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I want to applaud Joel Stein for his hilarious account of Edison, New Jersey in his Time magazine article this week, "My Own Private India"; it is as unique and groundbreaking as Thomas Alva himself.
Were it not for the intelligent, fresh sense of humor of individuals like Mr. Stein, the world may never know about Americans who happen to be of Indian descent. Gags about impossibly spicy food? I'd never heard those before! Multiple Gods with multiple arms? Multiple laughs! Recounting racial slurs like "dot-head"? Oh, Mr. Stein, is too good! I don't know how he comes up with such unique bits. (I was worried that he'd missed an opportunity to joke about Dr. King's predecessor, Gandhi, but I see that he got to that hilarity on Twitter. More never-before-heard satire!)
Growing up a few miles from Edison, NJ, I always thought it was hilarious when I'd get the crap kicked out of me by kids like Stein who would yell "go back to India, dothead!" I was always ROTFLMAO when people would assume that I wasn't American. He really captured the brilliant humor in that one too!
Critics might call Mr. Stein's humor super-tired or as played out as the jokes about that cheap Jewish car that stopped on a dime to pick it up, or that African American kid who got marked absent at night school. Although unlike Stein's Indian American piece, in 2010 those other jokes don't show up in mainstream media like Time Magazine. I wonder why that is...
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But progress can be noted in the fight against ethnic slurs in the substitution of 'Blonds' for 'Polish' in jokes involving stupidity.
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onegandolf1 46 minutes ago (10:05 AM)OK
What Stein wrote about "geniuses brought over their merchant cousins, and they in turn brought even less bright cousins" is very true and hillarious. But that goes with every race, even in this good old US of A, we all love, we have Carter and his less bright brother, Bush and his brother with questionable S&L; deal and so on...no harm done there. I am sure Joel has several not so bright cousins tucked away somewhere.
So I hope Joel Stein comes up with another article to counteract what he wrote without giving much thought just to fit the Thomas Edison section of the TIME, that how it would affect the other side .
I also do not see Kal Penn was acting oner sensitive or touchy in what he wrote...as some bloggers suggested.
And now this article - I guess when the right speaks about race, its racisim; the left talks about race and their words are taken out of context. The left's new slogan "I can have my cake and eat it too".
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MegWe 2 hours ago (8:57 AM)My POV is that your logic is so circular you give new meaning to the word "spin." And today, that is indeed saying something.
2. Bush nada, no legal repercussions for any of many proved lies and deceptions and betrayal of the constitution that have adversely affected millions of lives
3. Trent Lott losing his post was an action of his own party, Strom Thurmond never recanted
4. Byrd has been totally reamed by the conservative media undermining his long career of public service
5. Fawell? do you mean "Folwell" I thought Jerry has passed away -- Wright hardly got a free pass from the left, he has lost his reputation and his role as friend and mentor in the president's life
6. Is Joel Stein on the right?
7. Seems to me anyone "on the left" who makes a joke about race is thoroughly castigated. The media is a hundred times harder "on the left" than on the conservatives any day.
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JayMonaco 53 minutes ago (9:59 AM)HUFFPOST COMMUNITY MODERATOR
Amalek 3 hours ago (8:19 AM)Being careful of folks we don't know is instinct, even when they look like us. Racism is TAUGHT.
Simply put: Stein flubbed and in a big way.
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MattGuillen 4 hours ago (6:55 AM)His article was meant to be light and in good fun, I'm sure. But the good fun images of the "miserly Jew" evolved into made it acceptable to go that extra step--from humor to banking conspiracies to everything else that brought Hitler into power.
Humor is the most dangerous weapon of all simply because it is so subtle. It perniciously lulls you into a sense of acceptance of whatever traits it pokes fun at. Stein passes smoothly from genius to less genius to tacitly stupid in a few brief phrases.
Already some comment on this article refers to getting computer help via telephone from someone whose English is unintelligible. Next come jokes about jobs being taken away from more deserving "real" Americans.
And soon you have the very unfunny AZ law. Or in the case of German Jews, laws providing for members of the German-Jewish community to carry IDs at all times, signifying what percentage "Jewishness" ran in their genes.
We had the same thing in America after the Civil War. In Louisiana, an "Octaroon" was someone one-eighth Black, and thus ineligible to ride in White railroad cars.
Well, Mr. Stein--I've just fed you a line I'm sure you shouldn't pass up: "macaroon" for "Octaroon"
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KIVPossum 8 hours ago (2:45 AM)put in that dotheads was too tame of an insult and insult yourself for not thinking of better insults.. and keep smiling !!!! pretty cool, eh?
how adorable.. how funny! Joel sells bridges and ppl are buying all over.. what a cutie!
HERE IS SOME MORE RACISM FOR YOU!
INDIAN OWNED OUTSOURCING COMPANIES DISCRIMINATE AGAINST AMERICANS!
Indian owned outsourcing companies operating on American soil will not hire Americans (of any racial background). We are talking about discrimination involving tens of thousands of jobs here and this has been happening for a decade now, YET THERE IS NO OUTCRY AGAINST THESE INDIAN OWNED CORPORATIONS OPERATING ON AMERICAN SOIL THAT RACIALLY DISCRIMINATE AGAINST AMERICAN CITIZENS OF ALL RACIAL BACKGROUNDS, ETHNIC GROUPS, AND RELIGIONS.
"The ‘H-1B and L-1 Visa Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act’, co-sponsored by Senators Richard J. Durbin (Illinois) and Charles E. Grassley (Iowa) earlier this year aimed to “overhaul the H-1B and L-1 visa programs to give priority to American workers and crack down on unscrupulous employers who deprive qualified Americans of high-skill jobs.”
Among other things, the bill proposed that companies with at least 50% foreign workforce in the US be prevented from seeking more work visas, besides mandatory requirement to advertise jobs in government
http://www
There is a BIG difference between laws which discriminate (i.e Japanese which ban imports but monopolize on exports to benefit themselves) vs. calling people dumb, smelly and dotheads, and offending their religion. You know it.
Not sure what you are talking about here buddy. What part is hype and what are the details that you are talking about here? THESE ARE COMPANIES, OPERATING ON AMERICAN SOIL, THAT DISCRIMINATE AGAINST AMERICANS OF ALL RACES AND ETHNIC BACKGROUNDS (EXCEPT INDIANS). READ THE ARTICLE, ESPECIALLY THE LAST SENTENCE, WHICH I HAVE SEPARATED OUT FOR YOU IN CASE YOU DON'T GET IT:
"Indian engineers on temporary work visas constitute at least 80% of the workforce at most of the leading Indian information technology services firms operating in the US."
THESE COMPANIES, ON AMERICAN SOIL, ARE ALLOWED TO DISCRIMINATE AGAINST AMERICANS OF ALL ETHNIC BACKGROUNDS IN FAVOR OF INDIANS (80% OF THEIR WORKFORCE).
IN CASE YOU DON'T GET IT, U.S. CITIZEN AFRICAN AMERICANS, MEXICANS AND OTHER LATINOS, CHINESE, JAPANESE, EUROPEANS, WOMEN, ARABS, AND ANY OTHER U.S. CITIZEN CANNOT GET A JOB AT THESE COMPANIES. VIRTUALLY ALL JOBS AT THESE COMPANIES GO TO INDIAN MALES ON H-1B GUEST WORKER VISAS. THERE IS NO "IMPORT / EXPORT LAW THAT DISCRIMINATES" INVOLVED HERE - JUST PLAIN DISCRIMINATION, RACISM, AND XENOPHOBIA ON THE PART OF THE INDIAN OUTSOURCING CORPORATIONS OPERATING ON U.S. SOIL DOING WORK FOR U.S. CLIENTS.
THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RACE BASED JOB DISCRIMINATION AND CALLING PEOPLE DUMB, SMELLY, DOTHEADS, AND OFFENDING THEIR RELIGION. IN FACT, THIS IS MUCH WORSE BECAUSE IT DEPRIVES U.S. CITIZENS OF ALL ETHNIC BACKGROUNDS FROM BEING ABLE TO PARTICIPATE IN A FAIR LABOR MARKET.
How is fair job opportunities associated with right wingers and racists? How is talking about racism in an article about racism "spinning a discussion away from the main point"?
Before you accuse people of being racists and right wingers, you really should get an idea of what the situation in question is all about. Here it is in case you missed it:
"Indian engineers on temporary work visas constitute at least 80% of the workforce at most of the leading Indian information technology services firms operating in the US."
As a response to this and after over a decade of abuse by these companies, some in Congress have actually started to pay attention to the issue and have come up with some reforms. We are trying to gain support for those reforms because the Indian software lobbying group NASSCOM has enormous power in Congress. Here is the part about the Congressional reform being proposed:
"The ‘H-1B and L-1 Visa Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act’, co-sponsored by Senators Richard J. Durbin (Illinois) and Charles E. Grassley (Iowa) earlier this year aimed to “overhaul the H-1B and L-1 visa programs to give priority to American workers and crack down on unscrupulous employers who deprive qualified Americans of high-skill jobs.”
If you don't believe anything unless you've seen it on HuffPo first, here is the link:
Donna Conroy's H-1B article:
http://www
Also, many U.S. citizens have applied for these jobs, they just don't reply back. These companies used to actually specify "H-1B only" until people started complaining about it, like this add from last March:
http://usa
Additional restriction
Only Candidates looking for H1B transfers can apply for this position
Now they don't specify H-1B only in the job advertisements, but they don't reply back to U.S. citizens either.
I have worked with H-1Bs and I have never seen one that is dramatically more technically competent than a U.S. worker, and many times I have also seen my share of much less competent H-1B workers.
The "rocket scientist" portrayal is also a bunch of nonsense - if these guys were that big of geniuses they could all come in on the O visa, the visa for extraordinary intelligence, for which there is NO LIMIT (i.e. you can bring in as many "rocket scientist" quality geniuses as you want, just so long as they are really "rocket scientist" quality.
As far as competency goes, are you sure that they were not just testing them for competency because there is so much fraud in the H-1B system (fraud and violations found to be > 20% of all applicants by a recent study by USCIS:
http://www
Bottom line, I don't believe you.
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MegWe 2 hours ago (8:59 AM)