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Comment by nandhinianand | Hacker News Reader

I have a friend whose parents converted to christianity, and so my friend grew up christian. But guess what, the first time I met my friends' mom(at his wedding), the first question she asked after verifying native state(TamilNadu) was which caste I belonged to. (And yeah just to be clear, she asked which caste I'm from, and she/they're from xxx caste). So no caste is not something people escape from converting religion.

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I’m sorry but I’m completely facinated. What do you suppose would happen if your answer was something like: “Oh, we don’t believe in castes” or “I’m not in any caste”. I assume they’d just assume the “worst”.

yes, basically they would assume you converted from lower caste.

If the person is so forward with this, isnt that a good filter (of sorts) to avoid a specific person who will judge you by such things rather than your character?

I've had this happen with people trying to figure out wealth based on very specific questions regarding where my parents live, etc -- I run the other way. Better to know sooner than later right?

Two of my best friends are Indian Americans, and our friendships were natural and formed around shared experiences together, character, etc. It is nice to form friendships on a blank slate.

> If the person is so forward with this, isnt that a good filter (of sorts) to avoid a specific person who will judge you by such things rather than your character?

Sure do note, this is a friends' mom so atleast a couple of decades older than me.. I've a good friendship with her son, so i guess it's just a question of being polite with her and limiting spending time with her.

Have you read Ian Banks novel Look to Windward which has a heavily Casted society?

I'm guessing people will go with the highest probability guess. It's like when people ask about religion. Most won't take "I have no religion" for an answer if you're from a country/place where that's uncommon. They will still try to assume your family background unless you elaborate.

Okay few pointers, there's a bunch of dialects in the language that vary mostly based on which sub-part we come from. In turn, most sub-parts have one or other caste majority, additionally, people take a guess based on looks, accent and choice of vocabulary too.. So she'd assume something and keep moving on..

All upper caste Indians who convert to Christianity still keep something in their name to signal their caste. So much for egalitarianism

Yup. When the Portuguese ruled Goa and surrounding parts of India, they were happy to keep caste prejudices -- for example, for a long time they only allowed Christian converts of Brahmin origin to become priests.

Similarly, other Catholics attempted to integrate the caste system into Christianity in India (see the Malabar rites controversy), and had two different "castes" of priests, one acting as Brahmin's and ministering to higher castes, and one acting as Hindu priests from lower castes (pandarams), ministering to everyone else.

That is really messed up, i guess one thing you learn through history is that missionaries were in cahoots with the states they represented. I remember reading that a common tactic used by states who wanted to conquer places was that they sent merchants to trade first, then missionaries, then armies.

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