Whoa– is dating White not right?

this is why i only date brown.JPG

…because according to some commenters, apparently, it isn’t. Suddenly there are commentS about hot Desi girls choosing white guys over their own— and I emphasize the plural aspect of “comment”, because that’s what caught my attention– this wasn’t some one-off virtual rant. Frankly, Mr. Shankly, I’m shocked. While some of the people who are leaving the eyebrow-raising statements seem to be new, I’m fully aware that the normal pattern of Sepia engagement is:

Random Googling –> Sepia? What the-? –> Hmmm, interesting –> Lurking –> and then finally, posting.

If these anti-miscegenation fans have followed that tried-and-true process, then they’d be aware that there are more than a few members of the Mutiny community who are the products of interracial unions; I can’t imagine that they’d be so tactless as to disparage such pairings when they reflect someone like Siddhartha, Desidancer or SemiDesiMasala’s ancestry.

So, maybe these are just mischief-instigating trolls, having some wicked fun via drive-by hate-spewing.

Or are they?

I think there’s more to this– and that’s why I’m publishing this post. Let’s have it out, then. Some of you seem to be in the mood to REALLY tell us what you think, so here’s your deluxe chance. Almost everyone here is anonymous. 🙂 It’s safe to be honest.

The following comments were left on my post about a woman named Aarti being chosen as one of the cuter people on the Hill:

hillside: Also I’ve never dated an Indian girl either, probably partly because so many of the hot ones like the two on this list are into white dudes. [sm]
Sheetal: (referring to comment above)
I’ve noticed this too. What is up with that? [sm]

Sheetal followed that comment by excerpting the following portion of the Hill article, making sure to highlight certain significant words by “bolding” them.

Skipper is a native of Chicago but both parents are from India — something that had worried her when it came to the issue of marriage. The handsome man in church soon became her boyfriend, but he was American and Caucasian, far from what she thought her parents would ever accept.

Okay, loud and clear. Jamie Skipper is Desi and she married a Caucasian (never mind that Desis are Caucasian, too). Yet another commenter seemed to agree with hillside and Sheetal:

Kannan: its interesting that you bring this up..We have parallels with the asian community. I’ve heard/seen that before. Hot lil Korean spinner would rather hook up with tall lanky white dude than someone from her race and its kind of common because I know a lot of my asian brothers who want to date from their race gripe and bitch about it:) Its almost like an invisible social hierarchy And the same goes for desi guys, I have a lot of friends who date white girls just because they think it brings them more social value” Look at me FOB minority guy pulling from the majority race” However for me its never really been race, its whether I was attracted to the person or not and it so happens I have never gone brown 🙂 [sm]

Kannan, I think your final sentence encapsulates how most of us feel, but that doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t explore the other sentiments I’ve highlighted.

SM is at its best when we are honestly, openly and sometimes painfully hashing out the issues that our community/others refuse to acknowledge or discuss; I didn’t put this post up in order to invite you to pillory “hillside” and “Sheetal”. They weren’t abusive, they were blunt. I wrote this post because I wanted to know how the rest of you felt. The thing is, I am almost certain that they aren’t alone and that more of you agree with them than we realize. Maybe it’s time to call ourselves out.

To be brutally honest, I’ve been there. Years ago, I crushed on Desi guys who only seemed to “swing one way”; I’ve been let down gently by being told that:

If I did date Indian girls, you’d totally be my type.

I’m just not attracted to dark skin…I like pink nipples (!) (this from someone even darker than me)

and the best one, ever,

Um, I could never go out with you because it would be like dating my sister. White girls don’t remind me of relatives.

And what do black and Asian girls remind you of? It’s so telling that they almost never factor in to these cringe-inducing statements, it’s always white girls who are “preferred”, which invites doubt about the sincerity behind someone’s “type”.

Predictably, each of those instances left me feeling wounded. It didn’t help matters that every time my Mother came across some seemingly eligible, compatible (read: also raised-away-from-Mallus) ummarried boy, his mother would sorrowfully lament that

“He already has girlfriend. White. Enne chayum?”.

Mom would come home, grumpy. “The second they graduate from law or med school, they run after a vellambi. Chey!”

I knew why my Mother said something so annoyingly ignorant. Encounters with unavailable, suitable boys combined with input from her coworkers, a good portion of whom are African-American, to create an explosive cocktail of hurt; soon, my Mother absorbed that odious complex about “successful POC going white”, especially after the cutest brown resident at her hospital took up with some “white nurse who wasn’t even pretty” instead of someone Indian/Pinay/Chinese/Black (all of whom were/are allegedly gorgeous, in comparison). When they heard about the brown and white coupling, my Mother’s African American office mate snorted, “typical” while Ma shook her head and sighed. She told me all about it, bitterly.

“Mommy, maybe they’re in love?”

“Podi, penne. Stop being blonde.”

“Mom you’re being unreasonable.”

“You are never going to find a boy. There are no educated Malayalee boys with three degrees. If there are, they are only interested in the white girls.”

“I don’t care how many degrees…remember? I like engineers. They usually have just one.”

“Chinammamma is right. That’s a recipe for disaster. Boy should have more degrees than girl-“

“- and be three years older, and three inches taller and blah blah blah. Spare me, Ma.”

“Make fun all you want, those things are accepted for a reason- they work. You want your husband to resent you?”

“I thought you didn’t care if I got married?”

“I don’t. It would save me money. I’d rather travel than waste all that, or put the down-payment on a house for you. I have nothing to prove to your Father’s friends and I’ve never been interested in outdoing them. I just…saw Mercy’s son and thought he was so cute. My grandchildren would have been so cute!”

All right-y, then. What’s hilarious is that my Mother had to alter her theory a year later, when “Mercy’s son” got engaged to a Punjabi girl he met in law school:

“Sho! Anyone but a Malayalee penne, eh?”

“What, Ma…now there’s a hierarchy? White, then North Indian, then South?” 😀

I didn’t really make peace with any of this until I met an adorable white guy who confessed that he liked me…only to hear me gracefully blurt out that I only date brown boys. It’s true, I can’t help it. I always have gone brown and probably always will. It’s just what I am attracted to– black hair, dark eyes, tan skin (fur optional).

The epiphany I had at that moment, while staring in to wounded blue eyes and rapidly batting blonde lashes, brought me closure and a bit of enlightenment; duh, no one has to justify whom they are attracted to, but hopefully they are acting out of their purest feelings– we can’t help whom we fall for, but we can call ourselves out if we’re nursing some bizarre colonial hangover or other therapy-requiring-issue (full disclosure: I have a family member who ONLY dates white guys, because they are the polar opposite of her strict, very Desi Dad).

There are other aspects to the complicated issue of human mixology, too– one of my dearest friends is finally in a blissful relationship. With a black man. After being repeatedly rejected by Desi guys for her tan skin and curves, she has given up on making her parents’ dreams of an Indian son-in-law come true. Instead, she found someone who will accept her just as she is; she has decided to do what makes her happy– and I am thrilled for her. I’m also broken-hearted that essentially, she has to keep her love closeted. Additionally, I would enjoy beating the fecal matter out of the last Desi she went on a blind date with, who brilliantly said, “you’d be so pretty if you weren’t so dark!”, while recoiling from her. But I’m protective and furious like that.

Look. This stuff is real. It happens. Let’s talk about it, if you are in the mood. I’m opening a safe space for exploration, if you are so inclined. You don’t have to be P.C. or fake, you just have to be respectful and courteous; controversial topics are impossible to fisk if we’re not, right?

1,347 thoughts on “Whoa– is dating White not right?

  1. So here is my story-

    I was born and raised in Kerala. Left to the US for my undergrad. But here is the catch – I am a girl.

    Everyone I knew labelled my parents insane for letting me go. The whispers were mostly – #1 ALONE! living all by herself, GOD KNOWS WHAT SHE’S GOING TO DO and #2 She’ unmarried. She’ll never get married and neither will her younger sister.

    Then, I met a red-haired pasty white jewish boy who just made things siZZle! Three years down the line (which was three months ago) we got married in a civil ceremony with a few of our closest friends present. My parents have never met him. They have spoken to him only over the phone (like I said – my whole family lives in Kerala and I am here on my own). They are very happy for me. My mother, especially, is very supportive, mostly beacause she’s recognises how happy I am. She couldn’t care if he was black, yellow, brown, whatever! Murmured criticism have mostly come from Aunties and Uncles who frankly should learn to mind their own bidiness.

    We are planning a trip together to Kerala in December. Am I nervous?? *%$@, yeah!

    But honestly, I am more excited than nervous. I can’t for them to meet him.

    Now, about the differences- We grew up on ~ diametrically opposite points on the globe, met by chance and hit it off. The only way ‘race’ factored into the equation for me was when I was plagued by thoughts about what other people would think (despicable). That speaks for itself and really doesn’t merit any further elaboration.

    The other big difference(religion)- I was brought up in a devoutly christian household and I am fairly religous. My husband says “organised religion” ain’t his thing. I have wondered long and hard about the difficulties of raising children in this asymmetrical set up. The only certainty is that they are probably going to grow up confused as hell…which is really not such a bad thing because sometimes you end up with a stronger sense of self and identity when you delve deep into the confusion. So there!

    About my world back in India..wish me luck, yo’ll! All hell is probably going to break lose when I show up with white boy here! My distant relatives are going to freaakk! My husband’s game plan to win my grandmother over is by devouring everything she cooks(he loves Indian food). As for the rest of my immediate family..he wants to gang up with them – on me!

  2. Razib,

    Love your posts–keep it up! My apologies if it doesn’t reflect a full study of the relevant info.–but, isn’t a large part of the US/UK differential in terms of White/Brown or Muslim/kaffir difference that a large part of of the UK Muslims were explicitly recruited from poor villages, and so haven’t fared as well in the UK in terms of education, etc. as other immigrant groups? My deep apologies if you’ve already covered this in depth– though please link to it in future–this is the sort of stuff I read, though this may also reflect poorly on me as a Desi reader–anyway, your own blog is way cool and it is getting me back into reading about science, so–thanks!!

  3. i don’t think the emasculation of brown guys is as extreme or pronounced as east asian guys. there was an article in the UC berkeley paper i think about a professor talking to asian american female students who offered that they preferred whites and brown guys over other east asians.

    It is not so much that non-Sythian short, pudgy desi guys aren’t pathetic and awkward. It is just that non-Scythian dark, pudgy desi gals ain’t all that desired either.

    So it seems that these people have no choice but to hook up with each other or be single and bitter.

  4. 251:

    Ummm–do you want an honest view? Jews are cool and impressive people, for sure! Double that, in fact!!–but–if you are Desi and want someone to marry….–ummm–I couldn’t think of a worse match–I mean, obviously there are exceptions, like for everything, and I’m cool with that and all–but–for advice–ummmm–no!!!–that will not likely work–stick with Desis, or go with East Asians. . . .or “ethnic” American Christians likes Greeks or Italians–sorry if I sound preachy, but I don’t want to see any more examples of what my cousin went through in NYC–and no, I won’t comment further on it!

  5. that is fcking sad. fuking north india has screwed us over w/ their fairer than thou shit..and the tella people didn’t help either..damn british. what is this obsession w/ white-ness? u can’t be darker and beautiful?? and it doesn’t help that in South India..(and i hate to generalize..i’m the last person to use the racist term:”South India”) does not have any of our own actress…just about everybody is either Punjabi or Marathi or w/e. aaargh! most ppl. (my own people included) assume i’m from north and speak hindi 2 me..i tell them..”salaam bhai” “mei nahi hindi boltha..” or i’ll say..”anti sangatulu?” and then i comment 2 the people around me..is he Muslim?(in my own language) That usually shuts them up reaaaal quick. (in my state…only Muslims speak hindi/urdu) to me it does not matter how dark you are or how white you are..its about personality.. i personally think that darker you are..the more indian you are..i.e. not mixed w/ the persians and arabs..lol! but thats just the

  6. It is not so much that non-Sythian short, pudgy desi guys aren’t pathetic and awkward. It is just that non-Scythian dark, pudgy desi gals ain’t all that desired either.

    So it seems that these people have no choice but to hook up with each other or be single and bitter.

    As if you’re somehow superior or– dare I type it– desirable? With those deplorable, hateful opinions about “Non-Scythians”? Take your ignorant, racist bullshit elsewhere and console yourself manually, since no self-respecting, brain-endowed human would want anything to do with you.

  7. 256:

    i personally think that darker you are..the more indian you are..i.e. not mixed w/ the persians and arabs..lol! but thats just the


    Yeah, I know this is a nasty issue, but couldn’t we ABD’s just kind of collectively agree to knock it off re: discussion of the skin-color issue–I mean, not ban it or anything, just shun or disparage it? That would be one nice contribution of ABD’s back to the mother-ship, no?

  8. Interesting…. 67 comments on the post about the abandoned baby. 255 comments on dating.. 🙂 On the other hand it may not mean anything too…

    I wonder what kind of responses (if any) a blog post on dating a ‘firang’ would generate here in India…. LOL

  9. Rob, the commenter you thoughtfully responded to thought that Anna

    a) was not Indian b) thus did not have the right to comment on anything South Asian

    all based on her “American” name. Surely you can appreciate such breathtaking stupidity.

    I’d ask you not to feed the troll, but I banned him, so no point. Your point regarding colorism, however, was good. Shun and disparage is an excellent idea.

    Well, we made it to around 250 comments before the racist, the deluded and the unbelievably ignorant jumped out from under their moldy bridges. Not bad.

  10. that is f*cking sad. fu*king north india has screwed us over w/ their fairer than thou shit..and the tella people didn’t help either..damn british. what is this obsession w/ white-ness? u can’t be darker and beautiful??

    Jai, this is for you.

    Dating Website for White Girls seeking Indian & South Asian Men: http://www.southasianmen.com/

    My mate sent me this:

    Those of you who sit by your computer and complain/post about how you’re single, or how you can’t find a girl. You have a choice: continue to do what you’re doing and live your current life as you are OR do something about it. Go outside, meet people, have fun, buy some clothes, get yer hair did, gain a smidgen of confidence and gasp talk to women, if your standards are too high lower them.

    Follow this formula and you’ll get that relationship you want.

    Step one: See girl. Step two : Talk to girl. Step three: Ask girl out. Step four: Fail. Step five: Get back on that horse and try until it works. Step six: Be happy and wonder why it took you so long. Step seven: Get your heart broken, feel like a bag of douche. Step eight: rinse, wash, repeat until you find “the one”.

  11. As if you’re somehow superior or– dare I type it– desirable? With those deplorable, hateful opinions about “Non-Scythians”? Take your ignorant, racist bullshit elsewhere and console yourself manually, since no self-respecting, brain-endowed human would want anything to do with you.

    We Scythicans are descended from Adonis himself.

    Taught never to back down, never to give up, and that disparaging non-scythians on the internets is the greatest glory we can achieve in life.

    Scythians: the finest desis the world has ever known.

  12. Scythians: the finest desis the world has ever known.

    Actually, Jatts are the finest desis the world has ever known. ; )

    Bruaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah : )

  13. Razib, thank you! The word “caucasian” (as used to denote “white” in the U.S.) is one of my pet peeves. It bugs me when people in the U.S. keep using the word causcasian as if it is a term based on empirical data when in fact that particular usage was initiated by the German founder of scientific racism in the 18th century!

    In Europe, the word Caucasian is generally (and accurately) used for those from the Caucasus mountains regions or Turkmenistan/Kyrgistan. In fact, the German guy who thought of using the word caucasian to describe “white” people did so only because he thought men from the Republic of Georgia (Caucasus region) were the most attractive!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caucasian_race

    The inaccurate usage of the word prevails in the U.S. even though the “race categories” (from which the usage of the word in the U.S. stems) have been discredited. Not surprisingly, the corresponding words to describe other “races” are no longer PC enough to use. However, in the U.S. the word “caucasian” has really become a subliminal code to emphasize that the person being described is not “chinese or black” which were some of those discredited “race” categories (of course, these “races categories” had other names, which I will not bring up here).

  14. thanks for the link..

    http://www.asian-nation.org/interracial2.shtml

    Interesting stats..

    Is there any research being done on ‘at what age’ the concept of beauty is formed in the brain of the kid and “the factors that are typically associated with it (like the color of the skin, curves, predominant ‘culture’ etc..) ” gets ingrained ??

    That’s be interesting to know.

  15. I have never gone out with an Indian woman. Part of it has to do with the fact that most Indians I meet are my relatives. Pretty much every Indian party I go to includes relatives. My social circle outside this is primarily white with some black and chinese. I like going to independent movies and music fests, but I rarely see many Indians at these events. All my Indian friends are guys. I am in my 30s and I am caught between generations at a lot of Indian parties. Kids in their teens or their parents who are in their 40s. More important, white women approach me, Indian women don’t and I rarely am aggresive in making the first move. Plus age seems less of an issue in white circles compared to the Indian ones(unless you are Padmalakshmi).

    While I was born here, I lived in India too. So I can mix in both sets of Indian circles. My order of preference has changed from time to time. In my 20s, I rarely thought about marriage, but if I had to choose, it was race blind. THen in my late 20s, early 30s, it was someone who could understand Telugu a little bit despite the fact that I speak in English only because I did not want to play interpreter at family gatherings or explain why many Indians eat with their hands. Then it was South Indian origin and then North Indian origin(and they had to be bon here or Americanized), and then other races. But now I am back to my “who the hell cares what race or nationality I marry” thing. The more you progress in your 30s, there is just a bigger pool to choose from if you take out race as a factor. Then again, I am a choosy prick. While I am not religious Hindu, I do have a problem when the Christian women I have gone out with who think at some level that I need to be saved. I can handle it short term. But not long term. The white women got along the best have been the secular ones who do not take the whole saved thing so literally.

    I just cannot do the online dating thing. I am very active online mostly in sports, music , movie, and political sites.

    There are certainly Indians who avoid other Indians because of issues we have had with identity while growing up. Let us not deny that. Part of it is self hatred, part of it is probaby a subconscious effort to show they are assimilated, part of it is parents driving them to this. BUt in a lot of cases, it is simply a numbers game and I think this gets conflated with the other reasons i brought up. I have seen that among Chinese friends who complain that the other sex “puts out” more easily with whites or blacks than with their own. However, there could be other reasons and maybe we make too many assumptions of the other gender from our own and the mutual set of assumptions harms any chance some of us have with the other.

    At this point, my attitude is fuck it and just go with whoever makes you comfortable.Don’t need kids, and you don’t really neeed that special one person for life, no need to get married. I want kids, so there lies my dilemma. I am a free spirit, but not when it comes to raising kids. I would prefer to have them raised with a mom and dad.

    I mangled my name spelling lest I get googled at some time in the future. Heh.

  16. Scythians: the finest desis the world has ever known.

    Obviously you don’t know much about how the Sythians/Sakas were routed by Gautamiputra Satakarni, a Satavahana and gang. The Sythians like a lot of other nomads who came to India had their moments of glory but there was nothing extraordinary about them.

  17. A significant portion of the complaints are:

    1. Indian men only date Indian girls who are: sorority going, doctor becoming, straight hair forcing barbie dolls

    2. Indian women only date Indian men of acceptable professional status and economic prospects

    It doesn’t appear we have heard from the subjects of either stereotype

    Barbie dolls, speak!

    Investment bankers, speak!

    Cardiothoracic surgeons, speak!

    Surely, its time to hear the opposite point of view…

  18. Scythians: the finest desis the world has ever known.

    I’ve never ran into a self-identifying Scythian, especially in a physical confrontation, but I’m pretty sure it would play as follows:

    Scythian, “Yo, my ancestors had lightly-complected junk, which attracted all the tall, white, skinny Scythian gals from miles around. Maybe your momma like that pale dick, too!”

    Short, Pudgy Desi, “Perhaps, but then how would I be the perfect height to punt your balls back into your chest cavity–where they seem to belong?”

    Ardy, I appreciate your diligence in finding Scythian–non-Scythian battles, but here’s a MUCH more recent example.

    Yes, that’s right, when the IPKF invaded Sri-Lanka and tried to do a US-in-Indochina impression. Surprisingly, the short dark dudes sent them packing. It was so bad, that India has since refused to aid the SL gov with any offensive weaponry/personell deployments. Quite a kick in the balls, IMHO.

  19. As far as color, I noticed the Indian born people are more obsessed with color. I rarely hear fair skin talk from any of my Indian American friends or cousins.

  20. First off, I never understood why every ethnicity is always upset about their women dating outside the race. Generally mixed race children are better looking, smarter, and more genetically sound than their same race counterparts.

    I am Desi yet still “mixed” according to Indians–my father is Kutchi and my mother is from Mysore, yet I have light skin. For some reason this freaks Indians out. Maybe they think I use Fair and Lovely but I have been shunned by Indian males and females alike for being “a white wannabe.” Not sure what that means, but I always had a mixed race group of friends while most Indians only had Indian friends. I did not have severe identity issues–I was just choosing friends based on personality not race. Unfortunately most of the Indians I knew were narrow minded and arrogant. Needless to say, I never bonded too well with my Indian peers.

    Perhaps growing up has made me so that I feel no attraction to Indian men. To me if they aren’t like relatives, they just seem like Mama’s boys. They expect you to be a proper wife, etc. I’ve actually had Indian men freak out when they see I have tattoos and piercings–telling me I should be a “proper” Indian girl. Other races never do that…

    My current boyfriend is “white.” I say it like that because he only looks white. Every time we go out some Indian people (usually men) have to give us dirty looks. Little do they know he is also Jamaican and Indian and he probably knows more about India than half of them. He grew up eating Indian food and can easily eat peppers hotter than any Indian I’ve ever met. So stop hatin’! I love him because I just do, I don’t care what race anyone is. People are attracted to different things. And of course, if you grow up in a country where most people are white…you just might end up marrying a white person.

    And not to toot my own horn, but he is very good looking since he is of mixed race. And I KNOW our kids will look damn good! 🙂

  21. NotConfused on July 29, 2007 11:35 AM · Direct link

    First off, I never understood why every ethnicity is always upset about their women dating outside the race. Generally mixed race children are better looking, smarter, and more genetically sound than their same race counterparts.

    I am Desi yet still “mixed” according to Indians–my father is Kutchi and my mother is from Mysore, yet I have light skin. For some reason this freaks Indians out. Maybe they think I use Fair and Lovely but I have been shunned by Indian males and females alike for being “a white wannabe.” Not sure what that means, but I always had a mixed race group of friends while most Indians only had Indian friends. I did not have severe identity issues–I was just choosing friends based on personality not race. Unfortunately most of the Indians I knew were narrow minded and arrogant. Needless to say, I never bonded too well with my Indian peers.

    Perhaps growing up has made me so that I feel no attraction to Indian men. To me if they aren’t like relatives, they just seem like Mama’s boys. They expect you to be a proper wife, etc. I’ve actually had Indian men freak out when they see I have tattoos and piercings–telling me I should be a “proper” Indian girl. Other races never do that…

    My current boyfriend is “white.” I say it like that because he only looks white. Every time we go out some Indian people (usually men) have to give us dirty looks. Little do they know he is also Jamaican and Indian and he probably knows more about India than half of them. He grew up eating Indian food and can easily eat peppers hotter than any Indian I’ve ever met. So stop hatin’! I love him because I just do, I don’t care what race anyone is. People are attracted to different things. And of course, if you grow up in a country where most people are white…you just might end up marrying a white person.

    And not to toot my own horn, but he is very good looking since he is of mixed race. And I KNOW our kids will look damn good! 🙂

    OK… Sounds good.

  22. Is there any research being done on ‘at what age’ the concept of beauty is formed in the brain of the kid and “the factors that are typically associated with it (like the color of the skin, curves, predominant ‘culture’ etc..) ” gets ingrained ??

    i have seen data that suggests some attraction to the physical form of your opposite sex parent. that would suggest adolescence. but i think stuff like this is complicated. i know food taboos tend to crystallize betwee 4 and 7.

  23. “Not confused”, I am sorry that desi people have apparently hurt you so deeply that your defense mechanism is to make blanket generalizations, not make sense (fairness is scorned?) and be borderline obnoxious. I’m not being sarcastic– I feel sad after reading your comment, which is so over-the-top, it’s difficult to believe, which only makes me think you went through a lot. It sounds like the problem wasn’t mean or dumb desi people– just mean and dumb PEOPLE.

    In any case, congratulations on finding the one who makes you happy.

  24. Regarding the color complex, Alex Alexander, an Indian Christian who writes on diaspora issues, thinks the white skin complex amongst Indians, which seems to victimize many second generation women, is the result of colonization:

    My reading of South Indian literature leads me to believe that most of the attraction to white skin probably began with the Mogul invasions of India, followed by the colonization attempts by the Portuguese, French, Danes and British in India: beginning with incursions first of Portuguese into India (1498 CE Vasco de Gama) and later by other European colonisers. The influence of pre-Mugal Muslim marauders from the northwest India (Ghazni, Lodi etc) on south of the Vindhya mountains was minimal…There are scores of references in Sangam literature (? 100 BCE- 400 CE) to the beauty of ebony skin, pearly white teeth, ruby red lips of Tamil women. In fact, blackness was considered the perfection of beauty. In Travels of Marco Polo (13th Century) he wrote the following while visiting the south west coast of India, (Chapter 18) “in this province, the natives although black are not born of so deep a dye as they afterwards attain by artificial means, esteeming blackness the perfection of beauty. For this purpose, three times every day, they rub their children over with oil of sesame. The images of their deities they represent black, but the devil they paint white, and assert that all the demons are of that color”.

  25. No matter what the numbers say when they speak, it should be up to the desi girl (usually hot!) who she decides to fall in love with. That’s all there is to it, everything else is just poppycock.

  26. If these anti-miscegenation fans have followed that tried-and-true process, then they’d be aware that there are more than a few members of the Mutiny community who are the products of interracial unions; I can’t imagine that they’d be so tactless as to disparage such pairings when they reflect someone like Siddhartha, Desidancer or SemiDesiMasala’sancestry

    blush I’m so excited that I got a shout out!! A N N A thanks for the interesting and thought provoking post. I can’t believe that I didn’t log on and see this sooner.

    I’ve been scanning the comments and I know that there is little that I could contribute that wouldn’t be a repetition of someone else’s comment. But, from watching my own parents and from my own experiences, I know that family relationships and romantic relationships are complicated whether they are mixed or not. There will always be someone who is ignorant, prejudiced or unhappy about your romantic choices. And (I hope) that there will always be someone who is welcoming and happy about your chosen partner. But since there are awesome people that are the products of both mixed and un-mixed unions, I hope that everyone won’t shy away from love from someone just because of the color of their skin or their ethnic group.

  27. Why American men like desi gals : They like browny skin and inspired by kamasutra tradition which desis got in the blood…they can trust desi gals than american chics who are more like one night stand chics…

    Why desi gals behind American men: More attractive..well built body than desi men. Some desi gals are sick of Indian family tradition etc…

    My judgement: Go for American men….

  28. I just finished skimming through all these comments (whoa!!), so I apologize if I repeat anything.

    I think dating, for the desi woman, is actually more complex than most guys (including desi guys) realize. Whether you have to work through all the drama your parents heaped on you about it, or whether they were ok with it, I have found that people have way more assumptions about me, my sexuality, my view of relationships, etc., because of my ethnic/racial identity. Oftentimes they have no idea what my own thoughts or experiences are. I can’t even begin to count the number of times a non-desi has stopped to ask me if I was “sexually repressed” because of my upbringing or if my parents are strict. Hello, I just don’t want to have sex with YOU. Are you so insecure that you feel like you have to farm the explanation out to some all-encompassing “cultural” bogeyman?

    That said, it was also frustrating growing up. I went to a predominantly white high school with only 2 desi guys (one of whom was my brother), and 6 desis overall. The comments about how we would all end up married were inevitable. I always felt like screaming when this would come up, not only because it was racist, but also because it underscored that we were undateable by anyone non-desi. It’s not even like the other factors that go into relationships — mutual attraction, interests, etc. — were even on the table. The result was that we (desis) skulked around the halls avoiding eye contact with one another lest someone make some stupid comment about how we would spend the rest of our lives together.

    This was definitely different in college, but then there always seemed to be so much drama around dating (i.e. people would get drunk, go out, hook up, cry about how someone screwed them over by hooking up with their crush), so it didn’t seem wise to fly with the desi-party-crew. The rest of the cool desis were off in pockets of the world trying to escape the Indus drama. I can’t say I had milli’s experience per se, but for some of us there are definitely other elements of our personalities that make us “difficult” to deal with, or somehow “un-ideal” as desi women. For me it was absolutely my politics and my inability to keep my mouth shut when someone would say something stupid. Then pour on religious identity, an “unideal” body type, an unapologetic love of the outdoors (and subsequent dark skin/tan), a lack of interest in hardcore partying, and a hipster sense of fashion (not hip, just hipster), and it was no wonder it was almost impossible to find someone desi to date. With all that, it’s hard to find someone not desi to date. Even if the % of desi guys who would be “prospective” was comparable, we’re a smaller community. We’re going to have a harder time finding those match points.

    But it’s not like dating out of ethnic community is daisies and roses. There’s always those initial questions — is this person fetishizing me, or dating me out of a sense of exoticism? They seem cool, but will they be able to relate (or at least be sympathetic) to my experiences as a woman of color in the U.S. and all that that entails? Will they understand that my feminism or progressive/lefty politics are not something “cute,” but something that generally inform my life choices and world view?

    I know this sounds like a lot of baggage, but I think at the end of the day dating is hard no matter who you are. I wonder what good we do ourselves by trying to police our own dating choices. I hear the complaints all the time — desi women are superficial, they always date white guys, they don’t stick with their own. I understand the hurt folks are feeling, but all of these arguments are moot. Why do we spend so much time tearing down each other within our own community? And then why, as women, do we pit ourselves against one another? I wonder why people don’t look at mixed race couples, look at how they interact with one another, and say “Wow, that’s beautiful.” I don’t know, maybe I’m crazy, but I think love is worth celebrating regardless of your background/color, etc. Maybe if we spent less time carrying huge chips on our shoulders, we’d be able to recognize and appreciate that.

  29. 6-4 Scythian said…

    non-Sythian short, pudgy desi guys…

    Yo my scythian bro, I can confidently kick your ass anytime, myself being over 6-4; coupled with my 150 IQ and a supreme understanding of the universe, you stand no comparison with my non-scythian pure dravidian south indian self. So back off 😀

  30. Maybe if we spent less time carrying huge chips on our shoulders, we’d be able to recognize and appreciate that.

    ah, but what if it is a delectable fried banana chip?

    I think that if you involve yourself in a subculture, say the hipster crowd, you’re doubly cursed compared desis that choose to participate with a bit more mainstream pop/clothing/music culture.

    I’m equally put off by hipsters (who seem to have taken over every college radio station within 50 miles and also every veggie/vegan downtown eatery worth my money) and the sperry topsider-wearing, collar-popping Jerseyites that dominated my school. Color was definitely not a consideration–taste in music, books, sports (yikes!) were infinitely more important.

  31. just forgot to mention that I have an 7.6 inch dick too, in the previous comment…

  32. milli – I totally relate. I’ve often felt like the desi guys don’t like me because I don’t fit that mold of the typical desi girl – straight hair, professional track, etc. (Me: wavy hair; writer.) But, I’ve also often felt that non-desi guys don’t like me because I’m too conservative for their tastes. Anna – I would love a post about hair!

  33. I think that if you involve yourself in a subculture, say the hipster crowd, you’re doubly cursed compared desis that choose to participate with a bit more mainstream pop/clothing/music culture.

    Totally agreed. Although, to clarify, I am not a hipster, I just play one on TV 😉 [No, but seriously, it IS kind of frustrating to not be a hipster but to look kinda sorta hipster enough that people assume you are too cool for school (i.e. too stuck up to talk to them)]

  34. Generally mixed race children are better looking, smarter, and more genetically sound than their same race counterparts…I am Desi yet still “mixed” according to Indians… And not to toot my own horn, but he is very good looking since he is of mixed race. And I KNOW our kids will look damn good! 🙂

    Congratulations. It is VERY important it is to have good looking babies with eye colors that don’t clash with your wardrobe.

    FYI: These ‘mixed people’ you speak of remind me of the Scythians.

    I’ve never ran into a self-identifying Scythian, especially in a physical confrontation

    This is a given considering you were able to type that message.

    Scythian, “Yo, my ancestors had lightly-complected junk, which attracted all the tall, white, skinny Scythian gals from miles around. Maybe your momma like that pale dick, too!”

    It is not so much that our junk is light complexioned it is more that Scythians are hung like horses. Or more correctly horses are hung like Scythians.

    Seriously a there are a few Scythians who can tan dark enough to pass off as Punjabi jatts, I never said being dark was a problem for non-Scythian men. It is an issue for desi women, growing up in a world where de-pigmented blondes are seen as the epitome of beauty.

  35. Scythian,

    i’ll give you a quick life lesson dude–although i’d really rather you pick fights with every ‘dark and pudgy’ guy you see, since fights that you initiate are more likely to be failures–the taller every guy I’ve fought has been, the easier it was to take them down.

    tall dudes’ knees, crotch, ribs, plexus and throat are easy and all-too-tempting targets for anyone with a sufficient level of contempt for people who think that their height and build are automatically advantages in any given situation.

  36. US/UK differential in terms of White/Brown or Muslim/kaffir difference that a large part of of the UK Muslims were explicitly recruited from poor villages, and so haven’t fared as well in the UK in terms of education, etc. as other immigrant groups?

    thaz some of it. but i think the consensus is that it doesn’t explain the extent of the variance. uk sikhs on these message boards tell me that their community wasn’t drawn from economically more advanced groups either, but they have done better.

  37. Whoever brought up the IPKF example: good job. I am punjabi and very fair, by indian standards myself, but the attitude of sme punjabis that their “fair skin” is an indicator of some kind of affinity with Conan like master warrior-barbarians is ridiculous. Overall, Punjabis and even Kashmiris have very strong affinities with the rest of the South Asian population. The base racial group of India is the dark skinned, slender “Dravidian” type with thick black hair and medium (not too broad/not too narrow) features. Into that base has been injected more caucasoid blood from middle eastern/euorpean types, but the dominant phenotype and genotype is south asian. In my own family I have a few pale white looking people with blue eyes and some coal black cousins and most of us a shade of brown.

  38. It’s interesting to see some Desi dudes on this topic comment that the Indian girls never even glance at them. Because me and the Desi girls that I know of are starving for Indian guys! I’m a little jealous reading the tales of South Asian Associations and how all the Desi students ignore each other, which I cannot possibly fathom. In my country Indians are few and far-between, let alone second-generation Confident Desis. My parents have actually given up years ago on finding a Suitable Boy for me, they have resigned to the idea that my partner will most probably NOT be from the Desh, let alone from the same state/caste/whathaveyounot. I have dated my share of white men, but it does get a little old after a while, having to explain the same things about Indian culture over and over again! Unfortunately the few students who DO come over from the Desh to pursue graduate studies, either return to India as soon as they’re finished OR they apply for a Green Card to the USA and find themselves a Desi Born Indian girl!

    So, to all the unhappy Indian men out there, there ARE Desi girls who’d love to date you, but you’re just on the wrong continent…

  39. I’m really fair with a 7.7 inch cock, but really I think somebody above had a good point about something.

  40. The base racial group of India is the dark skinned, slender “Dravidian” type with thick black hair and medium (not too broad/not too narrow) features. Into that base has been injected more caucasoid blood from middle eastern/euorpean types, but the dominant phenotype and genotype is south asian.

    just to be clear, i do think one should be cautious about constructing models based on idealized races which admixed and produced hybrids. this works well in latin america, where in many regions spanish males and amerindian females generated the mestizo group (there are many areas where genetic tests show that 90% of the lineages are clustered with europe and 90% of the female with the new world indigenous populationss). it also works with african americans, who have an average admixture of european ancestry into the west african base at about a 20-25% level. but it doesn’t work well for many parts of the world which exhibit continuity and long term gene flow. for example, the latest data seems to imply that on the order of 9 out of 10 ancestors of people living in south asia today likely had ancestors living within the borders of south asia around 10,000 years ago after the ice age. but south asia is a big place (the size of western europe). it seems entirely likely that some of the extant physical variation has always been there and does not need to be explained via admixture.

  41. I’m really fair with a 7.7 inch cock, but really I think somebody above had a good point about something.

    i claimed 8 at the outset, so sit back and enjoy being the bridesmaid bitch.

  42. razib:

    Good point; however I think it is safe to say that more extreme outliers like the blue eyed kashmiris or red haired sikhs are almost definitely a result of , how shall we say, White man beef injections.

  43. Good point; however I think it is safe to say that more extreme outliers like the blue eyed kashmiris or red haired sikhs are almost definitely a result of , how shall we say, White man beef injections.

    there are easy ways to check into this genetically (the blue eye mutation in europeans is called OCA2 and has been expanding over the last 6,000 years or so). but in any case, don’t be too sure, there are many recurrent mutations in the human gene pool. there are australian aboriginals of the central desert who are blonde but exhibit not admixture (its genetic inheritance pattern is also a bit diff. than european blonde). and just because a population looks like another does not mean they are related. e.g., many of the peoples of melanesia “look african,” but genetically they are very distantly related (they are closer to chinese than africans, for example). similarly, the “round-eyed” ainu of japan were labeled “caucasoid” by anthropologists, but once genetics became advanced enough scientists found that they were clustered with other east asian peoples.

  44. Whoever brought up the IPKF example: good job

    thanks! Sometimes it seems as if that episode has been erased from the Indian public imagination.

  45. the above is what i call the phenotype is phylogeny fallacy. basically, physical similarities are assumed to imply common ancestry or descent. but given a long enough time and a large enough population evolution often results in convergences, so our intuition can be confounded.

  46. Razib:

    I defer to your far superior racial-genetic acumen 🙂

    By the way, there was something I came across at onepeoplesproject.com that lists you along side David Duke and a number of other racists. What’s up with that ?