From the NYT:
Across India, Nepotism as a Way of Life
By MANU JOSEPH
NEW DELHI — The Indian upper class, like royalty, is sexually transmitted. Politics, business, mainstream cinema and other occupations where talent is subordinate to lineage are dominated by family cartels, who plant their own over the rest. The Indian elite is a system where there is a 100 percent reservation for its own genetic material. And the most underrated joke in the country is when this class joins the middle class in lamenting reservations for the poorest Indians from the “backward” castes in colleges and jobs.
The urban middle class, too, is a beneficiary of the generous and tenacious Indian family, which subsidizes its children far longer and deeper than is generally accepted. Only a young Indian who is not supported by a family purse will appreciate the simple fact that he or she does not compete with other young people for a shot at a decent life but with whole families. The Indian is less an individual and more the mascot of his family background — much the way Rahul Gandhi is the mascot of the Gandhi dynasty. ...
Bilawal Zardari, 23, is chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party. Rahul Gandhi, 41, is a general secretary of the Congress party. Bilawal Zardari’s prime qualification for the position he holds is that he is the son of the late prime minister Benazir Bhutto and grandson of the late prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Mr. Gandhi’s is that he is the son of the late prime minister Rajiv Gandhi and grandson of the late prime minister Indira Gandhi. [And great-grandson of India's first prime minister, Nehru.]...
In mainstream Hindi cinema, all the top actors cast in lead roles, barring one, are sons of former film stars, directors or writers. ... It is unusual for Indian businessmen to donate to charity because such generosity is at the expense of their primary function — to materially enrich the lives of their children. ...
The parents stand by their children for a long time, buying them apartments and cars, and putting those with no family support at considerable disadvantage. In return, the useful parents exert considerable power over their children long after they cease to be children.
The Indian cricket star Yuvraj Singh is more often photographed with his mother than with pretty girls. In any other country it would be unusual to see a young sports star photographed so often with his mama. Rahul Dravid, one of the most revered cricketers, once dated a top actress, but he married the girl his mother picked.
Tiger Mothers, Eagle Fathers, Dalmatian Dads, and now, for the sake of alliteration, Python Parents. (Or maybe Boa Constrictor Parents?)
There are two theoretically distinct elements here: parental investment and nepotism.
You can have societies that are low in parental investment and high in nepotism, but you wouldn't want to live in one. The most trouble-free societies are high in paternal investment and low in nepotism, but, it's not easy to stay that way. It's rather unnatural. As Ibn Khaldun pointed out 700 years ago, when the all-for-one-and-one-for-all tribes come screaming out of the desert and conquer a lush city, within a few generations of prosperity, they are all stabbing each other in the back in family quarrels.
One problem with high paternal investment, apart from nepotism, is that it funds a lot of diminishing marginal return competition for positional goods. In 21st Century America, the Ivy League to Wall Street career path is so lucrative that it generates a huge amount of competition without obvious societal benefit. In contrast, in Heinlein's America, which was fairly low nepotism (especially from December 8, 1941 onward) and fairly high (but not extravagant) paternal investment, in contrast, it seemed sensible just to send your kid to State U.
I don't know anything about the lower 80% or so of the Indian population, but the upper reaches seem to be a high paternal investment culture.
This high level of nepotism makes India a more screwed-up nation than it has to be. What's interesting, however, is that high nepotism culture that helps make India a mess simultaneously makes Indians well situated to compete in globalized America.
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I think the point you're trying to make here Steve, and in in a similar post made earlier, is about game theory.
Here the game is nothing less than the control of the US wealth stock (which a lot of foolish polticians acting on the advice of even dumber neo-liberal economists, have basically put up for sale to the highest bidder)and the participants are a largely clueless, naive mega-herd of sheep (prime mutton on the hoof, just advertising their juicy rump-steak to the starving wolves of the world) ie white Americans, and the cunningist, wilest pedators of the field who have made many, many lifetimes study of a thousand and one ways to rip-off wily mugs in the malthusian death struggles that their homelands are.
Basically I'm talking about cunning refined to the nth degree here.
Of course the result will be, metaphorically speaking, a bloodbath.One thinks of a great white savaging a shoal of sardines or of a fox let loose in a battery hen house.
The upshot is that prey protein transmogrifies into predator protein.
Thank you WSJ and 'The Economist', Christ, not even the smallpox virus is more virulent than the toins your writers exude.
I recall Megan McArdle (among others) making the argument that it's natural for health care spending to go up, since what better things are there to spend money on nowadays? I reacted in horror--the idea of investing in one's own children apparently did not even cross her mind.
It did not occur to me at the time that the opposite extreme might be even worse.
India and Pakistan are extremely tribal and nepotistic. More than almost anyone. In a large public university, a department that is housed in the same building as mine has >90% of its professors coming from these two countries! And 100% of their labs are from there, too. Of the three Indian professors that I personally know well (two in my department and one collaborator elsewhere), all three employ their wives. Funded by federal grants, naturally.
I can't put my finger on it but I've seen that pattern somewhere before...
One only has to turn on the televison to watch a program with Mika Brzezinski, Willie Geist, and Luke Russert to realize that the U.S. is much closer to India that people realize.
Just look at second-generation hollywood or Washington, Dc to see that the U.S. is a country generally control by the second and third generations of powerful families.
get on this, steve:
http://www.jdunderground.com/ot/thread.php?threadId=26221#post380155
:-)
From the NYT... By MANU JOSEPH...
So they've got Dot-Not-Feather Scots-Irishmen now?
mainstream cinema... where talent is subordinate to lineage... dominated by family cartels...
Hmmm... wait a minute... I can see this... you mean where talentless hacks like, oh, say, a Shia LaBeouf or a Natalie Portman or a Liev Schreiber or a Julia Louis-Dreyfus get all the very best roles merely on account of the accident of their births into the greater Scots-Irish clan?
This high level of nepotism makes India a more screwed-up nation than it has to be.
Gee, ya think?
I mean, we are talking about the folks who invented [and then ENFORCED] the caste system, right?
These people took the notion of "partially inbred extended family" and turned it into not just a science but a RELIGION!!!
India has never and will never function as a group in the way that European and Asian societies do.
Unfortunately, with the way our own society is functioning we are all becoming Indian.
Indians are my company's favorite employee to hire. Very good at cranking out uncontentious analysis for clients who don't know which questions to ask (applied economics). And as their visa is contingent on working for the company, well, they put in extra hours (until they get a green card, afterwhich they are lazy). They seem also to be a bimodal group. About two thirds will insult underlings to their faces, and worse, take credit for underling's work. One third are as pleasant as can be.
-Hank the Plant
well situated to compete in globalized America.
and they were smart enough to get themselves classified as non-caucasion.
>90% of its professors coming from these two countries!
but if it were 90% it would be investigated by Obama's justice department - hell - even Bush's.
In many ways orientals, dot injuns are far more dangerous than blacks since they know how to use the system for power rather than just payouts.
...... I don't know anything about the lower 80% or so of the Indian population, but the upper reaches seem to be a high paternal investment culture. ........
Its the same in the lower 80% also, if the parents have the resources to do so. The funny thing is that the 80%ers will complain and even campaign against nepotism but their heart is not in it because they know that if they could they would do it also.
they already changed the headline on this from "zimmerman cried first night in jail" to "zimmerman wants to apologize to trayvonn's family".
you can see the original url here:
http://www.jdunderground.com/ot/thread.php?threadId=26221
but now when you click on the url, it changes to this:
http://abcnews.go.com/US/zimmerman-wept-jail-court-appearance-murder-charges-trayvon/story?id=16123136#.T4f5nnAdAxU
can anyone go back in internet time and get the original headline, preferably in jpeg?
They really shove their miscues down the memory hole really fast...
make India a mess simultaneously makes Indians well situated to compete in globalized America
and eventually make america a mess too. thanks neocon/liberals!
If you look at Britain during its great period, the period when its armies were most successful, many aspects of society were pretty much unabashed nepotism. It was certainly not a meritocracy.
Only the upper classes could be officers in the Army. Talent simply did not matter - you *purchased* your commission. The ruling class was the aristocracy, which was hereditary.
Yet Britains armies functioned just fine, practically conquering the world, and winning most battles in Europe, and its rulers were keen and efficient guardians of its national interest.
I am not arguing for nepotism as against a meritocracy. Logically, there should be no doubt that meritocracy is a far more efficient way to organize a society.
And yet.....somehow, Europeans did best when its society was less *logically* organized than recently. It is an interesting conundrum, one worth pondering.
Same could be said for Jews, Arabs, Persians, Chinese etc. White Americans are being driven out of lucrative industries by these people wholesale. It's shocking to see the ethnic makeup of people under 30 who are in or on the track to work in the most desirable careers, there are few heterosexual non-Jewish white males. Older whites aren't noticing this because most lawyers, bankers etc. their age are white. Lower level careers in IT, engineering, and back office work have already been Indianized, with often zero whites in a work place. We are adding hostile brown and yellow elites to the hostile elite we already have. Indians especially are often openly contemptuous of white Americans, not bothering to hide their hostility like East Asians or Middle Eastern people.
White Nationalism 2.0 recognizes that Indians and Chinese are at least as big of threat the white Americans as black and Hispanics are. Younger whites are seeing this close up. I heard several interesting conversations lately between young whites and their parents about too many Asians at colleges. Whites don't want to go to 30%+ Asian colleges. They have heard stories from their older friends and siblings about how large numbers of Asians are un-pleasant to be around. The parents can't seem to understand this because they have never been in such an environment. They still think of Asians and Indians as a "model minority" who were nice when they were 2% of their classmates back in the 70's.
We have the same dichotomy among racially aware whites with old people often seeing Asians as harmless or even potential allies and younger people who have went to school and worked with large numbers of Asians knowing how ridiculous those ideas are.
The tribal nature of Indians -- well, of everybody other than death-wishing white Liberals -- is why they so quickly hollow out the whites when they get into American tech companies.
I saw this many times first hand at various very large American tech companies starting in the '90s. As soon as an Indian became manager of a group, every new hire would be H1-B Indian and life was made increasingly uncomfortable for the whites who were pushed out of the group using any available means. In short order, the group was 90%+ Indian, with maybe a token Chinese guy or a Russian that wasn't so easily intimidated as a white American.
And you know, Indian coders are over-rated, so it's not like quality went up. But Indian managers tend to be very good at kissing the ring of whoever is above them, until they take over and begin slitting throats.
And of course since nearly all the upper level execs at American tech companies are complete SWPLs and DWLs to boot, they just love the vibrancy.
James Burnham was right decades ago. Liberalism is a death wish.
I think it's much the same in Latin America.
Paradoxically, more diverse a nation is, the less elite feels unity with most people. Latin American whites wanna keep it among whites, and upper caste Hindus wanna keep it among themselves--since many lower caste people are often of different ethnic groups.
If India were more homogeneous, the privileged would look upon even poor people as part of the national family. But the problem is there are lots of ethnic divisions in India.
People who run Hollywood and media aren't exactly all that diverse either.
"Tiger Mothers, Eagle Fathers, Dalmatian Dads, and now, for the sake of alliteration, Python Parents. (Or maybe Boa Constrictor Parents?)"
Rikki-Tikki Mommies :o)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rikki-Tikki-Tavi
I think we should make a distinction between social nepotism and biological nepotism. Social nepotism is when people consciously favor their own relatives. Biological nepotism is when the role of genetics begin to favor certain groups over others. Even if Jewish elites didn't try to be nepotistic, the end result would be the same since higher IQs among elite Jews will keep them at the top.
It's like there's social discrimination and biological discrimination in sports. Social kind barred blacks in the past. The biological kind bars non-blacks from many sports.
"The most trouble-free societies are high in paternal investment and low in nepotism, but, it's not easy to stay that way."
As the Indians would say, that is like watering your neighbor's garden.
Which in fact is what Christianity teaches: loving and serving your neighbor.
Communism teaches being served by one's neighbors.
Imagine if nordics operated that way.
Racism, tribalism, neptism, caste system, segragation, apartheid are all the same thing in different presentation.
How about "anaconda ancestors"?
I know exactly what HBD Chick would say... ;) I'd likely agree.
(Strong to extreme) nepotism is the way of life in most of the world. The highly outbred NW Europeans and their descendants are the exceptions, not the rule on this one....
This is how tribes are formed.
"The parents stand by their children for a long time, buying them apartments and cars, and putting those with no family support at considerable disadvantage. "
Mommy&Daddy should have fun like the boomers! Why you support your own children, it's not fair!!
"In mainstream Hindi cinema, all the top actors cast in lead roles, barring one, are sons of former film stars, directors or writers"
He overextends himself.
"Rahul Dravid, one of the most revered cricketers, once dated a top actress, but he married the girl his mother picked. "
Vijeta's co-students in medicine school remember being aware of her family's close ties with Rahul's family. They also recall that Rahul would make it a point to meet Vijeta whenever it was possible.
So is it a love marriage, after all? The Pendharkars parry the question with broad smiles.
and
"Rahul Gandhi is the mascot of the Gandhi dynasty"
They descend from Nehru, the Gandhi surname is instant PR in a democracy where most people are illiterate
An example
If the country is filled with low IQ people with a vanishingly small subset of people with high IQ ,then it's no surprise that the elite find it so easy to perpetuate their influence. The brain-drain to better nations might also be playing a major part.
Anyone who has watched as an R&D department, university department, or IT department rapidly transform from 1% Indian to 90% Indian knows that they are playing chess while the rest of us are playing checkers - or not aware that we're supposed to be playing at all.
I've come across Indian weddings and graduation parties in Heartland America with hundreds of guests where not a single one was white.
Once again, it's the double standard of multiculturalism: native-born white Americans, few of whom have any identity other than "American," are expected to accept outsiders without reservation as unquestionably American, while the newcomer, the outsider, is allowed to maintain a separate identity which excludes us.
This situation cannot last for long. European-Americans will catch on. Many of us already have.
I've taught quite a few Indian kids who are convinced, or have been made to believe, that they have that "gifted Asian" magic, when they don't. It makes for a lot of dismayed looks and dour parents. Don't really see that with Chinese kids, though. They either cut the mustard, or are realistic.
I have had my share of Indian superstars, though.
Look at the four leads of the much lauded new HBO show Girls.
One is the daughter of the drummer for Bad Company.
One is the daughter of famous artists.
One is the daughter of David Mamet.
One is the daughter of news anchor Brian Williams.
Say what you will about Sarah Jessica Parker, at least she was a teacher and truck driver's kid from Ohio.
"What's interesting, however, is that high nepotism culture that helps make India a mess simultaneously makes Indians well situated to compete in globalized America."
While making IT more of a mess. By the way, I think that Rahul guy is half-Italian. Which reminds me that the current king of Jordan is half-English.
First anonymous has it right, Americans' attitudes towards foreign cultures and those who hail from them are hopelessly naive, or shortsightedly greedy. Rather than pay attention to the ramifications of what Steve describes here, it was the bogeyman of terrorism that now causes Americans to view with distrust the greater ME. Why would anyone assume that an immigrant small businessman would be anything other than an American style entrepreneur-citizen in training? No, we are too focused on making sure our fellow citizens aren't gaming the system in pathetically small ways, like welfare fraud.
The elites are either stupid or apathetic to the possibilities of the lower class being preyed upon and manipulated by foreigners with a tribal ethos which gives them an advantage. This has long been the case in Europe.
The Burned Hand teaches best, and if the sheep are so proud of their unnatural system, to the extent that they will not recognize its cultural and demographic Achilles Heel, then they deserve what will come and may the sins of the fathers descend on the children.
"I am against nepotism, favouritism."
"Suhel Seth: India is crippled by nepotism and endemic corruption"
Gee, I thought India's a wonderful democracy.
"Guenter Grass, the German writer and recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature, brought forth last week an ODIOUS little poem that focuses on the threat to world peace posed by the Jewish state, and congratulates its author for the courage to point out this truth."
If it's not NOXIOUS, it's ODIOUS. Boy, that settles it.
Indian parents in the U.S. encourage their children to study hard and become doctors, engineers, etc. Many of their children become productive, tax-paying citizens. What is wrong with that? The economy is not a zero-sum game, and Indians prospering in the U.S. does not mean others are becoming poorer.
The United States is aging and will need more doctors. A substantial fraction of those doctors will be Indian, either immigrants or the children of immigrants. People want competent doctors, regardless of their skin color.
Watch the video at 6:13. The funniest thing I ever heard.
This article reminds me of my experience in Silicon Valley in the 1990s, when there was a mass immigration of people from parts of the world where ethnic nepotism is dominant. Whenever a minority gained a hiring position in the company, that department would be filled with the same ethnic group within a few short years. We had a customer service supervisor hire only blacks and Mexican supervisor ran shipping and receiving. He hired mostly Mexicans. There were two test departments in the company. One had a Philippine supervisor, so all his people were Pilipino. The test department had a Vietnamese supervisor and he had mostly Vietnamese subordinates except one Philippine that was always rebellious. These immigrants from the third world are sure a different lot from the West.
Instead of 'Python Parents', how about 'Anaconda Ancestry'?
Listen to this guy at: 2:30
"Indian parents in the U.S. encourage their children to study hard and become doctors, engineers, etc. Many of their children become productive, tax-paying citizens. What is wrong with that?"
I don't know, where did Steve or anyone else write that there's something wrong with that? I think the concern is with regard to tech companies where Indian employees promote their own, the political agenda of Indian-Americans (i.e., more family reunification visas, more H1-B visas, government set-asides, etc.), and the Goldman Sachs-type fiscal shenanigans which is a zero-sum game. Goldman Sachs had a large office in my old building, and a huge share of the employees were Indian. They weren't curing granny of her diverticulitis.
"The United States is aging and will need more doctors. A substantial fraction of those doctors will be Indian, either immigrants or the children of immigrants."
The West has never had trouble producing a surplus of competent doctors when financial incentives were adequate.
I think the more important question is where is India is going to get the doctors it needs.
@indian guy
- would you want to go to bombay and see everyone chinese?
Indians in small numbers were ok - large numbers they start to act like any other ethnic group - carrying out ethnic agendas that are in conflict with our, demanding set asides, and imposing their culture mores and lowering civic trust.
Okay, but the British Army wasn't supposed to be very good, because the idea was to prevent military coups by reserving leadership to the aristocrats who already owned the country. The Royal Navy, on the other hand, was crucial, so nobodies like James Cook could rise through the ranks if they were great men.
@ steve Okay, but the British Army wasn't supposed to be very good
the Duke of Wellington rose through nepotism and buying commissions and he beat napolean and cleaned in inja and the iberian pennisual.
but generally speaking as the germans said the british 'fought like lions but were led by donkeys"
Interestingly, many of the battles the brits are famous for - and had unbelievable victories were defensive actions: Roark's Drift, Lucknow,
exception: the reaction to the indian mutiny when Scottish highlanders discovered british women and children hacked to death with butcher knifes and learned they had been killed during a promised truce. Not the sort of thing to do to north europeans, and the hindoos discovered.
@indian guy,
in california indians demanded and got history books re-written to the point of ridiculousness (much like the irish and the potato famine=deliberate british genocide) it turned out the group that lobbied for this were connected with hindu ultra nationalist party - and it was all driven by upper caste indians - dalits for example, objected but SWPL liberals sided with the upper caste indians. Why? one reason: many Dalits tended to be Christian converts, and SWPL like KNOW, instinctively that can't be good.
@ /13/12 12:06 PM
i heard him speak once- total clown -he said that Sikhs sided with the British during the mutinty because british had more guns. - never mentioning the Sikhs always sided with the british over the muslims.
He also said the british won the sikh wars and mutinty because they had more firepower, which was complete BS - they were outgunned during the sikh wars and mutiny - they even took cawnpore with less numbers than the defenders had.
@Steve Sailer Re: the British Army & nepotism
Exactly. The main British Army was not very good during the victorian era, and was not expected to do very much. Nepotism didn't get in the way of their core missions of looking good in dress uniforms, overawing the lower classes, and occasionally going on a retialiatory raid against some backward country.
The Indian Army (organized under the British East India Company) was a highly meritocratic organization, with traiing schools, testing, and a large bueaucracy. When you entrust a small minority of people with running the empire's most lucrative posession and fighting tenacoius oponents on their own turf, nepotism is a luxury you can't afford.
"Indian parents in the U.S. encourage their children to study hard and become doctors, engineers, etc. Many of their children become productive, tax-paying citizens. What is wrong with that?"
Because a country isn't just an economy. America used to be a country with an economy; now it's an economy with a country.
The English were lucky to have their system produce one outstanding general in Wellington. He came from the Overlord caste in Ireland. His older brother came close to being Prime Minister.
But, he didn't have anywhere near the depth of fine subordinate generals that Napoleon had in his marshalls. The Revolutionary army was "careers open to talent" and was awfully good. Of course, the downside was that the most competent semi-outsider, Bonaparte, took over the whole state. That's why the Communist Party in the Soviet Union was always on the guard against "Bonapartism." Shooting or imprisoning competent generals almost cost them The Big One in 1941.
"Which in fact is what Christianity teaches: loving and serving your neighbor.
Communism teaches being served by one's neighbors."
No, they are pretty alike, actually. I find the elderly whites here in the South endearing because they remind me so much of the elderly in my birth country who grew up when the communist ideology was at it's strongest.
Both groups like good, clean grooming, condemn improper behavior, insist on conformity in custom and appearance, promote charity, value community and are overall very sensible and practical in their daily lives.
Remember that your common Eastern Block communist believer (of which there were millions) worked like a dog his/her whole life with very little to show for it, except for pride in oneself. These were the descendants of Christian peasants. Like Orthodox Christianity before it, communism was important to them as a shared community value of all that is good and proper. Most didn't study it closely just like their grandparents hadn't really studied the bible. They were busy working, practicing various trades, raising families and meeting up for an evening dance, if time permitted. They readily took to any system that provided structure and promoted good behavior. According to my school projects, when members of this population entered America in the 19th and early 20th century, it took the majority of them very little time to blend in with regular American protestant Christians.
If you've read "Animal Farm", you'll remember that the working believers were constantly told that they should work and sacrifice even more, and they did so in the name of improving what they believed to be their shared farm.
The US up till the I dunno post WW2 period was like this too. Its just common sense, in low trust societies with a weak state you rely on you kind.
Heck a good chunk of the affirmative action is design to prevent a kind of broader nepotism along racial lines. Its mostly only enforced vs. Whites of course.
This of course just means that business will set up in demographically favorable areas or take advantage of "free" trade an not bother hiring anyone in the US if they can help it.
Much simpler that way and to some degree the reason we have so many rent seekers and leeches and less useful work.
Here is my take as an Indian who has grown-up in India, educated in India/US, Worked in an elite US Lab, and returned to India.
As I follow Steve's blog, this blog is about Multiculturalism, Racism, etc;
In Summary why the Whites are finding a problem now is becoz of the policies that have been enacted to counter the historic wrongs that have/may have happened. For examples, Racism against Blacks [Policies to correct that; and its subsequent corruption of protective measures of Blacks], Women's Lib etc.
Even in India, a few families are misusing the Anti-Dowry laws that were enacted to protect women in harassing Grooms families.
The fundamental problem lies in MATERIALISM. The notion that only Materialistic objects bring happiness.
Ancient India was and to an extent even now life was totally Spiritual, we shunned Materialism, A True Brahmins life was one worth being revered. Except for a few Rich, all were poor, we shared what we grew, there was contentment, happiness, respect for Nature, and "living thing our means".
Things have changed, people are after Money, Cars, Gizmos, etc This rat race has created corruption. People who are not smart and hard working will take illegal means to acquire Wealth.
Most Indian kids are encouraged to become Engineers and Doctors, not becoz they must be motivated to solve Worlds problems as a primary goal, but to earn loads of money and live happily.
Except for Ambanis all are not Rockerfellers, mostly Middle class etc, it is natural for Parents to pass on wealth to their progeny.
The Ambanis give to their charities, mostly to Krishna Temples not to feed the poor, but to make special entrance gateways to the rich, starting a five-star hotel for the Rich in an Ancient temple town such things.
One can be egalitarian and starve their family and give away their wealth, they are idiots. Visit India and see the number of Lazy idiots around who feel entitled or even callous to their life.
I have given an Man food, but that man was so lazy even to put it in his mouth and chew it.
Modern, pre-modern India has always been Linguistic, Regionalist, Casteist, Sub-Casteist. I think it is a natural human tendency.
The lab where I worked in the US had bright people from allover the world, they have protective measures enacted against discrimination, even if there is discrimination it is very subtle. People are very smart and cover their tracks.
My conclusion to most problems is Materialism is corrosive.
"well situated to compete in globalized America.
and they were smart enough to get themselves classified as non-caucasion."
when convienent though, criminals are still evil white men.
The british military going into the second boer war recognized that they weren't even a second rate continental power, and needed to rectify that. They were the first in to the industrial revolution/end of infant mortality, and were able to win on numbers and equipment the rest of the world could only dream of, but there were problems, and there were places where they were effectively opposed.
"I think we should make a distinction between social nepotism and biological nepotism. Social nepotism is when people consciously favor their own relatives. Biological nepotism is when the role of genetics begin to favor certain groups over others. Even if Jewish elites didn't try to be nepotistic, the end result would be the same since higher IQs among elite Jews will keep them at the top. "
On the one hand-yes... I think, for example, Jews get a bad rep around here for being some sort of a huge in group with super benefits. The majority of the Jews that I know are almost doctors, dentists, accountants and overworked corporate lawyers, and they got there by getting the grades--> getting into good colleges--> doing well--> getting degrees. If these people are over represented in professions, it's because they just happen to choose and succeed in professional tracks more often than others.
BUT, a lot of those girls who manage to get fun, "meaningful" jobs with their shiny English, history, anthropology or various studies degrees also happen to be Jewish. They just happen to end up in those few art gallery marketing, junior editing or non profit management jobs.
I think the whole situation is complex, but rather logical too. Some groups have a lot of talent within them, so a lot of their members become well to do and well connected. It's perfectly easy to believe that when two doctors marry each other, their two children grow up competent and focused enough to become doctors too. And, perhaps, their uncle is a doctor as well. But, if within such a family there is a... free spirit or some such a creature who couldn't get accepted into a half-way descent med school even if it wanted to (and it doesn't want to!), it makes perfect sense that all these doctors (and lawyers and financial advisers and professors) will pull strings to get the "free spirit" a cushy gig choosing what color pens, t-shirts and condoms to buy for Planned Parenthood promotional events. It, probably, doesn't even feel manipulative or dishonest. They just happen to know a guy from college, or they have this well connected regular patient to whom they mention being worried this "free spirit" with a cultural anthropology degree, who replies, "Say! Would Becca be interested in helping design fliers and hosting promotional events for the small museum that the government just gave us a grant for? We are actually about to start looking for someone. Well, that's lucky!" And these, more useless children of highly functional people are obviously very well socialized and know how to carry themselves around upper/upper middle class people without embarrassing everyone.
Anonymous said...
"Indian parents in the U.S. encourage their children to study hard and become doctors, engineers, etc. Many of their children become productive, tax-paying citizens. What is wrong with that?"
Because a country isn't just an economy. America used to be a country with an economy; now it's an economy with a country.
*************
This. The rest of the thread will be the standard mixture of DWLs and Indians bemoaning Whites' "history of racism" and a few HBD realists disgusted at the DWLs and Indians.
Steve -- you're neglecting a critical element here. The US had the advantage of the frontier. High paternal investment and low nepotism works well for settling lands that are essentially empty. That strategy also worked for the conquering Vikings, and for European powers to various degrees in colonialization.
When you can avoid struggles over limited slices of pie by GROWING THE PIE you can sustain high paternal investment and low nepotism as ... LONG AS THE PIE GROWS. You don't lose out by sending your kid to State U, because the economy is growing, they'll have new and lucrative things to do. That's the whole point.
Declinism, loved by Greens and the Elites (but I repeat myself) screws over Joe Average, hence the desire to "drown them" in massive non-White immigration. Which keeps competitors from arising.
And no, the first Anon has not a clue. We have examples from history, over and over again, of what happens in this situation. A strong man, often though not exclusively from the military, arises, destroys the old elite, and sets up a more "honorable" new one that aims to spread the wealth around, and where possible increase the pie. Mao, Lenin, and Napoleon come to mind.
I'd further argue that Globalization itself is a failure, and one failing right before your eyes. Greece, Italy, **SPAIN**, Portugal, Ireland, Iceland, France, and even the UK and Germany are under pressure. So too, the Netherlands and even Switzerland. Only Norway with new oil and gas discoveries is sitting pretty.
Then there is China. Slowly ripping itself apart with internal power struggles. Bo Xilai and "Horus L. Kai" (wife's Western name) show the utter failure of the model in concrete terms, played out in real-time micro blogs largely beyond censorship. China's model of exporting cheap Nikes and Ipads to the West is hideously vulnerable to oil shocks and the like.
Globalization is like an extended version of the 90's dot-com frenzy. Think Pets.com. That bubble is already failing -- the nepotistic high paternal investment Indian elite, is hideously vulnerable to nationalism which I can assure you has not gone away any more than White people in general want to abolish themselves (just the elites).
Anon 7:12 -- it was Britain's NAVY, far less nepotistic, that founded the Empire. Britain could move forces around the globe more effectively and efficiently than rivals. Britain's Army was not particularly good, the book "Conquered into Liberty" makes the point that the Colonists were well exposed to British Army stupidity like that of Braddock against French forces outnumbered, ill-supplied (due to British Naval Superiority) and so forth. The Navy was expanding, required technical skill just to avoid running onto reefs and such, or being wildly blown off course, and had room for technocratic (but leadership failure) guys like Bligh. That Bligh was kept on, and performed well in technical jobs (dredging out harbors in Ireland, the Battle of Copenhage) speaks to the difference between the two in nepotism.
Anonymous said...
I think we should make a distinction between social nepotism and biological nepotism. Social nepotism is when people consciously favor their own relatives. Biological nepotism is when the role of genetics begin to favor certain groups over others. Even if Jewish elites didn't try to be nepotistic, the end result would be the same since higher IQs among elite Jews will keep them at the top.
It's like there's social discrimination and biological discrimination in sports. Social kind barred blacks in the past. The biological kind bars non-blacks from many sports.
----------------------------
Nonsense. Jews are not represented 10-40 times their share of the population as elite media executives, journalists, pundits, lawyers, judges, bankers etc. solely on ability. They form ethnic networks in various institutions and industries to discriminate against non-Jews. All of this is backed up by a larger network that crosses institutional boundaries and can bring pressure from all angles at any uppity white people who object to being demoted to second class status, as well as a phalanx of Jewish organizations that are lavishly funded.
Indian society isn't neccessarily super nepotistic by global standards. It might even compare favorably to Russia, China, or southern Europe. Really almost everywhere is nepotistic other than the Anglosphere, Scandanavia, and Japan.
The problem is moreso that Indian society is high parental investment/control, so every middle class and affluent kid has his parents pushing him all the way. It makes upward mobility in business, academics, entreprenuership, and the professions tough if you come from the bottom 95 percent or so of society. The problem is further compounded by the immense poverty and backwardness of the Indian masses.
Another issue is that when everybody is under the thumb of mommy and daddy, it tends to corrode the dynamism and innovative potential of the society. Which is something you see a lot of in India. Heck, it's
probably even more prevalent in East Asia, especially mainland China.
Steve is also right that this tends to do a lot to diminish India's human capital, but makes the upper few percent of the Indian population very competitive in the global economy (in which getting the right skill/experience and long years of education&credentials is key). Same can be said about the Tiger People of the East.
My final point would be that this wouldn't be happening if India was a low-IQ, low investment, r-selected (Rushton speak) society like many of the white and Chinese commenters often proclaim. I'd say that from my observation, the Indian masses seem like high parental investment, high future time orientation, and maybe moderate (low 90s or so) IQ. For the upper 5 percent of the Indian society, I'd put the IQ at maybe around the Western/Asian mean.
India is actually a lot like China, but shifted around 5 IQ points lower and much more chaotic.
"This article reminds me of my experience in Silicon Valley in the 1990s, when there was a mass immigration of people from parts of the world where ethnic nepotism is dominant. Whenever a minority gained a hiring position in the company, that department would be filled with the same ethnic group within a few short years. "
Has anyone documented this phenomenon?
A couple of years ago I did some consulting with public-sector organization. One of the units I interviewed was entirely staffed by French-speaking West African women. They were great: friendly, funny, a couple of the younger were pretty, but the fact is the organization had obviously hired a French West African manager who'd then hired her co-ethnics exclusively.
"The Revolutionary army was 'careers open to talent' and was awfully good."
I'm not sure this was the reason for French succeess. The real strength was less 'careers open to talent' as 'pass out guns to lots and lots of soldiers'. Most of those soldiers weren't very good but when 100,000s of French soldiers fought 10,000s of thousands of other troops, guess which side won?
It's like Germans had better soldiers gut Soviets had more men under arms.
"In Summary why the Whites are finding a problem now is becoz of the policies that have been enacted to counter the historic wrongs that have/may have happened. For examples, Racism against Blacks [Policies to correct that; and its subsequent corruption of protective measures of Blacks], Women's Lib etc."
Well, they are finding problems because they went from "my grandpa kicked your grandpa's ass, and I shall continue his legacy" to "my grandpa kicked your grandpa's ass, I am so soooorrryy! Here, take this free stuff."
The women problem is similar, without the bloodshed of course. Instead of being ashamed of being made kitchen slaves for so long, the fact is used as if it grants them some moral superiority. Though it's kinda amazing to make enemy out of the group that funds and made their "liberation" possible in the first place.
It's not that hard to get kicked in the teeth when you are desperately justifying your self-flagellation.
"In Summary why the Whites are finding a problem now is becoz of the policies that have been enacted to counter the historic wrongs that have/may have happened. For examples, Racism against Blacks [Policies to correct that; and its subsequent corruption of protective measures of Blacks], Women's Lib etc."
I think 'white wrong' was more to the blacks it didn't enslave than to the ones it did. I mean black Africans are far worse off than blacks in America.
And the great 'white wrong' in Rhodesia was not ruling with 'racism' but letting go of power. I mean look at Zimbaweans living under Mugabe.
And women's lib? What can be more white than feminism? It is a product of the West.
"Say what you will about Sarah Jessica Parker, at least she was a teacher and truck driver's kid from Ohio."
I dunno. If SJP is the face of meritocracy, then gimme nepotism any day.
Btw, though she's from Ohio, I think her Jewish-looking face was appealing to lots of Jews in Hollywood. I think most casting people are women, and many are Jews. So, she had the right look. So, she was a product of look-like-us-tism.
One more thing. Indian marriages are overwhelmingly arranged by parents. The tends to align mating incentives very well with astute decision making (ie get an IT degree, make lots of money, let your elders tell you what to do).
Perhaps this is why high testosterone, alpha guys are rare among Indians. Much rarer than caaucasians or blacks. Men who didn't submit to the parent/elder dominated social order were bred out. So you get a more beta population.
Contrary to what Whiskey might say, being a beta can be a good thing.
Good Read
http://postmasculine.com/a-dust-over-india
Indian R-selection in action.
http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2012/04/10/starving-in-india-a-fight-for-life-in-bihar/
Note the number of children.
The innumeracy of Indian-American is actually a good demonstration of why the average Indian-Indian is none too bright. The rhetorical weaseling, "it might even compare", "probably even more", and "I'd say that" is symptomatic of dysfunctional socio-religious paradigm that selected for sophistry over ability.
"I mean blacks in Detroit have all the freedom to rise up but they be acting dumb."
Rise up against what? The abandoned buildings? The grass and shrubs starting to grow out of the cracks in sidewalks? The 11% nonblacks?
"Logically, there should be no doubt that meritocracy is a far more efficient way to organize a society.
And yet.....somehow, Europeans did best when its society was less *logically* organized than recently. It is an interesting conundrum, one worth pondering."
1) much sorting for talent may have already been accomplished.
2) after being the first to industrialize, the could've withstood inefficiencies elsewhere for a while (like a vestigial organs can remain for some time)
3) A sense of ownership by the Elites may increase effciency.
Nepotistic hiring in IT would certainly explain why so much software sux.
Google's programmers can't even figure out how to make blogger display 201 comments. I wonder what programmers look like.
It, probably, doesn't even feel manipulative or dishonest. They just happen to know a guy from college, or they have this well connected regular patient to whom they mention being worried this "free spirit" with a cultural anthropology degree, who replies, "Say! Would Becca be interested in helping design fliers and hosting promotional events for the small museum that the government just gave us a grant for?
This is it in a nutshell. Just like blacks are always thinking/accusing whites of executing some grand oppression against them, whites feel the same about jews.
But in both cases, it is just white folks being white folks, jews being jews.
For all this talk about Indian it guys.
Way overrated. I was in the it/dot.com trenches in name companies in the 90's, got the creme de la creme of the indians.
Generally nice guys, but on the average, really didn't live up to the hype. Kinda sneaky, but always a lot of fun socially, I guess it is that beta male thing.
They are not like jews in that I've never met an indian that I had the slightest suspicion might be smarter than me, but I've met more than a few jews that make me rub my chin a little and consider the possibility.
"Anonymous said...
@indian guy - would you want to go to bombay and see everyone chinese?
Indians in small numbers were ok - large numbers they start to act like any other ethnic group - carrying out ethnic agendas that are in conflict with our, demanding set asides, and imposing their culture mores and lowering civic trust."
Well said.
If regularly getting conquered and humiliated by alpha males such as afghans, arabs, turks, europeans etc is a "good thing" then of course Indians are a very fortunate race indeed.
Sikhs, gurkas and some of the Rajput and even regular sepoys fought with distinction.
"el supremo said...
@Steve Sailer Re: the British Army & nepotism
Exactly. The main British Army was not very good during the victorian era, and was not expected to do very much. Nepotism didn't get in the way of their core missions of looking good in dress uniforms, overawing the lower classes, and occasionally going on a retialiatory raid against some backward country.
The Indian Army (organized under the British East India Company) was a highly meritocratic organization, with traiing schools, testing, and a large bueaucracy. When you entrust a small minority of people with running the empire's most lucrative posession and fighting tenacoius oponents on their own turf, nepotism is a luxury you can't afford."
What you say is indeed true of the regency era and early Victorian eras, but was not true of the mid and later Victorian era, when the British army produced, by most people's reckoning, many very good generals. Most of them gained their experience in India, and were even derisively called "Indians" by the titled fops who commanded the British army. The disastrous Crimean campaign finally convinced the British government that they could not place their armies under the command of aristocratic peacocks, and they began to more widely promote from the middle classes.
If one wants a detailed historical look at the Victorian world and the British army in particular, and just wants a stunnigly funny and entertaining good read, one can do no better than reading the novels of George MacDonald Fraser:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_MacDonald_Fraser
"Anonymous said...
India and Pakistan are extremely tribal and nepotistic. "More than almost anyone. In a large public university, a department that is housed in the same building as mine has >90% of its professors coming from these two countries!"
This is becoming much more common. I'm familiar with a similar situation, in this case an engineering department at a lower-ranked state university. They're not that good, either.
"For examples, Racism against Blacks [Policies to correct that; and its subsequent corruption of protective measures of Blacks], Women's Lib etc."
Well, they are finding problems because they went from "my grandpa kicked your grandpa's ass, and I shall continue his legacy" to "my grandpa kicked your grandpa's ass, I am so soooorrryy! Here, take this free stuff.""
And went from taking pride in the subordination of wives to being proud of the fact that now their wives are free to shack up with the pool boys
"Our women are more free than yours, bigots, and excuse the republicans"
Kind of a competition in masochism, to see who can enjoy a bleeding nose more.
" The economy is not a zero-sum game, and Indians prospering in the U.S. does not mean others are becoming poorer....."
It actually is quite often a zero sum game. There are a fixed amount of medical school spots the amount of which hasn't increased since 1975. For every one taken by an immigrant a native loses one. Same thing for BigLaw and IB jobs to a certain extent.
IT is just about the only place that you can make the case that high skill immigration benefits natives. If you write a cool iphone app that doesn't preclude me from writing one myself.
These people took the notion of "partially inbred extended family" and turned it into not just a science but a RELIGION!!!"
More proof that HBDers dont understand religion and never will-to their eternal disadvantage.
More proof that HBDers dont understand religion and never will-to their eternal disadvantage.
I'm not exactly sure what your point is - googling "hinduism caste system" yields more than 1.8 million hits, and quickly leads you to History of the Indian caste system, which has a subtopic called Hindu scriptures.
"Sikhs, gurkas and some of the Rajput"
1. The Gurkhas of Nepal are not Indian by race.
2. The Rajputs couldn't stop India from being conquered over and over, and acted as traitors after being defeated.
3. The Sikhs are not Hindus. Most sikhs belong to the jatt peasant caste which is the indian ethnicity with the highest west asian genetic component.
Taken together these groups constitute a very tiny percentage of Indians.
"Ancient India was and to an extent even now life was totally Spiritual, we shunned Materialism, A True Brahmins life was one worth being revered."
Brahminism is not true spirituality. The idea that spirituality is something inherited is absurd. The hindu caste system is fundamentally bogus. The character of the stereotypical brahmin is far from deserving of reverence.
In any case the brahmins were a hereditary priestly caste whose job was to conduct sacrifices or yajnas to the gods. These sacrifices originally included humans and horses. Nothing at all spititual about that.
I'm not exactly sure what your point is - googling "hinduism caste system" yields more than 1.8 million hits, and quickly leads you to History of the Indian caste system, which has a subtopic called Hindu scriptures."
Yes ,how can anything like google searches or wikepedia be wrong about Hinduism?!
I could explain varna,jati.tantra.mantra amd yantra to you or how the recent (yes 1500 years is recent to Indians) caste stratification was a response to the Hunnish infiltration and Muslim invasions.
But Im not sure it will do any good.
Neither will explaining how even in the Greek and Roman religions certain families were allowed to be priests ,oracles or vestal virgins.
Same goes for Judaism and its priests(Aaron/Levi) and kings(David/Judah)
Christianity used the story of Noah and his sons to subjugate an entire continent.
As for Islam-hey best of luck marrying an Arab woman if you are not Arab is all I will say.
In any case the brahmins were a hereditary priestly caste whose job was to conduct sacrifices or yajnas to the gods. These sacrifices originally included humans and horses. Nothing at all spititual about that."
Is it less spiritual than worshipping an idol of a corpse nailed to a two by four and venerating and viewing putrefied remains of saints on church grounds.
How about the quaint custom of symbolic sacrifice which entails eating the Messiahs flesh and drinking his blood?
Or rather than worshipping an idol ,worshipping fanning and dressing a book?
Re Sikhs,Gurkhas ,Rajputs
Taken together these groups constitute a very tiny percentage of Indians"
Yes thank god!If they were of any greater number India would remain beholden to the British to this very day.
You do realize the connection between those declared "martial race" and the "loyal" enablers and the glorified security guards of the British empire dont you?
Gurkhas are descendents of Huns defeated by guptas who sought to save their hide in Nepal.
Rajputs are overrated losers ,agreed.
As for the mighty Jats, well I have a question ,what exactly were they doing lying dormant in U.P and Punjab until the rise of Guru Gobind Singh?
Jats traditionally claim Yadav ancestry but if you want these timid peasant lot who like Rajputs willingly supplied women to Mughal harems as a non Hindu "West Asian",why should I stop you!
For all this talk about Indian it guys.
Way overrated."
Most likely yes, this was hyped by the SV overlords for purposes of cheap labor.
I was in the it/dot.com trenches in name companies in the 90's, got the creme de la creme of the indians."
Which universities did they come from?
"Generally nice guys, but on the average, really didn't live up to the hype. Kinda sneaky, but always a lot of fun socially, I guess it is that beta male thing."
Eh?I though alphas would be more fun but whatever...
"They are not like jews in that I've never met an indian that I had the slightest suspicion might be smarter than me, but I've met more than a few jews that make me rub my chin a little and consider the possibility."
Ever consider the possibility that you have an inflated opinion of yourself?
Nonsense. Jews are not represented 10-40 times their share of the population as elite media executives, journalists, pundits, lawyers, judges, bankers etc. solely on ability. They form ethnic networks in various institutions and industries to discriminate against non-Jews. All of this is backed up by a larger network that crosses institutional boundaries and can bring pressure from all angles at any uppity white people who object to being demoted to second class status, as well as a phalanx of Jewish organizations that are lavishly funded."
Please return my copy of Protocols when you are done.Thanks
Note the number of children.
The innumeracy of Indian-American is actually a good demonstration of why the average Indian-Indian is none too bright. The rhetorical weaseling, "it might even compare", "probably even more", and "I'd say that" is symptomatic of dysfunctional socio-religious paradigm that selected for sophistry over ability."
Sophistry over ability?Thus claimed a person who uses terms like socio-religious paradigm!
As for noting the number of children, one would do well to begin in China where an estimated 100 million girls are "missing"
Save some of that "high IQ" for the rest of us.
Oh wait..dont!
the cunningist, wilest pedators of the field who have made many, many lifetimes study of a thousand and one ways to rip-off wily mugs in the malthusian death struggles that their homelands are."
Eh? I cant speak for Chinese immigrants(my impression is a good number of them are rather docile) but Indian middle and upper castes(those who usually immigrate to U.S) can hardly be classifed as the "wiliest predators".They are considered rather aristocratic and effete by the lower castes and indeed so even by many whites!
What people outside India dont realize that the rich,middle classes inhabit completely different worlds even if they intersect far more frequently than in U.S if only because poverty in India is so much more prevalent
If you speak of power jockeying and toadying then yes ,then Indians are notorious for that but malthusian death struggles??!!!
Thanks for making me feel tougher than I actually am!
"Sophistry over ability?Thus claimed a person who uses terms like socio-religious paradigm!"
And how else would you define the hindu caste system?
I am guessing you don't even know what those words mean, yet you exclaim as if you have made some killer rebuttal!
You are proving the validity of Duke of Qin's point.
The innumeracy of Indian-American is actually a good demonstration of why the average Indian-Indian is none too bright.
Bright enough to take your IT job and point nuclear weapons at Beijing.
The rhetorical weaseling, "it might even compare", "probably even more", and "I'd say that" is symptomatic of dysfunctional socio-religious paradigm that selected for sophistry over ability.
You're just too funny.
"... They form ethnic networks in various institutions and industries to discriminate against non-Jews. ..."
"Please return my copy of Protocols when you are done.Thanks"
Not being familiar with the Protocols, can you please explain why his statement that you are impugning is wrong is incorrect? It would not be the first time that people "did well while doing good" and could not see the ugly side of it themselves...
""The Revolutionary army was 'careers open to talent' and was awfully good. ..."
"I'm not sure this was the reason for French succeess. The real strength was less 'careers open to talent' as 'pass out guns to lots and lots of soldiers'. Most of those soldiers weren't very good but when 100,000s of French soldiers fought 10,000s..."
Said another way, Napoleon's big revolution in military affairs was implementation of the national draft and the large draftee armies it produced. No more armies of aristocrats and their retinues they could personally fund.
Other contributing factors included Napoleon's understanding of logistics (like sponsoring the contest to invent "canned" food) and establishing the first continental-wide "real-time" communication system, based on the optical telegraph.
Of HBD interest, it's also worth recalling that Napoleon's first lack-of-success started in 1809, with "the Spanish ulcer", as guerrillas (the word comes from this conflict), probably mostly in Basque-heavy Navarre, tied down over a quarter million men who could not then fight elsewhere (against Wellington, for instance). The French never defeated the guerrillas. The Basques were apparently fighting for whatever it is the Basques always fight for, a great mystery I suppose.
"I saw this many times first hand at various very large American tech companies starting in the '90s. As soon as an Indian became manager of a group, every new hire would be H1-B Indian and life was made increasingly uncomfortable for the whites who were pushed out of the group using any available means. In short order, the group was 90%+ Indian, with maybe a token Chinese guy or a Russian that wasn't so easily intimidated as a white American. ..."
"Has anyone documented this phenomenon?"
I have also seen this many times in silicon valley engineering groups. (I've been in silicon valley since the early days.) Very true that there have been waves of managers that hire their co-ethnics, lately Chinese and Indian. Today this effect is integrated with chain migration. This also seems to be occurring is universities across the land.
I am sure this is not due to intrinsic attributes of any given population. Pretty much, world-wide, mediocre engineers are all about the same. And one of silicon valley's dark secrets is that many of the engineers are often pretty mediocre. It's often more important to be in the right place at the right time then the smartest guy on the planet.
Don't tell the professional ethnic boosters, but two big reasons for this likely are:
(1) Economic. Start-up IPO evaluation formulas include the number of engineers (they don't include anything about quality, a no-name school in India counts as much as MIT). Each engineer is worth about $1 million to the IPO. (If you outsource your engineering and can afford 8 Indian engineers for the price of one US engineer, well, that's another $7 million you can "print", completely legally, with the help of an IPO-friendly investment bank. You'd think is was some sort of CDO!)
(2) Legal/AA. I think big companies doing business in the US met their EEOC and affirmative action goals without effecting their own management by hiring non-US non-whites for engineering positions. Silicon valley is famous for not having many blacks or mexicans in the ranks. Hiring yeoman non-white foreign engineers allows them to be legal with respect to diversity quotas, but not negatively effect the bottom line too much (engineers mostly talk with each other, so you don't have to diminish the brand that much). So it's not giant brains causing entire departments to become ethnic, as much as the booster might imply, but good old-fashioned affirmative action and non-white skins.
Affirmative action does get ridiculous. It's probably time to talk about ending it.
They are considered rather aristocratic and effete by the lower castes and indeed so even by many whites!
-
I think that has a lot to do with sports. There seem to literally not be athletic Indians.
I am guessing you don't even know what those words mean, yet you exclaim as if you have made some killer rebuttal!
You are proving the validity of Duke of Qin's point."
What is it with India that many of its bashers and defenders are unable to read?
Dukes very statement implies his sophistry while he demonstrates little ability in proving his thesis.
The greatest writers use simple and clear language to express their views ,according to your logic they are nitwits because they refrain from communicating in graduate schoolese!
Late to the party, but it's super simplistic to think of nepotism as how much your parents are pushing for you.
Nepotism is just as much about how much your brother, your uncle, your grandparents and your cousing (to name a few) are pushing for you.
Parental investment may well be lower while relative investment is higher - HBD chick thinks this depends on the relatedness structure (Personally I doubt it, but there you go.).
Don't forget that nepotism is quite literally 'nephew-ism' and that this is highly significant. Favours for one's own offspring is virtually universal and goes without saying, but it is linear and self-limiting. When favours are systematically extended to nephews and nieces, that is when patronage grows rapidly in reach and power. This kind of system seems to be mostly alien to nuclear family-oriented northern Europeans, but to be first nature to a large proprtion of humanity. It puts us at a conpetitive disadvantage in many ways (though not all - in highly nepotistic societies, as Steve commented years ago, patronage tends to be reinforced by nephews equalling sons-in-law and grand-nephews equalling grandchildren. Too much of this behaviour has obvious consequences.
>The parents can't seem to understand this because they have never been in such an environment. They still think of Asians and Indians as a "model minority" who were nice when they were 2% of their classmates back in the 70's.<
Starting at age 30, and accelerating to terminal velocity at age 40-45, the brain of middling intelligences calcifies irretrievably. Most people's picture of the world in nearly all details remains for life the same as that obtaining in their heyday, i.e., ages 20-40.
Partly this is on account of environment and not heredity. Older people live in a bubble surrounded by same; they are out of the immediate struggles of the youngsters. Mention these struggles, and the oldsters will call to mind and discourse upon - as if it were current, valid, and apropos - a situation or assumption from 20+ years ago. Their batting average is lower than they think.
The Baby Boomer who, as a child, rolled his eyes at his born-1920 parents' inaccurate assumptions about tin lizzies, now is bloviating to the next generation, which is sunk in an almost-hopeless economic depression, that, e.g., the way for kiddies to get a job is to pull on a clean shirt and talk to the man in the morning about starting as a soda jerker that afternoon. "That's how I got MY first job... I didn't make much money as a soda jerker either, but managed to support a family of four by clipping coupons," etc. Mention HR, 19% unemployment, the near-universal requirement to apply exclusively through corporate websites, and so forth, and the elder literally cannot register it; it isn't his experience; therefore it isn't real. The mind's eye is fixed on hometown 1958, or 1963, or 1971.
Bill O'Reilly recently stated that people just out of college should get jobs as NYC taxi drivers, and if they didn't do this, then they were bums. The price of a medallion, how far one has to go into debt to obtain one, how far in debt students now are already, the non-meritocratic aspects of the NYC taxi situation, all of that simply didn't occur to him - and they wouldn't make a dent even were some "pinhead" to attempt to explain them to him. Bill is 62.
The dangerous part is that such gaffers are voting - the McCain crowd - and thereby potentially determining policy. They will, for example, vote for a candidate who would raid your pension - why? - because they equate collecting a pension (as opposed to collecting social security, of course), private or public, with being a "moocher" who is responsible for "bankrupting" the "land of opportunity" and encouraging the "stinky hippies." Visions of 1968 abound in deteriorating rods and cones.... And what of the trillions in war expenditures? Might these bear some relationship to the state of the economy, 2012? No - because images of Levittown, or of St. Reagan indulging in a photo op on a carrier in the '80s, are all that come to mind.
I think over-40s and under-25s should not be allowed within ten miles of any voting booth... and I am 45. It's a small price to pay.
The time when elders had valuable stores of advice is blowing away with the wind. Society is changing (collapsing) faster, and people are living longer, simultaneously. Elders can still speak to general principles of human existence...but how many Boomers are wise really? How many know more than the concretes they attended to while stoned or slammed in 1955-85? How many younger people will be any better?
When will the folks whose go-to for understanding race is To Kill A Mockingbird or some Stanley Kramer movie fall off their thrones of dementia? "They are fighting the last war," the younger generals say of the older in every generation.
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