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Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

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Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#381

Post by vinay427 »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #251
_jgdh wrote: post #80

For people who discuss this with Indian co-workers - don't be surprised if they find this bizarre or far fetched. For most upper caste folks, it appears as if the caste system doesn't exist because they've never been at the receiving end of it. Most people (me included) would be tempted to say - I've never discriminated, I've never seen it happen in front of me, I'm confident none of my friends would do it so therefo…

> For people who discuss this with Indian co-workers - don't be surprised if they find this bizarre or far fetched. For most upper caste folks, it appears as if the caste system doesn't exist because they've never been at the receiving end of it. A little bit like the class system in the United States (or France) eh :-)

Isabel Wilkerson, author of "Caste" which is mentioned elsewhere in this thread, draws a fairly clear distinction between caste and class. It's succinctly summarized in her interview with Trevor Noah linked below, around 2:35, and I don't know if I agree but I think you'd find her explanation potentially interesting nonetheless. I tend to instinctively balk whenever people equate or simplify multiple concepts into a single idea, because this too often yields an oversimplification in my experience, and the nuances are usually worth preserving if they genuinely exist.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=7m49DT8pPe0

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#382

Post by hawk_ »

KhoomeiK wrote: post #336
specialp wrote: post #303

Just for some clarification: What percentage of Indians are "upper caste"? What exactly is the cut off for being lower caste vs upper? I know this article says 90% of Indian US tech workers are upper caste but what is their representation as a whole in Indian population?

Brahmins are ~5% of India's total population and another 15% are also considered "forward caste", mainly from warrior or mercantile subcastes. So yeah pretty significant overrepresentation.

This is based on very outdated census. The percentage of the so called higher castes has grown a lot since.

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#383

Post by colinmhayes »

tw600040 wrote: post #366
lowend wrote: post #214

ITT: (Possibly) "Upper caste" Indians claiming: 1. This is due to a few bad apples 2. Reservation is the real problem (no it's not) 3. I don't do it therefore it doesn't exist I can tell you by experience the amount of concious and unconcious bias regarding caste amongst Indians both in India and abroad is ridiculous! I'm light skinned so people assume I'm "upper caste" and speak with me as such. My last name doesn't…

//How the fuck is a person's caste relevant? This is normal for you? I agree. It shouldn't be. But then it shouldn't be relevant during admissions too yeh?

How is growing up with extreme discrimination not relevant?

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#384

Post by swebs »

sharadov wrote: post #281

Unfortunately, the caste system is more complex than the issue of race in the US. The reservation system in India was instituted to bring parity between the downtrodden castes and the upper castes. When I was in engineering school in the late 90s, if you were from a lower caste, you barely had to get passing marks in the engineering entrance exam to make it to a top engineering school. And you would still have unfill…

That sounds exactly like the issue in the US.

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#385

Post by gurkendoktor »

sjy wrote: post #379
tomp wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody argues that tech is a meritocracy. Meritocracy is just an ideal, just like freedom, equality and defensive driving; it’s worth striving towards but you cannot ever reach it (and if you think you’ve reached it, you’ll inevitably start falling behind). Having said that, it’s one of the most meritocratic industries; do you know any billionaire doctors or lawyers that are college dropouts?

The relatively large number of tech billionaires – people with tens of thousands of times the median wealth – is a strange thing to use as an indicator of “meritocracy.”

The point that OP made was not the number of tech billionaires, but their backgrounds.

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#386

Post by paxys »

anonymousJim12 wrote: post #365
yumraj wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't you have a process where you ask the basis for both yes and no? Both yes and no need to be substantiated by examples by the interviewers and that should be able to tell you whether there is any bias or not.

Yes, they do provide a basis. In this case the basis was weak and lazy, though that is the style of work I've come to expect from working with this person.

IMO that should be concerning regardless of the caste angle. Throw out their feedback, raise this with their manager or HR, and recommend that they go through interview training again.

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#387

Post by flowerlad »

barry-cotter wrote: post #116
teekert wrote: post #58

So... They nicely fit in with the upper-caste Americans. As long as you have a system where you make some "upper-caste" universities so expensive that only upper-caste people can attend them, you will keep the caste system alive. This is why education should not be privatized, there are no equal opportunities within the US as well as in India. It's all about what family you are born into. The whole caste system is al…

Class isn’t caste though they overlap. Caste is unique to the Indian subcontinent as far as I’m aware. It is utterly unremarkable for there to be people of different castes living in the same village whose ancestors have lived in the same area for generations who are as genetically distinct as Swedes and Sardinians. The only thing remotely similar I’m aware of was the Manchu in China. Caste is about maintaining endog…

How about Hutus and Tutsis? https://www.thoughtco.com/location-of-conflict-tutsis-and-hu...

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#389

Post by paxys »

mabbo wrote: post #304

At no point do they say "Our company does not and did not allow discrimination against a person for being dalit". That is all they would have to say to take a clear stance- and they don't. > "Cisco is committed to an inclusive workplace for all," the company said in a statement to online news site thewire. > "We have robust processes to report and investigate concerns raised by employees which were followed in this c…

They don't say it because it is a legal matter and it would be stupid to make a statement about it to the media.

Re: Over 90% of Indian techies in the US are upper-caste Indians

#390

Post by jrochkind1 »

shuckles wrote: post #340
magicalhippo wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm Norwegian, living there. A very good friend is Indian, her parents moved here while she was just a few years old. I never heard her talk about her caste, or the system in general really. That is, until one day, out of the blue, she said she was getting married. Her parents had found a boy who also grew up here in Norway that she was to marry the following year. After a bit of talking it was clear she was not very…

If caste only came up in a mutual interest decision like a wedding where there aren't power imbalances, isn't that fine? Who someone chooses to marry seems like an unreasonable place to intervene to resolve disparities.

Who's talking about intervening?

If someone was interested in marrying me until they found out I was Jewish (the closest analogy to my own experience), I would not think that was "fine". Even if I don't know any way to "intervene" in it, certainly not if you mean legally, governments should not be in the business of telling people who to marry.

But if you told me that there aren't power imbalances in marriage decisions so it's "fine" and what am I getting upset about, why is it even worth talking about or commenting upon, I'd think you were an asshole.

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