Prejudice against Bengalis is pretty common in western India as far as renting is concerned.

Anan, housing discrimination is hugely evident in even the most cosmopolitan cities of India. It isn’t just a religion thing. The majority of hindus are from traditionally meat-eating castes and they are often excluded from renting in certain buildings.

Erratum in my reply. Bill Aitken’s book is Divining the Deccan and not Travelling in the Deccan.

Have written about this quite a bit. Including this one on American crime:
https://www.brownpundits.com/2018/06/04/is-american-culture-sharply-increasing-crime/

Written several about anti Jewish bigotry too. But that I am sure you know all about.

Why do you think anti Jewish anger and hatred is rising around the world? [India probably loves and respects Jews more than any other country. May Allah bless Bharat for this.]

An An, I do not know if the communal bias in Ahmedabad and even Gujarat is a lingering residue of the past, because Gujarat was among the boundary states caught in the wars between the Islamic North and the more Hinduized kingdoms below (Marathas, perhaps Vijayanagar). This could also be a simplistic take since a lot of syncretic stuff did happen in such states (Bill Aitken’s Travelling in the Deccan points to some of that). But even in the 80s when I did part of my schooling in Baroda and was aware of goings on in the city and Ahmedabad to the north, there would be sudden curfews in these cities because of ‘communal incidents’ as the issue was delicately put in those days. Today I would presume it is mostly driven by the middle class but I cannot say for certain.

Thanks for your long post on racism in the US. I am not resident so I went by a lot of the comment originating from the US, from both left and right as well as press reports on increase in hate crimes. I was not particularly looking at crimes or racist bias against Asians but race related stuff in general. Some of these reports say that these are anti-semitic or anti-black such as https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46189391 . This corresponds to what you had also written I think.

bevivek, this is shocking. Is this a lower middle class thing, middle class thing, or upper middle class thing?

What is the cause? Fear of terrorism?

And what types of muslims are discriminated against? Many Ismaeli are quite Irfan Sufi (which usually means interfaith) and or cosmopolitan and or non practicing. Only an idiot wouldn’t know the difference between sixer and Wahhabi, for example. Guess India has many idiots.

I am surprised to hear about Ahmedabad. What is the cause of tensions in Ahmedabad? In the last national election about 40% of muslims voted for the BJP in Gujarat. Isn’t this widely known? Surely a BJP voting patriotic Indian muslim isn’t likely to commit terrorist acts.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

“I was referencing the fact that the Trump administration has managed to make it legit to be openly racial. And the Trump Administration followed the Obama administrations when it is possible people thought that with a black president, perhaps America had genuinely turned a new page. Perhaps they have, in the long run, but at the moment, it seems very regressive to me.”

Can I ask what parts of the US are you most familiar with? Can your share your perspectives of them? The US is arguably the second most diverse country in the world after India (India is far more diverse). I am sure there are towns and counties with challenges in the USA. I don’t have experience with these towns and counties.

To be honest I can’t remember a single racist thing directed against me or Asians (that I observed) in the US. This is not to say it never happened. But rather that I regarded it as so irrelevant not to remember it.

A black friend recently told me that Asians have the best stereotypes of any American. Asians are considered nerds, geeks, geniuses, easy to get along with, low crime, hard working. This is a great assist to Asians (compared to caucasians, blacks and Latinos) in school, careers and business. And in dealing with police officers (who automatically assume that Asians are the victim or innocent.) Note that there are entire years where the US police do not kill a single armed Asian. And America has 21 million Asians. Statistically Asians are far less likely to be subject to police violence, incarceration, or commit crimes than caucasian Americans. For this reason police officers and Asians are friends in America. Asians are also considered “wimps”. Perhaps partly because the vast majority of violent crimes against Asians are committed by non Asians, Asians usually want more police protection.

Don’t get me wrong, I have seen many Asians get beaten up. But I attributed that to very intense American anti nerd and anti geek sentiment and jealousy rather than to racism. A ton of nerd and geek Jewish kids and nerd caucasian kids get physically assaulted too.

The large majority but not all the bigotry I have seen among Americans is anti Jewish. And it isn’t all simply jealousy. Asians are rich and successful too; but suffer less hatred from other Americans. Anti Jewish sentiment in the US appears to be rising.

I personally consider this a massive threat that needs to be dealt with. Otherwise the Americans who don’t like Jews will eventually turn on the Asians too.

The second biggest source of American bigotry after anti Jewish sentiment I have personally observed is male mysogeny against woman. Most of it subtle. I don’t want to elaborate on it now. I think males need to spiritually evolve to deal with it.

There is a problem with anti muslim sectarianism in the US as well. But it mostly manifests in the form of backing Islamists against moderate, atheist or ex muslims; calling people with muslim heritage Islamaphobes and so forth. Fortunately America is making progress in this.

Justin Trudeau and leading Canadian liberals warmly greeted Mohammed al-Qunun in Canada. [Until recently the left would have denounced her as Islamaplobe sectarian racist.] Another great example is the way that islamist leaning Linda Sarsour is becoming persona non grata among Hollywood actresses, starlets and the me too movement.

It helps that Keith Ellison and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar were and remain unapologetic liberal muslims who support reform, liberal, minority and ex muslims the world over.

People such as Maajid Nawaz, Irshad Manji, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Tarek Fatah, and ex muslims are growing in popularity and acceptance among the American and Canadian left. Note that the North American left and North American liberalism have bifurcated and are now quite different.

By contrast the Indian left remains far more regressive and anti muslim than the American left.

America also has a problem in how it treats black Americans. And it does not only come from the baizuo. There is a hard bigotry of low expectation. A continuous insinuation that blacks lack agency, power, intelligence and privilege. Some people cover this with the pretense that blacks need “help” and that they want to provide this “help” to blacks. But what lies under it is dark.

I have not met a single black American that was not opposed to the baizuo or caucasian intelligentsia. Sadly many Latinos and Asians are not that much better.

For example why is President Trump not demanding that black kids academically perform better in elementary school? How much of this is because of the bigotry of low expectations?

In many cases in the US, high academically performing black students are attacked by baizuo (caucasians) for being nerds, geeks, white, uncle toms, white washed, coons, and for betraying African culture (for wanting to become a hot shot computer coder versus getting a PhD in African studies).

The baizuo try to systematically attack authentic legitimate black leaders such as Glenn Loury and John McWhorter and rather use their power to portray baizuo collaborator blacks as the “real” and “authentic” leaders of blacks. The baizuo will put a black face in front of the effort for appearances sake.

However many black African Americans are standing up to them. Including many self described left, liberal, moderate and conservative black Americans.

This needs to be elaborated on later.

LOL

I was referencing the fact that the Trump administration has managed to make it legit to be openly racial. And the Trump Administration followed the Obama administrations when it is possible people thought that with a black president, perhaps America had genuinely turned a new page. Perhaps they have, in the long run, but at the moment, it seems very regressive to me.

AnAn,

I know only from personal & anecdotal experience that this happens in Bombay, Pune and Ahmedabad (about this last I heard from an ex Ahmedabad wasi about which more anon).

It is true that Bombay / Mumbai has a large Muslim population. Bombay has always been a combination of culture / religion areas and cosmopolitan ones. Thus the Mohammed Ali Road – Byculla belt traditionally had a large Muslim population, Dadar – Parsi, Bandra – Christian, Matunga / King Circle – Tamil, Sion – Gujarati etc. This has changed somewhat in recent times based on land price movements and new areas opening up. In all these culturally / religiously homogeneous places would in general discourage the ‘other’ so that is to be expected.

But around all this certain areas were more cosmopolitan such as most parts of South Bombay, Bandra, Andheri, Chembur, New Bombay areas such as Vashi, Nerul, etc. I am talking of Muslims single or couple trying to get an apartment for rent or ownership in these general areas and facing issues.

Only recently (last 2-3 decades) has Pune acquired a less Maharashtrian population partly due to it becoming a manufacturing and IT hub.

Re Ahmedabad, it has been communally polarized for a while. Two of my friends, he is Hindu (Menon) and she is an Ismaili, rented an apartment. Perhaps because of his surname they didn’t face an issue. But when they came to know it was a mixed religion marriage, it became hostile. Their son Sahil got beaten up when he went down to play. They moved out some time later.

Bevivek, are you certain about what specific people they did not want in? For example there are many Hindu Muslim marriages in India. How would they be treated?

Is the worry about terrorism or something else? Did they distinguish between Hindu tilted Sufi/Irfan vs convervative Sunni?

Mumbai has a large affluent successful muslim community. How representative of Mumbai can this be?

I don’t know as much about Pune (except that it is rapidly becoming rich and has lots of non Marathi people).