Ok folks get ready! The political fiend in me is ready to pound out three political posts in a row tonight (with a dinner break in between) that I hope you’ll find interesting and can add to in the form of interesting comments/debate. First up, in the aftermath of Super Tuesday here is what we learned:
- Women voters break for Hillary
- Latino-American voters break for Hillary
- Older voters break for Hillary
- Asian-Americans voters break for Hillary
- Male voters break for Obama
- Independent voters break for Obama
- Younger voters break for Obama
In the list of observations above, I want to especially focus on the two that I have highlighted, and on the nexus point between the two. Why is it that the Latino population seems to greatly favor Clinton (sometimes by a 3-1 margin), and helped her win in states like California? One possible answer some might suggest is the politically incorrect reason which offers that Latino people see African Americans as competition. They often compete for the same jobs, and many in the African-American community are quick to point out that illegal Latino immigrants depress wages, which works against African Americans seeking similar jobs (this was even a debate question the other night). Cynics would say that African Americans and Latinos would rather have a white person in charge than someone from the other group. Okay, lets assume all that is true for a minute. What about Asian Americans (including South Asian Americans)? Polls from last night showed that they voted for Clinton over Obama in even higher proportions than the Latino population. Here is an excerpt from Salon:
…a self-congratulatory article in the India Express touting the influence of Indian-Americans in the Democratic primary process reveals even greater constraints on the appeal of Obama’s diversity. In California, exit poll data suggests that 69 percent of Latinos voted for Clinton, while only 29 percent voted for Obama. But Asian-American voters skewed even more sharply pro-Clinton: 75 percent voted for her, compared to 23 percent for Obama. That’s almost as high as the percentage of the black vote (78 percent) that went for Obama…Despite the claims of the Indian press, the total numbers of Indian-American voters in the New York and New Jersey primaries were too small to significantly influence the overall results. (The total Asian vote was too small for there to be any relevant exit poll data.) A better case can be made in California. In Santa Clara County, where there are some 115,000 Indian-American residents, Clinton cleaned up, winning 54.8 percent to 39.3 percent — better than her statewide average. (Whereas just to the north, in San Francisco and Alameda counties, Obama was the victor.)…
But that’s just one piece. In California, 8 percent of all Democratic voters identified themselves as Asian — a category that encompasses a vast swath of cultures. Truly, California’s diversity is extraordinary. But it doesn’t appear, so far, to translate into a willingness to vote for a “diverse” candidate for president. [Link]
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p>So why didn’t Asians pick the more “diverse candidate” who seems to have more in common with them? Does this mean that Asians might be influenced by the bigotry against African Americans that pervades much of Asian culture (Anna joked around about this in her post last night)? Let’s just admit it. Many in our parents generation are openly bigoted against blacks. But all this might just be a partial explanation and miss the underlying reasons altogether.
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p>Over at the Huffington Post, blogger Jeff Chang provides one of the most cogent explanations of Asian American voting that I have ever read. It may shed some light on all of this:
Soon we’ll be hearing a number of crackpot theories as to why this was so. Are Latinos and Asian Americans in fact slightly more conservative on immigration issues than everyone previously thought? Ridiculous. Are Latinos and Asian Americans unwilling to bring themselves to vote for a Black man? Get out of here with that.
The reason Hillary won is because the Latino and Asian American votes remain emergent, not yet insurgent.
Emergent voting blocs respond to leaders in their community. If the candidate wins the leader, she wins her followers. Insurgent voting blocs instead respond to calls for change, and may focus more on single issues or agendas. If a candidate stakes out a good position, she captures the community. Hillary played the politics of emergence.
Early, she locked down important leaders in the Latino and Asian American communities. In Los Angeles, that meant securing Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s support, and the predominantly Latino unions that have supported him. She also landed the support of Fabian Nunez and Dolores Huerta. In San Francisco, that meant seizing on Mayor Gavin Newsom’s popularity amongst Asian Americans. She also captured a who’s who of Asian American elected officials starting with Controller John Chiang and moving on down. Just as important, Hillary’s campaign locked up a huge number of the leading Latino and Asian American party operatives–the people who actually deliver the voters.
All of them–from Villaraigosa to the Asian American precinct captain–were responding to what might be called aspirational politics. The individuals become proxies for the community. You hear them say in their campaigns, “When I win, you win.” Clinton’s main advantage is that she has the access to power and the party structures that deliver promises to officials and operatives. Obama doesn’t. Emergent politics favors individuals seeking power. Think of it this way: Hillary, the woman candidate, is bringing Latino and Asian American leaders into the old-boy’s network.
These leaders, in turn, deliver votes via their community’s structures of power: business groups, labor unions, voter groups, community organizations. Those groups tend to deliver an older voter who is already “in the game”, who can directly benefit from the opening of the old-boy’s network. “Experience” really is a cover for “access”. [Link]
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p>Hours after first reading the above post I am still impressed by Chang’s explanation. It also allows me to properly articulate something that I haven’t been able to do in the four years that Sepia Mutiny has been on the air. “What does the ‘Mutiny’ stand for in Sepia Mutiny?” we often get asked. I finally know how to answer that question. I want Sepia Mutiny to be one of the insurgent voices of South Asian American community (i.e., voting icebergs). I want to lend my voice to help limit the influence of emergent groups that claim to speak for all (see USINPAC). I want leaders to speak to my issues and not suck up to who they see as my “leaders.” The idea that Asian Americans would play follow the leader is not very surprising. Many Asian immigrants come from cultures where dynastic or strongman rule is the norm (think Gandhis of the Congress Party, or Modi in Gujarat for example). The people will vote how the revered leader or the influential local party official asks them to. The same is true in many Latin American countries. This is one aspect of the campaign where Clinton clearly showed her experience as superior to that of Obama’s. She knew exactly what to do to lock down the votes she needed.
So given that Chang’s analysis is correct and that the trend in Asian American voting continues, how will this play out? The Hill has an idea:
In Washington state, which caucuses Saturday, Asian Americans outnumber blacks. In Maryland, which votes in a primary Tuesday, both Asian Americans and Hispanics account for 4 percent of the population. And in Hawaii, which votes Feb. 19, they make up nearly 41 percent of the population, more than any other demographic…<
p>”They’ve seen the Clintons over the last 12-13 years,” said Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.), chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. “Obama, they’ve just come in contact with him in this last campaign. If Obama were to have a little more time, I think his exposure would have been greater.”
Asian Americans still remember that President Clinton appointed an Asian American, Norman Mineta, as his Transportation secretary, said Honda, who has not endorsed a candidate. Hillary Clinton tapped Gary Locke, the first Asian American governor of the lower 48 states, to co-chair her Washington state campaign. [Link]
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p>Seems like the tea leaves favor Clinton going into the next month of primaries.
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p>I discuss politics over email at length every day with a group of my UMich buddies. I often use some of our discussions in my posts. One of them voiced his frustration today like this:
But here’s where it starts to get tricky and darker. Latinos and Asians aren’t gonna vote for a black guy unfortunately. Thats why BO was never going to win Cali. Part of the working class vote for HRC is definetely a “not gonna vote for a black guy vote.” And part of the whtie male vote is a “not gonna vote for a woman, esp Hillary” vote.So poitively or negatively, IDENTITY POLITICS is ruling the day. If there’s ever been a question about how much identity politics has dominated progressive thinking, this is a strong indication that its completely corrupted us.
So how is BO staying in? He’s getting the 18-25 post identity politics people, and he’s causing more people to come to the polls.
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p>There is a silver lining in this for all those who (like me) want to see the end of emergent politics and the begining of insurgent politics. 18-25 year old Asian Americans voted just like 18-25 year old non-Asian Americans. That leads many to believe that the children of immigrants may be breaking the reliable habits of their parents. That will suck for politicians as it will make our larger demographic more unreliable, but good for us because they will have to listen to more of us.
Younger Latino and Asian American voters were energized by Obama, and formed a visible and crucial part of his GOTV ground troops. They had an impact. Roberto Lovato notes that Obama was able to bring down Hillary’s overall 4-1 advantage among Latino voters to a 3-2 advantage by Super Tuesday. It could be argued that Obama’s bottom-up machinery hasn’t yet taken full advantage of the pent-up energy amongst young Brown and Yellow voters.
When that power is unleashed, it will be unpredictable. The 1.5 generation, young Latino and Asian Americans from the ages of 16-40 who were born elsewhere but raised multilingual and multicultural in the U.S., represents a massive demographic bulge in those communities only beginning to feel itself. Before long, they will turn their communities’ emergent vote into an insurgent vote. And then the country will really discover not just the necessity of the Latino and Asian American vote, but what it is that they really want. [Link]
it’s the lobsters in the bucket situation. [the old joke goes that any time a lobster tries to rise above the rest and climb out of the bucket, the others claw it back]. what the younger gen sees as change by nominating someone who transcends barriers – their parents see as a challenge to their authority, “how come he is doing what we could never do?”.
hey! it’s a hypothesis. 🙂
i’m not very interesting in politics, but i read a lot of punditry the past day, and boy is political blogging filled with sloppy tardishness. more rigor at espn.com 😉 (not point fingers here!)
Cynics would say that African Americans and Latinos would rather have a white person in charge than someone from the other group.
no, that’s a robust social science finding last i checked. i could look it up, but let’s be straight here. the only state i saw in the exits where latinos and whites voted at the same clip for barack was in conn., everywhere else where there were enough latinos he did better among whites (new mexico is tied because anglos voted for him while latinos leaned clinton). no offense, but i found chang’s stuff kind of vapidly rhetorical. but yeah, there might be something to that. basically he’s saying asians & latinos are sheep who follow their leaders. perhaps it’s true. next time i have some mutton i’ll be like “this is my ’emergent’ meat!”
18-25 year old Asian Americans voted just like 18-25 year old non-Asian Americans.
which exits did you see this in? the cali exits indicated that young latinos were barely more pro-obama than old latinos, in stark contrast to the repeated pattern among whites (where even in the south the youngest cohort was often leaning toward obama). i didn’t see age breakdowns for asians.
one thing, a lot of latinos and asians were naturalized during a big push in the 90s under the clintons. the clinton era was an economic golden age, a time of opportunity. i pretty much assume prejudice against the ‘kala’ was part of it, but some of it was probably just that many immigrants have positive memories of the 1990s.
p.s. obama lived in hawaii, and his sister is still there (she’s eurasian btw). so we’ll see how he does there.
Chang’s theory makes for interesting reading but I don’t buy it completely. I don’t see the desi community playing follow the leader too much, or maybe I am mistaken.
I agree with you — it bothers me that leaders think they can simply suck up to the community leaders and expect us tired masses to follow. Isn’t that the general theory also behind endorsements by labor unions?
BTW, I guess I am one who doesn’t fit the voting patterns above. Asian American old people are supposed to vote for Hill. I am 42 (if it’s not old, it’s definitely older) and Asian American and still voted for Obama. Go figure 🙂
btw, there would be some interesting stuff if we broke down by generation, etc. for example, in new mexico the latino population is split between non-immigrant hispanos who claim descent from before the annexation by the USA, and new groups from mexico. i wonder if the former were more pro-obama than the latter? he did a lot better in NM than in cali.
I think the bay area really liked the Clinton yrs in terms of economy. The HRC rally brought 4000 people on Fri evening and I saw a lot of Desi/ yellow while waiting to get in. Also lots of union members were there, excellent rally and lots of fun. Inside most of the speakers were women or Asian Am politicians from various bay area cities.
The Obama meet on SAturday was so small in comparison, I was 2 rows from John Kerry. It was badly done — an older black woman who was in charge actually lost the sign up sheet and got really mad, they didnt have enough posters to hand out etc. Michelle did draw 1800 @ SJSU but it was really last minute I think. Reg the L.A politicians, I am not sure how much they helped both Nunez and AV have had scandals. In fact Prop 93 failed and Nunez had lobbied Arnold to try to pass it. Whoever wins, Calif is solid for dems and will deliver in Nov imo.
btw, the fact that 1.5 and 2nd generation brown AMERICANS seem pro-obama should say something, shouldn’t? for all the sepia & chutney & curry and all that we’re not that diff. from privileged upper-middle-class white college graduates (going through airport security is a little more fraught). which is why some of us are skeptical of your ‘iceberg’ idea abhi; identity politics is for the ’emergent’ DBDs and what not, we just play at the game while we’re not having wine & cheese 😉
btw, listening to the media and talking to people i get the impression that they’re trying to tone-down the reality that latinos really didn’t like obama. e.g., a friend heard a latino activist talking about how younger latinos broke pro-obama like younger whites, and i pointed him to the exit poll to show that it wasn’t comparable at all. and on the radio people keep talking about how latinos in new mexico voted for obama, without noting that he still underperformed vis-a-vis whites. the fact that in the south obama bleeds among older whites is something we wouldn’t try to pretend wasn’t due to some anti-black racism; i think it’s not cynical to admit that racism exists in all groups and it ain’t just whitey.
I’m not discounting it or I wouldn’t have written it. All I am saying is that it doesn’t explain the whole story. Chang’s explanation fills in the blanks for me.
btw, this from chang’s piece: When that power is unleashed, it will be unpredictable. The 1.5 generation, young Latino and Asian Americans from the ages of 16-40 who were born elsewhere but raised multilingual and multicultural in the U.S., represents a massive demographic bulge in those communities only beginning to feel itself. Before long, they will turn their communities’ emergent vote into an insurgent vote. And then the country will really discover not just the necessity of the Latino and Asian American vote, but what it is that they really want.
that’s not true if the immigration spigot keeps flowing at current rates. what we’ll see a metastable equilibrium where 1.5 and greater generations will assimilate toward other sociological parameters besides their identity. but the older generations will keep ’emerging’ because they have different needs and wants (e.g., look at the regular conflict here between DBDs and ABDs based on india-america relations). a 4th generation latino who can barely speak spanish but is proud of their ‘aztlan’ identity or whatever has a lot more in common with barack obama, who to some extent is a self-created black man (i.e., he was raised in an asian and white milieu), than with a peasant from chiapas who can’t speak english.
I’m not discounting it or I wouldn’t have written it. All I am saying is that it doesn’t explain the whole story. Chang’s explanation fills in the blanks for me.
right, it’s a syngergistic dynamic. neither explanation is exclusive.
‘besides their identity.’
besides their ethnic identity. i would argue that just as there are many ‘irish americans’ who have only vague associations with ireland or irish culture (which, doesn’t really exist anymore in the way they would imagine because of the ‘celtic tiger’ dynamic) is going to be the reality for many of our kids.
There you go again abhi, If Asian-Americans not wanting to vote Obama is racism, why then is not the black population wanting to vote Obama racism too? I guess black people who vote Obama due to his skin color aint racist,but Indian-Americans who do not vote Obama are racist. Interesting double-standard. I guess Obama’s socialistic stance, his D-Punjab comment, his vote against the Indo-US nuclear deal had nothing to do with it,right?. But ah ignore all these factors. If you are against a black candidate because of his policies, it has to be racism, not anything to do with his stance.
So tomorrow if Robert Mugabe stood for the US presidential election (assuming he gets a US citizenship), people who vote against him, are racist, right? Logic like this is what keeps people like Mugabe in power and allows empty-suits like Obama to get so much coverage. Color has nothing to do with it,If say Thomas Sowell stood for election,lot of Asian-Americans would vote for him.
But race-baiting is a favorite pastime of liberals. Any criticism of blacks is racist,even when the criticism is valid and has nothing to do with skin color. Obama is an avowed socialist, and has no executive experience whatsoever. Now I admit Hillary has no experience either but she has Bill to look for advise. Obama keeps chanting “change” but has a resume thinner than a wafer, he has no proven capability to lead. Maybe this is what concerns Asians and Lations. That and Hillary has done a lot for latinos and asians.
But ignore all this,it has to be racism. Seriously liberalism is a mental disorder
I think ‘Razib’ puts it well: ‘… i think it’s not cynical to admit that racism exists in all groups and it ain’t just whitey.’
Of the two, I favour Obama, and I wish more South Asians were supporting Obama, but one thing that is constantly being brought up, that brown people are supporting HRC not Obama, is bothering me slightly. Isn’t the insinuation brown peoples’ natural preference should be for Obama racist?
Probably the selfish side in every desi argues like this – Well if you are a “minority” and want to weild more influence then it is better you side with the “majority” and more “powerful” ( read white ) and thats why probably the more tilt towards Hillary at the expense of “diverse” Obama. And as Razib mentions above apart from some ocassional issues what do the general well off middle class desis have in common with blacks ? Does the average desi really go through all the socio-economic troubles that blacks go through. Absolutely not. I think it is myth that diversity attracts desis and makes them feel comfortable. How many Indian-American who are born here or lived here for a long time feel totally out of place in an all white or less diverse surroundings ? If not what is so appealing about Obama other than the fact that he is young and smooth talks a lot.
If Asian-Americans not wanting to vote Obama is racism, why then is not the black population wanting to vote Obama racism too?
i think it’s pretty obvious that blacks are voting so much for obama in part because of the implicit race baiting of the clintons prior to south carolina. in cany case, black people came here as slaves. they were disenfranchised and lived in a state of apartheid until the 1960s in most of the country. they were ethnically purged from much of the north (read the book ‘sundown towns’). they’ve been part of the history of this country since its founding, and have formed from 10-20% of its population throughout that whole time. i think i would cut them a little slack for voting on ethnic solidarity grounds; as a point of fact clinton and obama aren’t that different in their policy stances.
let’s take asians off the table. latinos voted for clinton even though obama consciously and proactively pandered to them on immigration issues (e.g., driver’s licenses). so what’s up with that?
(i’m speaking as a pragmatic pro-obama libertarian who opposes affirmative action)
Isn’t the insinuation brown peoples’ natural preference should be for Obama racist?
i think you’re over reading 😉 that being said, i think a lot of ABCDs identify with obama for biographical reasons; a multicultural background and bobo ethos.
And as Razib mentions above apart from some ocassional issues what do the general well off middle class desis have in common with blacks ? Does the average desi really go through all the socio-economic troubles that blacks go through. Absolutely not.
remember that among whites obama regular does the best among the super-educated and wealthy. so income is a predictor only in proper context. note that among cali latinos age isn’t an issue; they were pro-hillary up and down. in contrast, whites and blacks showed strong obama preference inversely with age.
Wow, impressive how for Clinton Santa Clara country went. There was a fair bit of Obama support in the tech crowd and at Stanford, where there were 2-hour lines at the polling station. Exit polls at stanford indicated that 75% went for Obama. I’m not sure how statistically significant or proper these polls were, but:
Even though 75% total went for Obama, only 43% of latinos did thesame. Obviously a skewed demographic here, and it may be there were more female latino voters at Stanford than male, but still: among relatively affluent (or to-be affluent) and educated latinos, in an overwhelming pro-obama environment, and age-group, Hillary won.
(Source: http://daily.stanford.edu/article/2008/2/6/clintonWinsCalifornia
This accords with the exit polls Razib pointed to – there does seem to be a lot of historical ties and allegiance to the Clintons that’s likely playing a key role.
As for asian-americans, intuitively I’d have to say some part of the overwhelmingly pro-Hillary split has to be tied with racial issues; especially given relatively little knowledge or info on Obama. It may only be a small component of the split, but anecdotal experience with a lot of first-generation AAs (chinese, vietnames, indian..) suggests this to be the case. After a couple of years of chinese (mandarin) language classes, you’d be surprised how frank the racial insults and slurs are sometimes.. How this compares with bigotry from other communities is unclear, but I’m inclined to say its as big an issue as the whole emergent/insurgent theory in such compressed-timescale elections.
Well if you are a “minority” and want to weild more influence then it is better you side with the “majority” and more “powerful” ( read white ) and thats why probably the more tilt towards Hillary at the expense of “diverse” Obama.
right. we need to get past the cut-out models of the past and get a bit more subtle. look at it game-theoretically and compare the pairwise combinations for example. for example, as a brown-skinned south asian i think i would experience less prejudice from the average white on the west coast than east asian (who are prejudiced against dark-skinned people quite often or find them repulsive), black (who are often anti-immigrant) or latino (who frankly are often not that well educated have some stereotypes about ‘turks’ and what not). if you control for education it isn’t much of an issue, college and post-grad educated people share a common ethos. but racial sensitivity is something non-whites get a pass on so let’s just say that consciousness isn’t always raised (this includes brownz also; i mean, we even discriminate among each other based on region, religion and skin color).
i hate to point it out, but many folks from our parents’ generation of Indians, especially immigrants, can be pretty racist. and, i think the same envy that might exist between latino’s and blacks (but for different reasons) exist between asians (not only south asian) and other minority groups.
you’d be surprised how frank the racial insults and slurs are sometimes..
east asians are as prejudiced against dark skin as south asians (including against dark skinned south asians). some of the tienamann square protests emerged in a background of race riots at beijing university where there were rumors of african students raping chinese women. this is not to say that east asians are nazis, just that people really shouldn’t be surprised. (and obvious east asians often view south asians as blacks, we’re pretty kala as well!)
Err, that’s santa clara county.
Also, asian americans at stanford went overwhelmingly for Obama – 94%. So, some interesting generational shifts here not so present among Latinos at the same campus?
i hate to point it out, but many folks from our parents’ generation of Indians, especially immigrants, can be pretty racist.
if you are a bodega owner what is your typical experience of blacks? a university chicago professor like barack obama? there is correlation between lack of blacks (whitness of a state) and obama support. racism is bad, but those of us who don’t work a mini-mart where black youth insult or intimidate us regularly have certain luxuries in being broad-minded.
Abhi, I understand what you/Chang trying to get at through the emergent vs insurgent idea. But with respect to numbers, in an immigrant community the insurgents will always be outnumbered by emergents. So by that logic Hillary kind of people who indulge in emergent politics will always win over Obama just by sheer number unless somebody really changes the way of thinking of the emergents.
To follow up on what razib said, with regards to RandomDude@12, blacks have demonstrated, time and again, their willingness to vote for white (Democratic) candidates, in huge numbers. On the flip side, whites and Latinos have not shown any particular willingness to vote for black candidates. There’s a big difference between not voting for an otherwise acceptable candidate due to a positive alternative (as in the case of blacks vis-a-vis Clinton and Obama) vs. voting for a candidate because of a negative attitude towards an alternative (which accounts for at least part of the Latino vote). Does anyone doubt that if it were Clinton vs. Edwards, Clinton would be cleaning up the African-American vote?
Razib, Do you have some cites for that? That kind of shocks me, and runs counter to my (admittedly non-representative) experience.
On the flip side, whites and Latinos have not shown any particular willingness to vote for black candidates.
well, illinois has elected two black senators. massachusetts has elected one (in the 1970s) and now has a black governor. seattle’s long time de facto mayor has been black. the point that whites will not vote for blacks is correct. but, there is another that also contribute to this, many black politicians start out in black districts or black cities, and so never develop a broad message which appeals outside the ‘community.’ part of it is due to redistricting which involved collusion between black democrats and republicans (who wanted to get rid of blacks from districts which would then be safely republican).
@ Razib, While the blacks have been through hell in this country, the present generation has it pretty good,with so many advantages available to them. While Indians and Asians were never enslaved in the US, Asian history in the US aint a cakewalk. The Asian exclusion act, Indians being driven out of NE, all point out that Asians too had to struggle to reach their present level of acceptance. So cut Asians some slack when they vote along ethnic solidarity lines as well, or the next best thing Hillary Clinton.
@ jackal So blacks cannot be racist towards east and south asians,right? Why dont you read “Black racism” by Ying Ma? Racism cuts both ways. I could argue that blacks not voting for Hillary could be due to an anti-Asian or anti-Latino bias on the part of blacks.
I’m not saying that counterexamples don’t exist — they clearly do (Obama’s being one of them). But in a big picture, blacks don’t have a problem voting for whites, while the converse is not true.
Do you have some cites for that? That kind of shocks me, and runs counter to my (admittedly non-representative) experience.
personal communication. also, there’s a fair amount of literature on the eugenics movement in east asia in the early 20th century. the chinese intellectuals associated with may 4th movement and what not for example mooted sterilizing all colored races; which was everyone besides east asians and europeans. i don’t know why this should be surprising. i’ve talked to kashmiris who obviously view ‘indians’ as ugly black beasts 😉 (i mean, they don’t come out and say, but the subtext isn’t exactly hidden).
Humm, the stereotype my east asian friends tell me is prevalent among their parents/grandparents generation of south asians/indians is that we’re “smart” but our cooking tends to be, shall we say, ‘fragrant’ 😛 perhaps they were just being polite. on the other hand, the black monkey stereotype seems to be rather prevalent among east asians (even among some family members in India, who I became furious with..). The prejudice and stereotypes seem to be of a different order, at the least.
While the blacks have been through hell in this country, the present generation has it pretty good,with so many advantages available to them. While Indians and Asians were never enslaved in the US, Asian history in the US aint a cakewalk. The Asian exclusion act, Indians being driven out of NE, all point out that Asians too had to struggle to reach their present level of acceptance. So cut Asians some slack when they vote along ethnic solidarity lines as well, or the next best thing Hillary Clinton.
Ask yourself this — would you rather be born black in America, or Asian? Both in terms of historical and current discrimination, I don’t think you can compare Asians and blacks at all…
So cut Asians some slack when they vote along ethnic solidarity lines as well, or the next best thing Hillary Clinton.
i would be cutting them some slack if they voted for bobby jindal. but that’s not what it is obviously if you vote for clinton. like i said, racism isn’t all of it. but they aren’t voting for clinton because they favor white hegemony.
23 · razib said
There is definitely a subtle difference between a wealthy, highly educated, upper middle class white collared Indian american as opposed to middle-lower class less educated blue collared Indian-American ( kind razid referes to above). But if the number of Indian-Americans in the former category is much more than the latter ( though i don’t know the actual numbers here ) then more number of desi will be broad-minded.
back to the general response to abhi’s post and the framing of this issue. i read and listen and there are only polar or two-dimensional analyses. but like i said, we have to look at it game-theoretic like, and case by case basis. whether you identify with obama probably has to do with your situation in life. if you grew up as the only brown kid in a all white town who do you have more in common with biographically? obama, half-kenyan and half-kenyan raised in hawaii and indonesia, or hillary, who grew up in a suburb of chicago and was a goldwater girl? supporting obama to some extent is a form of affirmation of identity politics for many ABDs i think; and many young people general. we feel like ironic outsiders. and he is one of us.
But if the number of Indian-Americans in the former category is much more than the latter ( though i don’t know the actual numbers here ) then more number of desi will be broad-minded.
right, there are multiple parameters you need to plug into your function to generate an expectation. an engineer who came in ’96 from india might be well educated and affluent; but they’re not a stereotypical ‘wine & cheese; voter. brownz born & raised with college educations who evince a ‘pan-brown’ ethic sort of are.
p.s., many affluent immigrant brown americans had to work in crap jobs in grad school or early on in their business career where they encountered disrespectful black youth who would mock them. those of us who were raised in middle class white suburbs didn’t have to go through that experience don’t have the same associations and are appropriately sensitive.
That second point is pretty specious given that exit polling (and other polls) have shown Clinton’s South Carolina antics and race-baiting drove away more black voters than would have otherwise voted for Obama. It’s rather obvious that that more than latino and asian support for clinton made the difference. Of course everybody can be racist. The point is that the overwhelming asian-american numbers for Clinton in California, combined with our ancedotal experiences, suggest race played some, perhaps small, role. As I said, this could largely be the result of poor campaigning and knowledge of the opposing candidate. Is there any data for this? Not that I know of; just observations and intuition. Yeah, I feel like David Brooks..
@ Milind, Depends. If it where a upper middle class black American family vs. a upper middle class Asian (Indian) family, I would want to be born in a middle class black American family. I would be a US citizen, not needing to immigrate, can get federal aid and affirmative action quotas and in general have it much easier. On the other hand I would defnitely not like to be born in a poor black American family, but that has to do with economics and not race.
@ razib, Bobby Jindal is not the typical Indian-American culturally, he is much closer to the white evangelical in the deep South. Hillary is if you could say that, the best proxy Indian-American candidate.
Bobby Jindal is not the typical Indian-American culturally, he is much closer to the white evangelical in the deep South. Hillary is if you could say that, the best proxy Indian-American candidate.
just an FYI, according to the ‘general social survey’ 23% of indian amerians are christian.
Yeah, southern white evangelicals really groove on his Rhodes scholar status–that’s just so them. Seriously, quit giving poor Jindal such a hard time just b/c he panders to the majority on a few issues–all politicians do.
35 · razib said
Razib what do you mean by outsiders. We have grown up here. We are not surrounded by desi folks like DBDs or our immigrant parents. We do everything American maybe ocassionaly indulge in journeys across the ocean or weird langage/food at home. Does that upbringing make you feel uncomfortable with an all white or less diverse surroundings. So I don’t see what desis have in so much common with Obama except the skin color ( not being white ) and having multi-racial parents ? If you are really appealing to politics and power play and issues as Abhi calls it, instead of tug at the heart I don’t see anything that should pull a desi towards Obama anymore than Hillary.
@Razib, Thanks for that. But the Indian American Christians are Catholics and not largely evangelical. Bobby Jindal went out of the way to woo white evangelical southerners, not your average desi irrespective of religion. But still I could say that Bobby Jindal’s victory has given a political visibility to the desi community.
I oppose Obama due to policy. My stance would be the same if Obama where white or Asian.
priya, i don’t feel like an outsider really. i’m way too self-absorbed and conceited to really care much about my relation to most people 😉 that being said, as someone of a muslim background it got old being asked about worshiping a cow. you’re an exotic little weirdo, and obama was too. and yeah, it is emotional. i don’t think there’s much of a policy difference between obama and clinton, especially on domestic issues, so a lot of the results hinge on identity and what not.
He’s a freaking biology major, and rhodes scholar, who’s anti-evolution! He doesn’t just pander, he over-panders or perhaps more frighteningly, actually believes it. The dissonance really ticks me off.
Thanks for that. But the Indian American Christians are Catholics and not largely evangelical. Bobby Jindal went out of the way to woo white evangelical southerners, not your average desi irrespective of religion. But still I could say that Bobby Jindal’s victory has given a political visibility to the desi community.
well, let’s not forget the orthodox, shall we? and there are plenty of converts. and why are you contrasting jindal with catholics when he’s a catholic convert? and yeah, he pandered. he’s a politician.
He’s a freaking biology major, and rhodes scholar, who’s anti-evolution! He doesn’t just pander, he over-panders or perhaps more frighteningly, actually believes it.
brown has a pretty robust evolution integration into their bio program apparently. so he’s lying. and since he’s catholic there’s no necessary relation between his religion and creationism. he was just trying to get bubba to vote for him.
True, but mostly pretty fringe, no? I’m just suggesting that your average “korean-american on the street” doesn’t conflate desis and african-americans.
Well that’s pretty sad. I guess he really wanted to make sure he got elected, and covered all his bases forcefully. He could’ve just not said anything about it, but this being Louisiana, I imagine the democrats would’ve brought up teaching ID anyway.
I’m just suggesting that your average “korean-american on the street” doesn’t conflate desis and african-americans.
no, that’s true. but there are non-african ‘blacks.’ i mean, a lot of brown people are pretty black, and east asia (like other parts of asia 😉 thinks darkness is ugly. don’t worry, they don’t think you’re a brother 😉 and i don’t know how fringe it is. lee kuan yew is pretty disgusted by south asians (and whites), though he’s not vulgar about it (e.g., the famous sterilization of the swimming pool after an indian diplomat had used it).