I am gonna make this kinda long and I will apologize if my grammar is horrible (i am writing this on an rush).

Ever since the first time I experienced racism in the US, I was always pondering the question of: “why does this happen? How can an community end it or minimize it without being some kind of sheep and hurting ego?”

I am an FOB who came to America when he was 10 and then lived and finished college here and is now working. All this time I kept wanting to answer this question.

I have read so many human psychology books and this is the conclusion I came to: the main problem for prejudice is how we are portrayed—how we are portrayed is based on stereotypes—and stereotypes are based on the average action an group does.

So what is an average thing that we are doing negatively? It’s our social skills.

The thing is, in Indian families from an young age we are not really taught how to socialize. Meaning we maxed out stats in academic intelligence but not in social intelligence like body language, speech and looking glass effect.

It’s not our parent’s fault because their parents haven’t really emphasized this social intelligence either, they kinda just pressured them to compete and fed them the crush-hook or crook mentality.

With this mentality, it’s no wonder so many desis struggle to connect with people of a different countries. Just imagine that, an minority who outperforms and isn’t charismatic and also very different.

Of course, not all Indians are like this, but most Indians are like this. Even many ABCs and FOBs are like this regardless of whether they grew up in India or not.

I was fortunate enough to change myself after high school and learn to be charismatic and see great success. I noticed that becoming more charismatic led to less racism for me. Even in more racist places like the rural country counties in America , because I mastered my charisma ,I was able to break the ice with these farmers and change how they see Indians.

Thing is there is an narrative written by certain interest groups who have an prejudice and few goals and they also found a way to make money out these goals. They decided to take advantage of an flaw many Indians have and use it to portray us in a negative manner. Most of it works on people who never got to know our good sides.

Now you have read this far, so here is the TLDR on what I said: the solution to ending racism is every Indian person putting effort into building up their charisma in the country they are in.

Thing is charisma is an skill, so with practice anyone can learn it. Because most Indians lack charisma and have few insecurities, by working on overcoming this weakness more Indians can develop an better image for our community. I believe this is the best way to end racism for good and in large scale can benefit more Indians. If the negative stigma barred more Indian growth, then the positive stigma will enable it

Someone who's lived in Brampton and been part of the GTA South Asian community community. The kirpan debate keeps popping up every few years like the last 20 years

The thing is on paper, both sides have a reasonable case. It's just cultural awareness and trust that really resolves this issue

I'm sure you've heard about the incident at goodlife. It's s***** because a knife and religious symbol are not mutually exclusive categories. The guy is clearly a social media influencer looking to rage bait and using his religion as a shield. It's unfortunate that he hasn't been called out for this.

Important part now is that this incident has spread to mainstream news and is seen by communities where South Asians are not as present, and to be quite Frank and sort of understandable. Why they would side with the employee

https://youtu.be/MZ2XFQqqFNs?si=Y6W9jKCMJqoimv7N

Who do you usually get? For me it’s Avan Jogia (beck from victorious) the most often. I haven’t really gotten baljeet or anything lol.

the patel brother near my house is NEVER organized i don’t know if this is like a universal thing in other places aswell but why do they have such a hard time up keeping the place ? i’m like genuinely confused , this is a big corporation it’s not like it’s a small one ? there’s stuff is all over the place , kids are just running around , everything is mixed up and i can’t even find stuff where it’s supposed to be . it’s honestly became kind of ghetto if you ask me , i was literally thinking that in my head while i was there .

i truly did have a terrible experience there . don’t even get me started on the worker who was scanning our items , she was SO rude she was just getting in my moms face that i literally had to tell her to scan out items and hurry up and stop making unnecessary comments or else i’ll file a formal complaint and get her fired , that did make her stop and she continued to just do her job . i guess she was on the older side and i think after that she started gossiping with the coworkers because i was just in like short shorts and a sports bra because i had just got back from the gym .

me and my mom just got our stuff and left from there as quick as we could after that . this truly was such a disappointing experience .

A close friend of mine comes from an Orthodox family where arranged marriage is an important tradition. She's recently started meeting potential matches, and the experience has been much more complicated than she expected.

What surprised her was that, out of the first few people she met, three brought up the green card process very early in the conversation. They were pretty direct that, because of the uncertainty surrounding recent H-1B and F-1 immigration policies, they were specifically looking to marry a U.S. citizen or green card holder in hopes of securing a more stable immigration path. I understand that immigration stress is very real, and I can empathize with how difficult that situation must be.

At the same time, it's been unsettling for her because she's trying to find someone who genuinely wants to build a life together. When immigration comes up so early, it's hard to know whether someone's interest is in the person, the relationship, or the immigration benefits that marriage can provide.

It's made what is already a vulnerable process feel even more difficult. She's worried about how to tell the difference between someone who is sincerely interested in marriage and someone whose primary motivation is their immigration situation.

I'm curious whether anyone else has seen this dynamic recently, especially in communities where arranged marriages are common. Have immigration concerns become a much bigger part of these conversations, or is this just an unfortunate coincidence in her experience?

I normally don’t post things from a news source with an agenda, but this one hits close to home.

Worth a read.

I wanted to go back to India again but as a teacher, I only have winter break off which is around 14 days. The summers are burning so I dread going there now. I wanted to see places like Delhi, Agra, and Goa but I dread these summers.