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Spoil the culture

“Brown people have no right to move to white countries, they can visit, but then leave”. Never thought I’d hear these words in 2020, particularly from a Jewish woman, herself an immigrant from England. There were so many things to unpack in that sentence, but my blood was up and I waved my brown arms in front of her, demanding to know what about this skin made me unworthy to move to a “white” country. “Brown people spoil our culture, the culture of Europe, the art, language, music, all evolved to suit a white population.”

Those words ended an almost 2 hour conversation at the dog park, walking around a lovely lake, with dogs of all shape, sizes, colours, and, dare I say it, races, playing happily together. Yet here was this human, who, after months of lively conversation with me, was finally admitting that the colour of skin meant I shouldn’t be there, sharing the same country with her. (Predictably perhaps, her dog is snowy white, and mine is a beautiful brown!)

I came to the US in 2002, as countless other Indians did, for higher education. Looking back, I cannot believe how naïve and uninformed I was. Growing up in India in the 80s and 90s, my only exposure to America was through TV shows like Friends and Seinfeld. Everyone got along, everything was happy. Racism was over and done with in the 1960s I believed, when the South was finally desegregated.

Initially in college, I didn’t realise that things were not rainbows and flowers. I’d always wanted to do outdoorsy stuff and so joined a club that did just that. One of our first outings was moonlight kayaking at a state park in Hillsborough county. We were a group of about 8 kids, of which I, and a Pakistani boy, were the only 2 brown ones. We set off in 2 cars, no one in our car had a cell phone, and so we stopped at a payphone we saw on the way, outside a bar. Yes, there really was a time when cell phones weren’t ubiquitous and payphones were real. While one of our party was making the call, the rest of us were walking around the parking lot, stretching our legs. All of a sudden the door opened and a horde of men poured out. In reality, there were about 10-12 people, but in that moment, it seemed like a massive crowd. (I suppose I understand now why Trump thought the crowds at his inauguration were immense. In times of great emotion, one’s mind tends to exaggerate a bit!) They backed us up against the wall of the bar and demanded to know if we had put bombs in their trucks. There was a storm of profanity unleashed, in which the words “brown” and “terrorists” featured strongly. One of our white friends did some rapid talking and got us out of that situation. Even with that experience, I didn’t think racism was a widespread problem. I just thought this was a natural reaction of a few people to the horror of 9/11.

While I stayed in the world of academia, racism didn’t really touch me at all. Outside that world, things were very different. A superficial politeness, even friendliness, hid a world of dislike and distrust. Indians were not immune from this either. An alarming number of Indians treated black people and Hispanics in much the same way. An alarming number of Indians felt and professed superiority over other people based on the colour of our skin and the self-proclaimed richness of our culture.

At first I railed against this, aghast at the hypocrisy my people were demonstrating. Then I ranted against the caste system; perhaps that was to blame for this. But slowly I came to realise that there was a deeper cause at play, a primal cause. Man is a tribal animal, we identify with certain members as our tribe, fight for the survival of our tribe, and have done so since Homo sapiens first evolved. It’s ingrained in our DNA.

Tribalism certainly still has a myriad of benefits. I certainly identified with my Desi-ness; even as I ranted and railed against the racism I saw in some people, I accepted them as “my people”. So, how can we use this trait to our advantage? How can we make tribalism a powerful tool in the fight against racism and inequality?

I believe the answer lies in “spoiling the culture”. Very often, Indians tend to stay in our little worlds, content to find love and acceptance and a family amongst our own. Some of us who venture outside of that make rich, lasting connections with “others”. We spoil the culture of our non-Indian friends by introducing them to the wonders of Indian food, music, dance, and festivals. We light up their lives with Diwali, spread joy and laughter with Holi, spark playfulness and fun with kite festivals, and so much more.

It is impossible to hate that which we know and understand. We must reach out and make those connections, bring people into our world, reach into theirs, build bridges with food and festivities. Spoil the culture, and by doing so, our tribe increases, to engulf everybody. When we are one tribe, one nation, where’s the place for hatred and division?

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