Comments on: A Different Model Indian Minority

By: abw

abw — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 01:23:19 +0000

I personally believe education IS more expensive in the West Indies. However, I am NOT all too sure this is the complete case in India.With that said both “culture” and “race/systemic factor” play a part-with race/systemic factors to me being the stronger factors. On the one hand, I do not rule out hard work/education for being a factor in the success of groups precisely because our past accomplishments happened in spite of the racism/economic inequality and other barriers.Although much of the black community was in poverty THEN despite hard work/education.Other “systemic” problems in addition to racism could account for this then.Nevertheless, there are plenty of people-including black people- that are working poor that work one/two/three low-wage/non-upward mobility Mcjobs with side hustles(petty capitalist enterprises to boot-see Sudhir Venkatesh’s book Ghetto Capitalism on this-a man that is not black or white but an East Indian immigrant);and occasionally folks with some college education that are still languishing in poverty. Speaking of black people with a college education and no criminal record for that matter,even with a degree and no record they STILL have a harder time attaining employment than a white person with just/without a high school degree and a criminal record.When you put these two phenomenon together you see the cause of some of the economic strains in the community. Also another observation that influences my opinion that “race/systemic factors account for more” is the general decline I see of the standard of living amongst the middle class in this country from the downward mobility of alot of its members. Third, I am aware that there are a lot of Asian professionals and businessmen that are successful but speaking of Asian businessman- these businesses like other ones generally depend on cheap labor-and they used their conpatriots for very cheap labor(often cheaper than native labor) who sometimes outnumber the business folks at least 2:1; and in some of these cases, those workers being paid cheap are not living well since sometimes ethnic business can’t always pay much as the average American business(although many of these undercut their workers too whether native/foreign). Speaking of cheap Asian labor, I was not talking about the sweatshop workers you see, I was referring to the low-wage restaurant workers you do see. But either way you look at it, these segments of workers do not have a high standard of living-and in the Case of contemporary Chinese immigrant workers for example they have a hard time despite the fact that they have some IN TACT ethnic institutions to fall on. As a matter of fact, according to Peter Kwong in the book Forbidden Workers and various articles, those ethnic institutions that people depend on for social capital, like ROSCA’s are not as resilient as they used to be partly because the dire economic conditions these immigrants face that are constantly worsening coupled with the general downturn in the economy,globalization,outsourcing,the shutdowns of factories, technological changes and other factors as a whole. Which shows that hard work, education, and social capital alone is NOT always THE key to success or a panacea for widespread economic problems.Basically, I feel that folks suffering do not help themselves when they do not try to work hard, get their education, or revive their social capital but these strategies alone should not be seen as a panacea to systemic economic social problems. Nor should these strategies be used to ignore the for protest/action against economic inequality or social injustice. So for a segment African Americans that resent successful Asians but over downplay personal effort, stop overdownplaying these strategies and use these strategies to your advantage when you don’t; and for Asians that overglorify the model minority myth and endorse the belief of Black/Latino inferiority, know that there alot of people-African American, Latino, Asian, Arab or Jewish, White and Native American that still languish in poverty despite having high school diplomas or some college in some cases, one or two jobs, a side micro enterprise hustle, and no criminal record. All “problem minorities” and what’s considered failures; and all “model minorities” aren’t what’s considered successes. But, personally, I think what is deemed success/failure in the American context anyway is NOT WITHOUT FLAWs. Personally, it is a miracle that as many people survived in U.S. industrial society.

By: Buck Wheat

Buck Wheat — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 01:31:57 +0000

Yuz beez rihtz! us niggras bez blamin whity and thee woe times it bez us…

By: SM Intern

SM Intern — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 00:27:56 +0000

You know what? I just noticed the DATE on this post. It's nearly a year old. You do have some axe to grind.

By: SM Intern

SM Intern — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 00:25:46 +0000

On a separate note, I have to ask why Sepia Mutiny mods threaten to ban a commenter who advocated multi-lingualism (she/he wanted people to know more languages than just English),

We don't ban for such ridiculous reasons. Do you have a link? Is it possible that you don't know the entire story re: the commenter you are standing up for, i.e. they were abusive elsewhere/it got deleted/this was the final warning?

This is a purely volunteer-driven endeavor. Everyone has a full-time job. If there is an instance which seems inconsistent with regards to banning, it's probably a result of that simple truth and not whatever wicked double-standard you are imagining.

but let another commenter repeatedly make comments openly condoning rape and trying to argue that men just have their urges.

Again, do you have a link? One of this blog's most memorable collective experiences involves a memoir about someone being raped; so no one here would condone such a vile act. It sounds like you are going out of your way to make us sound evil because YOU are upset about what some random commenter wrote.

Every visit to this blog leaves me with the feeling of being deluged with complete nastiness.

patient: Doctor, it hurts when I do this (pokes self in eye)

doctor: Then don't do that.

By: Boris

Boris — Sat, 11 Aug 2007 23:53:10 +0000

On a separate note, I have to ask why Sepia Mutiny mods threaten to ban a commenter who advocated multi-lingualism (she/he wanted people to know more languages than just English), but let another commenter repeatedly make comments openly condoning rape and trying to argue that men just have their urges. Every visit to this blog leaves me with the feeling of being deluged with complete nastiness. Since this is such a high-traffic blog, it disturbs me to think that this might represent a cross-section of my supposed community.

By: Boris

Boris — Sat, 11 Aug 2007 23:43:36 +0000

One_up said: "Unfortunately, no one in the black community denounced the new stuff [hip hop] coming out as fake."

That is utterly and completely false. I don't even understand how you got that idea. You must deliberately insulate yourself with a really, really narrow group of conservatives or something. Watch the documentary "Beyond Beats and Rhymes". read what most scholars in AfrAm have to say on the topic. Look up how the women of Spelman college rejected a visit from the rapper Nelly. Mainstream corporate hip-hop's biggest consumers are white boys. And white men control the companies that put the records out there. There is money to be made in promoting negative images of African Americans. If you're the kind of person who reads McWhorter, I'm guessing you don't go out of your way to find independent, progressive hip-hop.

This entire thread, revolving around tired notions of African American inferiority, makes me ill. Yeah, Asians have the bestest values in the whole wide world! Rah, rah rah.\end sarcasm.

Another point - while there is no shortage of awful hate crimes in Queens, some of these American browns, who are mostly clustered around the tri-state and California need to get a reality check and realize that there are whole swaths of the country that they've never ventured to and never plan to.

Browns wouldn't have squat in this country if it weren't for the Civil Rights movement. Again, people need to understand that the term "culture" is highly problematic and vague, and stop foolishly disregarding how class forms people's ideas about race. Most Asian immigrants who came during the 70's wave already had advanced degrees.

By: MD

MD — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 00:35:05 +0000

Oneup – some of those schools are probably better in many aspects

Little known fact about long-time commenter MD: I interviewed at Meharry for med school years ago. Didn’t get in, went to Iowa.

By: Huey

Huey — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 00:22:08 +0000

Aren't West Indians of East Indian descent, despite their African ancestry? Would that not make them desi?

Of course they're desis. I don't know why they can only claim one ethnicity and not the other. When will this black-desi animosity cease? What is the big deal really? Black folks have been in the Western Hemisphere for over 500 years; we can't be THAT much of a mystery.

By: rasha

rasha — Sat, 07 Oct 2006 17:36:20 +0000

Aren’t West Indians of East Indian descent, despite their African ancestry? Would that not make them desi?

By: Oneup

Oneup — Fri, 06 Oct 2006 06:40:05 +0000

I very much agree with you that there's a vibrant black culture with many if not more cultural practices that are in use as any other ethnicity. If you go through a list of cultural markers; the number of markers that are active within the black community are as numerous, if not more than in other communities. For anyone to say different is seemingly to miss the reality of the situation. this is particularly evident to me in the rise of Atlanta as a place that African Americans are moving to.

Thanks Sahej! I wonder if anyone here has seen Drumline? I LOVE this movie... its a bit corny at points, but I think it does a good job of showing various aspects of black culture and how thing diverge from mainstream white american culture. It also shows how different black american ideas of success can be, which was touched upon earlier in this thread. For instance, many upper middle class black people view a college like Howard or Hampton U as being far superior to any harvard, yale, or oxford...

To add: I too hope to make my home in ATL one day.