September 27, 2006
Misogyny killsIssues
There are times when I feel desperately ashamed of my community/communities (Desi/Punjabi/Sikh). I realize this is just one side of the story we’re hearing, and that we shouldn’t jump to conclusions, but it is all too believable and makes my blood run cold.
This is the story of 27 year old Navjeet Siddhu from Southall, who committed suicide by jumping in front of a 100mph Heathrow Express train. Not only did she jump, but she jumped carrying her two children.
She suffered from depression, which began when she gave birth to a daughter rather than a son. Her condition became worse after her husband, Manjit, who left her to return to his native India, said that he would come back home only if he did not have to do any household chores. [Link]
Navjeet Siddhu and her daughter Simran died instantly. Her son, Aman Raj, died in the hospital 2 hours later. To add to the carnage, Navjeet’s mother, 56 year old Satwant Kaur Sodhi, committed suicide at the same spot six months later.
Navjeet Siddhu died back in August of 2005, but the inquest into the incident is just now being held, hence the news attention. The husband comes off as hideously callous in news stories:
The court was told how Mr Sidhu, who arrived six minutes after the incident at Southall station, walked past the bodies of his wife and five-year-old daughter, Simran, to pick up the body of his 23-month-old son, Aman Raj, and take him to hospital. [Link]
It’s possible that his actions had a rational explanation - that Aman Raj was the only one who looked like he would survive - it’s hard to tell without having his side of the story. We really shouldn’t prejudge her husband based on such flimsy evidence. However, even if this account is a media fiction, this sort of thing is far too common and that makes it easier to believe that it might have happened.
ennis on September 27, 2006 08:55 AM in Issues · T·r·a·c·k·b·a·c·k address · Direct link · Email post
Dubai, Sept 17: Accidents and suicides have been found to be the leading cause of deaths of Indian expatriates in Saudi Arabia, with at least 244 of them reported to have died due to unnatural causes in the first eight months this year.
Out of the 3.5 million Indian expatriates in the Gulf, 1.5 million out live in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
While car accidents and suicides were the leading causes of unnatural deaths, the maximum number of natural deaths were caused by heart attacks, the Indian Embassy in Riyadh has said.
A total of 303 Indians in Saudi Arabia died of natural causes, bringing the total number of deaths in the community to 547 in the period between January 1 and August 31 this year, K Muraleedharan, second secretary at the embassy said.
"The cases of suicide among Indian expatriates indicated that they took such extreme steps as a last resort to highlight their problems relating to non-payment of salaries, harassment by employers, or family problems at home," Indian officials were quoted as saying by Arab News.
A breakdown of figures for the unnatural causes of death shows that traffic accidents claimed 135 lives, followed by suicide (32 cases), industrial accidents (26), murder (8) and undisclosed unnatural causes (43).
Link to the above news story: http://www.zeenews.com/nri/inner1.asp?aid=197821&sid=HEL
Oh gosh what a thing to read first thing in the morning Ennis. I'm speechless yet again.
Here is my question...with education and permeation of the west comes progression (a fair assumption). Could grassroots education in the Punjabi/Sikh community address these issues? This and the other issue of men going to India to marry and leave the women after marriage and run off with all the money? This particular community is affected by this more than anything else. And can local community leaders make a dent in this problem?
According to whom? This sounds like the story a disgruntled cousin (say) would suggest, and it would be eagerly picked up by the press with no verification. Depression is a very powerful underlying cause, and the household chores could have played a rather small role in the matter. Suicide isn't something anyone enters into lightly. It seems simplistic to assign this one cause to her self-slaughter.
Again, a delicious morsel of story, but according to whom? "Walked past" makes it sound so leisurely. And, as you say, the boy survived for an additional two hours. Besides, if he got there six minutes after they been hit by the train, would there have been no one to help? Is that possible, for three people to be hit by a train in London, and no one to help for six whole minutes? And, in any case, who informed him of the accident?
The evil ethnic man who refuses to do housework, and walks past his wife's and daughter's bodies. It's a story that fills a certain psychological need in an audience that already thinks foreigners are weird. But I'm taking it with a grain of salt, until I see more evidence that things really did happen that way.
Being ashamed brings despair and inaction, Ennis. Shame kills and restricts individuals amongst our various communities, don't let it kill hope too.
The Times is on heat for Asians these days. A few weeks back, a Scottish girl was believed to have been kidnapped by her father and taken to Pakistan. The leading article in the Times the next day was about how this could not be tolerated anymore, the backwardness and evil of Pakistani men. The truth of the story was that the 13 year old girl, daughter of a white Scottish mother and Pakistani immigrant, went to Pakistan willingly to escape the drabness of her life in a council estate in the highlands to go and live with her wealthy family in Model Town, Lahore. The frenzy of accusation in the British media was amazing. Then the truth came out and not an apology or retraction was made.
Whilst it is good to be alert to the biases in stories like this, we still have to acknowledge the underlying issues internally. It's not impossible to hold both awarenesses in the mind at one time, so that one doesnt have to cancel out the other.
Couldn't agree more.
Mr. K - you're right that there may be another side to the story, that's why I phrased the post as carefully as I could. It is entirely possible that the husband is a bereaved man who has lost his wife and children and is now being pilloried unfairly by the press.
Unfortunately, I haven't seen his side of the story written up. That's why I tried to balance competing concerns. I don't want to be Gurinder Chaddha, but I don't want to be Uncle Whitewash either.
Sadly, this kind of story is too common, particularly in that part of that community.
There was a debate on BBC's Newsnight programme on the very subject of the media's reaction to the story of Misbah Ali, the Scottish girl who left her mother to live with her siblings and father in Pakistan, how it was branded as an evil and wicked inbred Muslim kidnapping his daughter to probably marry her off to a goat farmer. The debate was quite good. On one side, a lady said these things happen occasionally, forced marriages and so on, so it is nessecary to bear things like this in mind, and on the other side, the journalist said that white people, and the media generally, are by default, unable to think about Asians, specifically Muslims, in anything other than the most presumptuous and cynical way.
A few years ago, I remember reading a story in the Daily Mail about a Hindu lady who had an affair with a white man. It all ended tragically with her husband killing himself. A fairly straightforward tragic story that happens every day, but they turned it into a two page spread on the evils of arranged marriages, and dowry, and blah blah blah (these guys were doctors - not peasants from Bihar). The only thing they didnt throw in was how Hinduism condones ritual child sacrifice. I think that kind of coverage is detrimental, because it makes people cynical of the media's attitude. Something about it was extra sad - because they used a tragic incident to suit their agenda, which was, and is, that all Indians are backwards, and multiculturalism is an evil designed to destroy Britain. And in amongst that is a tale of tragedy and lost lives, and a squalid scene surrounded it. I could just picture the commuters on the train in the morning reading it, then glancing at me and thinking to themselves, 'Bloody evil backwards Paki'...
A sad story indeed. The kids look so cute in that picture and the mother looks so happy.
has post-partum depression been hypothesized in this?
I've changed the post slightly to give it a bit more nuance, based on your feedback.
JoaT - unfortunately, community leaders within this subsection of the community show very little concern with these issues. Nothing in the accounts indicates that she was beaten or abused by her husband. Even when a woman is physically abused, it's hard enough to get people to pay attention - generally they don't want to know about it or engage with it. There's a lot of three monkeys behavior.
w.r.t. the older daughter, but she was 5 years old at the time.
From the link
I don't see the reason why you should feel ashamed.. Atleast from the link, it looks like the conclusion is "she had a loving family".. People commit blunders when they are depressed..
The one with the loving family was the grandmother of the children.
Red Snapper -
I hear what you're saying about the Times. You see similar bias in their story "Drowning Sikh bathers 'were trapped in unravelled turbans'" - I looked at other versions of the story which said the problem was that the floor of the lake dropped away quickly, and that one of the youths couldn't swim. That's very different from the idea that they drowned because they were trapped in their turbans.
Yeah Ennis, that was a really tragic story. The report I read, in the Guardian, said that they were holding hands, about twenty of them on a youth group holiday, just messing about on the shore of the lake on a warm day, and one of them stepped off a ledge in which the depth goes from two feet to 18 feet, and the other two died trying to save him. But the Times is like that. I remember also when there was a strike at Heathrow airport by the mostly Sikh female workforce of a catering firm, it held up flights for a while, and was major news for a couple of days. And because they needed a hall to hold the trade union meeting, the gurdwara in Southall gave them the use of the hall, and The Times reported that the striking workers were holding a meeting in a mosque!
"Mr. K - you're right that there may be another side to the story, that's why I phrased the post as carefully as I could."
Ennis- The opening phrase itself seems too shallow coming from a blogger like you. By saying that you are ashamed to be desi/sikh etc. when such an incident happens you are implying that such incidents happen only in these communities. Depression is a major disease all over thw world and it definately is not confined to any specific communities. This woman was suffering through major depression and needed help. I would not at all jump to conclusions for the husband. I mean seriously, my husband refuses to load the dishwasher but I don't go and jump in front of a train! I think you need to rephrase your opening statement.
Red Snapper this sort of ignorant shit irritates me as well. There was a hindu priest recently in Queens that was accused of molesting a girl from the temple. His temple said TEMPLE on the outside yet the reporter kept using the word "Church" over and over and over again. It was so blatant it grated. I mean this is NYC not fucking the cornfields of Kansas where I might forgive someone for being that ignorant. But I've been surprised. I have mehndi on my hands from a wedding this weekend and my boss was like "What you got a tatoo" and when I said it was henna from a wedding this weekend he was completely clueless about it. I mean he really had no idea about brides or traditions or that it's a Indian thing. He was born and raised in NYC!! People annoy me!
I brought up post-partum depression because there have been more than a couple of mothers who've jumped on to the subway in the last few years. everytime it shakes the city and we end up asking the same questions. here's a couple of snippets
a "rich" doctor, a psychanalyst to boot, drives to the subway in her mercedes and jumps onto the tracks with her 6 mo old and this article relating a person's personal struggles and her recounting how her mother was incapacitated through depression several years into her child's birth.
Ennis,
That's just your interpretation of the statement. From what I remember of various news items at the time, he went to his son first because the boy was the only one who was still alive. That's all there was to it.
************************
Regarding the 3 Sikhs who drowned during the weekend, there as an article in the Daily Express newspaper yesterday which included quotes from an interview from their cousin Simran Singh. Simran had been taken to see the bodies afterwards, and had noted that his cousin's turban was unravelled and had wrapped itself around his legs and other parts of his body. Simran therefore suggested that perhaps this was the reason his cousins drowned.
Again, that's all.
While I understand team SM's consternation at ennis' personal expression of shame - the fact remains that misogyny is prevalent in punjab and folks of punjabi descent. there was this grim case i think i posted on sm (or maybe not) in which the authorities found 300+ female foetuses dumped in a well outside an illegally operating abortion clinic. it is a problem and must be acknowledged. kudos to ennis for being so bold and making the statement. pride and shame go hand in glove - cant have one without the other.
Whether or not the Times story is "fair and balanced" with respect to this particular family is not really relevant to me. My concern lies with the problem at large. Even if Mr. Sidhu is being portrayed unfairly, I think we can all agree that this is still a problem in the community at large. It amazes me how, in so many facets of life in both the east and the west, traditionalism is still such a force despite the amount of knowledge humans have amassed. There are still people who believe a baby girl is of no value and people who believe that evolution should not be taught in schools. It makes me want to scream. I identify strongly with my cultural heritage, but at a certain point traditional values that no longer hold water need to be abandoned. I do not understand the mentality of people who are not willing to recognize the fact that societal values need to be continuously re-evaluated.
unfortunately i have also observed this to be true. i personally know of two women (both sikh) who have been forced to undergo multiple abortions by their in-laws till the ultrasound showed a male baby. the verbal/physical abuse that went along with it and the effect all this had on the women is heart-wrenching. it is not a mainstream practice and may be far less in the west, but it still happens. it needs to change from our generation, which is why this discourse is important, it is not meant to harp on the punjabi community or on the particular family in this case... these are attitudes and mindsets that need to be questioned and altered.
As a northie I am also ashamed of this terrible tradition in our culture. I remember well stories of how girls would be given tea when boys were given milk or horrific expressions like "wo to paraya ghar ki ladki heh" when referring to a daughter.
Ennis hasnt sensationalized anything, he is being very honest with his reactions.
"wo to paraya ghar ki ladki heh"
English please, English.
Ennis, this story makes me sick too, because it echoes what occurs in India on a regular basis - reading the newspapers there, at least two or three times a week an item appears informing you of a housewife's suicide (and I'm talking about reading the Statesman - the issue is not limited to the Punjabi community). While many on this thread would like to blame the phenomenon on post-partum depression or other forms of mental illness, or relegate the item to biased reporting, it's a fact that misogyny kills.
I suspect this woman had few financial or social options without her husband, and that is what triggered her depression. There are spiritual and emotional factors which bring on mental illness - you can't just dismiss something neatly as 'depression' and believe all to be explained.
Sriram's comment provokes me to ask this question: When will the men of our communities collectively speak out against misogyny, violence and abuse toward women? Too often, domestic violence/misogyny is an issue that women have to deal with as victims, and men at large rarely get involved. I suppose I should clarify--that's not true just for our South Asian communities, but society in general.
I respect the men on this site who have voiced their opinions, but I'm wondering how we can effect larger attitudinal change within the men of our communities? I'm not saying it's solely up to them, as the way mothers raise their sons plays a big part, but until there is a major shift in the way they (and as a result, our communities) think, I doubt much is going to change.
Does anyone know of any activist/educational efforts such as the Men's Network Against Domestic Violence in our desi communities?
Ismat,
I think on the part of some men (and also some women) it becomes a question of weighing cultural honour/integrity and genuine horror over these incidents. Unfortunately cultural honour/integrity wins. Something Hairy said about evolving values makes sense - people need to understand that self-critique is not a sign of cultural weakness, but rather a sign of vitality.
BTW, this isn't a punjabi or sikh thing, its widespread in North India. Growing up in Bengal I had never heard of such a thing till I visited family up north.
no these are back in kuwait, i knew them when i used to live there... i haven't heard such stories in canada.. so far, hope it remains that way. i have however indirectly heard of physical abuse stories, esp towards women who came to canada after marriage from india... even if someone knew abt it and wanted to report it, but the families have ways of hiding these stories. many times even the women don't want to report bc they don't know of any other options for themselves... they can't go back to their families in india bc society won't accept them there anymore, family's indignity bc of the fact that the daughter is back at home and all that crap... and if they have kids they don;t want to leave them behind. there are also constant threats towards these women from in-laws/husbands, pulling on their vulnerabilities. it is very complicated emotionally for these women. sometimes their own mind can be their prison, but they don't know of better options. and if they are pretty isolated, as in most cases, how will that change.
Someone asked what are religious institutions doing about this kind of thing. I doubt they are doing much - religious institutions are always the slowest to react to what needs doing, just look at the paedophilia scandals in the Roman Catholic church in Ireland and America and how long it took for them to even admit there was a problem. More often than not, they are either in denial or disinclined to intefere or are wrapped up in religious issues.
There has to be a grassroots approach and support for people in these situations. A few religious people making a public stance would be welcome, but I would always be wary of investing more authority in any religious/community leader, especially in the current context of multiculturalism in Britain where they already have a little too much legitimacy in the media for my liking.
I wish this was as clear and simple as it sounds. I recently got involved when a good friend who doesn't live in the area anymore alerted me to some massive atrocities happening in her maternal home. She's married with kids and lives several states away. Turns out her mother and brother have been systematically verbally and emotionally and occassionaly physically abusing her sister in law that they brought from India.
Ask me if this was easy when the woman whow as being abused did not want any help despite everyone trying. The father and mother have now split after 35 years of marriage over this issue but this woman is not willing to leave her husband or her MIL because she has nowhere to go and her sisters will have a hard time getting married in India if she gets divorced.
These things in our community are NEVER easy no matter how strong our intent, effort or involvement. Even if the cops come they can do nothing if the woman isn't pressing charges.
then i admit. i'm not married. who's to say what kind of insecurities a marriage will dredge up. maybe misogyny is the id to the man's character. i dont claim to walk on water so have no right to call someone out.
i wasn't offended hairy_d, i understand your sentiments... unfortunately things are never as simple as they appear at first glance.
It is possible these attitudes amongst some Indians in the West will not die out until the older generation responsible for perpetuating such beliefs and behaviours is no longer around. If enough 2nd-Gens have also taken this on board then it may take even longer than that. It's considerably less common amongst younger generation Indians in Britain (compared to parents' & grandparents' generations) but it does depend on the specific social circle; my own friends are almost completely Westernised in such matters and have parents at the more liberal end of the scale, so beyond a certain point I guess I can't really comment on the more retrograde and conservative members of the British Indian community.
The Indian community in the US has it tougher compared to the UK because you still have an ongoing influx of large numbers of immigrants from the subcontinent. If such people are going to continue these misogynist practices and their own children regard this as an acceptable way to behave, then the cycle will continue for an even longer length of time over there. However, the fact that the United States is much larger geographically than the UK and the desi community is comparatively less close-knit may also make a difference to how matters develop. I don't know -- I've said before that there are obviously considerable differences between the American desi and British desi communities both in terms of regional origin and "culture".
One doesn't need to actually be married or have children etc to recognize it's challenges. You as a thinking adnd feeling adult who choses to question himself like a vast majority of men has progressed from the state of being a Neanderthal are doing just fine. We need to stop making excuses for those that haven't figured out how to handle adulthood and the responsibilities that come with it. A man's character isn't that shallow, simple or insecure for it to rely on misogyny. Or we'd still be living in a cave.
Ismat (#28),
I think the first step is to recognize the fact that the problem will never by truly eliminated. The "progress v. tradition" debate has existed since the dawn of civilization. So, just as there are people in the U.S. who still believe that African Americans should still be slaves and women should not have the right to vote, there will always be people who believe a baby girl is a discardable burden to the family. The second problem I see is the chicken and the egg. I do not believe men in male dominated societies give up their power entirely willingly and that creates the need for women to assert themselves. So change is not going to happen from the top down. But, how does an oppressed population with no power assert enough influence to effect political cultural change (the cultural change being the far more difficult of the two)? In the U.S., university educated women, who were not able to secure jobs after completing their degrees, drove the women's movement. In many areas of the world, such women simply do not exist. Therefore, I believe that the driving force for change will have to come from educated women who return to these areas to organize and educate their sisters. That is asking a lot, but I think that's the key to the problem. If there is a population of educated women willing to physically go to areas where women are disenfranchised, then we will be able to start something. Obviously I have no answers, but I think this is an important discussion to have.
You are right in that there are definitely cultural differences and mostly because Indians have lived in the UK in a much tighter community far longer than they have lived in the United States often surrounded by mainstream culture that they tried not to mingle and be part of while lacking community support.
The problem isn't however an old generation or new immigrant issue. My entire generation which is most probably the first generation of Indians in the US has had to deal with the issue of "arranged marriage" where despite being born/raised here and being terribly western a significant amount of men still opt to go to India to marry a girl of their parents choices. And so many of these marriages have failed terribly. This has become an old story at this point.
Until traditions are questioned and broken by renegades this will continue. I don't think it's as simple as putting the weight of this matter on our parents or the new immigrants.
Interesting comments Jai. I definitely think that the closer the links between 'motherland' and the families over here has a bearing on these things, in a certain demographic/social profile. Indian Americans don't have these things to the same extent, being mostly educated macaccas.
Sriram, re #39... excellent comments. you are right abt the bottom-up approach but the practical reality is still that more social and judicial structures are needed to allow women to take independant steps in some countries, ie india. i cannot go into many details due to time constraints, but one example is about a law in india that was passed last year which gives sons and daughters equal rights to land inheritance. now a woman who has the option of relying on the income from her land or by selling her land may think twice about staying in an abusive relationship... she has some degree of financial independance this way. women that do not have the know-how or financial options cannot make such steps no matter how much advocacy is going on... because there really is a fair amount happening in india. then again, at least the advocacy is helping to enforce judicial changes... there needs to be a top-down balance as well to aid faster progress.
I also think that there's a blatant and pathological (Punjabi? Many other kinds of desis share it, too, though) need for drama, which frequently leads to grievous harm. I'm speaking from personal experience, so it may not be immediately relevant to the case in point, but I could argue that sometimes the notion of suicide isn't exactly driven by depression so much as a very juevenile desire to "show them," a very passive-aggressive form of retribution against a person or persons who are perceived to hold near-absolute power over the "victim."
Misogyny and double-standards can frequently take a bad situation and make it far far worse. I've been party to situations where the wife has done nothing wrong per se, but in the midst of marital strife the respective parents of both husband and wife have taken the husband's side. It was horrible and shameful to witness, particularly because there was no need for side-taking at all. And the wife's reaction in those situations was practically read from a script. It was so predictable! It culminated with threats of suicide, at which point everyone kind of calmed down a bit.
But not enough for the wife to go to her own home, sad to say.
It all felt like a really bad Indian movie.
I fail to understand why this incident reflects badly on us as a group. Yes, this story is tragic -- and my heart goes out to this woman's family. And yes, I agree, there needs to be community resources available to help newly-immigrated desi women facing abuse. But why should I feel ashamed to be desi because of it?
White people commit rape and domestic violence more than most Americans want to admit, yet we never see our gora friends and co-workers hanging their heads saying, "oh I'm so ashamed to be a gora -- I read in the newspaper last week that a gora man beat his gora wife to death." Yet when we read about a brown person doing this in the paper, for some reason it's supposed to reflect badly on all 1 billion of us browns. Why?
alright i really need to get back to work but just wanted to post this link. i am a huge fan of Dr. Geeta Rao Gupta, here's her interview with NOVA, PBS... she comments on the 'bias towards boys in india and the consequences of the imbalance'. might shed some light on issues being brought up!
White people commit rape and domestic violence more than most Americans want to admit, yet we never see our gora friends and co-workers hanging their heads saying, "oh I'm so ashamed to be a gora -- I read in the newspaper last week that a gora man beat his gora wife to death." Yet when we read about a brown person doing this in the paper, for some reason it's supposed to reflect badly on all 1 billion of us browns. Why?
you've never encountered white guilt?
if you take pride, you should also take shame. no pain, no gain.
Because of the ways in which certain practices are deeply rooted in our communities and more importantly the ways in which our communities fail to acknowledge and deal with them. If you're not of North Indian decent, this will feel more distant.
I get your general point, and that's one of the things that I hate about Gurinder Chadha's movies - the way that no brown men can do right, and the way that all human failings are blamed on brown men in particular. But in this case, it makes some sense for us to be unsettled by it.
Salil, I think I know what you mean, where if you refuse to stop seeing the girl or boy your parents dissaprove of they say they'll kill themselves, that kind of thing. But I dont think it applies in this case. I think there is a level of depression where you reach a completely different zone, reach a kind of psychosis, and it is beyond that. It is a really dark place that is almost unimaginable. Recently there was a case in England of a (white) guy jumping out of a hotel window in Greece with his son and daughter in his arms after he had a holiday argument with his wife, he was suffering from depression. He intended to kill himself with his kids. He and his daughter survived the fall, but he landed on his son and killed him. There was another case recently of a lady jumping off a bridge in Bristol or Wales with her teenage boy. I think this aspect, taking the lives of your children, is the most horrifying and inexplicable thing, and it is rare, but still happens regularly, and it indicates a level of mental collapse that goes behind the usual melodramas and gestures of broken relationships.
There is a difference between Indians in US and UK. In US, most of the Indians are well educated (as Red Snapper pointed out). And the immigrant populations coming into US mostly come as students or IT professionals. UK on the other hand attracts a lot of less educated people (mostly as Indians in UK inviting people from their "pind").
I do agree that India is traditionally a male dominating society. And to make the problem worse, the people who immigrated 10 or more years back seem to keep the practices, whereas India itself has spearheaded into an evolving culture of equality of sexes (referring to metropolitan cities and demography of middle to upper income levels of the society).
There's absolutely no need to be ashamed. Desis have a disproportionately large number of talented, educated women out there writing books, making films, treating patients, starting companies. It's an extremely complex community.
I have wondered on occasion if the bias toward boys in many desi families does not, in some cases, work against boys. I never felt the intense pressure to become an engineer/accountant/doctor that so many desi men have felt. There's a freedom in being an educated desi woman in the West which perhaps educated desi men don't feel.
In Canada many of the most non-progressive events occur among the Vancouver Sikhs, many of whom are generations removed from India. However, they tend to have a bunker mentality toward the mainstream, hunkering down whenever something bad happens - like an honour killing - and refusing to comment. Leads me back to the surmise that perhaps it is not so much ties to India but the development of a reactionary mentality which leads to things like this.
Abhi_az
Indians in the UK are not a static people - for every pindu there are 50 'thrusting' 'spearheading' cool dudes and modern people, so its always good to just state that, so people don't go around generalising. Although it will take at least one thousand years to reach the level of perfection of American Macacas, who are the pinnacle of all things.
"you've never encountered white guilt?"
That's totally different, white "guilt" is a term that whites use when dodging responsibiity for acknowledging current gains, benefits, and social stratification, due to past criminal acts, against large groups of people. It's a temporal distance. And I use responsibility in the sense of acknowledgement, and resistence to a system of privelage.
Lavanya speaks to a spatial distance, ie someone in another part of the world commits something, and we feel ashamed/responsible etc... This is something whites have never undergone, and never will. When Tim McVeigh parked a Ryder truck filled with explosives, white men named Tim across the country did not experience any discrimination while renting vehicles.
Good point...these attitudes/behaviors are not simply Punjabi, you can find them well-entrenched thoughout the Hindi-speaking states as well (but there are comparatively fewer Hindi Wale in the diaspora, apart from Indo-Carribeans who are many generations removed from India). Pakistan has it even worse. ABDs from Bengali, South Indian, or Marathi backgrounds may not realise the extent of these attitudes up north. Gujaratis I'm not so sure about...from my observations, traditional Gujarati culture was as 'bad' in these respects as other northern Indian cultures, but in the diaspora things have changed a lot.
"Lavanya speaks to a spatial distance, ie someone in another part of the world commits something, and we feel ashamed/responsible etc... This is something whites have never undergone, and never will."
not only are you are a blackologist, you are a whiteologist. i didn't know the bible of human nature was already written, can i find it in the local library?
That's a good point.
ABDs from Bengali, South Indian, or Marathi backgrounds may not realise the extent of these attitudes up north.
it might not be as bad, but the "stranger" tendency exists in bengali (bangladeshi) social lore. the wife is an intruder whose role is to eventually oust and marginalize the mother-in-law, until the cycle recapitulates itself as she herself is ousted by a newcomer.
Lavanya speaks to a spatial distance, ie someone in another part of the world commits something, and we feel ashamed/responsible etc... This is something whites have never undergone, and never will.
btw, this point is not without merit. i simply object to the stock generalization and transformation of whites into some essential amorphous Other. we wouldn't tolerate it for browns (or blacks or yellows). two wrongs don't make a right, yada, yada....
Exactly. When the general population advocates the production of male babies, or decides to rescind the 19th Amendment (hey, some parts of the country aren't too far from this), or simply treats its women children far far differently from its male children, preventing them from getting a proper education, forcing them into lives of menial servitude, etc...well, I guess then we Punjabis would have a lot easier time assimilating.
I kid, I kid.
Kind of.
Red Snapper:
I see what you mean. That aspect of taking your children with you implies a warped thread of CARING that goes something like, "this world is so bad that I can't even let my children remain in it, especially if I'm not around to care for them." The only other explanation is the opposite, that hidden resentments force them to take their children, too.
Either one is horrible to contemplate.
I frequently feel like desis are particularly bad at reviewing and analyzing their own behavior. We're a community of freakishly-strong rationalizers. In the Western world, I think a mother or father who feels like commiting suicide and taking his or her kids with them would tend to seek help, because he or she knows at some level that what he/she's feeling is wrong, and deeply disturbing. But I know a lot of desis who allow themselves to feel what they feel, no questions asked, and nevermind where those out-of-control feelings may lead them. The merest suggestion that they might feel differently with contemplation or self-analysis is regarded as a personal attack, and rejected outright.
I really really hate that.
Red Snapper
I agree. I wasn't trying to generalize, I was just referring to the "pind-related" (or pindus) immigrations to UK.
"not only are you are a blackologist, you are a whiteologist. i didn't know the bible of human nature was already written, can i find it in the local library?"
No single one, but here, here , here and here are a few places you might start.
I am unsettled by it. But being disturbed is different from feeling ashamed to be desi. I'm Tamil, and while I wouldn't go as far as saying southies treat women better, the expectations of women vastly differ between regions. That's why I cringe whenever I hear "Desis are so misogynistic" because I don't think it's fair to lump us all together and make such blanket generalizations. And I can't tell you how many times in high school someone asked me if I'd seen "Not Without My Daughter" and if that "really" happens in my community. wtf.
It's an excellent point. In fact, free thinking educated women even have the option of wedding one of these wealthy doctors/accountants/engineers while they remain free to pursue other more satisfying life endeavors. Not saying they all do it, they just have the option.
Lots of privileged white kids built "shantytowns" and otherwise protested their universities' investments in South Africa in the 1980's. Many were motivated by shame at what White South Africans were doing.
Of course I can't speak for white people, not being white by some standards (and being continuously amazed at what I learn about "white culture" in the Sepia Mutiny comments). I'm just a Pasty-American.
'm Tamil, and while I wouldn't go as far as saying southies treat women better, the expectations of women vastly differ between regions. That's why I cringe whenever I hear "Desis are so misogynistic" because I don't think it's fair to lump us all together and make such blanket generalizations.
1) well, don't southies treat women better if you go by the metrics? (sex ratio, literacy, as well as cultural practices like matrifocality, etc.). why not call a spade a spade?
2) "desi" culture seems very punjabi-weighted in lexicon ("gora," etc.). the majority of brownz in the UK are ethnic punjabis, and second largest group in the US are prolly punjabi (after gujaratis). i think it is fair to object, elsewise the identity will go in directions you don't think it should in terms of perception.
and being continuously amazed at what I learn about "white culture" in the Sepia Mutiny comments
well nina, you aren't a whitologist. you need distance from Whiteness to truly comprehend the eviltude of Whiteness. brown-skinned people with high incomes and fancy-pantz educations are uniquely qualified to comment on white oppression since they have seen such injustice in their day to day lives.
OK - 'Shame'. Is it good or bad in the following scenarios:
*A Muslim in London feels shame about terrorism in New York, Madrid and London?
*A Hindu in Leicester feels shame for Gujarat 2002?
*A Jew in New York feels shame for the deaths in Lebanon?
*A Sikh in Toronto feels shame for Air India bombing?
Maybe we need a different word, because to me, 'shame' suggests a degree of guilt, culpability, and possibly, a kind of acceptance of collective guilt, which leads to many of the problems we see in the first place. Maybe a more accurate description is a sense of impatient anger, gained from personal and intuitive insight into the situation.
With certain problems or stigmas or attitudes we see amongst our communities, we do feel in some way angry and frustrated by their persistence. Does this suggest culpability? In what way can this be used as a spur to action and to challenge? If it is a spur to action it is a good thing, if it becomes a way to stigmatise or perpetuate hatreds, or leads you to forsaking who you are, it is a bad thing, in a certain way.
I would say that privately, we will all admit to these conflicted feelings about certain things, regarding 'or people', but given the circumstances and with whom you are talking, this assumption of shame can have differing manifestations. I might privately, or even on a forum like this, admit to a feeling of anger, shame, or even personal culpability for some things, secure that I am amongst friends who will understand what I mean. In a different circumstance, in which a hostile person demands you feel shame, and subsequent to that charges you with personal responsibility on the basis of collective guilt (your group is guilty for the actions of individuals) - then I think I would feel different, or at least be wary of the implications.
India as a male dominated society! Ha
Well, don't forget we have already had a woman president whereas amrika is not even close to that concept!
Well, don't forget we have already had a woman president whereas amrika is not even close to that concept!
until recently south asia seemed more mired in the aristocratic principle of leadership with dynasties than amerika. so, the rise of indira, hasina, benazir, etc. is more a function of giving due respect and power to those with a history of leadership than gender equality. trivially clear, but sometimes needs to be stated....
I will not generalize, but here is a story of my own family. My uncle and aunt, who moved to the US in 1980, seemed to have culturally calcified that year. Over the next 15 years, they visited des about five or six times, each time bringing us suitcaseloads of lavender scented soaps, shampoos, teeshirts etc. Each trip, they seemed somewhat out of synch with the realities we were living in India. They made so much of a distant cousin marrying outside the community.
I myself moved to the US and now can confirm that this particular couple, and the people they hang with, have stopped evolving. They live very bunkered lives, around other Indians. They know gores, but don't really socialize with them. They "have given up" on their kids's decisions re. marriage etc, but they are even more shocked by the kids in India.
When I read about the Vancouver Sikhs, I see the point.
skepmod, some of the same in my fam (my fam came about the same time). this is a general tendency in that diasporas tend to preserve old cultural forms. e.g., quebec french is relatively archaic, and some of the peculiarities of east anglian englilsh is only preserved in the new dialect of american english (which is east anglian derived).
Do you have a link on this East Anglia/American English connection?
There is a certain cruel stereotype that people in the East Anglia countryside are a little in-bred, 'Deliverance' types.
omg i have seen a handful of families like this here in canada.... my friends and i who have all moved to the west in the last decade or so, have also noticed/ commented on how some families that have moved here in the 70s/80s carry an obsolete image of india in their minds and fail to see the country for what it is... this is a particular community, not a general trend, but it was very surprising to me! we have many hypotheses on why this is.
Abhi_az,
The vast majority of such immigrations to the UK occurred during the late 60s and early 70s. Most Indians in the UK -- Punjabi or otherwise -- were born in this country.
It's not like the US, where there is currently far more immigration directly from India and where a much, much higher percentage of the desi population consists of recent immigrants.
There is not a shortage of extremely highly-educated and financially successful 2nd-Gen Indians in Britain -- they're one of the most high-achieving groups in the country, and are well-known for it.
Do you have a link on this East Anglia/American English connection?
please check albion's seed by david hackett fisher. interestingly, during the 17th century east anglia tended by particular literate and industrious (read: calvinist) vis-a-vis other rural parts of england. the puritans who settled in new england were even more so.
'until recently south asia seemed more mired in the aristocratic principle of leadership with dynasties than amerika. so, the rise of indira, hasina, benazir, etc. is more a function of giving due respect and power to those with a history of leadership than gender equality. trivially clear, but sometimes needs to be stated'
The above is only a partial accounting. The South Asian societies inherently deify women.
There is not a shortage of extremely highly-educated and financially successful 2nd-Gen Indians in Britain -- they're one of the most high-achieving groups in the country, and are well-known for it.
see here.
Thanks Razib I will check it out.
"Most Americans of German descent began denying or playing down their German heritage during World War II.
i.e. becoming white.
"Lots of privileged white kids built "shantytowns" and otherwise protested their universities' investments in South Africa in the 1980's. Many were motivated by shame at what White South Africans were doing."
Again, spatial separation. There's no risk in denouncing oppression on another hemisphere. How about shantytowns protesting police brutality, inequalities in the criminal justice system, and so forth going on in their own backyards?
Damn Razib, Indians are beaten into second place as usual by the Chinese kids in those school results.
Yeah right, pindus. We are clever macaccas too. The second cleverest in the whole of Britain.
South might have a better sex ratio, but there are pockets where it is as rampant as anywhere else.
Google search : female infanticide tamilnadu
There is not a shortage of extremely highly-educated and financially successful 2nd-Gen Indians in Britain -- they're one of the most high-achieving groups in the country, and are well-known for it.
see here.
Yeah boring model macacas they are. don't buy the nonsense that they're edgy and hip :-)
Razib,
I have to disagree with you, bro. Nobody bears moral responsibility for the crimes of anyone else, either historical ancestors or modern-day people who happen to be from the same background as them. I strongly object to the idea of "collective guilt".
(I'm not saying you're suggesting all Punjabis/North Indians/whatever are "guilty" in this way, but I'm referring to the concept in relation to anyone, regardless of their background or ethnic/religious/national affiliation).
You give it one more generation, and we'll all be golf playing boring old farts voting Conservative.
In all seriousness, I wish a few more Indian kids would fail their exams, so we can maintain the ghetto chic a little while longer, it goes down well when I visit Long Island.
jai;
i think razib agrees w/ you. He's just asking how do go from that position to having "pride" in accomplishments that are not you own. the same logic that protects you from guilt should also deny you pride.
When? I missed that memo.
I totally agree, Lavanya. But this is why I think we should be thinking of a larger picture in the way Ismat suggested. While it is unfair to say all X does Y, I think we can say, without even getting into cultural specifics, that an unacceptably large percentage of the world's women are being denied basic human dignity. If the question and debate is framed in that way, someone smarter than I might be able to come up with solutions that are applicable across the board (though I don't mean to suggest there is some sort of panacea or magic bullet to solve the problem) and need not be limited to one socio/cultural/religious group.
Totally agree. The whole notion of demanding emotion from another person is ludicrous, yet it happens all the time: people demand shame, respect, love, kindness, forgiveness, anger, sadness, blah blah blah. Brownz are definitely susceptible to this, due to strong notions regarding obligation that serve us well in certain contexts, yet work against us in others.
Skepmod, Sumiti:
I've noticed the same "calcification" you describe. Since these desis moved to another part of the world, a large portion of their lives was dedicated to maintaining a certain set of cultural ideas in resistance to the cultural norms of Canada / the US / Western Europe (all of which are actually quite different with regards to societal pressures, but I'm lumping them together for the moment). But the world sits still for nobody; India marches on, and no one there fought to maintain anything culturally because by default, whatever culture evolves there naturally IS Indian.
The end result of all this are these pockets of calcification (would calling them "cysts" take the metaphor too far?) abroad. It happens with other cultures, too, by the way. And various members of the following generation tends to see it as a whole bunch of irrelevant nonsense. The facades sometimes are torn down, or find their way into the colloquial, or become marginalized, or just become fodder for humorous anecdotes.
Having something to struggle against sometimes gives you something to stand for, even if you never really try to define it.
I've often read those stats about Pakistanis and Bangladeshis in the UK being left behind, but rarely encountered an explanation (besides the unsatisfactory Islam-is-a-dumbing-down-mechanism one). Razib, any idea? Different immigration patterns?
Manju,
Which, somewhat ironically (considering the main article of this thread), is also one of the fundamental teachings of Sikhism.
I don't think anyone should have any pride in certain behaviour exhibited by another party who's from the same background as you unless you agree with their behaviour and would do the same if you were in their position (ie. you share the same beliefs/motives/ideologies driving their actions).
Exactly the same concept applies to "shame" too -- you should not feel ashamed of anything your ancestors or people from the same background have done, unless you personally agree with their negative actions (or were in a position to stop them but did not do so).
Lavanya:
Its 100% fair.
Don't expect people from other countries to say "Indians..from the state of Punjab are ...". This is too far fetched.
The 'blanket generaliztion' has both positive and negative connotations at times.
We all are lumped together...India prides itself on "unity in diversity".
"Its 100% fair.
Don't expect people from other countries to say "Indians..from the state of Punjab are ...". This is too far fetched.
The 'blanket generaliztion' has both positive and negative connotations at times."
It's not fair, it's just realistic
Sakshi,
Sorry, I mean prime minister....not president.
And I agree with lavanya. Why should I or you feel guilty or ashamed about it unless you have personally taken part in it! How can I feel guilty or held responsible for the actions of a billion people. I mean if someone asks me why does this happen in india i.e. female infanticide....I say I really don't know, my family or any of our relatives/friends never participated in any such shit! Yes, it happens in India but then if I ask my american co worker why do mormons have many wives......they don't know either.
You are absolutely right, Sumiti. And I'm not denying that there will be instances when necessary help will come from the top (e.g., the U.S. Supreme Court and its Brown v. Board of Ed. decision). But your example also illustrates the chicken/egg problem that I tried to describe in a previous comment. Were these laws you cite passed due to the kindness of the legislature, or was it the result of a groundswell of individuals demanding their basic human rights? My guess, not being familiar with the situation, is that it was a combination of both. However, I'd be willing to wager that the laws are more a result of the latter than the former.
I've often read those stats about Pakistanis and Bangladeshis in the UK being left behind, but rarely encountered an explanation (besides the unsatisfactory Islam-is-a-dumbing-down-mechanism one). Razib, any idea? Different immigration patterns?
well
1) "indians" from what i know include a diverse group, and include the east african emigres who are particularly accomplished. there is no equivalent among pakistanis (ismailis are accomplished, but i think they would be included as "indian" mostly, i don't know how many live in pakistan).
2) bangladeshis are much more likely to be FOB.
3) i think islam might be a factor, but i think it is due to social assimilation with non-british exemplars. sikhs are a good comparison with the pakistanis, as both are ethnically the same, and my understanding is that the SES origin difference is not great.
see here for a long post on the topic.
Abby - Nobody is trying to hold you responsible. Some people are just "curious" about things which they haven't seen..so the best person (in their opinion) to ask is the fellow Indian co-worker.
I have no qualms answering such questions/queries as long as they are asked in right earnest. If the purpose is to ridicule/stigmatize Indian culture, then I do give them a mouthful.
I think we can say, without even getting into cultural specifics, that an unacceptably large percentage of the world's women are being denied basic human dignity.
Fair enough. If this story disturbed any of you, do something about it. Donate/volunteer/organize a fundraiser for your local South Asian women's shelter/family assistance organization, or start one if you don't have one in your area. If you know of family members/family friends going through abusive domestic situations, become an advocate for those women and reach out to them instead of idly doing nothing. But please refrain from self-hating rants of "I am so embarrassed to be desi, our culture is so oppressive towards women, India is a male dominated society," etc. These are loaded statements that accomplish nothing. Besides, I've heard enough of this cliched crap from goras telling me how primitive my culture is.
Jai:
or course, if you agree with their actions you would not, by definition, be ashamed of them.
I am so embarrassed to be desi, our culture is so oppressive towards women, India is a male dominated society
the last is a fact. the second is i think arguably pretty correct (though it is true of most cultures, more or less, i would argue that north indian hindu culture is more oppressive toward women than south indian hindu culture, and that north indian muslim culture is more oppressive than north indian hindu culture).
as for the "collective guilt" issue. i once talked a german woman, aged 25, who was somewhat resentful for the pall of shame than hung over her generation for what occurred during her parents generation. her argument was that she shouldn't have to be ashamed for things that happened before she was born. on the other hand, she was quite proud of kant, goethe and beethoven. i objected to this, because people selectively should not be allowed to identify and de-identify IMO. that is why i added "atheist" to my handle, i didn't want people to identify me as even culturally muslim, i don't want to be identified with that religion and object anytime someone tries to pin it on me. i am proud to be an american, but i also take shame in what americans did in the 19th century to native people, to what they have done with blacks throughout their history, etc. it doesn't matter that i wasn't born here, or that my blood lineage only showed up around 1980, to take pride implies that you are going whole hog with identification and there is an implicit contract which binds you to a past that you take as your own.
agreed. and i cant and wont wash my hands off any desi crap because i ... cant. i was born a wee bit too swarthy to be anything but. and yea... i feel equally responsible for toronto's homeless problem, because... i got nowhere else to call home... so. take notice, s