Are you still here?

Wanted to ask you about the dynamics between the Indians and Africans in Jamaica.

Especially in regards to their views regarding sexuality and family.

Do the Indians in Jamaica marry or do they go the common-law way?

Do the Indians have various children by various baby’s mammas and baby’s daddy’s?

Amongst my Indo Carib and Afro Carib friends (quite alot), I see a BIG difference in views of sexuality and family.

It is true, like Siddhartha pointed out, that African Americans seem to have a much bigger sense of family than middle class white Americans. However, the family dynamics are very different from the Indian American family dynamics, in terms of marriage, or lack thereof, and the baby’s mamma/baby’s daddy factor, etc.

What is this nonsense you are talking about? We are discussing facts. If you can’t refute the fact (v.v.difficult as it is) you shd find some other way of analysing the issue.

Kavita, Mr. Wadhwa is smoking the same myth-making crack that so many desis in the U.S. are addicted to.

Actually Wadhwa got to where he is because he doesn’t smoke crack or sip the Koolaid

Progress is about what one does. It isn’t very interesting to convert this into a discussion about what people are and that gets into the domain of pseudoscientific quackery like IQ, the Bell Curve etc.

In our district I have seen extremely poor black children of single moms make it to elite colleges by simply paying more attention to their studies and less to the inconsequential stuff. It is also known for children from affluent families to have their first DL suspension before graduation. So it is still about actions, sabe?

As far as I know desis too are human (even if some think otherwise). If the rich ABCD/FoB thinks that they have it made will get ahead in life no matter what because they are desi they are more likely to go bust. It has happened in India so it can happen here – the first generation struggles and earns, the next enjoys and stagnates, the third fritters away and destroys the fortune. Just as the urban poor in India spend a fortune on getting their children educated; the least well off desis in this part of the world (whom some desis would rather not acknowledge) would do better by putting their children thru college than getting carried away by the limo liberal desis. In fact that is what many of them do.

What about those immigrants who left for labor camps in Africa, to tea plantatoins in Ceylon, the traders who left south India for Malaysia and Burma? How did they fare? Were they all necessarily the brightest and risk takers or just survivors? What about the Indians who were in the USA in the early parts of the century out in California? Yes, I agree the problems African Americans face cannot be compared to other immigrants – the shadow of slave history is long. But I don’t believe you can also minimize the hardships faced by Indian immigrants who have succeeded in the face of racism, absolute discrimination. At some point we need to look at what breeds sucess and apply it. Some of these lessons may not by pretty.

I said “most of the desis”..not all. The ones that you mentioned are an exception..not the rule. And guys who work at their own gas stations don’t have to slog long hours with low wages. And as metric mentioned, they usually employ a lot more desis under them (who constitute the 2nd group).

This is so true. This group often consists of businessmen in disguise. And they’re not afraid to use a little elbow grease – not above working in their own gas station. I though every desi knew this?

Though, I’m sure there are desi’s that work for desi’s that own the cab company, etc.

” I am not a genius… and I am quite unremarkable (though, I think most of my ivy-league peers are unremarkable [read:normal]as well).” I think, Oneup, you are not giving yourself enough credit – I mean intelligence wise. You obviously have the ability to make thoughtful insight and think laterally – that might have been enough to give you a good perspective and to succeed. There are brain surgeons who don’t understand political and other social dynamics – yet society would deem this person as intelligent. My dad, for example, extremely intelligent, but he has some very narrow-minded views about certain things – he just can’t wrap his head around them, no matter how hard you try to explain. I’m a very visual person – good with visual puzzles and drawing from memory, – that’s also difficult to classify, and I’ve never been tested on such things in any class (except art class in high school) and one other standardized test, though I can’t remember what it was called.

It’s also funny that you say most of your ivy-league peers are pretty normal as well. People worry that affirmative action will result in a bunch of mediocre professionals – I don’t see why this is a huge problem – well then, they’ll be just as mediocre as everyone else! Everyone loves to think they got where they are on hard work and merit alone (even my orphaned uncle, who is now a successful professor and researcher, who grew up dirt poor in India, had someone who thought he was special enough to warrant a scholarship. And he acknowledges this). By the way, we don’t have affirmative action here in Canada, though alot of white people think there is affirmative action – heh. I guess some people want to believe in it so they have someone to blame for their failures. A dumbass girl in my highschool class told me that my parents have their jobs because they’re non-white – ha! Similar comments have been made to black students at my sister’s school – especially when getting into very difficult programs. Sheer ignorance! There are provisions for aboriginal students, but for some reason, the seats reserved for them are rarely filled. I had a couple of aboriginal students (visablly so) in my classes and they were so intelligent that I doubt they would need a special provisions to gain acceptance. I’m sure everyone doubts their intelligence anyways! YAY!

We do have something called “equal opportunity” for government jobs, but no one really knows what it means, or what kind of specific action would be required in such a scenario. I’ve applied for such jobs in the past, and they always have a statement in the posting “We are equal opportunity employers and encourage applications from women, etc” – GREAT! But what does that mean, anyways? Does it mean they want to know this info on your application? It means you can self-identify, but from talking with friends, most do not self-identify because A) it’s awkward, B) They believe that self-identifying may actually harm them, C) Employment equity means that if 2 candidates have equal qualifications, give it to the woman or visible minority…. who’s to say what equal qualifications are? D) They want to be able to say they got the job based on “merit”. That’s why I don’t even bother. If they wanted to hire me, they’ll hire me, if they don’t, they won’t. I know that they do take measurements to see if there is equal representation pop. wise- but last I heard, there is not adequate representation from visible minority groups in my province, but then who do you hold accountable? I’m guessing people just rush to hire a visible minority for whatever job x they don’t really care about and call it a day. Doesn’t sound very useful or productive for anyone involved.

It’s such a complicated scenario… I’m getting really depressed and just wish that people could be more accountable on their own. I wish education on race relations, in highschool, went beyond the pc-correct “Love your neighbour” and actually involved some raw discussion. The problem is, most teachers are not informed enough and or comfortable enough to moderate such a discussion. As we’ve seen, it can turn ugly fast – much uglier if you’re in highschool!

Ugh… Where’s Manish when you need him?!?? Manish! WHERE ARE YOU???

MD:

I don’t think tashie was directing her frustration at you. Oneup echoed a little bit of what you said, too. The way he explained it – I can kind of see some of your point now, or at least what you’re getting at.

“There is no denying the fact that money plays a very important role in an immigrant’s social assimilation.

Most of the people who come from India can be broadly classified into two categories.

• Educated, holding advanced degrees (or an intention to pursue grad studies and then ‘settle down’ in US).
• Not highly educated (high school)..they usually end up working at gas stations, driving cabs etc.

The first group has absolutely no idea about the hardships that are usually faced by the people in the 2nd group. We (the 1st grp) pursue our advanced degrees, get high paying jobs, move into suburbs, raise our kids..and have enough money to pay for their kids’ college tuition etc”

The richest Indian’s I know do things like work at a gas stations and drive cabs, but the thing is they work in only 1 of there 10 gas stations and might drive 1 of the 30 cab’s that they own. These are people that make like 200,000 grand a month. You dont need a education in America to be rich, you need to be cheap.