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An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

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Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#211

Post by whats_a_quasar »

mutant_glofish wrote: post #155
whats_a_quasar wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Protected categories = you can't refuse to hire someone because they're not white Affirmative action = you can give someone an advantage in a hiring process because they're not white, with the intention of correcting historical discrimination They are closely related in that they deal with race, gender, and class distinctions. But the ethics of the two are quite different. Banning discrimination by protected categori…

[flagged]

No? Refusing to hire someone because they are white is unlawful discrimination based on race.

Discrimination against whites is not a hot topic in America because of the historical and social context, but the law makes no distinction.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#212

Post by rawgabbit »

amluto wrote: post #82
margalabargala wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's mentioned in the article is that as caste is a primarily SE Asian phenomenon, this is a bill that targets SE Asians. People tend not to like being singled out on the basis of their race. Mentioned in the article was one person who tried to address this by banning discrimination "on the basis of ancestry, including caste" which seems to me to be a completely reasonable adjustment.

> What's mentioned in the article is that as caste is a primarily SE Asian phenomenon, this is a bill that targets SE Asians. People tend not to like being singled out on the basis of their race. That seems weak. One should not (and legally may not) discriminate on the basis of being Indian, which is a South Asian phenomenon. One should not discriminate on the basis of having Native Hawaiian ancestry, which is a Hawa…

I thought Indians are South Asian?

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#213

Post by blahblahblack »

crazygringo wrote: post #206
blahblahblack wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am an Indian who oppose this bill, because of multiple reasons. A good amount of Indian population here in America is form a Hindu background. And the majority of that population doesn't really believe in a caste system. I have never ever ill intentionally asked anyone their caste. But the way the bill is worded, It implies that anyone in my lineage can be sued based on my perceived caste (based on allegations of c…

The problem with that argument is that it's the same one used to justify not having laws against racial discrimination or gender discrimination. E.g. you can be a white manager and not a racist and promote a better-qualified white employee rather than a less-qualified black one, and then be sued. "Just because I automatically found myself being white!" The solution is simply to have good documentation around the reas…

They have been literally infinite issues related to gender and race discrimination before such protections were in the law. Regarding the caste-based issue, there is literally just one case that was in the courts. And the case was pulled back (not settled). There is Zero evidence of any caste-based discrimination across the Americas in workplace today.

You can not get away from your race. But you can get away from religions and caste. I would like to get away from my religion and caste. This bill makes it impossible.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#214

Post by numpad0 »

eklavya wrote: post #71
ramraj07 wrote: post #43

If I have to count the number of times someone senior to me or some colleague has judged me or severed ties with me because of my caste, it will be 8-10. All in the United States. If anything it’s far worse here than when I grew up in India. I’m not of the “lowest caste” as it’s perceived but by looks I am often mistaken to be a Brahmin, one of the highest ones. So my fellow Brahmins get offended when I’m not strictl…

I am sorry you have had such a bad luck with your company. All the education in the world can't teach basic human decency. You can probably take some solace in the fact that I have not seen any such behaviour in the Indian tech scene so far. Maybe give it a shot and come here (trade a different set of problems). It must be an absolutely horrible of a mix in the US for this to be 8:10.

It's not like "these people" haven't heard of that idea of basic human decency, more like they think whatever the books they carry has a priority over someone else's ethics and laws. But teaching them what's correct to a free man is a bit weird and it's also a rather steep slippery slope towards Chinese Uighur camp situation, so these problems are starting to grow and compound everywhere in developed worlds.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#215

Post by breadwinner »

callalex wrote: post #203
breadwinner wrote: post #75

Some states in India are less advanced than others. To those who are from the more advanced states, this supposed caste discrimination is a nothingburger, and they see such accusations as unfairly tarnishing the image of their community. See [1] for example. But to those from less advanced regions (those where education has not made inroads... some regions have less than 60% literacy rate), this is still an issue. [1…

It’s not clear to me that the link to education is so tight. After all, it is the top executives of tech companies (highly educated people) who have been the subject of lawsuits for discriminating by caste.

The way you were raised influences you for life.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#216

Post by orwin »

My only experience with multiple Indians coworkers is from like 6 years ago. The one who could talk multiple Indian dialect, loved his country and his town explained to me what I should do if I ever visited seemed oblivious to castes. The other two (both from Punjab if I understood correctly) were of two different castes (and religion, I learned that towards the end) and it was... Weird. You could feel unease. Maybe the first one could afford to ignore castes his whole life, as his parents and grandparents were some kind of town mayor/leaders in an affluent part of india, as my understanding is that caste discrimination is more prevalent in poorer part of the country, but from that short interaction (less than a year), I thought at the time that India wasn't there yet.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#217

Post by hef19898 »

mkoubaa wrote: post #197
blahblahblack wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am an Indian who oppose this bill, because of multiple reasons. A good amount of Indian population here in America is form a Hindu background. And the majority of that population doesn't really believe in a caste system. I have never ever ill intentionally asked anyone their caste. But the way the bill is worded, It implies that anyone in my lineage can be sued based on my perceived caste (based on allegations of c…

"But the way the bill is worded, It implies that anyone in my lineage can be sued based on my perceived caste (based on allegations of course) that is inherited to me against my will." Not a legal expert but this is extremely far fetched. You must have a great deal of contempt for the US legal system if you think this.

More like "now under this bill, I cannot discriminate anymore based on my, and others, heritage that was opposed on us against their will, obviously this is against nature / the will of the gods..."

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#218

Post by crazygringo »

blahblahblack wrote: post #213
crazygringo wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with that argument is that it's the same one used to justify not having laws against racial discrimination or gender discrimination. E.g. you can be a white manager and not a racist and promote a better-qualified white employee rather than a less-qualified black one, and then be sued. "Just because I automatically found myself being white!" The solution is simply to have good documentation around the reas…

They have been literally infinite issues related to gender and race discrimination before such protections were in the law. Regarding the caste-based issue, there is literally just one case that was in the courts. And the case was pulled back (not settled). There is Zero evidence of any caste-based discrimination across the Americas in workplace today. You can not get away from your race. But you can get away from re…

> There is Zero evidence of any caste-based discrimination across the Americas in workplace today.

That seems to be factually untrue. And you can't cite the lack of court cases as evidence, because court cases aren't brought unless there's a law in the first place.

> I would like to get away from my religion and caste. This bill makes it impossible.

No, the bill is a path to do precisely that. What you're saying makes as much sense as "passing anti-racism laws makes it impossible to get away from race as issue". That's not how it works.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#219

Post by numpad0 »

margalabargala wrote: post #47
whats_a_quasar wrote: post #16

I'm legitimately confused about the strength of opposition to the measure. It seems like it should be a small, uncontroversial, update to protected categories. Are people opposing the term "caste" appearing in U.S. law? Is the concern that the law will cause other Americans to judge Indian/Nepalese/Sri Lankan communities? If anyone here can explain the emotional significance of the bill to someone who is not South As…

What's mentioned in the article is that as caste is a primarily SE Asian phenomenon, this is a bill that targets SE Asians. People tend not to like being singled out on the basis of their race. Mentioned in the article was one person who tried to address this by banning discrimination "on the basis of ancestry, including caste" which seems to me to be a completely reasonable adjustment.

Nitpick, it's South Asia, which is euphemism for India/Pakistan. Southeast is regions culturally more connected to China than India.

Re: An effort to ban caste discrimination in California has touched a nerve

#220

Post by blahblahblack »

hef19898 wrote: post #217
mkoubaa wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But the way the bill is worded, It implies that anyone in my lineage can be sued based on my perceived caste (based on allegations of course) that is inherited to me against my will." Not a legal expert but this is extremely far fetched. You must have a great deal of contempt for the US legal system if you think this.

More like "now under this bill, I cannot discriminate anymore based on my, and others, heritage that was opposed on us against their will, obviously this is against nature / the will of the gods..."

Bhai, I've never discriminated against anybody ever or even thought about it. I'm an extremely liberal person who support all the liberal policies in America. People need to open their eyes and realize that this bill is meant for split and division, not unity. This is definitely a larger political game than me and you.
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