A few years ago, during a hilarious segment on the Conan O’Brien show, Pete Holmes, an American comedian made a very interesting observation, that it was perfectly okay to be “racist” towards some groups. The show from 2018 notes that while people are super “hypersensitive” about several things, it’s “completely fine” to be “racist towards Italians”. It’s completely okay, argued Pete Holmes to make exaggerated accents giving the example of the superhit videogame Mario in which he says: “It’s a-me, Mario.”
Holmes points out that Mario is actually a struggling immigrant and people ought to help him instead of mocking him to which O’Brien states that it’s also completely okay to make racist stereotypes about the Irish. O’Brien assures Holmes that there wouldn’t be a “letter of complaint” if the duo shouted at each other in exaggerated Italian or an Irish accent.
It would appear, we can add a third group to that list: Indian-Americans. While there have been attempts to educate people about the crude racist stereotypes – like comedian Hari Kondabo did about Apu’s fictional accent – it’s fair to say that it’s far less dangerous to cock one’s snook when one mocks Indian-Americans. For example, no one bats an eyelid when Trevor Noah does a racist Indian accent, but the same wouldn’t fly if it was a different group. This has become apparent with the rise of Vivek Ramaswamy, more so post the GOP debate.
{{/usCountry}}It would appear, we can add a third group to that list: Indian-Americans. While there have been attempts to educate people about the crude racist stereotypes – like comedian Hari Kondabo did about Apu’s fictional accent – it’s fair to say that it’s far less dangerous to cock one’s snook when one mocks Indian-Americans. For example, no one bats an eyelid when Trevor Noah does a racist Indian accent, but the same wouldn’t fly if it was a different group. This has become apparent with the rise of Vivek Ramaswamy, more so post the GOP debate.
{{/usCountry}}This was evident when American journalist Kara Swisher tweeted: “Best nickname I have heard so far for this tech bro: RamaSMARMY. Add yours below — leaving comments open (for now) for this one obvi(sic).”
Perhaps Swisher, didn’t know while tweeting but Ramaswamy stands for Lord Rama, but it was interesting to still see several Indian-Americans call out Swisher for her insensitivity.
Twitter user Vishal Ganeshan wrote: “IMO elite white libs have a lot of pent-up resentment against high achieving Indian Americans, whom they see as competitors. Vivek as a Trumpian conservative is an acceptable target, so now they can finally be openly racist behind the facade of political opposition.”
Another wrote: “Ah, more Hinduphobia from the American Left ('Ramaswamy' is a Tamil/Kannada surname (sic) meaning 'Lord Ram'). And then act as if vilifying Hindus on the basis of their faith is a 'tart and innocuous' thing. No wonder this podcaster turned off replies - she knew she is being racist.”
Another wrote: “The same liberal White woman would call anyone having fun with Obama's name Islamophobic and Racist.”
Another added: “I love how American Progressives are speed running their transformation into a new age KKK.”
Earlier, Vivek Ramaswamy’s faith was targeted by Republicans including the DeSantis campaign and pro-Trump pastor Hank Kuneeman. According to an article in The Rolling Stones, Kunneman, spent a large part of a recent sermon attacking Ramaswamy’s faith, claiming they were in danger from this “new young guy”.
He claimed: “If he does not serve the Lord Jesus Christ you will have a fight with God.” Attacking Ramaswamy’s beliefs, Kunneman said: “What are we doing? You’re gonna have some dude put his hand on something other than the Bible? You’re going to let him put all of his strange gods up in the White House?”
Kunneman said he didn’t care how good “someone’s policies were” if you didn’t profess the “name of Yeshua”. Incidentally, Ramaswamy has never denied his Hindu faith even going as far as saying that he’s not “running for pastor-in-chief” but commander-in-chief. He claims that the “real divide” isn’t between those of Hindu, Christian or Jewish faith” but between those who believe in “one true God” and “those who have replaced the vacuum with new religions like “wokeism, transgenderism, climateism and COVIDism”.
It's fair to say that Vivek Ramaswamy seems to have created a new niche, which was hithertho unseen in Indian-American politics. Most prominent politicians with Indian backgrounds have always had Americanised names like Naveen “Bobby” Jindal or Nimarata “Nikki” Haley. Vivek Ramaswamy in his tailored suit and glib speeches is testament to a new confident community of Indian Americans, who no longer want to be Papa Joe's favourite altar boy but is willing to be an equal representative in the 'greatest country of earth'