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My experience with racism in India and USA
 This is w.r.t this post calling Americans racist. I wanted to share with you my experiences on racism. From the day i was born, my mom tried different oils, lotions to change my skin color. Everyone ridiculed my mom for giving birth to a dark girl. Everyone told her it would be difficult to find a groom for her as she is very dark. This would trouble my mom and she tried everything to change my skin color. I was born intelligent. I topped most of the competitions at school. I was a good orator. When i was in my 4th grade, my teacher told me she could not give me the role of cinderalla for our school day function as i was dark and they wanted a fair skinned girl. They chose a fair cinderalla over me who could not even deliver her lines. I went home heartbroken. The next year i was chosen for a dance performance for a school show. One of the teachers asked me to not stand in the front row as i was dark and they wanted pretty girls in the front. I was asked to move back. Imagine what a 5th grader would have gone through. Anyways as i turned into a teenager, my confidence was at rock bottom. I was dark you see. That is like almost the end of the world you see. I tried all sorts of things only to realize nothing in this world can change your skin color. I kind of got used to people calling me dark. At 20 i got admission at a very prestigious university in US for higher studies. I landed here. Out in US, not one single day was i told i was dark. Everyone around me were so appreciative of my other skills apart from my skin color. I met a very handsome guy whom i started dating. My confidence slowly built up thanks to this guy . I am soon going to marry him. In US I was never told a single day by anyone that i was dark. Infact a white girls came to me and once complimented me for my healthy skin. I am not making this up BTW. The reason i wrote this was because i saw so many comments here saying Americans are racist. Hell no. We Indians are the most racist people in the world, we dont realize it. In US there are laws against racism. In India there is not one single law that will protect a dark skinned girl from being ridiculed. It is just accepted as being OK to say you are dark. So people before you comment saying she is dark and ugly- think of what you will be doing to the 100s of girls in india who are dark skinned. You will be shattering their egos, bruising their self confidence and they will be scarred for life. Today I work as a developer at google . I consider myself beautiful and am very confident. It took me years to realize that self-confidence comes from within.
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i think most of the comments written here are by same person..I am living in UK n i saw many racist people here.One M.P who was a speaking as racist even in public won the election with majority votes.What does that mean?Majority of voters support him right?majority of them are racist right?Even though many doesnt show there arrogance.
Well..I am an Indian and i am not against truth.I know there are many Indians who behave as racist.Actually i felt the british born Indians are behaving worst to newly migrated indians and some of whites are very sweet with us.In India there is difference between even south and north part.North think that Souths are ugly n bad(but the truth is that they are more intelligent than us and even the literacy rates are very high on there side.) while south also blame north.
To be frank there is racism in every corner of the world.Its we the youth that should unite against racism,whoever is that(white,black or brown..)At the end ,the humanity should be the thing that we all love..Fight against all racism and be a good human being.That should be the motto of our life.
Regards
Mariyam Jasmin
this is a good post..i totally agree im not dark skinned but i always have people ask me how come many asians from pakistan and india want to be light and i have no answer because i think its ridiculous...im british people should be grateful for the way they look...people who are dark skinned are very lucky becuase there are thousands of people who want to get a tan to look darker i dont understand what skin colour has to do with anythin thats why it annoys me at times when i see actresses and actors who started of with not so fair skin and now they are fair....its weird...everyone in the world is beautiful no matter what.we are Allah's creation and we should appreciate that we are here...who ever wrote the above post its really good the way you have expressed yourself.
Let me share my opinion here. I grew up in India, came to the US for higher studies, now working here etc. I was never dark, but not extremely fair either. I faced a different kind of discrimination. I am tall (5'10") and I am quite intelligent. I have great facial features, thick lips, straight nose etc and men go ga ga over me in the US. I am also very slim. So, over all , I am considered a great beauty in the US.
When I was growing up in India, I was considered too tall and was constantly ridiculed because my parents won't be able to find a groom tall enough for me ( ha! as if I gave a sh*t!), I was called bamboo, giraffe, lamp post etc etc and was constantly reminded by my own family not to even think of high heels.
I have thick lips like Angelina ( which is a trend now in India and world over, all the heroines enhancing their lips etc). I was ridiculed by my own family and friends as having lips like a 'negro' (their words!). Their verdict was I was just a okay looking girl, nothing pretty, but not ugly either. What did I know, i was just a teen ager.
I came to the US when I was 21 and suddenly I was flooded with so much attention from everyone that it was confusing. Now I understand I am quite good looking actually and all the features for which I was being ridiculed are actually something people strive for! The height, the lips, the perfectly smooth skin etc. And now I do wear high heels. I am dating an European guy for last few years and he told me I look great in heels, as it makes me look like a model, and not listen to what Indians say about too tall etc. If someone is shorter than me , then its their problem. Right.
But I do understand the discrimination against dark skin. Its severe in India. I have a cousin sister who, in her prime, looked like a mix between Anu Agrawal and Freida Pinto. But she is dark skinned. Hence her pet name given to her by her family is ' Kauwa' (the crow!!) and 'kali', she was/still is (she is married now) always mocked and her parents lamented how to find a groom for her etc! She was stunning, but was treated like dirt by her own family because of her skin color!
This could be my story as well,plus there was additional racism with me becase i was Fat too...peaple are so conservative about judging people and just have a benchmark settings with there appearance
Oh lord! such generalizations.
Racism exists in America. May be it's not so much towards Indians.
Yes, many Indians are obsessed towards dark skin/fair skin but NOT every Indian is. If your own family says you are ugly b'coz of your dark skin then it reflects on your family, not entire India.
Looks like you all found a reason to complain about India all over again. India is a beautiful country with a rich heritage and vast diversity. Be happy about that and respect that and DO NOT for gods sakes put all Indians under one umbrella.
there is racism everywhere, and in different forms. in some places its right on the surface but in others it takes situations to bring it out. if it is not color, its appearance, or nationality, or religion, or culture....the list goes on. improvement in our societies should be made at the individual level. if only every person makes a conscious effort to be accepting of every human being we come across...... the world would definitely be a better place. who cares if we look different or live differently? we are all human beings with the same desire to live in the best way we can. no one is better than the other!!! the only rule: DONT JUDGE A PERSON"S WORTH.
Not just Indians but all Asians are racist, class concious shallow snobs. If its not the skin colour, they pick on race, religion, culture etc... I have lived in UK most of my life though born in Asia. The Brits love my golden brown colour!! In fact they spend all year saving up in order to go on holiday and roast in the sunshine to get my colour!!
i would love to give you a very very big hug.
well done !!!
hats off to u darknlovely u build up ur confidence....ur post is really nice and yes i think ur just sooo true.i totally agree what u have written.
Then take brown skin girls like Aishwarya to America and send us really beautiful white girls like Katrina to India. That way, all will be happy! :D
I completely agree with you - Indian people are the most racist pricks alive; yet, they pick on everyone else and deem them racist. I just don't understand.
I thinks its alot of nri indians that marry out of their race because they think they are too cool to marry indians. men usually go for chinese or white or russian etc, girls usually white men. but i have heard some horror stories in punjab and villages where they treat daughters like total garbage, so its not wonder people are running away from this. the worst when these people with dirty mentalities come abroad, oh god! they bring their dirty views over here too (america). its not only embarassing for other indians, but we dont want to hear that crap over here.
I am a dark skinned Indian male. I have spent some time in Canada. In India, people always assumed I was the courier guy, or peon or some other profile which they automatically take for 'lowly'. People in India do not know about fairness. It's not about skin color, it's about what you have within. And it's not about your profession either, Indians need to learn how to respect a person for what they do as well as what they are.
In Canada, my boss never failed to wish the janitor "Good Morning". In India, if a boss speaks with a subordinate nicely, the subordinate stops respecting the boss. WTF!!!
There are many things which reek of hypocrisy. In India, if you are rich and not famous, you NEED to be fat and rude so people know you are a "heavyweight". WTF!!!!!
racists come from all races, it's in our blood.
Americans r not racist..this is the most beautiful n free place to live
This could be my story....Totally agree that we Indians are the most racist and the biggest hypocrites.
same here...indians always told me that im ugly because im dark. My own very family told me that ugly. I have yet understand why do one say that to a little kid she is ugly? anyway i came to america when i was 12, as of yet i still havnt met a person who put me out becuse im dark or called me ugly because of my skin tone. infact most people come up to me and compliment on my hair (which is very curly and something my mom and INDIANS dont like because it's CURLY) or my lips which is big(also somethin not acceptable by indians). what i learned from my life is that Indians(my own people) would always call me ugly but americans would call me beautifull.
Really really happy for you!
I'm from Singapore and staying with Chinese and Malays....most Dark Indians falls into racist attack. Hey classify Indians as hairy, smelly(due to coconut hair oil), dirty and simply too dark. Fortunately, I wasn't too dark. i was considered fair and has olive undertone. But, my friends weren't that lucky.
From birth, parents and in-laws do not care if they have a baby girl or boy but what they want to know it if the baby was fair or not! I had this dark friend. Her parents was finding for her groom and trust me they really had a hard time as many guys do not want dark girls. It took her 3 yrs to find her a groom but then one Indian national married her so that he can be a Singaporean!! But then, the main reason is to be a SG citizen not because of her inner beauty.
In Schools, several of the Chinese students insult and humiliate Indians due to their skin tone. I really had enough of these racist people. Due to this racist remarks, many of the Indians here to dont want Indians as their soul mate and would marry a Chinese instead so their kids will be fair and will not suffer the same fate they had! This is really heart-wreaking! When I go back to my native, (INDIA) esp on weddings they will criticize the bride if she is dark! WTH!! Why wouldn't people see that dark isn't contiguous or something we should frown upon?
Guys please wake up!
awesome. you're so lucky you got over it! im fully Desi but i have a different problem. my skin is wheatish but everyone is always ridiculing my facial features as they are round and my mothers are extremely refined and pointy and she has large cat eyes. she was a model in her teens here in Canada, where i was born.. i didnt get my dads features of my mothers, im totally different and everyone is ALWAYS making fun of me....i dont mean the westerners but like....ALL my family members...then they're always asking me why im so "short." im 5'3". but mostly, 90% of the time they always ask things like "why are u so ugly and ur mom so pretty?" or " i bet ur adopted." u have no idea. sometimes i cant sleep at night cuz i cry so much.but the WORST part is that even my mom calls me horrible names! she ridicules me all the time, she insults the way i look and degrades me! im 19 and i have no confidence whatsoever..... honestly speaking even to this day my mother has NEVER called me "pretty." :( the furthest she has ever gone is to say "tum bus THEEK lag rahi ho." We have relatives that are very light skinned and fair and she would always go up to them (these fair girls) and hold their faces and admire their faces. that stabbed me in the heart like nothing else! dang...umm..just writing this brings tears to my eyes. if you haven't felt it u have no idea what its like to go through it. my mother herself is quite superficial but now she is beginning to realize that there's more to people than just outer beauty (NOW she is, finally). the one person who is suppose to give you confidence and call you beautiful and give you hope in life did just the opposite with me. ive become so accustomed to her calling me disgusting things that im just numb now. ive just stopped listening and caring about what she says. sometimes it seems like shes ashamed of calling me her daughter. honestly i can feel this!...anyways sorry for going on and on. just wanted to tell my story. good luck to all of u girls and i want to wish u all the best. love u all xx
Darknlovely, what a thoughtful and interesting post.. Had to write my bit. I have a dark complexion going by Indian standards. I worked in US for a couple of years. Dark skinned people go through so much racism in India that we find Americans so good since they don't give a damn about our color. Even if a few do behave in a racist way such as ignore us on the road and see us differently for our accent or dress we dont see it as racism .Many Indians dont even notice this behaviour of americans since they smile and greet at whoever they meet. Even a few people in India try to ignore and ridicule a person with poor english and is not dressed fashionably.Atleast english and dressing is something that can be corrected. What does a person do about skin color?
I had a roommate from Noida. Pretty and fair and used to look like Karishma kapoor. A sweet girl who was extremely confident since she is a very fair girl from India who is used of receiving only compliments. I Don't blame her for being proud since we the people of India make sure fair girls know that they are so beautiful due to their color and have a higher chance of success compared to the dark girl next door. She used to get so offended if any of our american co-workers didn't return her smile, didnt compliment her clothes or corrected her english when she was wrong. She would call them racist. It used to happen to me too but i am used to it in India itself.But I used to see it in a whole different perspective and found them so accepting of various cultures. Even if a single american complimented me on how good I look someday and how good my skin was I would stand stunned.What an Irony huh?? Mon, 2010-07-19 19:44 — Anonymous. You reminded me of my friend( I sincerely hope its not my friend herself on pinkvilla :-) ).
Right now i am pregnant with a girl child in US and my mom keeps telling me to eat things which ensure that my daughter is fair. I keep telling her in US color doesn't matter. Fair or dark you are still Indian :-). But I guess my view would have been different if I were in India. Bad if my daughter is born very fair since she will also complain how racist americans are towards her even though she is not 'dark' :-)
im sorry but this story sounds soo fake
i was born in america...live and grew up in america...and i have never seen racism in my eyes. Not against anyone and not against me. I kno u may think i am unrealistic or lying but im not. i have a huge family and they have never been racially outcast. And that is a big deal for me... ;) I have never been to India, but i hope for them that they surpass this.
Let me tell you my story...well as a baby i must have been a dark I dont know how dark ..baby...while the rest of my family very light ..my mom extremely light with light eyes n hair..my younger sisters blond. I do remember my mom at times being rough about my looks( she felt insecure to have a child which didnt resemble her), I guess... so I never felt pretty as a child n I didnt bother either...I was always intelligent..but by the time I was 8-9 I turned pretty light with light hair ..and people always commented on my light looks... I was even called "bhuri" ..so I never knew that I was born somewhat dark skinned ...@ school I was hated n appreciated at the same time for my lovely milky white smooth skin... in college I was this "heroine" type sought after female. It was only when I was 18, that I went to stay at my uncle's house that I experienced this extreme racism...my uncles mom-in-law.... couldnt keep her shock of seeing me all fair with pink cheeks n lips ..a firang looking girl ..she started taunting me all the time.."oh do u know u were such an ugly dark fat baby/child, we were shocked to see you..." everytime she caught hold of me she would taunt.... I was so traumatised and hurt..as I never knew or was told ..that I was born dark, fat n ugly....nobody had ever told me about my "dark secret".... I recently after 13 yrs asked my mom abt it n the old lady's rants...but she just ignored it..today nobody believes I am Indian..as I look too western .... I could be Russian,English ..Polish to my Polish neighbours...but I still cant forget how I was attacked by that Racist old lady !!
2010-07-19 19:54 — Anonymous ... I think people are just rude and jealous of what they dont have, in your case your brains and smartness. "
--> to pin her issues down to 'they were just jealous' .. maybe, maybe not. to deny some color issues there is to not move forward. they were obviously not able to see her nature-given beauty... because each society has a limit-filter on what it considers great, normal, bad. if we let go of these filters, we can be free to be ourselves and not limit each other.
Amazing really happy for you that you pulled through & now a successful strong women all the best to you & all the ladies struggling though this more power to you.
great story thanks for sharing that and you go girl!
i just wanted to add my two cents - i think people are the same everywhere - we have the good, the bad and the ugly. the only thing ''different'' in india is that people take it to a higher notch by being in denial and being hypocrites! thus, the image of all indians being humble, modest, non racist, morally upright folks - an image indians themselves have bought into, all the while knowing that they are just as racist and pretentious as people anywhere!
i'm going to digress a bit - i was stunned to know that in india, in the maximum cases of paedophilia, the perpetrator is a family member - a father, uncle, aunt, brother etc. yet the cases never make headway since people want to avoid the stigma - and maintain the facade that such things happen only abroad but not in susheel, indian families! (this is not made-up - there was a book on this topic written by an indian lady - i remember reading about this in the indian newspaper the hindu several years ago). Another thing that comes to mind is, again indians dubbed aids asa ''foreign'' disease that would never happen in india,since indians weren't promiscious, there were no ''homos'' in india, family values are india's cornerstone etc.etc...but look where india is now...alomost catching up with africa for the maximum aids cases.
my point, through all that rambling,is that, in this same pattern of ''doing and denying'', indians accuse others of racism but are such racists themselves.
i'm an indian and this aspect of my country shames me. let's all first learn to be the change we want to see in the world.
Indians love to point a finger at other countries and say how racist they are but as an Indian i know exactly how racist Indians are themselves! They have a derogatory term for people belonging to different regions. All south Indians are 'madrasis' and dark. All people from the North East are 'chinkys' 'chinks' and the girls loose characters. The men belonging to the Sikh community are 'joodis'.....and it goes on and on. Why, even people who're African American or belong to African countries are called 'kaalu' 'haapshi' here. And some of those calling them these names are themselves a just few shades lighter than those they're making fun of!
Indians don't realise the true meaning of India. India 'is' it's diversity in terms of languages, landscape, cuisine, clothing and looks. Indians from different parts of the country could look like they're from any part of the world! If only the Indians celebrated this diversity instead of making fun of those who're different from them!
good article. I'm from a state in the North East of India and have lived in Delhi for almost 20 years. I cannot begin to tell you just how many racist comments i've heard. People think some of us exaggerate it but i know exactly how it felt when i had to live with it every single day. My sister lives in London now. She said not once did she get teased in any way there but one day when in an Indian grocery store she heard someone say 'ching chong'...she was shocked! guess what? turned out to be an Indian man..! Not only do people pass racist comments they also cast aspirations on the character of girls from my region. The ignorance of Indians about their own country ceases to amaze me till this day! Forget the states in the North east of India, they don't even know what countries are not part of India!!
I wonder how many people know that the word 'chinky' 'chink' is the same as the 'N' word for black people. and is considered racist..?
true encounter with the dumb kind-
ignoramus- 'are you from Nepal?'
me- 'No i'm from India'
super ignoramus- 'yeah but from Nepal right?'
good for you! and you can be an inspiration for so many.
imagine if India had overcome its color barriers like America has (although there are still pockets of issues). Imagine how different your time would have been. but don't worry, India will have its own color revolution where people will accept each other and let go of barriers...
this 'color barrier', it's the worst thing .. i have heard the case of two sisters.. both almost exactly similar face shapes, but the younger one just being a few shades lighter;; the elder being too dark for comfort. all the family would taunt the two growing up.. that the younger would have such an easy time getting married, etc. etc.. needless to say, despite having almost exactly the same fact shape and height, the younger one, due to her confidence skyrocketed: she made friends in school easier, had brothers and friends do her homework for her... was the teacher's pet and made important friends;; and is known to be very arrogant of her looks. she ended up cliimbing the corporate ladder to the very strong self esteem she has. the older is humble and follows the younger sister around, despite having a very very high iq, as if her extra melanin is a crime. she is so lovely, but her self-image is so damaged, she never believes it...
i feel very very very bad for children who think they are doing some right or wrong, simply based on the # of melanin they are born with. when you have self-acceptance, you will love the world. that's why it's important that each of us try to honor each other's inner beauty, as well as appreciate that our outer forms are all different and unique, each lovely in different ways. this is not to say that dark is good and fair is bad or vice versa, each color has its own beauty.. this is only to say that we are all unique creatures and we should never define ourselves by society's limited views-- if someone tries to limit. let's set each all free to be all that we can be. :)
I grew up abroad in canada I have heard how cruel some kids can be, they call all dark skinned people tamil, and I have been called a hairy indian before. Its not so perfect around here either. but yes, its less than india I would say.