I am a prospective MBA student who wants to apply to schools in the US as mentioned before on this blog, so I end up reading a lot of related articles from businessweek online to gain perspective and keep myself aware.
I saw this article titled 'Degree arrives, Job Vanishes' by an Indian guy named Sunny, who was raised in America, I assume, because the article says he grew up in Queens. He writes about his experience being a recent graduate from Ross School of Business, Michigan with a withdrawn post-mba job offer from the financial giant Bear Stearns that was taken over by JPMorgan Chase recently. The article talks about his struggle to find himself another job and is written well, but what shocked the living wits out of me were the comments that were posted by readers under the article. About half of the comments ranged from offensive to borderline racist to completely unacceptable. I cannot believe that so much racism can exist, even today, in a country like the United States that has such a mixed culture and where the economy is heavily contributed to, by 'coloured' people. I guess, the pressure of the recession there is making certain Americans even more hostile towards foreigners in their country, who might have/take the jobs that they don't have.
The link to the article:
http://www.businessweek.com/bschools/content/apr2008/bs20080427_135843.htm?campaign_id=alerts
You can scroll down to the bottom of the page to read those atrocious comments.
6 comments:
Disclaimer: I found a total of 10 comments in the link (within the link). If there are any more, please give us another link.
Well Sue, we better face reality - Racism still exists. Much more in Indians than anyone else. Hell! Our government promotes it! Some states have reservation upto 85%. In UP, if you call a lower caste by his caste, there is an uprising. The same guy goes to his tahsildar, with proof, to get a caste certificate. WTF!!!
What surprises me is how easy it is for us to critisize others when it comes to this topic. The world is becoming a very 'emotionally exitable' place. If I start getting offended at everyone calling me a mallu, what am I? It is a part of my identity and there's no running away from it. Silly... very so.
Is the plight of 'Sunny' any different from an 'outsider in Bengalooru or Mumbai? Even if he comes back to India, unless he goes back to his 'home state' people will still treat him the same way. And still he will be called a 'firang' (the word for an outsider 'paradesi' is a swear word in Tamil).
I sure empathize with him. God knows how difficult it is to get into a good school and pay through it. But that's what life's about. And this is not the first case, and will certainly not be the last.
Call me jaded, but I found nothing 'offensive' about the comments. Insensitive? Yes. Rude? Yes. Ignorant? Yes. Outright stupid? Yes. Racist? No!
P.S.: I do not appreciate racist/sexist innuendos. I have very low tolerance for people who use it to refer to others. Especially when it comes from bloody mallus, concieted bongs, white trash, madrasis, niggers, and feminist bitches.
I agree with Walker..maybe the comments have been deleted, but I didn't find anything racist.
The postscript that Walker left is frikkin funny though
@ the boys: Yup, I went back and found that some comments were definitely deleted....maybe it is a win for me and my article.
@the walker: ok, so now we seem to have different connotations of "racist". So be it!
@ walker: the problem is not being called mallu, golti or whatever else....one of the comments, which is now deleted, stated " get your @#$@#%$% ass back to your country cos you don't deserve a dollar of our money" - what this comment means is that it's ok for poor sunny to spend a $100,000 at an American school but not ok for him to make it back?
I don't know. I am still a little lost with what "racism" is, I guess.
Racism is an undeserving brown kid eating what could have been pushed out of your third helping into a dustbin without getting off your fat @$$...
Eating the food that his countrymen produce without exporting it at a lower price? Bomb the B@$t@rd$!!!
"...reminds me in life over and over again what beasts we human beings really are. When you get right down to it human beings are nothing more than ordinary jungle beasts. Savages. No different from the Cro Magnon people who lived twenty five thousand years ago. No different. Our DNA hasn’t changed substantially in a houndred thousand years. We’re still operating out of the lower brain. The reptilian brain.Fight or flight. Kill or be killed. We like to think we’ve evolved and advanced because we can build a computer, fly an airplane, travel underwater, we can write a sonet, paint a painting, compose an opera. But you know something? We’re barely out of the jungle on this planet. What we are, is semi-civilized beasts, with baseball caps and automatic weapons." - George Carlin
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