Question for south asians about prejudice

[Anonymous]

DH and I just moved to the area. Both of us are second generation indians with two small children and have never selected friends based on their orientation, religion or skin color. We recently met a south asian neighbor who has a circle of south asian friends who also had young families. This neighbor recently invited us over right for dinner along with their other friends right after the presidental election. A few of the men in the group were using racial epithets while they were discussing political issues. Needless to say we felt very uncomfortable the entire time yet and were even more surprised that no one else in the group spoke up. If I knew this group better I would have spoken up or at least expressed how I felt in afterwards via email. I do not want to hang out with this group anymore and am left to wonder why a group of educated adults who grew up in the US can have such disturbing views. It makes me wonder whether there is a problem with prejudice in our community. Other south asian women please chime in to help me understand all of this

[Anonymous]

They learned it at home.

[Anonymous]

Arabs do it too. Not all of course, but I am shocked by the frequency.

[Anonymous]

I'll bite, and hope that you are not one of the many trolls on this forum that doesn't like South Asian people.

I am a South Asian woman (but my husband is not South Asian and most of my friends are not). Regardless, I've never had this problem with South Asian people of my generation (I assume you mean you are first generation - your parents immigrated from India? If you are second generation, it would be your grandparents).

Were the people you were with from India/Pakistan, or did they grow up here? The lack of familiarity with other races could contribute to their racist comments (that is not to say I am justifying their behavior, but an observation based on other from-India-Indians that I have met). If they are first generation (the children of immigrants), then no, I've never experienced this among my friends or relatives and you just got stuck with a bunch of racist assholes that you should avoid in the future.


And also, so what if you didn't really know them? You should have spoken up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They learned it at home.

This is such bullshit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Arabs do it too. Not all of course, but I am shocked by the frequency.

Caucasians, too.

[Anonymous]

I grew up in this country with one Indian parent who similarly held a lot of prejudiced views against African Americans, especially of a lower socioeconomic status. Along the lines of, I came here with nothing and made something of myself, they have lived their whole lives here and haven't taken advantage of the opportunities available to them.

I do NOT agree with these views at all but I think they exist some immigrants and maybe some of their children adopted them as well.

[Anonymous]

Sparkle?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Arabs do it too. Not all of course, but I am shocked by the frequency.

Caucasians, too.

I don't run into it with white people very much. I'm white, married to an Arab, and hear his friends' kids saying horrible things about black people, and they don't think I know because they don't know I speak (passable) Arabic. It seems, in my circles, to be a generational thing. Never heard that from the parents, who were born in the Middle East. The kids were all born here. Don't know if that matters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH and I just moved to the area. Both of us are second generation indians with two small children and have never selected friends based on their orientation, religion or skin color. We recently met a south asian neighbor who has a circle of south asian friends who also had young families. This neighbor recently invited us over right for dinner along with their other friends right after the presidental election. A few of the men in the group were using racial epithets while they were discussing political issues. Needless to say we felt very uncomfortable the entire time yet and were even more surprised that no one else in the group spoke up. If I knew this group better I would have spoken up or at least expressed how I felt in afterwards via email. I do not want to hang out with this group anymore and am left to wonder why a group of educated adults who grew up in the US can have such disturbing views. It makes me wonder whether there is a problem with prejudice in our community. Other south asian women please chime in to help me understand all of this

Troll

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'll bite, and hope that you are not one of the many trolls on this forum that doesn't like South Asian people.

I am a South Asian woman (but my husband is not South Asian and most of my friends are not). Regardless, I've never had this problem with South Asian people of my generation (I assume you mean you are first generation - your parents immigrated from India? If you are second generation, it would be your grandparents).

Were the people you were with from India/Pakistan, or did they grow up here? The lack of familiarity with other races could contribute to their racist comments (that is not to say I am justifying their behavior, but an observation based on other from-India-Indians that I have met). If they are first generation (the children of immigrants), then no, I've never experienced this among my friends or relatives and you just got stuck with a bunch of racist assholes that you should avoid in the future.


And also, so what if you didn't really know them? You should have spoken up.

OP Here. I am not a troll. This experience actually happened and DH and I were both surprised that this kind of behavior was tolerated in a group. Fortuantely our children are not old enough to understand the conversation but there were older elementary school age children that were in the room and could have easily heard what was being said. To answer the question above these were first generation. I will be more specific and say that they all had a very common south asian last name that began with P and grew up in New Jersey. The K word was being used over and over again.

[Anonymous]

I guess this particular circle of friends has some prejudices. What more can you glean from this experience?

[Anonymous]

Patels saying kracker? What "k" word?

[Anonymous]

13:39 - First generation means YOU immigrated; 2nd generation means your parents did. 3rd generation is if your grandparents did.

OP, I have truly never heard that kind of racist talk from South Asians who grew up here. (DH and I are lawyers, and our Indian friends tend to be in public service; most of our friends aren't the traditional doctor/engineer. It's more of a liberal group, so maybe that has something to do with it.)

I have definitely heard that kind of language from my parents' friends (though not my parents, thank goodness). It's a little ridiculous. The immigrants I spend time with are older, so I don't know how much of that is a function of when they came here.

I do know that my cousins and family in India do hold some racist ideas. They probably have interacted with 1 black person in their lives (collectively!), so there definitely seems to be more of a media bias than we think there is. I'm not sure what to do about that. I do set them straight whenever they say anything obnoxious.

You should call them on it! It's not ok to talk like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:13:39 - First generation means YOU immigrated; 2nd generation means your parents did. 3rd generation is if your grandparents did.

OP, I have truly never heard that kind of racist talk from South Asians who grew up here. (DH and I are lawyers, and our Indian friends tend to be in public service; most of our friends aren't the traditional doctor/engineer. It's more of a liberal group, so maybe that has something to do with it.)

I have definitely heard that kind of language from my parents' friends (though not my parents, thank goodness). It's a little ridiculous. The immigrants I spend time with are older, so I don't know how much of that is a function of when they came here.

I do know that my cousins and family in India do hold some racist ideas. They probably have interacted with 1 black person in their lives (collectively!), so there definitely seems to be more of a media bias than we think there is. I'm not sure what to do about that. I do set them straight whenever they say anything obnoxious.

You should call them on it! It's not ok to talk like that.

Nope....1st generation means the first generation to be born here. The immigrants are called immigrants.