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Comment by mywittyname | Hacker News Reader

At some point, wouldn't it be difficult for people to tell? A person who grew up outside of India will only have a passing understanding of this nuance anyway, because they would not have been regularly exposed to the other group, so their entire understanding will be from what is passed to them by their parents. And the next generation will have next to zero understanding.

Plus, those nuances will probably get erased by adoption of the customs of their new country. Like they begin to prefer local adaptations of their cuisine, they speak like kids from their schools, etc.

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Maybe. The slave class in the US was in theory gone by 1870 (I don't care to look up the end of the civil war. 150 years latter a lot of people still know who is a descendant of that class. Somehow, something, fueled that through several generations.

I'm not sure how it fits in, but it's interesting that the first Black American president was not a descendant of that class.

Yeah, but it was pretty obvious who were the former slaves. There was no "nuance" about it.

When the tell-tale signs aren't physical, but small, subtle difference, they are easier to erase. You can change your name, religion, what you eat, and how you talk. So if those are the signs of your ancestors' caste, they probably won't last for generations in the west unless there's a conscious effort to preserve those distinctions.

One thing people clearly step around discussing is that the darkness of your skin is literally one of the main UC signifiers. Lighter skinned individuals are assumed to be UC.

So yes, this is a lot like racism in America.

a lot of this was legally enforced until the 1970s. see e.g. the Racial Integrity Act in Virginia for one example. the state had a legally-codified definition of race ("one-drop rule") and put a lot of bureaucratic effort into keeping records of everyone's race, so that they could enforce segregation and bans on interracial marriage.

if Reconstruction had succeeded and Jim Crow had never happened, who knows what the salience of this would be today?

Not everywhere though. Northern states didn't have nearly as much, but even in middle of nowhere small towns where no blacks even live people still know about it.

Unfortunately, no. My wife's best friend is Hindu from Upper Caste. (Brahim) she was born in the United States.

She always been so liberal and open minded. Most of her friends are Muslims. She is barely religious.

But whenever it comes relationships, she brings up caste. She married into upper caste, she was very worried about caste of the guy. If her sister is dating a someone from a different caste, she brings it up and says something like that dating him is like dating a Muslim man. You will not marry him, just have fun. She talks about it with us as if it is totally normal.

Then one of her husband's friend is lower caste Hindu who converted to Christianity. She uses deragotry terms (Malloo?) for him when he is not around.

While I haven't had any deep conversation with her about caste but few times when I asked why she obesses over it, she says it is not just caste but totally different culture. Which to me sounds bullshit.

Just want to add some more context. When I say she is liberal, she is indeed liberal. Her feed is full of BLM and LGBTQ causes. She has made donations to many of such causes too. She is the nicest person and worries about other people's issues. Gets really sad if there is a sad event in news, no matter where.

I think the problem is people have certain blindspots. Media can help you see these spots. That's why she is hyper aware of causes that the American media cares about.

In terms of caste, she grew up with certain beliefs but it is not something American media has shed any light on it.

She watches Bollywood movies but don't think they watch anything else from India. And I don't really see Bollywood dealing with caste issues seriously.

That's why she doesn't even understand the question when I ask why caste is so important. Also my wife stops me before I can dig any deeper.

Unfortunately, some immigrant parents indoctrinate their children in the ways of the old world. I've had many american born Muslim friends growing up, some of them were self professed atheists, but one thing I've never seen any of them do is eat pork. I believe it is because from a young age if you are made to believe that pork is disgusting, unhygienic etc... You develop a reflex that cannot be overcome. It is probably the same with some upper caste immigrants raising their kids to believe that lower caste people are unhygienic, unintelligent etc... I believe the term is dehumanizing and if you do it enough, it works reflexively.

Well, hold on. I’m indian american, I and my parents are lifelong atheists, our families are supposed to be vegetarians by caste and tradition and whatever but we’re not, but! though I eat chicken and fish and so on, I won’t eat beef, not because I feel “indoctrinated” or because I have an insurmountable reflex (I’ve eaten beef voluntarily on a few occasions, but that was mostly to avoid causing a scene).

Notwithstanding the ecological reasons to do so, I voluntarily don’t eat beef because I feel like it’s one of the easiest and least-damaging (ie it’s a tradition that seems to represent comparatively little direct historical social strife) means left to me, as a second-gen person, to maintain some aspect of my heritage.

Identity and tradition among second-gen immigrants in America is complicated (as is identity, generally) and doesn’t really admit generalizations like these.

I never generalized second gen Indian Americans, i merely said some, keyword is some, immigrant parents indoctrinate their children with old world philosophy and indoctrination works, it doesn't matter where you were born, if your parents (and extended family) beat certain ideas into your head through repetition and you do not either have the wisdom/experience to understand right and wrong for yourself, you can and will be indoctrinated.

Just to add context, mallu is a term for malayali people, who live in kerela state for india. It is used insultingly as an ethnic slur.

So, she is kinda right. It is not casteist, but a word used in a derogative way for a certain ethnic group.

yes, Indian Americans generally don't care too much about caste, and their children will care even less.

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