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Confronting anti-blackness in our community
We’ve known for a long, long time that colourism is rampant in South Asia. And now, in light of everything that is happening in the world, we should acknowledge that we are also some of the worst perpetrators of anti-black racism. We may fall under the same People of Colour (POC) umbrella, but we are not yet the allies we need to be.
Recently, cricketer Daren Sammy, who played for the IPL team Sunrise Hyderabad, posted a video on Instagram where he described being called “ kalu ” by some of his teammates, under the impression that it was a harmless nickname. In the video, he shared how, whenever he was called kalu , there would be laughter around the room, which he thought nothing of. After learning the true meaning of the word, he urged the individuals responsible to reach out to confirm whether they were using the word in a derogatory sense or not. Unsurprisingly, there are people justifying casual racism, refusing to accept that it’s a racial slur, saying it’s just a nickname . And therein lies the problem.
Several Bollywood actors have also faced criticism for showing support for the Black Lives Matter movement while also promoting skin lightening products. I remember those fairness cream adverts from when I was a little girl, and having that seed planted in my mind that “fair = lovely”. That light skin was something to strive towards, and that dark skin was something that needed to be fixed. Fair skin was associated with affluence, as only the rich could afford to stay indoors out of the shade and avoid manual labour. To have dark skin meant that you worked outdoors, and therefore meant you were poor. For these celebrities, activism seems to consist of merely posting a black square on social media with a hashtag, without putting the effort and resources into combatting discrimination and the stereotypes they’ve profited from and helped perpetuate for years. And I think part of the reason for this is that people don’t want to admit that they were or are part of the problem. People do not want to be held accountable, and that in turn limits progress.
There are Bangladeshi rappers who use the n-word as if it adds authenticity to their image. There is a sense of entitlement there, because to them it is part of hip-hop culture and thus an essential component of the music. They feel justified in using the n-word, because to them it is something that is reserved for all POC, not just for black people. There is very little regard for the history of the word. It has been reclaimed by black people and black people only , and should only be used by them. Being non-white doesn’t automatically mean us brown people have the right to use a word that had been used for hundreds of years to degrade and discriminate against black people, and is still used to this day to racially abuse black people. Similar to the Daren Sammy incident, it’s not the intent that matters. Whether it’s used harmlessly or merely as an attempt to emulate black musicians is beside the point—the word is rooted in racism and as long as non-black people continue to use it in whatever context, it will serve as a reminder that we feel more entitled to use a single word than we have empathy for the injustices that black people have faced for centuries. There is no debate. It is a word that is simply not ours to use.
Our anti-blackness is also evident in the way we would rather have a white foreigner marry into the family than a black foreigner—“ Kalo na hoilei holo ”(“as long as they are not black”). That is the attitude that so many Bangladeshi families hold, and I have seen this first-hand. It harks back to colonialism and the caste-based discrimination which is still so prevalent in our communities. We already have a problem with putting more emphasis on academic achievements than judging people by their character, and then we add race on top of that and end up breeding this incredibly harmful mentality that black people are just undesirable as in-laws. We create this hierarchy that places black people right at the very bottom, with absolutely no logic to support it.
It’s as if black people only exist for us to benefit from their contributions to sport, film, literature, music, art, food. We celebrate the things they create while simultaneously ignoring their plight, and limiting our allyship to a few performative acts on social media.
Black people should not have to die for us to realise that there is still a massive prejudice issue at home and in South Asian diasporas. We should not have to rely on black people to draw elaborate analogies to explain why they deserve equality. Black people are being murdered with impunity by the very people who are meant to protect them. It shouldn’t take acts of senseless violence against black people to spark conversation about our anti-black racism and how we are contributing to the systemic oppression of black people around the world. Our silence is equivalent to complicity.
Through acts of micro-aggressions, casual racism, and then actual racism, we South Asians are allowing white supremacy to thrive. Comedian Nish Kumar put it succinctly: “We can either stand in support of the Black Lives Matter movement or we can be the foot soldiers of white supremacy.” We need to check our behaviour on a regular basis. We need to confront racism and biases in our everyday lives and have those uncomfortable conversations with family members. We need to educate ourselves, our elders and the younger generations, and challenge ignorance in its many, many forms at every step of the way. Racism isn’t just shouting slurs at minorities—it is systemic and institutionalised. It’s a global and multi-faceted issue that doesn’t exist in a monolith.
To focus our attention on our own relationship with it does not negate or undermine the struggles of other minority groups around the world. We should be capable of having conversations about multiple issues—it is incredibly exhausting to keep up the activism and to constantly be learning, but it’s a fraction compared to how people who experience it daily feel. We must be able to talk about things without resorting to whataboutisms. The crux of this article is specifically about the anti-blackness in the South Asian community, but it does not mean there aren’t other forms of prejudice present.
As targets of discrimination ourselves, we have every responsibility to look out for our brothers and sisters in other marginalised groups. This movement is about justice and solidarity. We know all too well what it feels like to be oppressed because of the colour of our skin, which is all the more reason to unite in the fight to dismantle the systems built to keep us down. We can’t effect change on a global scale if we do not adjust our attitudes at home.
There is currently a colossal paradigm shift taking place. The events of the last few months will, hopefully, be studied for generations to come. We are witnessing perhaps the largest civil rights movement in history, and it is up to us to decide which side we want to take.
Zahrah Haider is a freelance writer currently working as an editor for the International Bar Association. All views expressed are her own.
PHOTO: REUTERS