How To Be An Anti-Casteist • Hacker News Board

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#271

Post by Bang2Bay » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 6:55 PM UTC

fellellor wrote: post #234

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I started to wonder where I was in this hierarchy . I guess you're not Indian, so as I understand it that actually makes you casteless - untouchable, by strict adherence to the rules but here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3ACaste%2FArchive_1#Forei... there is the quote: "if memory serves, Westerners (particularly English) are held to be Brahmin, "

WTF is even that page? You might as well have quoted 4chan. It’s so hilarious, I’m not even offended. To be honest.. I can see it working as a scam of some sort. As long as the “white man” has money you might as well be of the highest caste right? Here we’re trying to eliminate caste, but some geniuses want to give a caste to all sorts. You might as well give gold a caste...

looks like it is a page similar to this. a talk page. I guess we are trying to eliminate caste hierarchy/oppression (though there are legal provisions that already do that in india) .

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#272

Post by Bang2Bay » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:03 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #198

skissane wrote: post #102

> They patted his shoulders to see if he was wearing a white thread that only Brahmins wear. If Brahmins can be identified by wearing a white-thread – do any non-Brahmins ever try to pass as Brahmin by donning a white thread for themselves?

Note: not all Brahmins choose to wear the thread.

and others wear thread as well.

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#273

Post by dang » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:03 PM UTC

starpilot wrote: post #153

dzhVAaT8A3Sg wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of what you are saying is true but I had a good experience with Indians maybe because I knew how to react to it. But Indians are extremely diverse. My wife is Brahmin, and I am white, and I've been around Brahmins as a result. I have found Brahmins who come to the US often are not particularly religious but still practice some of old customs. They complain about a lot of Brahmin hate in India and like escaping f…

> Indians have a culture of going the extra mile at work. lol fuck off. Indian work culture is toxic, nothing more. Most Indians in America think so.

Posting like this is obviously not ok and will get you banned here, regardless of how wrong someone else is or you feel they are.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and sticking to the rules when posting here, we'd be grateful.

Edit: this has been a problem for a long time:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22643316

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21831073

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21794777

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21480287

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21460158

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17434075

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16599066

We usually ban people for less than this. I'm going to cut you some slack because you've also posted some good comments recently, but please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and follow the rules from now on.

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#274

Post by haltingproblem » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:24 PM UTC

known wrote: post #245

puranjay wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't know your caste, you're most likely upper caste.

In America there is no system in place today that forces people to remain separate or keeps one CLASS subservient to another. If you were born the son of a street sweeper, but excelled, you would be fully accepted by your peers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_mobility Not so in India. The Caste system freezes everyone in place for their life time. For someone to move from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lower_cas…

I hope you mean this with some irony. The current prime minister of India, who is a self made in every way possible is not upper caste and the President is a Dalit. They both belong to the ruling Hindu right BJP.

The opposition, Congress, which is secular left, has been dominated by Brahmins including the Gandhi family. For all the anti Brahmin nonsense spewed by the Congress, they could have remedied it by the Gandhi's stepping aside instead of ruling India for 40 year out of its 70 directly and another 10 by proxy in the 2000. Ironically even the politburo of Indian communist parties are dominated by Brahmins.

Just step aside!

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#275

Post by haltingproblem » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:30 PM UTC

furyroad wrote: post #220

I have been following the discussions on caste here at HN and other forums. I noticed that whenever this topic comes up, there are some arguments brought up to either deny the existence of the caste system in modern India or to blame it entirely on the European rulers or portray it as a noble social system that was hijacked for political purposes. Let me address these points. 1. Caste system was a thing of the past I…

You are conflating caste with varna and jati. Caste is a British invention though not nefarious just a product of their times.

My grandparents were farm labor, their children were merchants, and their grandchildren are professors and scientist. What caste are we?

If you misunderstand the problem - conflate caste with varna and jati - you will never understand or solve it.

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#276

Post by haltingproblem » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:40 PM UTC

hairband wrote: post #159

Quoting from the article: > Years ago, these invitations to go swimming with American friends and neighbors were a sign of acceptance. But now the same invitations for his fellow Indians felt like a trap to out him as a Dalit. Not trying to defend casteism or anything, and Maybe I understood it wrong, but this makes it seem like if Indian guys are inviting him for swim then it must be ascertain his caste, but if Amer…

I am very suspicious of this claim of being invited to swim by an bunch of Indian guys. Swimming is very uncommon as a sport or a skill unless you are from a wealthy Urban family in which case you are deracinated and westernized. The whole NPR story sounds like imagined slights or straight up confabulations.

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#277

Post by whimsicalism » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:04 PM UTC

occamrazor wrote: post #203

whimsicalism wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ivy League schools in industries like finance This also has to do with the fact that, in consulting and finance, it is the perception of intelligence by the customer that is much more important than the actual intelligence. Managers would rather hire the team of consultants from the Ivy League and rich people would rather pay the management fees for the Ivy League team to manage their money. In industries that are…

This doesn’t justify the practice. If my clients were racist, should I be allowed to only hire white people?

To be very clear, I'm not claiming the practice is just. It isn't. My only claim is that this doesn't arise just because of bias of the interviewers.

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#278

Post by paloaltokid » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:15 PM UTC

klmadfejno wrote: post #256

paloaltokid wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The dialogue here seems foreign to me. Playing a coy game where you realize someone is trying to infer something about you so you dodge the question. It's weird to imagine that people engage in a cultural dance where you need certainty of arbitrary facts before you decide to act like a dick (oversimplified). Okay but where are you really from?

I'm not sure what you mean to imply here. If you're implying you think I'm Indian and pretending I'm not, well I'm not Indian and I don't follow why you would think that.

I’ll stick my neck out here and say that my assumption is that you’re a white guy like myself.

If you don’t know, many non-white people get asked that question all the time. That dance you say you can’t imagine, well, it happens quite frequently.

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#279

Post by drieddust » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:37 PM UTC

creata wrote: post #269

drieddust wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say division of labour should be hereditary. I said India had division of labour but people were allowed to move up and down as per their skill and abilities. The hard caste boundaries were enforced by British colonial rule. My other comment quotes shloka from Hindu text clearly saying everyone is born lower class unless they earn their place. How is that unfair?

Sorry, I totally misinterpreted your comment before you edited it. I still don't understand a few things though. > Profession like engineering, arts, temple building, city planning were all done by the 4th class. What's the use of this "class system" if one class covers such a broad area? Isn't it so broad as to be useless? > clearly saying everyone is born lower class unless they earn their place. Was this ever true…

> What's the use of this "class system" if one class covers such a broad area? Isn't it so broad as to be useless?

Hinduism is evolutionary in nature. It anticipated emergence of new profession as society progressed ahead with time . Having said that first three classes were fixed in terms of duties of education, defence , and business. They were responsible for providing stable environment for rest of the professions to bloom and evolve. That why last class wasn't fixed. It is impossible to predict emerging professions anyways.

Moreover The Varna system was merely a loose way of classifying the society. These weren't categories you have to live your entire life. Many people moved up and down. Vishwamitra was a king who turned into a sage as an example. There is a long list of such cases.[1]

> Was this ever true in practice?

Yes to a large extent. Please read comment of dilippkumar quoting from the books describing practices of pre-conial India.

If you have time please read Bhagwad Gita for an introduction to Hindu philosophical system. Many Westerns like Bethovan, Robert Oppenheimer, Thoreau have drawn inspiration from it. Remember this book was written 5000 or perhaps before that. Only a stable and developed society would've thought about these ideas in such details I would argue.

[1] http://www.hindupedia.com/en/%C5%9Audra_Hindu_saints

Re: How To Be An Anti-Casteist

#280

Post by whimsicalism » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:42 PM UTC

dorkinspace wrote: post #264

jfengel wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a similar system in the US, based on skin color. The article's title references the book How To Be An Antiracist . It's very much on people's minds today, and the article was written to see what lessons the US can learn from the situation in India (including Indians in the US, where caste-ism remains a problem). https://www.amazon.com/How-Be-Antiracist-Ibram-Kendi/dp/0525...

>There is a similar system in the US, based on skin color. Is there? It is very easy to find instances of poor black kids that are now multi-millionaires due to sports. Lebron James, for example, grew up without a father figure and in a poor household. He is now a billionaire.

So because a few black people make money off of sports we don't have a racially biased system?

There are also rich "low caste" people in India - it doesn't mean there isn't caste discrimination.