relevant even if it was. Just families classifying families in their towns. Geography means nothing, families of most castes live right next to each other.

bradleyjg 3y ago

But to me that sounds a lot like “all Californians, both rich and poor, are prohibited from sleeping under a bridge.” In the saying (by Anatole France) the point is not so much that the poor get arrested while the rich don’t, it’s that the poor need to sleep under the bridge because they have no where else to sleep. If non South Asians aren’t being targeted by the law because they aren’t discriminating—-that’s a good thing. No one wants more discrimination so that laws against it can be fairer.

catlover76 3y ago

> I guess you could argue that all Californians—regardless of their ethnicity—are prohibited from discriminating on the basis of caste. The law would literally prohibit everyone from discriminating on the basis of caste. There's nothing arguable or debatable about that. As I posted above, I think it's a valid point for Hindus to make that they feel kind of targeted, but the flip side of that is that they feel that way because they are the only major religion where this is a pervasive problem. The rest of us are known for other problems and faults lol...

function_seven 3y ago
> The law would literally prohibit everyone from discriminating on the basis of caste. There's nothing arguable or debatable about that. I'm not debating the literal law, I'm debating the effects of the law. Harsher sentencing for crack cocaine literally applied to everyone of all races. But... yeah, it was done that way to target Black offenders, sentencing them more harshly for a couple rocks than White stock brokers got for a kilo of powder. Just because a law technically applies to all, doesn't mean it does so in practice. This law does target Hindus. They may have a pervasive problem, but I'd prefer the solutions to be neutral to nationality or religion, like the ones we have now. Step up enforcement of existing laws so you can deal not only with caste-ism, but also sectarian strife among other groups. Shia or Sunni, Catholic or Protestant, Orthodox or Reformed, etc.
- catlover76 3y ago
  > Step up enforcement of existing laws so you can deal not only with caste-ism, but also sectarian strife among other groups. Shia or Sunni, Catholic or Protestant, Orthodox or Reformed, etc. That's a pretty good point that nobody here has raised yet If there was a way to ensure basically that people didn't discriminate against people of their own broad religion who were of a different sect, and that such a law would automatically cover caste discrimination by people of upper caste background against people of lower caste background (whether or not either claim to profess any specific religion termed Hinduism), that would certainly be better. There are a couple issues with this in practice, however, and this suffers even more strongly from the conceptual problem that discrimination between a Shia and Sunni or between a Catholic and Protestant, etc., is almost certainly already covered under religious discrimination, whereas caste apparently isn't. A big part of the problem with this bill is that we actually don't seem to have a clear answer on the latter question--it seems like almost everyone is kind of just assuming that caste is or isn't already covered by existing law based on their preferences. Doesn't seem to be a lot of definitive caselaw either way. From that perspective, it's pretty reasonable for Newsom to veto it for now until the situation becomes more clear (though it's probably the case that his move was driven more by political calculation than wise leadership).

huytersd 3y ago

Indians can’t even tell castes unless they are from essentially the same county/local cluster. This is only really a problem because you have a lot of people from the same part of Andra pradesh coming and working in the tech sector.

theogravity 3y ago
I thought they can also sometimes identify via last name?
- miscaccount 3y ago
  not really, many of the states does not use last name and many take up their fathers name as last name. It also varies from state to state, so the probability of you identifying another person caste from their last name is very small. With many people taking different names that are modern from parents ,its really hard to know .
  - theogravity 3y ago
    My wife has her father's name as her last, so what you say definitely tracks.
nitwit005 3y ago
You can always ask about someone's background, or look it up. Google suffered a backlash in Japan when they made ancient maps easy to find, as people feared it'd make it easy to connect them to frowned upon ancestry: https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=7514420&page=1 https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=7514420&page=1
- huytersd 3y ago
  You can’t look up this stuff, it’s too local and none of it is written down or relevant even if it was. Just families classifying families in their towns. Geography means nothing, families of most castes live right next to each other.