Brownz have the same reasoning when it comes to being gay, funny enough. "*gasp* he can't be gay - he comes from such a good family..."

The belief is that educated people come from strong families in which you're taught the differences between right and wrong.

George W is proof against this.

The "good family" defense is used by everyone, not just Indians. My parents on LI have no Sindhis in their circle, so they can probably get an out by saying, "At least it was not a Bengali family."

“This case is very frightening for Indian families here,” said Bharat Jotwani, a wealthy friend of the Sabhnanis

Yes, Jotwani is a douchebag.

The only thing frightening about this case is the treatment the maids received. It's ridiculous how he is insinuating the they were convicting for being brown instead of convicted for being guilty.

The "good family" defense is used by everyone, not just Indians

Is it? I still don't understand what it means!

An action is either criminal or not
A person either committed that action or not
A person is either guilty of a crime or not.

Where does a person's family come into this? Is a family on trial or an individual?

Honestly, I've never heard this line of reasoning outside of desis.

Honestly, I've never heard this line of reasoning outside of desis.

Sometimes I have heard "Well he comes from a good Christian family" when watching the news about someone who has committed a crime. I think when people are part of a community, whatever it may be, they have a hard time believing someone in that community could actually do wrong.

"Honestly, I've never heard this line of reasoning outside of desis"

I am shocked by this piece of news......

Is it? I still don't understand what it means!

It's like, "He was quiet and kept to himself." that you hear uttered by the neighbor of a serial killer.

2008 may go down as the year Indians made their mark on the tabloid crime scene. Slavery on Long Island, contract killing in Atlanta, accelerant-aided homicide in metro Chicago.

FYI - none of these crimes were committed by confused American-born and raised Indians.

I agree that the "good family" or "how educated" defense is largely Indian. They still have not discovered that being very able & a sociopath are not mutually exclusive. Here in Western media we have evil geniuses, in India movies we just have fat goons

What I can’t understand is why their friend, Jotwani, thought that this would be a defense:

Oh, c'mon Ennis; either you're feigning surprise of out of touch with regular people. This is how normal people talk; in a sort of ethnocentric, tribalistic, borderline-racist framework often expressed in bombastic absolute terms.

Now lurking behing this scotch-weilding uncleji's statement is an element of truth: people from good families are less likely to commit crimes, and wealth is often a signifier of good values, like hard work. though offensive to capitalists and progressives alike, sociologically speaking, where you come from is the best indicator of where you'll end up. the abused child is more likely to become an abuser himself; the one from a family that values education more likely to get educated, and so it goes.

But he chose to express this thought in a completely unnuanced way mixed in with a good dose of indian ethnocentrism (ie racism) that's patently offensive to the latte-drinking progressive class, so attuned to the subtleties of language especially when it reveals hidden biases like classism and racism.

I drink lattes too, but I put some johnny walker in the cup; so i'm not so shocked.

Yep, this is pretty common mentality among desis (esp older generation) saying that 'cannot be true because he/she comes from a good family'. Or the reverse is 'so and so cannot be a good person because he/she comes from a stinking rich family'. I have also heard from an African American recently that 'she cannot be a bad person because she is Christian'. So, I think it is pretty common in different communities in a different way. People will generalize someway to defend their own.

The question remains: Why?

Were the (wealthy) criminals themselves damaged by their upbringing, in order to commit the abuse? (The "My Parents Didn't Love Me Enough" defense.) Or were they just "born bad"? (If there is such a thing...)

I have NO idea. But I can't think of the perpetrators as "normal".

i think it's laughable that wealth would be considered an indicator of moral values. wealthy families are also the ones that employ many servants, and although it's not unique to richer people, i would never be surprised to see a wealthy family treat their servants like second-class citizens. (these are of course generalizations based on my experiences with "upper class" folk in the desh.)

i don't know if the term "good christian family" is the same as "good indian family", if you look at the cultural weight put on the two words. to me christian, in the american context, implies a wholesomeness/morality whereas in the subcontinent "good" usually refers to class/wealth/status and moral character is of little value.

5 · Ennis said

An action is either criminal or not
A person either committed that action or not
A person is either guilty of a crime or not.

Come on, Ennis. You're a lawyer. The entire legal profession makes its living in the grey areas of perception, and tries to create sufficient doubt, that maybe the guilty are not guilty, and occasionally, even the reverse.

You correctly note that Jotwani may be inarticulate. I think his basic point is not that educated or wealthy people do not commit crimes, but that not all the gory specifics of what has been alleged here could possibly have occurred given what is known about the circumstances. Also, to stretch this a little, wealthy people do commit crimes, but usually not ones that involve slicing people's ears off with kitchen knives or feeding people their vomit. At least in American suburbia.

I've made this point before, but the overall guilty verdict does not mean everything said in court was proven to be true. It does not even mean they are actually guilty, just that the prosecutors were successfully able to convince the jury that they were, and/or that their own lawyers could not create sufficient doubt in the jury that they could be let off.

There are many other issues here. Do prosecutors coach witnesses? Of course. Do they choose certain cases to prosecute based on their perception of 'deterrent effect'? Of course. Can juries be swayed? Of course. Can prosecutorial bias extend to the race and/or ethnicity of the accused? Yes. Could that have happened here? Shouldn't we be asking?

people from good families are less likely to commit crimes, and wealth is often a signifier of good values, like hard work. though offensive to capitalists and progressives alike, sociologically speaking, where you come from is the best indicator of where you'll end up. the abused child is more likely to become an abuser himself; the one from a family that values education more likely to get educated, and so it goes.

Manju, You're saying something different from what Jotwani's saying.

After a crime, I've heard people wondering how little Johnny could have become a murder given the warm and loving family that he came from. They then say something like "I feel so sorry for his mother"

I've never heard somebody say, after the evidence has been laid out, and guilt assigned "Well, despite all the evidence, it couldn't possibly be true that Johnny's a murder because his mother was such a nice person" or more strangely "because his mother was so wealthy!"

Jotwani is saying the latter, your statement fits better with the former. Class is a lousy defense after the fact unless you're from a system where different people have different rights, and your class determines your moral worth.

Are Sabhnani's and Jotwani's... Sindhi?

"If you encounter a snake or a Sindhi, you kill the Sindhi first". I heard this from a Marathi friend.

That poor uncle has probably fought racism all of his fcking life, of both the subtle and not so subtle variety.. He has probably also experienced the xenophobia and racism that this country codifies into law. He underwent all this, to make sure his kids, pups like you, had a better life. He probably fought against all kinds of prejudice, to get where he is - Where folks don't automatically assume that he is some kind of lower life form because of his skin color and his accent and his papers and the food that he eats and the art he can't appreciate and the fashions he can't carry.

Along comes this case, where two folks of INDIAN (in caps to reflect the size of the INDIAN in the newspaper headlines about this case) origin are convicted of this horrendous crime, and everything that he has worked for all his life, his IZZAT / RESPECTABILITY, him being part of a community that's respectable, lies in tatters. And when asked by some pesky reporter, he tries to defend it.. may be in not as articulate a fashion as you pups would like, but then, you had a chance to go to fancy shmancy schools because of sacrifices made by uncles like him.

So young ABCD sardarji, at least try to understand where uncle is coming from. Before sitting in judgment on uncles inarticulateness, see how visceral an experience it is to see someone from your community being convicted of such a crime.

ennis, my guess is that absent a dead-body like in your little johnny argument, jotwani views this like a date-rape scenario, his word against hers. for him, the standard of "guilty beyond a resonable doubt" can only be met with a dead body and cruella holding a smoking gun, when you have wealthy indians from a good family vs. poor indonesians.

that's just the way it goes in the old world, sometimes in the new too.

tera baap: can you tell us what sort of codified prejudices Mr. Jotwani fought against? did he march across the Edmund Pettis Bridge? did he stage a sit in at diners to demand that hindoos be served too? or is his civil rights work done mainly via deeming other Indians innocent based on their ethnicity and annual income?

>>> can you tell us what sort of codified prejudices Mr. Jotwani fought against? did he march across the Edmund Pettis Bridge? did he stage a sit in at diners to demand that hindoos be served too? or is his civil rights work done mainly via deeming other Indians innocent based on their ethnicity and annual income?

Are you saying that only African Americans had to deal with prejudice ? Are you really that stupid know-it-all ABCD ? :-D

Simply because no Indians were lynched, doesn't mean that they didn't have to deal with their share of problems.

Tera Baap,

I don't know if I speak for anyone but I believe your point can be better made without resorting to personal attacks.

20 · Tera Baap said

Simply because no Indians were lynched, doesn't mean that they didn't have to deal with their share of problems.

Very true. One time, I went to a bar and they didn't serve Johnny Walker Black. But they had White Russians. I slapped the Indonesian next to me and left.

16 · TheBrownChamp said

Are Sabhnani's and Jotwani's... Sindhi?

"If you encounter a snake or a Sindhi, you kill the Sindhi first". I heard this from a Marathi friend.

LOL! I heard “If you encounter a snake or a Mallu, you kill the Mallu first!”

Must be a variation of this for every region in the old country!

Manju #22

This is the funniest comment I have read here in a long time. Thanks for the laughs

LOL @ manju hahah

tera baap: you can keep rambling incoherently about how us "stupid ABCD pups" (who actually uses the word pups? lol)don't know the sacrifices that you and your comrades made, or you can actually give examples of how racism against Indians is codified into law in this horrible land of bigots .

“If you encounter a snake or a Sindhi, you kill the Sindhi first”. I heard this from a Marathi friend.

Shaane, don’t drag us in it. We’re down w/ them Ulhasnagar peeps. Motawanis, Armanis, all of them.

Yes, they were Sindhi. No, that's no reason to start regurgitating anti-Sindhi stereotypes. As the above discussion reveals, some of the sayings about one group are actually madlibbed. Let's not linger on this topic ...

Sometimes I have heard "Well he comes from a good Christian family" when watching the news about someone who has committed a crime.

right, but isn't that more from the sense of disbelief? Ie the reactions to the Columbine killings even though its a "good, wholesome [read: white], suburban town"? Not that his statements are justified, I just don't think they are necessarily a defense, rather a register of shock and disbelief.

Tera baap,

Even though my dad broke his back to send his kids to fancy shmancy schools, he doesn't suffer from the delusion that his respectability is tied up with that of every other desi's and understands that the wretched come in all hues. Furthermore, my father is not so self-centered as to put his izzat over the izzat of those poor maids who will have to suffer the psychological fallout of their treatment for the rest of their lives. Please don't pretend to speak on behalf of all of those in your generation for they are not you.

No true Indian?

Manju: "Very true. One time, I went to a bar and they didn't serve Johnny Walker Black. But they had White Russians. I slapped the Indonesian next to me and left."

HAHAHA!!

Even though my dad broke his back to send his kids to fancy shmancy schools, he doesn't suffer from the delusion that his respectability is tied up with that of every other desi's and understands that the wretched come in all hues. Furthermore, my father is not so self-centered as to put his izzat over the izzat of those poor maids who will have to suffer the psychological fallout of their treatment for the rest of their lives. Please don't pretend to speak on behalf of all of those in your generation for they are not you.

Sure.. Your daddy is the bestest and the most enlightened daddy in the whole world.. but spare a thought for those who are lesser mortals than your precious daddy.

At least try to understand, where Jotwani(?) uncle is coming from.. And what he is trying to protect in his inarticulate voice.

>>>> you can keep rambling incoherently about how us "stupid ABCD pups" (who actually uses the word pups? lol)don't know the sacrifices that you and your comrades made, or you can actually give examples of how racism against Indians is codified into law in this horrible land of bigots .

Why dont you ask your dad/mom ? I am sure they would help you understand :-)

>>> Very true. One time, I went to a bar and they didn't serve Johnny Walker Black. But they had White Russians. I slapped the Indonesian next to me and left

Yup.. model minority never faced any racism/xenophobia ;-)

Sure.. Your daddy is the bestest and the most enlightened daddy in the whole world.. but spare a thought for those who are lesser mortals than your precious daddy.

whoa. relax buddy.

Tera Baap:

1. If you use the quotation codes, it'll make it easier to read your remarks. In most browsers they're listed right above the comment window, right after it says "Comments"
Just highlight the code that you are quoting and click on the quotation marks. If you prefer to write html code, you want to use the blockquote tags.

2. Please don't bait and don't make personal remarks. The conversation degenerates very quickly when people start to do that.

"At least try to understand, where Jotwani(?) uncle is coming from.. And what he is trying to protect in his inarticulate voice."

Well, notwithstanding the fact that they are "educated, nice people" apparently they were found guilty by a court of law. Could the Sabhnani's afford good lawyers with their millions? Maybe the judge was racist? Even abused Indonesian maids are fairer skinned than us in the eyes of whitey.

@@CdnMedStudent

>>>> Well, notwithstanding the fact that they are "educated, nice people" apparently they were found guilty by a court of law. Could the Sabhnani's afford good lawyers with their millions? Maybe the judge was racist? Even abused Indonesian maids are fairer skinned than us in the eyes of whitey.

The post and subsequent comments were about uncles comments, not about the nature of Sabnanis trial and guilt.

Simply put, the author was expressing incomprehension, asking, Why would uncle say such a thing ?

To say that - yeah yeah, uncle is racist, uncle is caste-ist, uncle is first gen Indian-American, uncle is evil, uncle has bad breath, uncle is uncle - is simplistic.

It doesn't take into account what uncles went through to get where they are and doesn't question if their fear of being in the negative spotlight is justified or not.

i think the "uncle" here is the more *normal* than american born brownz who think his behavior and comment is strange. by "normal" i mean closer to the human average, not necessarily better. college-educated americans from a particular social and economic background are schooled in speaking and thinking of themselves and other people and groups in a particular way. sometimes it is hard to remember i think that that's a specific folkway, even if it is the dominant folkway in american *discourse* (as opposed to discussion :-)

after 9/11 many american muslims were skeptical that osama bin laden was behind that atrocity in anyway, or that muslims were. because *by definition* muslims wouldn't commit that sort of crime. people have particular frameworks when it comes to their ingroups vs. outgroups, and their set of prior assumptions make it likely that they'll engage in these sorts of rationalizations.

p.s. on a much milder note i have know of white secular liberals aghast that the offspring of so & so converted to evangelical christianity and is now a republican. the comments are often along the lines of "i mean, he had everything, it isn't like he needed to be bitter about his economic situation, he had all the privileges in the world...."

Simply put, the author was expressing incomprehension, asking, Why would uncle say such a thing ?

To say that - yeah yeah, uncle is racist, uncle is caste-ist, uncle is first gen Indian-American, uncle is evil, uncle has bad breath, uncle is uncle - is simplistic.

I doubt that was Ennis's intent - to simply categorize Uncle as a one-dimensional caricature.

It doesn't take into account what uncles went through to get where they are and doesn't question if their fear of being in the negative spotlight is justified or not.

Agreed - racism and xenophobia can be worse for DBDs than ABD (note I left out the C). However, that doesn't justify standing by someone who mistreated others, even if it's unthinkable that someone with that izzat could ever do this.

I believe the point is that we cannot pick and choose who to shun based on how respectable the person is, regardless of culture. It leads to an ethical seesaw - what if the couple were not respectable? Then it would be ok to shun them?

and just to make it clear, college-educated americans who are well versed in the sort of sensitivities which are now normative among that group have their own shibboleths and ingroup vs. outgroup ticks.

I think something that we can all agree on is that there is absolutely no reason to defend this couple, even if they do hail from the same country as our parents (or we) do. I think the point the OP was trying to make was that Mr. Jotwani had no basis for assuming the slavers were innocent because they were rich Indians.

tera baap: if you have encountered so much racism here in America, why don't you return to your village in Hindustan where life was perfect?

“There is no way on earth any Indian family in the United States could do what they were accused of,” he said. “The [Indian] people I know here all feel this way. Anybody from India who has come here comes from a very good family…”

He underwent all this, to make sure his kids, pups like you, had a better life.

I think lost in all this is the crime and the details of the crime that the Sabhnani's were accused of. I wonder if the Uncle in question read the details or saw the evidence on the bodies of the maids who were abused. Here is a link to the NYTimes with some fairly graphics pictures. I think most of the people here are objecting to a blanket statement that the Uncle in question was making ... almost in denial about the fact that people of a certain class and type cannot commit these crimes. It has nothing to do with previous discrimination but rather the immediate knee jerk reaction to defend anything of his class and type. It's a thinking that goes with people like us do not do things like that ... even in the face of massive evidence to the contrary. It's comes with a certain sense of entitlement.

On another note, Manju put it much more succinctly and humorously when he described slapping an Indonesian over a perceived slight. At the risk of over explaining his point I'll say some of the abuse I've seen by Desis of mexican and south american workers in their grocery stores and restaurants would make you cringe. It's a power differential where even if you have no power in the larger society you can wield power over people you perceive are weaker than you.

Jotwani is an idiot.

Talwar

Johnny Valker >>>> if you have encountered so much racism here in America, why don't you return to your village in Hindustan where life was perfect?

Aha !! Out comes the inner red neck..

Just as an FYI, the reason I came to America was to steal American jobs, fornicate with American women and in general spread my filth around.

I wont leave until I achieve all that, and theres nothing you or your daddy can do about it.. B-)

46 · Tera Baap said

Johnny Valker >>>> if you have encountered so much racism here in America, why don't you return to your village in Hindustan where life was perfect?
Aha !! Out comes the inner red neck..

Are you saying no self-repecting Indian would be seen dead with Johnny Valker Red?

"inner red neck"

speaking of prejudices which can be mooted in "polite" company.... :-)

It's a power differential where even if you have no power in the larger society you can wield power over people you perceive are weaker than you.

i think one can make a case that a rich brown long islander experiences particular disabilities in comparison to a poor white resident of appalachia. nevertheless, i think the reduction of power as purely a function of racial identity to the total operational neglect of class is something which often emerges among brown americans. despite the reality that there are many working class and poor brownz, the fact is that the community is on average an affluent once, and the children of the suburbs who went to "good schools" and landed "good jobs" are i think more likely to speak and address the issue of racial oppression than working class brownz who have more proximate concerns than the macro-level power structures in society (despite the fact that they are much more salient to them than a brown american MD who receives slights but still banks 200 K per year).

>>>> are you arguing that he is implying that the sabhnanis locking up and abusing their employees was necessary to provide the sabhnani 'pups' with a better life?

No. I am saying that uncles have worked really hard to get where they are and to help pups like *you* get where you are.. An inarticulate statement borne out of fear of having to face renewed prejudice - subtle and in your face - does not say anything about the world view of the person who made that statement.

FWIW, implicit in the statement is also the tacit position that a crime like the one that sabnanis have been convicted of is a terrible crime.

>>>> or that jotwani's making illogical/unsupported statements is somehow necessary to giving his own kids a good life, or that his provision of said good life warrants ignoring his remarks or condoning of the abuse?

I think I already agreed the uncle was being inarticulate/obtuse with his statement, very much like you in fact.. :-P

>>>> furthermore, he completely did a disservice to his community and its izzat, as you mention - he should have stated that despite the disappointing verdict, he hopes that it does not reflect poorly on the US-Indian community as a whole, since many/most (but not all) are law-abiding, hard-working members of american society. i understand that he may not have been sufficiently articulate in the spotlight, but you don't say something unless you believe it. the worst part is, he didn't say this personally about the sabhnanis - that they are wonderful people, i can't believe they'd do this etc - he completely denied that an entire group is incapable of committing any crimes of any nature. your defense of jotwani is not much different than his defense of the sabhnanis - and at least he knows them personally.

Yeah Yeah.. I should be in jail just like the Sabhnanis.. OK ? Now band together with Johnny Valker and try your best to send my filthy ass back to desh. :-D

@manju
>>>> Are you saying no self-repecting Indian would be seen dead with Johnny Valker Red?

No.. every ethnic Indian, self respecting or not, should cower in fear when wannabe whites spout xenophobic garbage.

Very true. One time, I went to a bar and they didn't serve Johnny Walker Black. But they had White Russians. I slapped the Indonesian next to me and left.

Are you saying no self-repecting Indian would be seen dead with Johnny Valker Red?

Manju - you are making me LOL!

AK:

or some magical transformation happens on the AI flight over?

The magic of AI is well known to airport crews. The rodents which get on board AI in India can be trapped by using masala vada as bait. But the ones that board AI outside India respond only to Swiss cheese and chocolate.

Manju - you are making me LOL!

Cmon now...he/she is not that funny.

Brownz have the same reasoning when it comes to being gay, funny enough. "*gasp* he can't be gay - he comes from such a good family..."

Off-topic but it seems Sindhi, Gujew and Hindu Punjabi families are more open-minded about gays than other Indian groups. The only Indian gay/bisexual/lesbians, I met, are from the Sindhi, Hindu Punjabi and Gujew community.

Any gay/bisexual/lesbians from these three communities can comment on this?

i think the reduction of power as purely a function of racial identity to the total operational neglect of class is something which often emerges among brown americans.

Right on, Razib!!

brown american MD who receives slights but still banks 200 K per year).

An MD with a little bit of "get up and go" can easily do better than 200K!! I mean, really, some physicians really are upper middle class!
;-)

50 · Tera Baap said

No.. every ethnic Indian, self respecting or not, should cower in fear when wannabe whites spout xenophobic garbage.

first i'm a stupid ABCD pup (i'm still laughing at that word) , then a redneck, and now a wannabe white. i guess everyone who feels those slavers should be punished is automatically a self hating redneck wannabe, eh Uncleji?

btw, i still want to know which anti Indian laws you had to overcome in order to make it in this country.

>>>> first i'm a stupid ABCD pup (i'm still laughing at that word) , then a redneck, and now a wannabe white. i guess everyone who feels those slavers should be punished is automatically a self hating redneck wannabe, eh Uncleji?

No.. but pricks and xenophobes who say "Go home.." to other immigrants most certainly are rednecks, if they are brown, they are self hating wannabe whites.

>>>> btw, i still want to know which anti Indian laws you had to overcome in order to make it in this country.

Why don't you ask your dad.. ? And what will you do even I tell my experiences to you ?

Regarding comment #3 about Bengalis, a Malika Ghosh Garrett has been charged in Atlanta with mistreating a nanny she illegally brought from India. There is also a case of a couple (not sure where in the subcontinent they are from) allegedly mistreating a Latina maid in the Silicon Valley. What is going on??

No.. but pricks and xenophobes who say "Go home.." to other immigrants most certainly are rednecks, if they are brown, they are self hating wannabe whites.

Yellow card. Language directed at another commenter. Argue the position, not the person please.

>>>> Yellow card. Language directed at another commenter. Argue the position, not the person please.

You tolerate folks asking others to "Go Home..", and when someone calls them out as Xenophobes/Racists when they do that, you say "Yellow Card"..

May be you should have invited the kids who yelled "go home.." at you into your home and argued your position with them instead of chasing them around with a baseball bat..

I didn't like that first part either, but I don't like to meddle directly. Once we get into pricks and xenophobes and direct name calling I know it's going to go downhill fast so I stepped in and blew the whistle.

Please, both of you. Argue the position not the person.

Honestly, I've never heard this line of reasoning outside of desis.

Classic!

LOL.

ennis, what if she had gone scot free as opposed to getting convicted ? would you then be indignant as well ? if yes, you've already made up your mind she's guilty, why bother with arguing position vs person, might as well just argue & get it done with.

ennis - this is a context confusion. I can understand what might have prompted the defence. Remember that the Sabhnanis and the Jotwanis come from a collectivist society with high power difference. Poor choice of words. the person was found guilty, end of story. Jotwani's explanation is a classic DBD excuse - one that is rarely understood by ABDs. . And I am NOT defending anyone here. Do the crime, do the time is a hard concept to grasp for many DBDs. The appropriate response to Jotwani is "Sabhanani and his spouse have brought shame and disgrace to our community. They need to excommunicated. How can you defend them".
And to the commenters who talked about one set of laws for the aam junta and another for the powerful - certainly more true in India than in the West. Sabhananis are not aam junta by desi standards and hence need to be held to a higher standard.

60 · Tera Baap said

You tolerate folks asking others to "Go Home..", and when someone calls them out as Xenophobes/Racists when they do that, you say "Yellow Card".

Wrong. I didn't tell you to back to India because of your ethnicity (which would be hypocritical to say the least), but rather due to your repeated claims of how America is such an anti Indian country and also your condescension towards ABDs. Keep up the Uncle Tom insinuations, it's really helping your argument.

i do agree with the earlier posters who said that this is a common reaction from just about all families, friends, and neighbors of criminals, regardless of race or class, i.e. "He was such a good kid , he never could have done anything like that!" etc. What irked me about your posts were your low personal attacks against others and your endless rants about how the first generation sacrificed so much in the face of vicious bigotry and we stupid ABDs don't know an iota about it.

53 · TheBrownChamp said

Cmon now...he/she is not that funny.

Oh, Puh-leeze Brown Champ...you're just jealous of my way with the ladies.

>>>> Wrong. I didn't tell you to back to India because of your ethnicity (which would be hypocritical to say the least), but rather due to your repeated claims of how America is such an anti Indian country and also your condescension towards ABDs. Keep up the Uncle Tom insinuations, it's really helping your argument.

Regardless of your reasons, its a xenophobic thing to say. You can squirm left and right but it is what you said.. An immigrant asking another to "Go Home.." deserves the epithet that you think I was insinuating.

Rest of the garbage you spout is not even worth responding to.

An immigrant asking another to "Go Home.." deserves the epithet that you think I was insinuating.

your interlocutor identified themselves as "american born." so they're not an immigrant.

razib, I essentially agree with you that class dictates the power structure but often browns( and other groups) make a distinction (incorrectly) that class and race are tied, hence you have stereotypes that in the real world have implications. But we've got into another area and strayed from the topic of this thread.

I'm still waiting for someone to show how Uncleji's past caused him to come to the defense of criminal behavior and torture or the defendants maids. His statements as I have said before come from a sense of entitlement of his group.

i don't think anyone who knows how domestic servants are abused in india, or in any of the southasian, southeast asian and middleastern countries would be surprised by these atrocities. she was just a little bit more monsterish. i think the feeling of having the power of life or deportation over these people must be heady.

that class and race are tied, hence you have stereotypes that in the real world have implications

race and class are tied. white liberals routinely conflate race and class because minorities, as a whole, are poorer than and less wealthy than whites. i recall in '96 a white liberal friend of mine stated that welfare reform was racist. he seemed a big chagrined when i pointed out that though a larger proportion of non-whites are on welfare, at any given time most people on welfare are white.

in any case, a subset of asian american groups are very affluent and were raised in nice suburbs and went to nice schools. yes, they were subject to racism and discrimination that alex johnson IV would never be, but they also have some advantages over cletus smith. the world is complex, but alas discourse is not....

[deleted for vulgarity, try again]

KXB:

Statement 1: The "good family" defense is used by everyone, not just Indians. My parents on LI have no Sindhis in their circle, so they can probably get an out by saying, "At least it was not a Bengali family.

Statement 2: FYI - none of these crimes were committed by confused American-born and raised Indians

====
Hypocritical much?

TheBrownChamp: "If you encounter a snake or a Sindhi, you kill the Sindhi first". I heard this from a Marathi friend.
"If you are in the jungle and see a poisonous snake and an Indian, kill the Indian first" Malaysian and Indonesian saying.

People are so cute sometimes...

====================

Johnny Valker: can you tell us what sort of codified prejudices Mr. Jotwani fought against? did he march across the Edmund Pettis Bridge? did he stage a sit in at diners to demand that hindoos be served too? or is his civil rights work done mainly via deeming other Indians innocent based on their ethnicity and annual income?

Have you ever heard of the notion of the "lace curtain Irish." In the United States most Ethnic/National groups have had some wealthy or educated people immigrate along with the of lower echelons of poorer/less educated swathes. Now you don't have to have a thorough perusal of history to realize that these two groups were treated differently. There are many many many Indians who come to this country, who are treated with a greater amount of Prejudice than most of the Doctors/Engineers (and their kids) who moved here.

Manju: Very true. One time, I went to a bar and they didn't serve Johnny Walker Black. But they had White Russians. I slapped the Indonesian next to me and left.

Pithy....very pithy...patronizing too, but that comes with the territory and hard work of trying to educating the immigrants to the American way of life and sense of humor I guess.

razib: your interlocutor identified themselves as "american born." so they're not an immigrant.

Would the appropriate response then be "after you"?

Not that I'm trying to pull a shake n' bake with the puppy-hating gentleman above against the ABDs but I think "tera baap" for all his virulence was trying to make the point that a certain amount of cultural understanding is lacking among the Americans whose parents are of Indian origin (is that approximate enough?) for the Immigrants who are of Indian origin. And I believe (again this is just me reading through the many insults) that he finds this deficiency baffling because these Americans should have a great Cultural IQ due to their lifelong exposure to their parents.

Erratum: greater Cultural IQ

I am a DBD and back in the 90s, I constantly heard this ("We are all educated, nice people") and its variations "Our family is a nice one" or "Our family is a respectable one" or "Such a thing has never happened before in our family", etc....I was aghast, because guess what brought out such comments - I was going through a divorce!
I don't think I'll ever quite understand what "nice" means when an Indian utters it.

I had a boss who was from one the the "right" families in rye/greenwich. HE used to complain that his parents used to say about someone that at least we knew they came from a "good family". He used to respond. "No. we dont know if they come from a good family....we know they are from a rich family. they can be complete degenerates with money..." That leads me to believe its not something only people of indian descent say.

"i don't think anyone who knows how domestic servants are abused in india, or in any of the southasian, southeast asian and middleastern countries would be surprised by these atrocities"

WHAT????I spent the first 30 years of my life in Pune,India and I am shocked to hear of the atrocities. Yes we had all kinds of maids in India, but no I never heard of anyone treating their maids in such a disgusting manner. One of our maids, who has been with us for almost 2 decades, has the same place in our house as our grandma. I do not know of any household that treated their maids the way the sabhnani lady treated them.

And now when I go back to India on my annual visits and see my cousins who have 3-4 different maids in their house, I am pleasantly surprised! My cousin speaks to her maid more lovingly than she would speak to her hubby. The maid goes on vacations without telling my cousin, and there is no way my cousin can shout at her when she comes back......infact my sis made her a cup of tea and listened to her vacation stories! My friends maid's kids all get to go to good schools, camps all courtesy of my friend.
One shout and the maid is gone and everyone and I mean everyone in India knows how difficult it is to get a good maid.

BTW, totally agree with tera baap.......no point analyzing jotwani uncles comment. I think they are totally taken out of context i.e we don't know what question the reporter asked him. Also he just found out his best friend is going to jail....he is emotional and shocked. Leave him alone.

Peace.

One shout and the maid is gone and everyone and I mean everyone in India knows how difficult it is to get a good maid.

The magic of AI is well known to airport crews. The rodents which get on board AI in India can be trapped by using masala vada as bait. But the ones that board AI outside India respond only to Swiss cheese and chocolate.

No. I am saying that uncles have worked really hard to get where they are and to help pups like *you* get where you are..

An inarticulate statement borne out of fear of having to face renewed prejudice - subtle and in your face - does not say anything about the world view of the person who made that statement.

I think "tera baap" for all his virulence was trying to make the point that a certain amount of cultural understanding is lacking among the Americans whose parents are of Indian origin (is that approximate enough?) for the Immigrants who are of Indian origin. And I believe (again this is just me reading through the many insults) that he finds this deficiency baffling because these Americans should have a great Cultural IQ due to their lifelong exposure to their parents.

23 · Kev said

16 · TheBrownChamp said

Are Sabhnani's and Jotwani's... Sindhi?

"If you encounter a snake or a Sindhi, you kill the Sindhi first". I heard this from a Marathi friend.

LOL! I heard “If you encounter a snake or a Mallu, you kill the Mallu first!”
Must be a variation of this for every region in the old country!

every region of india has their own "snake theory". i actually heard the sindhi variant of the snake theory from a punjabi friend of mine. in southern india, we've heard the mallu version: "If you see a Brahmin and a snake, kill the Brahmin first."

Read a few more of the comments and seriously the ABD commentors need to know that a good maid in india is worshipped like a goddess. One is considered extremely lucky if he/she has a maid who can do the work with minimal supervision and is also trustworthy at the same time. If you find one like that, you have to treat them nothing short of a family member, meet all their demands and literally go out of your way to please them. If not you run the risk of loosing them to your neighbor and everyone in urban India knows that is the worst thing to happen in your very busy lifestyle. And a lot of money does not get you a good maid in INdia, you really have to love and nurture them!
One of my aunts gave me this piece of advice for a good successful marraige: Get a good maid, love her like family member and hang on to her forever.

If you find one like that, you have to treat them nothing short of a family member, meet all their demands and literally go out of your way to please them. If not you run the risk of loosing them to your neighbor and everyone in urban India knows that is the worst thing to happen in your very busy lifestyle.

Read a few more of the comments and seriously the ABD commentors need to know that a good maid in india is worshipped like a goddess

I've seen that, but honestly it was more in the old days, when people were attached to families for good. I've also seen the marketization of domestic service help conditions for servants, they can walk away when they want.

Sadly, however, I've seen more bad treatment than good (although more indifferent treatment than either).

In any case, the conditions in LI were different. The women couldn't leave so there was no need to treat them well.

For ppl who can afford luxuries either in India or the US, the luxury becomes a necessity.
Car= luxury in India but necessity in america; Maid= necessity in India but luxury in america

Car= luxury in India but necessity in america;

Please feast on the expense of this Aunty too..
Family(Aunty) accused of modern slavery in Atlanta

Ennis, totally disagree. INfact in the old days, the maid was not that much of a necessity.....but today with the nuclear family system, one has to depend a lot on the maid and hence treat them extra nice and keep them happy.

Yes, they can walk away whenever they want and unfortunately that was not the case in LI

AK, you can pretty much live in ANY city in India and do without a car. A rickshaw, taxi, bus is just a yell away. I have lived in the burbs in philly for 5 years and now in Raleigh and it is impossible to live without a car in any of these places. And that is for the majority of US except for NY may be.

I've had a crawling in my heart and head since this story broke. My inlaws live not too far from the Sabnanis and for all intents and purposes the entire desi community of that generation is quite connected. I know quite a few people that know them. For the most part the story made me squirm because like the Sabnani's almost all the desi families I know from LI in that area have maids/cooks including my inlaws and this was just one of those unbelievable stories that took everyone by shock. People who have known the Sabnani's personally had no idea this was going on and I believe the few I know. That it happened so systematically is just incredibly tragic. I guess I have failed to understand till now having watched this closely why these women didn't leave a long time ago.

The thing is that I've seen maids treated differently in a lot of these households during different times. Families where there are younger kids where the maids are primary caregivers to them tend to have a emotional bond with their maids. Families who don't have younger people in the home, and generally have grandparents in the home who have a certain way of dealing with maids in India tend to be rather clinical in how they treat their maids.

The whole thing makes me squirm because of how the Sabnani's were touted as these rich rotten people. The vast majority of Mutton Town, Syosset, Dix Hills, Woodbury, West Hills desi community that is very very affluent worked their asses off to get their money. None of those families come from money so it leaves a bad taste in my mouth that the community has gotten shyt about their homes and wealth because of the Sabananis. Nothing was handed to them for free. It's just shitty that wealth was viewed as a bad thing because there were maids involved.

as someone who has lived without both a car and a maid for the last 15 years or so, i can definitively say that i consider neither to be a necessity. and not everyone in america has a car.

ak, if you live in within city limits of a thorough metro system (say New York, DC even, maybe even Beantown), a car is not a necessity, in fact it's usually a burden. If you live w/out a car my guess is you live in one of these areas.

Jaisingh @ 80:

You are either as good a writer as Prosper Merimee* or you are confusing how families back in India (intend to) treat supple, young, demure bahus and/or a good milking cow (well, except for the part about losing to the neighbour).

Either way, your memsahib characters do not get my sympathy. Sorry.

*Prosper Merimee...combines witty and accurate social observation with acute psychological insight. The plot is simple, if not banal; but in his account[s]...[all] is achieved with great economy--a passing comment, a suggestive detail, a gesture, a word--as well as by most careful construction; and we are left with an indelible impression of the complexities and ironies of love [for maid] in the modern world.

-- Douglas Parmee, 1964

84 · ak said

food, housing, clothing, a modicum of money to afford all these - but everything else is just extra.

83 · jaisingh said

Car= luxury in India but necessity in america

Sometimes You Need Stupid, "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles" The Movie

Honey(my wife, who loves Steve Martin, like most Indian women), You would enjoy this moovie

food, housing, clothing, a modicum of money to afford all these - but everything else is just extra.

for 50% of the population, jewelry is added to the list.

Ohh Malathi, thanks for calling me a memsahib! JK:) Even today's Indian maids would downright refuse to call anyone that. They stick to didi instead.
Neway, I was not trying to behave like anyone or gain sympathy???(why would I do that???). Just giving you the real picture.
I was in Pune last march hunting for a house and I liked this small community on Pune-nagar road which is almost an hour away from the city, kind of sits in the middle of nowhere, and I asked a neighbor who moved in a couple of months ago (pretty new community)how he likes living there and he said it is very peaceful, no noise, pollution but the biggest drawback is maids refuse to come here because it is not very accessible unless you have a 2 or 4 wheeler.

last I heard, the community is selling very slow..........

Jaisingh,

I am not calling *you* a memsahib. If I were you, I would consider it a compliment to be compared with Prosper Merimee and then, say no more.

Also, Jaisingh,

Please refrain from generalizing the situation for maids in India based on your experience in Pune. As a DBD who has had some chances to observe the marketability and working conditions of maids in Banglore, Delhi and Chennai (and other rural and urban places in Tamil Nadu), I am left with the impression that things are not even across the nation.

73 · RahulD said

Have you ever heard of the notion of the "lace curtain Irish." In the United States most Ethnic/National groups have had some wealthy or educated people immigrate along with the of lower echelons of poorer/less educated swathes. Now you don't have to have a thorough perusal of history to realize that these two groups were treated differently. There are many many many Indians who come to this country, who are treated with a greater amount of Prejudice than most of the Doctors/Engineers (and their kids) who moved here.

"Lace curtain Irish", and their Italian counterparts the "Wonder Bread WOPs" are slurs used by the working class members of the respective community to indicate that the upper classes are whitewashed. Less affluent Indian immigrants may have a harder time financially in this country, but I fail to see how discrimination would differ. To racists, an Indian doctor is just as much a "dothead" as the Indian gas pumper. Remember that the first victim of the "Dotbusters" in NJ was a doctor.

Furthermore, my original question still has not been answered: What laws did our parents have to change in order to succeed here?

I've never heard "lace curtain Irish" being a slur, specially it being used in books and in my neighborhood which is an Irish one...calling someone Irish and calling someone a wop is not the same thing, I'm pretty sure. And no it has nothing to do with their communities being "whitewashed" (what a lovely term by the way), but with the lack of connection...not unlike the one the ABD's have with the DBD's in many instances, except it seems more pronounced among Indians.

I was trying to play devil's advocate, but now that you apparently had asked a question - I'll try to answer it while trying to keep the same role.

There don't need to be Government authorized laws for discrimination to exist!. Again, I certainly think that Indians haven't had to face as much racism as Blacks in the United States but that does not mean that people like Mr. Jothwani haven't faced enough to affect their worldview significantly!

I'm not so sure that the comments made by Mr. Jotwani are particularly unique to the desi community. When the media first started focusing on child sexual predators (I'm thinking late 80's to mid 90's) the common refrain was shock and disbelief whenever the accused turned out to be a "family man"(code for suburban and middle class or higher). The dissonance between the nature of the crime and the public face presented by the accused can stretch peoples' credulity beyond the snapping point so that they believe the authorities must have gotten it wrong or the victim is a liar. People have become more exposed and inured to the idea that predation can be committed as easily by the Scout leader accountant who throws an annual block party as by the wino hanging out in an alley near the school, so you hear less of it these days. However, every so often, the "good family (including educated)" defence will pop up for a particularly shocking crimes (especially when a prep school student/graduate is involved).

I think the key element is whether or not one believes in the integrity of the justice system. If you have enough distrust of the system, then the dissonance between the crime and the accused/convicted will lead you to believe that the system has made a mistake (whether the mistake is Duke or O.J.). If you believe that the system has functioned properly then your reaction to the conviction of someone you identify with will more likely veer towards shock and sorrow rather than shock and disbelief. Personal factors, including previous experiences of racial injustice by the authorities, lying witnesses or prejudice, can certainly colour one's belief in the capabilities of the system. Given the added stress of knowing that the entire group may very well be tainted by the actions of a few, I'm not as surprised by the comments of Mr. Jotwani.

Jai Singh et al: I've seen both the worship and poor treatment of maids in India, but more worship in the last five years or so. Again, it depends on the employer and circumstances. Asian maids in Arab nations have it the worst, though, as a lot of you regular SM readers are aware.

Why should I refrain from putting my thoughts out there, malathi? My observations are based on situations in Pune and Mumbai. It would be naive to assume that the situation is the same all over India. Its like a white person looking at rural pictures of india, and assuming that the whole of India is like that:)

Maitri,

'Worship' in the context of maids in India is a loaded concept. Naipaul has depicted it much better than I ever can hope to in his short story 'One out of Many' included in his booker-prize winner 'In a Free State'. I believe that other South Asian writers have also touched upon this issue, but I am not able to recall any more specific references right now (I need to check my shelf at home).

Jaisingh, I did not ask you to refrain from putting your thoughts out; only from generalizing. Did I mention that Merimee is extremely, intentionally funny? Your comment # 80, whether you intended to or not, gave me the same LOL moments. So please don't stop putting your thoughts out there.

In my experience of living in New Delhi/Bombay and Guwahati for 27 years I have seen fair amounts of both ill treatment and treatment of help as family members. Jai Singh, the respect that you imply is that because of supply shortage or change in attitudes?

#80 "One of my aunts gave me this piece of advice for a good successful marraige: Get a good maid, love her like family member and hang on to her forever."

jaisingh, I'm pretty sure your aunt was basically asking you to marry the maid.

Jaisingh presents a datapoint that I don't doubt is valid, but from what I have seen this seems to be the less common scenario. Good drivers are in short supply in most metros and are beginning to be treated better (their employers put them up in some hotel during travel) but maids/domestics are not. The only exception is in households where they expect someone of the same caste to handle the food. It's pretty hard for old school Brahmins to find Brahmin cooks (or pujaris) as most are professionals. Ditto for veg Jains and Marwaris. Other than that it is is pretty damn easy unless you are looking for someone with a CV like Mary Poppins that you can pay a pittance. That's why in Bangalore you have services like eBaba, people complaining that they can't find help when they in fact can if they weren't so damn stingy and paid enough to keep the maid and her kids out of the slums. In TN, I can say that less than 20% of the households I see treat their servants with dignity (e.g. use the respectful forms when addressing elder servants, having them eat with you when possible). And a good 20% are physically abusive though not in the spectacularly degenerate way of the Shabnanis. I'm sure I'll be taken to task about it, but I often get embarrassed going out to eat with desis who think they can bark at people here the way do at the "help" in India

These two got what they deserve. I am sure they will have fun in prison,I don't care what race or how rich you are you can still be an ass.

"jaisingh, I'm pretty sure your aunt was basically asking you to marry the maid"

Yes! That is why I cried like a baby when I had to leave the maid and accept this maidless life! How I miss her every single day! She definately was the key to my happy marraige.......now we sacrifice and compromise on a daily basis:)
Louiecypher, don't even get me started on the drivers! Good drivers are as rare in India as polar bears in Iceland!
Also my maid of 5 years in India was of a different caste than mine and same goes for many of my friends/cousins households. From what I have seen, our generation places more emphasis on the maids cleanliness/habits/skills etc than her caste.