Are you in an Aviyal Relationship?

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sindoor.jpg My baby cousin at UCLA still hasn’t forgiven me for joining Facebook. His objection is not that I’m too old for it or that I lessen its “cool factor” with my elderly presence—he just hates the program and apparently I was the last person he knew and cared about, who was not on it. That had more to do with pragmatic causes than most anything else; I was happy on Friendster and consummately preferred it to MyAss or the more “global”/Brazilian Orkut. I didn’t have time to maintain profiles on a plethora of time-sucks. And most relevant of all, I couldn’t be bothered to get an “alumni” email addy from either of the schools I managed to graduate from…and once upon a time, you needed such official stuff to participate in the Facebook-orgy.

Not anymore. And so a few of you began inviting me to join it and I pointedly ignored such requests…until one of you was Facebook-stalking a guy you thought was sooo cute.

“What’s his friendster link?”, I asked.

“He’s not ON friendster…he’s only on Facebook!”

“Well, then I can’t see him.”

“But you just HAVE to see this one picture…I have a feeling you know his friend.”

“You know how I’ve never been a bridesmaid?”

“Yeah what does that have to do with anything??”

“I’m signing up for this bullshit right now, so A) you best marry his ass and B) I best be in some sort of poufy outfit, twitching out of boredom on an altar in a year or three.”

“Omg, whatever you want, just SIGN UP” Continue reading →

SRK is Fair & Handsome

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Via the News Tab, mutineer Dari points us at FT coverage of Shah Rukh Khan’s ad for Fair and Handsome skin cream –

Strong enough for a wheatish woman but made for a man…

Shah Rukh Khan, Bollywood’s biggest star and corporate India’s most ubiquitous brand ambassador, is coming under pressure to abandon his controversial endorsement of a men’s skin-lightening cream.

Television commercials for Fair and Handsome, airing in August, show Mr Khan (or “SRK”) lauding a product that many see as entrenching discrimination based on skin colour by encouraging people to bleach themselves a lighter hue.

…Mr Khan urges a dark-complexioned and depressed-looking young man, struggling to attract female attention, to stop using skin-lightening products designed for women.

“Why are you secretly using a cream for girls?” Mr Khan asks. “Their skin is soft. Yours is rough and tough.” Several shades whiter and visibly more self-confident by the end of the 40-second commercial, the young man duly snares the girl of his dreams.

The commercial, of course, is up for all to see on YouTube –

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Cuddling and being dirty can halt HIV?

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soap.jpg

So I’m reading Jezebel, where they wittily illustrate their take on a certain news story with a photograph of a turtleneck…

…and I realize that obviously, what is being discussed there MUST be blogged here, because if there’s anything which is widely relevant to the brown Diaspora, it is the wearing of, ahem, turtlenecks. On your pee-pees. And for those of you who are sporting one such fleshy outfit, take heed– today’s Grey Lady has some filthy words for ya.

A study in Uganda has come up with a surprising finding about sex and H.I.V. Washing the penis minutes after sex increased the risk of acquiring H.I.V. in uncircumcised men.
The sooner the washing, the greater the risk of becoming infected, the study found. Delaying washing for at least 10 minutes after sex significantly lowered the risk of H.I.V. infection, Dr. Fredrick E. Makumbi reported on July 25 at an International AIDS Society Conference in Sydney, Australia.
The researchers do not have a precise explanation for the findings, which challenge common wisdom and the teaching of many infectious disease experts who urge penile cleansing as part of good genital hygiene. Health experts have suggested that washing the penis after sex could prevent potentially infectious vaginal secretions from entering the body through the uncircumcised penis.

A lubricious error (and what inspired the picture I chose to go with this post)!

Because of a slip-up, the researchers did not ask details of how the cleansing was done or directly about using soap, said Dr. Ronald H. Gray, a co-author from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Some soaps used in Africa are more irritating than those used elsewhere.

See? That’s why you should take happy little soap’s advice and rub…never mind. Continue reading →

NYC Meetup Wrapup

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A quick thanks to all the folks who showed up last Saturday evening for the SM / UB joint meetup. A N N A’s ankle precluded her attendance (get well!) but long time mega-commentor Razib was one of several surprise guests for the evening.

Festivities were scheduled to start @ 5pm but more than just moi + Manish suffered from IST – Verlaine only opened its doors @ 6pm so a few of us socialized outside for a bit. While Verlaine had initially planned to allocate a small corner up front, our numbers swelled and by peak hour our >>50 folks occupied the entire front half of the venue (“we don’t die, we multiply”). Including in&out flow of peeps, I’d guesstimate we had close to 70 people over the course of the evening. About 15 folks survived till about 10pm when a few of us broke off to grab dinner @ the Mexican place next door.

I did my best to circulate and say hello, make a few intro’s and the like but alas, there were quite a few folks I didn’t get a chance to connect with. Still, I was a bit surprised by the number of lurkers + not-quite-regular readers I met. I sorta expected some of the regulars but was duly impressed with the folks who drove up from Philly, NJ, LI and other places to partake in some desi camraderie despite hitting the blog perhaps once or 2x a month. Wild stuff.

Pictures? Well, fotog extraordinaire, Preston Merchant has a few snaps up on his site and Ultrabrown host Manish Vij has a few more picts + commentary over here. Neither of them quite have the one pict that conveyed the scale of the event but it’s a fun browse nevertheless. Any attendees – would love to hear your take in the comments.

Off we go to San Francisco.

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I feel SO much safer now!

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baby terrorist.jpg Abhi posted a link on our news tab to a story about…well, stupidity. Way to focus on the fine print, while actual, credible threats go unchecked.

For seven-year-old Javaid Iqbal, the holiday to Florida was a dream trip to reward him for doing well at school.
But he was left in tears after he was stopped repeatedly at airports on suspicion of being a terrorist.
The security alerts were triggered because Javaid shares his name with a Pakistani man deported from the US, prompting staff at three airports to question his family about his identity.
The family even missed their flight home from the U.S. after officials cancelled their tickets in the confusion. And Javaid’s passport now contains a sticker saying he has undergone highlevel security checks.

Little Javaid is a British citizen of Pakistani origin, which makes his “dream” of going to Florida-land as a reward for his good grades even more poignant, to me. The other Javaid is a 39-year old Pakistani who was arrested in connection with 9/11; while they convicted that Javaid of fraud and deported him, he was never charged with anything related to terrorism. His name, obviously, is a red flag for the exquisitely useful database/process which Homeland Security created…you know, the one which apparently doesn’t bother cross-checking birthdays in order to discern the difference between two or more people who share a name.

Because of this cluster, Javaid’s parents are debating a name-change for their unfortunately-nomenclated* offspring, and I don’t blame them, though I can only imagine how frustrated and resentful they might be. September 12, 2001…the day common sense commenced its slow and horrific death.

I found the reactions from people who had read the article interesting. Illuminating, even.

Said Craig from London:

Poor kid, my passport was mistakenly stamped with the incorrect stamp when transiting though Australia a few years back, the immigration bloke realised it and crossed out the initial stamp and re-stamped it correctly but I still often get asked “why were you refused entry to Australia” when going through immigration. Still if simply changing your name is enough to bypass the system it shows how utterly pointless the US no-fly list is.

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Meet Imus’ replacement

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Most folks have probably heard by now that former morning radio show host/shock jock Don Imus, fired for his racially charged invective against 19-year-old girls, recently settled a lawsuit with CBS that could pave the way for him to return to the airways:

Imus was fired in April after referring to a mostly black university women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hos,” a racial slur that generated a storm of controversy and led CBS Radio to cancel his “Imus in the Morning” show.

CBS and MSNBC first suspended Imus’ show for two weeks, but as calls to fire him grew, notably from New York civil rights leader Al Sharpton, MSNBC dropped the show and CBS followed suit the next day.

“Don Imus and CBS Radio have mutually agreed to settle claims that each had against the other regarding the Imus radio program on CBS. The terms of the settlement are confidential and will not be disclosed,” CBS and Imus’ lawyer said in a joint statement. [Link]

Leaks indicate that Imus will probably get 20 million in the settlement. What might be of most interest in all of this however, especially to our readers, is who has been tapped by CBS to replace Imus. It is obvious that CBS is looking to make up for its former host’s racial biases. NOT:

He was verbal about the Indian-American community whenever he got the chance, critics say, and now Craig Carton has a national platform.

That makes many Asian Indians unhappy.

Members of the Asian community are saying that CBS is making a mistake by hiring the New Jersey 101.5 FM radio shock jock who has maligned the Asian-Indian community repeatedly in recent years on his “Jersey Guys” radio show.

It was announced by WFAN-AM, New York, Tuesday that Carton will co-host the morning radio show that used to be the turf of Don Imus, fired in April for making racial and sexist slurs about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team. Carton takes over the morning show with Boomer Esiason beginning Sept. 4.

Carton has hosted 101.5’s “The Jersey Guys” broadcast during the afternoon drive-time slot for five years. [Link]

You know what our community needs?? An Al Sharpton-type figure. I remind me of a young Al Sharpton sometimes. I’m just sayin’, if the community wants me to step up then I might [crickets chirp loudly in the background]. For those of you who have forgotten as to why we think the Jersey Guys are morons and why Carton’s mouth doesn’t deserve a wider audience, may I direct you here, here, here, and here. So in summary, racism is good for radio as it brings in listeners who then buy the products advertised during the show. Don’t complain to the radio show when Carton inevitably starts spewing garbage. Complain to the advertisers. Or better yet, listen to NPR instead.

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Will "Clergy Response Teams" be inclusive enough?

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Louisiana’s local news station KSLA had a rather intriguing headline last week. In a television news report they made the claim that the Department of Homeland Security is currently training members of local clergies to help out is some capacity should the Executive Branch ever declare Martial Law within the United States:

Could martial law ever become a reality in America? Some fear any nuclear, biological or chemical attack on U.S. soil might trigger just that. KSLA News 12 has discovered that the clergy would help the government with potentially their biggest problem: Us…

If martial law were enacted here at home, like depicted in the movie “The Siege”, easing public fears and quelling dissent would be critical. And that’s exactly what the ‘Clergy Response Team’ helped accomplish in the wake of Katrina.

Dr. Durell Tuberville serves as chaplain for the Shreveport Fire Department and the Caddo Sheriff’s Office. Tuberville said of the clergy team’s mission, “the primary thing that we say to anybody is, ‘let’s cooperate and get this thing over with and then we’ll settle the differences once the crisis is over.'”

Such clergy response teams would walk a tight-rope during martial law between the demands of the government on the one side, versus the wishes of the public on the other. “In a lot of cases, these clergy would already be known in the neighborhoods in which they’re helping to diffuse that situation,” assured Sandy Davis. He serves as the director of the Caddo-Bossier Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness.

For the clergy team, one of the biggest tools that they will have in helping calm the public down or to obey the law is the bible itself, specifically Romans 13. Dr. Tuberville elaborated, “because the government’s established by the Lord, you know. And, that’s what we believe in the Christian faith. That’s what’s stated in the scripture…” [Link]

It should be noted that KSLA was just the latest to reveal information/rumors about this program. A few other websites on the internet (of varying authority and reliability) mention other details:

A whistleblower who was secretly enrolled into the program told us that the feds were clandestinely recruiting religious leaders to help implement Homeland Security directives in anticipation of a potential bio-terrorist attack, any natural disaster or a nationally declared emergency… It was stressed that the Pastors needed to preach subservience to the authorities ahead of time in preparation for the round-ups and to make it clear to the congregation that “this is for their own good.”

Pastors were told that they would be backed up by law enforcement in controlling uncooperative individuals and that they would even lead SWAT teams in attempting to quell resistance. [Link]

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“Exotic Flavor for Flav”

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From Fuerza Dulce comes this video clip of a contestant trying to get on VH1’s Flavor of Love:

I sputtered. I laughed. I frowned. Honestly – I’m confused. It’s a pretty bizarre mish-mash of orientalist cliches, done in a ham handed way. It’s neither hilarious nor completely unfunny, although she does act like she’s in on the joke.

Here’s the question – is Orientalism OK when we do it? Or does one desi’s 15 minutes of fame in brownface make the rest of our lives harder by not just reinforcing these tired tropes, but making them seem OK?

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Bill Sali is So Wrong, He’s Superwrong

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Congressman Bill Sali (R-Idaho) recently criticized the attempted opening of a session of the U.S. Senate with a Hindu prayer (which did not go well for reasons having nothing to do with him: see Anna’s post). He also openly lamented the presence of a Muslim Congressman, Keith Ellison. As Sali puts it, “Those are changes, and they are not what was envisioned by the Founding Fathers.” Now he’s made another statement clarifying the earlier remarks to the Nampa Press Tribune:

Friday, Sali said multiculturalism is in conflict with the national motto “E Pluribus Unum,” or “out of many, one.” He said multiculturalism would mean “out of the many, the many.”

“The question is, is multiculturalism good or not?” Sali said. “I don’t think the Founding Fathers were multicultural. Multiculturalism is the antithesis of (the motto).” Sali said the United States was founded on principles derived primarily from the Scriptures. And he said drifting away from those principles could put the country in danger.

“If we’re going to move away from those principles … we better consider the blessings of God that have been bestowed on this country and the protective hand of God that’s been over this country,” Sali said. (link)

Wow, he just gets wronger and wronger. Sali is confusing, in a fundamental and embarrassing way, the idea of religious freedom, which is unambiguously written into the Constitution, and the fuzzy contemporary concept of multiculturalism. For Sali, a Muslim Congressman or a Hindu prayer in the Senate can be sneered at as “multiculturalism,” when in fact it is simply Americans exercising their First Amendment rights to freedom of religion.

Relatedly, Sali is dead wrong when he says that the Founding Fathers were operating on “principles derived from the Scriptures.” (He’s trying to pull a fast one with that sneaky word, “derived.”) Like other conservatives who want to impose their idea of “God’s law” on us, Sali is flagrantly ignoring who Thomas Jefferson was and what he believed.

(For even more painful wrongness try this: last year Sali argued that the rate of breast cancer in the U.S. is linked to abortion — in a speech he gave on the House floor.)

Fortunately, not all Republicans are like Sali. Yesterday I stopped by the India Day celebration at Penn’s Landing, Philadelphia. It was a perfect August day, and the bright saris and salwar kameezes were flapping in the breeze — while massive rusty barges moved down the Delaware, headed for China. On stage, the endless array of high school girls doing Bollywood dance numbers was briefly interrupted by Al Taubenberger, Republican nominee for Mayor. In front of a crowd of 300-400, including a number of non-desis, Taubenberger patted Indian Americans on the back for “working hard and playing by the rules.” Amidst the sipping of mango lassis and the many voices whispering “who’s this guy again?” in at least a dozen Indian languages, there was a smattering of applause. Continue reading →