These sort of class distinctions are much less pronounced in America, which is why so many oppressed or impoverished people from elsewhere yearn to travel here and make a new life. It's nice to hear about someone who was able to realize the American Dream and escape the class prejudice of their home country.
That might be the case, but the constant reminder of race is very weird to me. As in, it's very common to denote someone to be "black" or "white" or "hispanic" and so on. I can understand this to some extent when it comes to describing how someone looks (eg police warrant) but in most other contexts... it's just feels very strange with the obsession of what color/origin someone has/is.
Most countries don't have a history of race based slavery. Rome, Inca, etc viewed conquest as the path to slavery. Even most American slaves where at the root captured by a different group in Africa rather than based on skin color.
The race to slavery connection was more an accident of history than any design. Early America had some black slave owners and they imported from Africa because Native Americans tended to die from disease or escape.
Yet, they also lack the deep institutionalized racial slavery connection. Despite what people think slavery is actually more expensive than providing subsistence level pay. Due to the constant immigration influx and institutions like indentured servitude slavery was never important to New York's economy and by avoiding the slavery trap they actually had much stronger economic growth.
NYC did see slavery from 1655 (fist auction) to 1827 but issued a gradual emancipation act in 1799. Hardly hundreds of years of institutionalized slavery. Even before that there was various waves of freed slaves associated with the Revolutionary war. When black men made up one-quarter of the rebel militia in White Plains and where then freed after the war etc.
There was slavery in New York in 1626 before the first auction. 1626-1827 is two centuries. You are also ignoring the "and discrimination" part of the statement that I made. New York had segregated neighborhoods until much later such as Stuyvesant Town which opened in 1947. NYC is also famous for its racially biased stop-and-frisk policy which lasted into the 21st century. Overall, it's pretty clear that my statement that there was "centuries of race based slavery and discrimination" is accurate even for New York.
Ahh, but they did not have institutionalized racial slavery before the auctions. Simply having slaves is not enough, as US slavery was based on the European peasantry model which has no racial component and it was only after massive influx of African slaves that the connection became so strong.
Also, segregation spread from the South after the Civil War so there was a significant gap from the end of NY slavery to the start of Radical segregation which means it was not a continuous period.
Remember the Civil War ended in 1865 slavery absolutely ended in NY in 1827, but was almost non existent at that time long having been phased out.
From 1821 until adoption of the 14th amendment in 1868 New York required black men to own property to vote but did not require white men to own property to vote. There are many other examples of discrimination that could be found, but your entire position is frankly too absurd to bother arguing against any further. The idea that there were not at least two centuries of time in which there was some form of race based slavery or discrimination in New York is preposterous.
I am not arguing that there was zero racial discrimination, we still have forms of racial discrimination built into the law today.
However, at the time women where not allowed to vote at all. Thus it was not pure racial discrimination.
Just for perspective North Carolina and New York did allow freed blacks to vote in 1790. And in 1860 two states still had property ownership requirements to vote I am saying deep cultural views are a more complex topic than you think.
PS: As one historian put it, economics pushed poor white farmers to abolitionism before the civil war. However, economics pushed those same farmers to discrimination after the civil war.
Yep, every time I read about a racial issue in the US, it turns out it's always a social/economic issue, but talking about the "working class" is implicitly prohibited in the media (thanks to the red scare) so they make it about race. Divide and conquer works fine. Hell, even the poorest americans will bash on unions and any idea of a class identity. Are the poor misrepresented in higher education? Just shove in some blacks to even out the color, that'll fix it.
When societies/individuals achieve high status and realize self-worth, they usually develop a generous and liberal disposition (not a bad thing). Unfortunately, when the position is threatened, they may go back to the survival mode and become intolerant.
That is very true. Also when societies/individuals don't have a long history they haven't had a chance to accumulate modes of thinking from the past that are no longer deemed appropriate but are difficult to shake off once acquired.
A better way to allegorize the Indian caste system would be the racism in USA. No one in urban centers or in the new generations is racist against black people. Go to the folks from the older generations and in the hinterlands and you will find that racism still exists somewhat.
A similar trend is present in India. The new kids in urban centers don't care about caste. The old people in the villages and hinterlands? They do somewhat.
And then you always have the politicians on every side of the spectrum who artificially inflate caste and race issues for their own gains.
Racism is not a binary thing. There are always low levels of racism, and they exist in urban centers most certainly in large numbers. I would say the vast majority of people are racist to some degree, in that they hold inescapable prejudice inside. It’s in our society and almost impossible to have it not at least subtlety enter ones consciousness.
You are completely wrong. I have lived my entire life in Delhi and I can tell you that there is rampant caste discrimination in urban India. I can cite many anecdotes but usually the denial of discrimination, which your comment does, is in itself an indicator of bias.
Oh really not that long-ago in the UK we had high caste member of our team say that they could not socialise with us in at particular venue as that would make him unclean.
There is also a lot of evidence of caste discrimination in the UK otherwise why was caste discrimination added to the protected groups in the UK, I know one of the MP's involved
I came across this a while back as well, (UK also), somebody I worked with began a relationship with a girl from a higher caste and it caused all sorts of trouble.
The whole point of the article, and her book, is to bring the caste system and its consequences into light. Allegorizing it would wash away all the specific issues she is trying to raise!
What? Caste and racism are different issues with a common goal (subjugation) and have considerable legs. I would vouch there is a visible resurgence in both. Narrowing to an India-US narrative, caste ideology is constantly imported into the US under the auspices of various Regional Groups. This is visible in the informal societal groups that are formed as well as some official groups that are formed. See the tail end of her interview [1] about Telugu Immigration Groups which are segmented along caste lines (and her request for membership).
I would not mind seeing an AMA from someone in a lower caste in India, someone from a lower caste in US, and someone from an upper caste in the US.
> The new kids in urban centers don't care about caste.
Oh yes they do, maybe less than before, but its still present. To native, +-cast membership is usually very obvious.
When you are born into privilege, and you are told whole childhood that you are entitled to it and those less fortunate 'deserved' it by their actions in previous lives, it's hard thing to give it up, and say 'no, I deserve less'.
An physics postdoc should pull in 40-60k (mean 49k) without an NYC CoL so I'm not sure subway conductor is better. Adjunct salaries can be disgustingly low but that's mostly in the humanities AFAIK.
My friend got under $40K as a physics postdoc in TX, my partner got around $50K as a math tenure-track in midwest, and those are the lucky academics that could find these positions.
You can look up salaries at many public institutions. The trend is pretty sad.
Some people might get a lot of money by winning the lottery, doesn't mean it's a viable career choice.
Disclaimer: I jumped ship, and still might suffer a bit from the sour grapes syndrome - but not because the salaries in academia very any good.
I do believe the reference is to her capacity for intellectual work (teaching vs driving a train) based on the environment her parents would have raised her in. Not genetics.
Yes. Please ask any of the marginalized persons in the us. About half of ALL transgender youth commit suicide - they would rather die than experience hate.
We also forget that their are people still alive today that experienced racial segregation. Many will gladly tell their story.
My parents visited India a few years ago, they faced that issue when their guide refused to enter a coffee shop, when he explained that it was because he was not allowed to enter because of his caste, they turned back (disgusted)...
One of the main benefits in India of increasing urbanization is the accompanying anonymity. I would assume this incident didn't occur in a big city. Did it?
According to the author of the book being discussed, the caste system is very much alive in cities [1]. From what she said, it seems like people can tell your caste by asking a few simple questions or observing your body language. The caste system persists even among Indians in America.
Discrimination when it comes to housing (just as in matrimony) is still rampant in India: religion, gender, marriage status, and certainly caste are all reasons people are regularly denied access to rental properties. I suppose my point was more about ephemeral commercial activity, like entering a coffee shop, which was the example that was given in the grandparent comment.
Edit: Fascinating interview, by the way. Thanks for posting it! Loved this part:
>GIDLA: I will say this: Everybody is dying to know whether I got into university because of reservations. My answer to them is, “Go ahead and die.”
My point had little to do with that. A city with millions of people and a large migrant population offer an opportunity to escape the communal memory that smaller populations can sustain. Unlike race, caste isn't an obviously visible feature, and even someone bent on discrimination will have a harder time discerning the relevant signifiers.
People's last names often give away their caste, sometimes where they come from. I have seen people being treated poorly because of the way they dressed - that is the rich/poor divide. Also, a lot of Indians, even in cities, do still dress according to their religion or caste.
From personal experience, I know that the people that may be described as the oppressors in Indian "urban" societies are often the ones that take on servile qualities when they try to assimilate in Western societies. Western society is often seen as the superior kind and the so-called oppressors of Indian society recognize a hierarchy in it, in which they are at a lower rung. It is hard to break out of that mindset.
Of course, this is all based on personal experience. I wouldn't say this is the general rule.
It's called hate here, when for example a person regards homosexuality as immoral and opposes gay marriage. I've rarely heard anyone publicly claim that such people just have different social standards, or if they do, they are vilified for defending hate.
Any time in history when one group has been oppressed by another, it's been considered normal by majority social standards of the time. When those standards change, discord and sometimes even war is the result.
But that's the issue. If someone simply sees homosexuality as a something that isn't "approved by God" or something of that nature, and they in their minds are just going along with God's law, are they really hating something? I've heard many anti-gay marriage people say that they have no problem with gay people but that they just oppose gay marriage.
Is that cognitive dissonance? Almost certainly, but is it hate? I don't think so.
We throw around the word "hate" too much and doing so loses a lot of the nuance bound up in human attitudes.
Hate is one of those blinding emotions/states of mind that causes people to deliberately sabotage the thing-hated. Simply opposing a practice cannot be said to be hate unless the hate is what is driving the opposition. Opposition is not sabotage, even though it may seem so to the one opposed.
You had just said it: they oppose the institute of marriage, which is not only a traditional way of announcing the union of two people (let's for a moment accept the fact that maybe marriage is only a Christian creation), but is also a legal way of exposing it.
Now please tell me how opposing the gay marriage is not in any way a sign of hate towards gay people that bars them from certain legal liberties? You could try to sell this point of view as a "kind" point of view, but your conginitively dissonant ignorance still makes you hate people as a result; even if you are not conscious about it.
Some believe that people who get abortions oppose the "institute" of life (since we don't know when life starts, we can't say it doesn't start before 9 months). Is it possible to oppose a practice one believes is barbaric without hating the person who is practicing it? Of course it is-- if you understand human nature. No one is their behavior-- so, the most logical thing is not to hate a person for a single element of their being. Since we can say that most people are logical, we can say that most people don't hate others on the basis of one element.
You're playing the redefinition card rather than accepting that abortions of one human being are never your own business, and the set of values you have accepted when you had accepted "God" in your life have been created centuries ago when we knew close-to-nothing about medicine.
Engaging in discriminatory, derogatory and demeaning behaviour actively. That comes from hate. The experiences of the person featured in the linked article, that could only come from hate.
I think people that oppose gay marriage do so because of hate. But found a neat little loophole out of being called hateful by claiming that they have no problem with gay people.
My reasoning is this: taking any kind of stance on any subject requires some kind of motivation. If you are moved to spend energy on something, you are motivated by some need to do so. If you oppose something that does not directly affect you, the reason is most probably hate.
As someone raised Southern Baptist but not currently identifying as so, I can attest that when I once peacefully opposed homosexuality, it was 100% out of a trust that God knew what he was doing and that I should trust him, despite my own personal ignorance.
The belief that others can only oppose groups of people out of "hate" stems from a strong lack of empathy and understanding for people on the other side of the issue.
> If you oppose something that does not directly affect you, the reason is most probably hate.
Either that, or you are serving something percieved as greater than yourself.
Yes and no. Sure, 'hate' is probably the wrong word, and may be counter productive in many cases. And you're right about the empathy; everyone likes to apply labels that mean they don't have to feel.
On the other hand, accusing the people you oppose of being demonic Satan-spawn looking to corrupt our youth and destroy our lives and country, of being the baby-molesting other that causes nightmares, well, that probably isn't caused by an excess of good feeling.
I am wondering now if you read the linked article. There is logic in not wanting a giraffe in your field of vision at a movie hall. Actively discriminating against people because of arbitrary conditions of their birth is not that logical. Active discrimination in the life of "untouchables" means that they are viewed as dirty or lowly. I think it is a bit simplistic to think that it is ok to actively stick to demeaning and derogatory practices because it is societally accepted or because that's "just how things are".
Ok if we're using this bizarre analogy, it's as if you never even could tell if there was a giraffe in the movie theater or not, but if there was, you want it gone.
When a gay couple gets married on the other side of the country, do you notice? Does your life change? If it's the mere idea of it you're opposed to, then that's bigotry, not some practical concern like a giraffe blocking your view of the screen.
> When a gay couple gets married on the other side of the country, do you notice? Does your life change?
The word 'marriage' doesn't mean in 2018 what in meant in 1918, or even in 1968, or 1993. In large part, that's a good thing (domestic violence is no longer legal spousal rape is no longer legal, married women don't have a kind of legal-child status), but it's also a bad thing (due to no-fault divorce laws, marriage can be terminated by one party at any time; marriage is no longer the cornerstone of a couple's life, but the capstone to their lives; there's no longer social support for a reliable, lifelong marriage).
Many people who oppose legal recognition of homosexual unions as marriages don't have animus against homosexuals, but rather nostalgia for the previous meanings of marriage. They believe that a stronger concept of marriage makes for a stronger society.
Personally, I think we ought to go all the way and abolish the legal concept of marriage entirely: it's a religious state, not a civil one, and thus not the business of the State. But I understand the concerns of those who worry about how a diverse society which has lost all respect for marriage will survive — I just think we're already there, so we might as well be honest about it.
If you believe God's law is paramount and have convinced yourself that God's law does not allow for gay marriage, then your opposition is not based on hate, but rather based on your conception of what's proper and what's not.
This urge to thrust "hate" on people is dangerous because is dehumanizes them. If someone is hateful, then they are evil, and evil people deserve punishment.
So the thinking goes, but it is regressive thinking.
The disagreement about gay marriage stems for many from religious doctrine and what is traditional social practice, not hate.
I see no reason to not use the word "hate" in this context. Someone can hate broccoli without implying that broccoli is evil. Someone can say "I hate royalty" without implying that any member of royalty is evil, or that there should be any sort of "punishment" beyond a switch to a republican form of government.
Hatred - a "strong dislike" - does not need to be expressed through fiery emotion. A checklist which says "I will not provide service to someone who is {insert protected class}, followed robotically, is still an expression of hatred.
A computer vision system could be used to implement some sorts of racism, so of course the CV system itself could not be said to "hate" the person. Instead, it's an expression of the hatred embedded in the system.
Someone choosing to follow God's law is expressing the hatred embedded in that belief system. That they might "only" be an instrument of that hatred rather than an instigator does not absolve them.
You wrote "Is it really hate though? Or just people accepting certain social standards and living their lives in accordance."
If those social standard are based in hate, then why shouldn't we say those people are being hateful?
Moreover, if many others from the same society hold different beliefs (e.g., there are Christians for and against gay marriage, and for and against slavery, and for and against tattoos, and for and against women speaking in the church, etc.) then why should we excuse those people who choose a specific interpretation which condones and encourages discrimination?
I disagree. If anything, hate is a very human action. And the truly opressed know this. By not calling it out, you are actively complicit, giving more power to the oppressor.
How many times does the story need to play out? Didn't we just see the #metoo thing play out? These women are victims of hate. Same story with LGBT and black.
No one is dehumanizing anyone. The word is about human autonomy and dignity.
Tyler Cowen interviews Sujatha Gidla on his podcast, Conversations with Tyler [0]. Not having heard of her, and not having any exposure to caste societies, I was struck by the sharpness of her insight and the strength of her conviction. I highly recommend listening.
The term "caste" is not used to refer to social stratification. It is more specific [0].
America has its own ethnic-based social stratification issues, but I think that opponents of caste systems would say that comparing modern day America, with its issues, to the entrenched caste system in India is a comparison that greatly waters-down the oppressiveness of caste and minimizes the challenges facing its reform.
Unlike most of her lot, her family was "middle class", thanks to the help of Canadian missionaries in her region who aided in education and offered them religion. Her family was thus Christian and benefited with education. Her parents held jobs as college teachers.
Gidla says that proselytization didn't help her lot. "Christians, untouchables - it came to the same thing. All Christians in India were untouchable. I knew no Christian who did not turn servile in the presence of a Hindu."
Proselytization did help her a lot: it was the reason the christians were there in the first place.
I must admit that simply from the headline I assumed that this was about a person who should have been fired multiple times for gross incompetence but the city could not due to some grievance process gone wrong.
To everyone whose response to this is "Oh yeah, that's just like racism and slavery in America." Please consider the following:
Both racism and casteism have similar results. That is, subjugation of certain peoples, violations of human rights, the preservation of the oppressing class, death--a whole host of evils.
However, they have different sources, are codified differently, entrenched in different cultures, and therefore should be addressed and combated differently.
Sujatha did not write a book to make people understand that American slavery (and its continuing echo) is bad. Furthermore, purely trying to understand Sujatha's story through the lens of American slavery is essentially hand-waving away the points she is trying to make.
