Advancement Project

July 8, 2010

I Forgot to Laugh: Joel Stein's My Own Private India

"I'm writing about your article during July about the abuse of Indian People. Well, I'm here to state the other side. I hate them, if you had to live near them you would also. We are an organization called dot busters. We have been around for 2 years. We will go to any extreme to get Indians to move out of Jersey City. If I'm walking down the street and I see a Hindu and the setting is right, I will hit him or her. We plan some of our most extreme attacks such as breaking windows, breaking car windows, and crashing family parties. We use the phone books and look up the name Patel. Have you seen how many of them there are? Do you even live in Jersey City? Do you walk down Central Avenue and experience what its like to be near them: we have and we just don't want it anymore. You said that they will have to start protecting themselves because the police cannot always be there. They will never do anything. They are a weak race physically and mentally. We are going to continue our way. We will never be stopped."

This quote was published in a newspaper by the Dot Busters, a New Jersey street gang, whose objective was to drive South Asian Indians out of New Jersey. The Dot Busters were responsible for numerous violent attacks including the brutal beating and murder of Navroze Mody in August of 1987; a month after this Dot Busters' letter was written.

I hope that Joel Stein was unaware of the severity of the hate crimes against South Asian Indians that occurred in New Jersey during the 1980’s. If that were the case we could cite his failed attempt at humor in his article, My Own Private India, as a product of ignorance. However, because the article is based on his own experiences we cannot grant him that benefit of the doubt. Instead we must contribute his statements to pure disregard, insensitivity and an ethnocentric ideology; characteristics that magnify mankind’s sublet differences and further divide, rather than unite nations for the common good and broaden our perceptive of the world.

The article published in TIME Magazine describes Stein’s hometown of Edison, NJ in the 1980’s as a predominately white and wealthy neighborhood. The article serves to describe the changes that occurred within the town during the influx of South Asian Indians to the United States. As mentioned in the article the sudden increase in the South Asian Indian population was the result of a change in U.S. immigration law that lifted prior quotas and restrictions allowing a significant number of Asians to immigrate. Stein recounts his experience describing the first wave of South Asian Indians as “geniuses” as the majority of the earlier immigrants were well educated professionals; an observation supported by historical fact. However, Stein goes on to describe the second and third wave of immigrants, consisting of working merchants, as “not-as-brilliant” and “even- less- bright cousins” referring to them as the reason why “India was so damn poor”. Such comments blatantly ignore the historic and economic factors that have contributed to poverty in Indian. Stein significantly downplays India’s rate of poverty where the average annual household income is below what the average United States high school graduate makes in a week. Consequently, Stein turns the lives of some of the world’s most vulnerable people into a joke but he doesn’t stop there. He continues to ridicule Hinduism, its deities and general Indian culture. Joel even goes so far as to suggest that the residents of his town could have created better insults to further humiliate the South Asian Indians.

The article, despite its intentions, is clearly offensive (hence the petitions for its removal). It is especially offensive that such a large, well known and “respected” organization like TIME would allow for such content to be published. Surely the editors have some form of conscience that would not allow them to publish an article that suggests that it is alright to openly deny a particular group the right to live freely in the United States.

Since the article was published both TIME and Joel Stein have written apologies:

TIME: We sincerely regret that any of our readers were upset by Joel Stein’s recent humor column “My Own Private India.” It was in no way intended to cause offense.

Joel Stein: I truly feel stomach-sick that I hurt so many people. I was trying to explain how, as someone who believes that immigration has enriched American life and my hometown in particular, I was shocked that I could feel a tiny bit uncomfortable with my changing town when I went to visit it. If we could understand that reaction, we’d be better equipped to debate people on the other side of the immigration issue.

If as American citizens these are the kind of thoughts and reactions we have to immigrants searching for a better life in the United States, what does that say about our own ideology? Are we the only people allowed to reap the benefits of freedom? Are there limits to liberty within our country? Are we not ourselves a mixture of different ethnicities and nationalities? And why do people of color experience the most resistance? These are questions that we need to answer to better understand ourselves and to advance as a unified people with the mindset of equality, liberty and justice for all.

If we do not redefine liberty and the role the United States plays as the “land of the free” we will continue to witness racial and immigrant injustice similar to what is occurring in Arizona. The law that orders foreign citizens to carry their “alien” registration documents with them at all times promotes racial discrimination and racial profiling. It not only affects immigrants but citizens too. Similar laws are being proposed in other states that claim that illegal immigration is a threat to national security. Yet, although national security is of the utmost priority it does not authorize any individual to limit the basic rights we posses as humans.

An indication of change became apparent July 9th as the Justice Department filed suit against Arizona, claiming that the state law is unconstitutional. If the Arizona law is successfully defeated perhaps we as a nation will begin to understand that it is much more important to embrace our differences, whether in New Jersey or Arizona, rather than to shun people for being different.

David Eubanks is a communications intern at Advancement Project, a national civil rights organization that advocates for racial justice.