{"id":3930,"date":"2006-11-04T18:03:01","date_gmt":"2006-11-04T23:03:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com?p=3930"},"modified":"2006-11-06T14:31:17","modified_gmt":"2006-11-06T19:31:17","slug":"whats_in_a_name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/2006\/11\/04\/whats_in_a_name\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s in a Name?"},"content":{"rendered":"

With what seems to be the ongoing theme<\/a> on Sepia<\/a> Mutiny this<\/a> week of<\/a> (self) identification<\/a> of South Asian Americans<\/a> and racialization of America<\/a>, I had to share the following story I got in my inbox this morning. My friend’s name is Nirva<\/strong>. Nice desi<\/em> name, right? Nirva is shopping for a bicycle, and found one on craigslist…<\/a><\/p>\n\n

Nirva:<\/strong> I saw your add on craigs list about the bicycle sale. And, I’m really interested in the nishikisport and murray women’s bikes. Are both of these frames lightweight and are they new? Thanks, Nirva \n

<\/p>\n

Craigslist Bike Seller:<\/strong> what nirva, whateva<\/font><\/blockquote>\n\n

[What exactly deos the “whateva” mean? Was it an insult to her name? Or was it a “we have no bikes for you”?]<\/p>\n\n

N:<\/strong> i am sorry what did you say? <\/blockquote>\n\n
<\/p>\n

CBS:<\/strong> oh yeah righ they are brand new for 80 dollars yes. come right over this is hollywood and you can buy a bike nishiki brand for 80 dollars. what boat did you just get off?<\/font><\/blockquote>\n\n

[“What boat did I get off?” Kind of presumptuous to get all of that simply from her first name, don’t ya think?]<\/p>\n\n

N:<\/strong> Excuse you…..First of all. It’s a question. If you want to answer it then answer it right. Damn you’re great with customer sales. Ya really want the bike now. Go take some happy pills and think twice before you get on a high horse and act anti-immigrant. \n

<\/p>\n

CBS:<\/strong> anti-immigrant? I just saw the movie Borat and you can not take a Joke!<\/font> I do not think you want the bikes since they are not Brand New. They are used and I am sorry if I offended you but you are obviously too serious.<\/blockquote>\n\n

[Oh no. She didn’t go there with a Borat<\/a> reference…]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

N:<\/strong> I don’t want your bike because of your first response “what nirva, whateva” and because you asked me “what boat did you just come off” (by the way anyone would find that to be a little on the anti-immigrant side). <\/p>\n

You think you’re not anti-immigrant because you saw the movie Borat??!?!??!?!! Borat’s all about highlighting how anti-immigrant and stupid people are when it comes to dealing with people of other cultures, not to mention the guy who plays Borat is a white guy from England (He’s not really from Khazakstan in case you didn’t know) So you think you you’re not anti-immigrant cuz you saw a dumbass mainstream movie? A person who truly supported immigrants would never say something like “what boat did you just come off?” \n

You think I can’t take a joke. Sure I can. What I can’t take is an offensive comment. \n

CBS:<\/strong> blah bla bla, go eat some cake you cake eater. hey nirva you need to get those papers soon thats why you are too uptight. hurry up and go to the ins and stand in line<\/font><\/blockquote>\n\n

<<\/p>\n\n

p>I think she needs to go buy that bike just so that we can get an i.d. on this craigslist bike seller. My first thought when I read this interaction is CBS is never going to sell her bikes with that kind of a ‘customer is always right’ attitude. My second thought — Borat is how she justified those comments, really? Final third thought — in this crazed world of anonymity of internet where one feels empowered to say whatever they feel like, the idiots can still make racists comments inferred all from a single name. No where in her entire e-mail was her ethnicity or race ever mentioned – CBS felt that they could make bigoted comments on Nirva’s ethnicity simply by her first name.<\/p>\n\n

What is<\/em> in a name? After all, names is why Kalpen Modi changed his stage name<\/a> to Kal Penn – and saw an increase in audition calls subsequently. How many desis do we know who have ‘Americanized’ names — or nicknames of cartoon characters to make it easier on other people to say your name? Would CBS have reacted the way she did, had Nirva signed her e-mail with a ‘Betty’ or ‘Cindy’? Would CBS have had the courage to say the things she said in the e-mail to Nirva’s face? I think Nirva responded quite civilly — I think I may have let my temper get the best of me if I responded to those e-mails …What would you have done?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With what seems to be the ongoing theme on Sepia Mutiny this week of (self) identification of South Asian Americans and racialization of America, I had to share the following story I got in my inbox this morning. My friend’s … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,10,30],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3930"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3930"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3930\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}