For the rest of us, I think we need to be reasonable in our assessments, especially when the other country under discussion is China.
For the rest of us, I think we need to be reasonable in our assessments, especially when the other country under discussion is China.
Seems like it isn’t a system worth defending. China has so many issues, it also blows my mind that people around here defend and praise China like they’re doing good things. They aren’t.
There are some pockets where this is not true, but they are exceptions.
And those comments aren't defending it.
Upward mobility is available in India, too. But remember that to have "upward mobility", there needs to be place at the top. For a country which has been under hundreds of years of regressive colonial rulers, there is not much place at the top.
Global wealth is much more in the US than in India right now, so it is not wise to compare rags-to-riches of the US with those of India.
India's government jobs, elite engineering and medical seats have a legal 50%+ quota for "lower" castes people. Did you know that? So, I am saying, 50%+ students graduating ALL elite engineering and law and medical and nursing schools, etc. are from these "lower" castes. Did you know that?
> Global wealth is much more in the US than in India right now, so it is not wise to compare rags-to-riches of the US with those of India.
I agree and will go further to point out that the "rags to riches" story of the US is mostly a fairytale propped up by a few exceptions. I grew up impoverished and have seen over and over how it affects the trajectory of my life in ways out of my control. Any remarkable success on my part would be in spite of the American economic system, not because of it.
I have always been taught that greatness is in work (karma), and not in birth (janma), and honestly I have seen it practiced.
A "lower" caste High School teacher gets visibly much more respect in our society than a random priest from "higher" caste.
This is like saying America's racial quotas (or former ones) put you in a 'bucket'. Caste is essentially race / genetics. You are not bucketed, it is simply a reality of your ancestry. Of course you can't change it.. you cannot change your genetics. This is a ridiculous goal post.
Not to say it isn’t a problem. But race is still a problem elsewhere too.
Yet, we also outlawed slavery and Jim Crow laws in the US and yet my local prison in the Deep South is filled with 90%+ Black people. We outlawed redlining and yet the modern credit score system does an excellent job of continuing the purpose of preventing Black people from getting loans and leveraging their wealth.
All this to say, my understanding is the sentiment and infrastructure are still in place regarding India's caste system.
Caste is very much alive in India and this sort of blanket denialism reeks of upper caste privilege.
If caste is all that irrelevant, please go ahead with changing your surname to an obviously lower caste one. We will see how quickly you come crawling back to your so called “irrelevant” caste privilege.
Honestly the caste never comes up. In almost any conversation. And I also grew up far away from megacities.
I only heard a couple of priests blabber about the glory of their caste, but they were piss poor and had nothing else to be proud of. And they were bad as priests as well. That is, you wouldn't call them if you care about pure Sanskrit pronunciation, carefulness and seriousness during rituals, etc.
The people who suffered are dead. The people who committed discrimination are dead. Yet the whole nation has to accomodate. Reservation must be done on Pro-Rata basis. If one state like Kerela is advanced, doesn't do caste discrimination and another like Bihar is very much into it. Then only Bihar state should reservation, not whole of India.
As for changing caste... You only need to reference it if you're seeking government benefit. If you don't care about it, stop keeping track, and don't share it with your kids... They'll never know and just get assigned general or whatever they call it. Of course, since caste is literally genetic, anyone doing a genetic test will quickly figure it out. However a gene test is not enough for seeking caste benefit status if I understand correctly, so this is as erased as you can get
> people bring up the caste system as if it's the cause of every issue there or as if other countries don't have similar problems
This is a straw man; The US is a shit show. China has major problems. The topic is wealth distribution in India.
> While it makes sense for Indian nationals to want their government to do better ... outside observers comparing ought to benchmark countries against one another fairly
I am allowed to study and comment on the state of any government I please. Being from the US doesn't change my ability to think critically and again, the topic of my comment is not "a benchmark of all countries fairly", it's a discussion on future wealth distribution in India.
> All countries have social inequality
Sure! Doesn't change a thing.
> If India were to eliminate social inequality it would become superior to most countries on the planet.
Besides the point. No one here is arguing about where India fits into some arbitrary ranking of countries.
> For the rest of us, I think we need to be reasonable in our assessments, especially when the other country under discussion is China.
China has massive wealth distribution issues as well. We all remember the recent bank runs. That doesn't mean India doesn't have its own problems, which I have brought up.