251–260 of 324 posts
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I'd say there's a difference between being clueless and having a clear definition everyone agrees on. I have an idea of what the caste system is, but if I tried to explain it exhaustively I'm sure I'd get a lot of details wrong.
I don't need a bulletproof definition of race to oppose discrimination on its basis
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…
I’m also genuinely surprised and frankly intrigued by how quickly this topic gets flagged off HN. It seems there is serious disagreement about this in the tech community.
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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.
Half of it came during my academic phase though!
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Do you mean in India? If you don't mind can you tell me what years those were? I just want to see if I happen to live in a bubble or it was a different time (as in, sufficiently long ago for me to not see it).
The academic phase was during my PhD between 2009 and 2017 in Texas. Upper Caste Hindu professors (2) and fellow grad students and postdocs (2). The professors thankfully weren’t my advisors, but made it their business to pester every Indian student during poster presentations if they found they were not upper caste or weren’t behaving as one (by eating or dating habits).
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The new law that is being passed will not solve your personal issues with socializing. The law is designed to protect you from unfair discrimination by your employer, i.e. being fired due to your caste.
Analogy here would be, I’m saying I almost got robbed, robbery is real. You’re coming and saying, “this new law won’t solve your issue, it’s for actual robbery only.”
As someone completely ignorant in this cultural phenomenon, given it seems to be hurting some people what are the arguments for not banning it as discrimination? (I was hoping to read at least one in the article, but perhaps I'm blind?)
The caste system dates back to the Vedic period (around ~1500 BC), it's engrained into the fabric of indian society and through the years this hasn't really diminished. For instance the British reinforced the notion of the Caste system, and so did Gandhi, for many it's not seen as something that should be stamped out, but a way of organising a social hierarchy. Modern Indian politics is controlled by the elite - all…
Source on this? I've heard people say the opposite.
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"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.
It's not just about legal system being abused. I would like to see casteism dissolved from the world. Grew up in India and I was taught to be caste agnostic. I have seen my parents being friends with and working with people of all castes. I grew up pretty liberal. This bill is trying to attack on a problem that does not exist on the same scale as any of the other discriminatory issues that we ever talk about here in…
That's absurd. The laws aren't for people who wouldn't discriminate. They're for the people who demonstrably do.
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Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshi and Nepalese.
Not really; the argument would be that it creates a crime only Hindus can be accused of. A Muslim or Christian or Sikh Indian, Pakistani, etc., would not be targets for caste discrimination lawsuits, under the logic. Of course, as a legal matter, that's not true; anyone could be accused of caste discrimination if the law passes, whatever their religion, race, or national origin.
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They're not. Most protected classes are things like "race" or "marital status" - not "black" or "married". (Age is an exception here, at least federally: young people are not protected.)
That's usually what the literal interpretation of the law would be. However, the courts have set the precedence so that it is more or less legal to consider race to increase "diversity". For example, see Regents of the University of California v. Bakke. [1] With the recent SCOTUS ruling, things have changed a little bit. Unfortunately, that really doesn't prevent people from finding ways to get around the ruling. [2]…