551–560 of 1001 posts
I observed it multiple times during CS graduate school. An Indian high caste classmate refused to let his roommate sleep in the same bedroom. The higher caste guy told us that his roommate is of lower caste. The other poor guy ended up very obedient and sleep in the couch for 2 years. They have a group of high caste guys and talk sht about a few fellow low caste guys in the class Eye opening.
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Anyone that really thinks the USA has no caste is in an upper level caste. It's less formalized here than in other countries, but it absolutely exists.
Anyone who thinks the USA has a caste system doesn't understand what a caste system is. People are not defined or restricted based on the occupations of their parents. Class mobility is celebrated, so much so that the successful often play-up any humble origins in their families.
We’re right to celebrate people from humble origins climbing the social ladder. But it doesn’t happen anywhere near as often as it should.
> After Gupta posted a link in the email group to a petition to reinstate the talk, respondents argued that caste discrimination does not exist, that caste is not a thing in the United States, and that efforts to raise awareness of these issues in the United States would sow further division. > Some called caste equity a form of reverse discrimination against the highest-ranked castes because of India’s affirmative a…
I think the argument that "efforts to raise awareness of these issues in the United States would sow further division" isn't totally without merit. As an America-born Indian-American, I honestly don't know what my caste is beyond knowing I'm not Brahmin (I didn't do the string ceremony some of my childhood family friends did), and have basically zero idea of how I'd identify someone else's caste. I imagine that that'…
Nothing gets better if the skeletons stay in the closet, basically. It's no different for caste awareness than it is for teaching slavery and segregation.
[1] Edit: and look what I did! "Here at home" clearly comes out making this seem like a "foreign" problem, but as you point out this is your home too! That's why we should all be hearing people speak out about it.
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Anyone who thinks the USA has a caste system doesn't understand what a caste system is. People are not defined or restricted based on the occupations of their parents. Class mobility is celebrated, so much so that the successful often play-up any humble origins in their families.
The US caste system absolutely exists; it’s called old money. And old money communities absolutely limit occupations and opportunities based on this.
Caste comes from the Portuguese word "Castus". There is no literal translation found for this word in ancient Hindu Sanskrit texts. The quoted article comes written from a time under British Raj where peoples backgrounds were used to further divide society so that they would not rise up against the British. Caste in the same sense of occupational background exists in all cultures but was never used in such a divisive way like the British Raj did. For example people of the "Smith" surname used to be Goldsmiths or Blacksmiths. But the British put a sense of elitism into some communities in India, telling them they are higher than others. There is no Hindu scripture which says who is high or low, but merely responsibilities.
Skilfully sidestepping any explanation of the metric being used to measure “high”, the educated spiritual priests in British Raj times and intellectuals were all banded together into one and labelled "highest caste" because they represented the “highest threat” to Anglican domination and those who represented the “lowest threat” to the Anglican were pushed into the lowest caste.
During the British Raj of the 540 principalities existent at that time, over 400 were ruled by Shudra Kings (Professor Vaidyanathan, IIM Bangalore) which the British denoted as low caste. When the British left, the second largest landowner in India after the Indian Government, was the Church and thus it’s reasonable to note that the largest transfer of assets and land from was in fact from the Shudra groups (Lord Harries’ so called low-castes) to the Church. Further, there is readily available overwhelming historical evidence that the Dalits “the Untouchables” were themselves a creation of the crushing sanctions created and imposed by the Anglican Colonialists of the Church of England as is clarified below. The castes and tribes “notified” under the 1871 Act were labelled as Criminal Tribes for their so-called “criminal tendencies”. As a result, anyone born in these communities across the country was presumed a “born criminal”, irrespective of their criminal precedents.
Mixing castes was normal as it was based on deed back few thousand years ago, only recently caste mixing wasn't allowed. Some further reading:
https://pragyata.com/caste-system-pointers-for-the-social-me...
https://www.healthline.com/health-news/tech-gene-data-reveal...
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Your point here is unintelligible for me.
I was trying to show by example that grandparent's definition of sexism is ridiculously expansive to the point of choking out all other dimensions of life. I chose them as two things that don't often get cited as evidence of sexism (though mechanic isn't so dirty a job, and isn't dangerous at all. I have more personal awareness if mechanics, so that's what I chose.)
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I think the argument that "efforts to raise awareness of these issues in the United States would sow further division" isn't totally without merit. As an America-born Indian-American, I honestly don't know what my caste is beyond knowing I'm not Brahmin (I didn't do the string ceremony some of my childhood family friends did), and have basically zero idea of how I'd identify someone else's caste. I imagine that that'…
As an America-born white hippie, though... I have a hard time seeing an argument like that and not equating it with attempts to suppress discussion of racial equality issues here at home[1]. The fact that you don't experience discrimination doesn't mean that no one does. And you should know if people do, and why. Nothing gets better if the skeletons stay in the closet, basically. It's no different for caste awareness…
Your point about "security through obscurity" makes sense; I wouldn't attempt to conceal the history and the current problems.
But the strategy here today seems to be trying to force people to own a given racial identity: at least some people are demanding that white people should stand up to publicly renounce their privilege, etc. And I'm afraid that this strategy of forcing people to self-identify as "white" rather than just "person" plants a seed in some minds that germinates into them sprouting into white nationalists and so forth.
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Anyone who thinks the USA has a caste system doesn't understand what a caste system is. People are not defined or restricted based on the occupations of their parents. Class mobility is celebrated, so much so that the successful often play-up any humble origins in their families.
Social mobility has been declining in the rich world since the 40s. The USA doesn’t have a formal class system, but it’s increasingly rare for people from poor families to become wealthy in modern day America. We’re right to celebrate people from humble origins climbing the social ladder. But it doesn’t happen anywhere near as often as it should.
If you want to talk about social mobility, we can talk about that as a separate topic.
What does ideal social mobility look like to you? Here is a baseline for discussion:
https://www.heritage.org/sites/default/files/~/media/images/...
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I think the argument that "efforts to raise awareness of these issues in the United States would sow further division" isn't totally without merit. As an America-born Indian-American, I honestly don't know what my caste is beyond knowing I'm not Brahmin (I didn't do the string ceremony some of my childhood family friends did), and have basically zero idea of how I'd identify someone else's caste. I imagine that that'…
Isn’t this just relying on security through obscurity? The knowledge is already out there for anyone wishing to seek it. Why pretend it doesn’t exist? For what it’s worth, I am not of Indian descent.
Never underestimate people's ability to segregate themselves using whatever demographic markers society tells them is important to their identity.
> The children with brown eyes were suddenly more confident — and condescending. They hurled nasty insults at the blue-eyed kids. The children with blue eyes made silly mistakes and became timid and despondent. The two groups stopped playing together. Fights broke out.
https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/karinabland/2017/...
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What if you just lie and tell everybody that you're brahmin (or whatever the alpha caste is)? Do you need identifying papers? Is there a big market for forgeries?
I wish it were that easy. First of all lying like that is near impossible unless you know every single thing done in a Brahmin household, you'll be caught eventually. In a workplace setting, you might be boycotted but if this were in India, you have a high chance of getting murdered brutally. Dalits get killed for just riding a horse, walking through upper caste residential streets and many normal things. In this sca…
