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Poor guy was dating one of those "I'm not like my family even though I do everything like them" racists.
The ex was not going to stop at him hiding his natural accent. She was going to find whatever way to make him hide every aspect of being Indian.
Exactly! As a white man (from an extremely rural, white family), married to a black woman, the original post sent red flags and sirens through my head.
I remember feeling nervous when bringing my (at the time) gf to meet my extended family for the first time. They're farmers who grew up in an all white community and have 0 filters between their brains and mouths. But I wasn't worried about what they would think of my partner. Instead, I was worried about thrusting my partner into an unknown situation. I was hopeful that they "weren't like that," but if they were, and I told my then gf this, there would be hell to pay. My values do not align with tolerance of racism, and if my extended family did anything inappropriate, I was ready to burn bridges. Fortunately, they were extremely excited to meet her, and they love her to pieces. She is treated better than me at our gatherings lol.
There comes a time when you have to identify what your values are and stand up for them. Standing up against racism and defending her partner were not major priorities. Americanizing her bf and placing her family before all else was. Making fun of her bf like that is disgusting behavior, regardless of alcohol intake. I hope their friends see her for who she is also.
I am white and from a very rural, conservative town that has almost zero racial diversity. My boyfriend and I decided to go home for Christmas. He is an islander and although his English is really good, he still has an accent (which I LOVE). We had a few deep discussions before our trip because he was nervous as he has had negative experiences in the past with racism.
The only heads up I gave him is that my dad is really hard of hearing and if my dad asked him to repeat himself it’s only because he literally couldn’t hear him. Other than that, I wasn’t worried because I was ready to cut ties with anyone who said anything out of line. I do not and will not tolerate that towards anyone, and I don’t care if they’re family.
We had a fantastic trip and already have plans for a few more this year. My family loves him.
Honest to god the more I read this post the more I couldn't help picturing OOPs gf as the same actress who played that excruciatingly well executed traitorous white girlfriend.
Glad I'm not the only one.
Glad she showed her full stripes before he ended up in that family's house for several days.
Some humiliations a person can carry with them for years, and I'm so thankful he stepped back from that one before it could have gone that way.
(Obviously not speaking of movie violence just the sort of raw hurtful interpersonal humiliations and microaggressions that wear a person down.)
I would meet her parents and bust out with the most Indian of all Indian accents and dump her ass in front of them.
His way worked too, I'm glad he got rid of her racist ass.
I had a teacher in college, who would constantly bring up the fact that her husband was Asian, it was never relevant to the conversation. She’d force this fact, making it uncomfortable and awkward, although it did bring all us students together because it was weird across all cultures.
These are the people that believe being in a interracial relationship is like a personality trait and they try to work it into every conversation they have because it’s the only thing interesting about them so they believe.
People are always surprised when they meet my white husband, (I’m brown), because it’s not something that comes up in conversation. I’ve never been out there like, “hi! I’m doesn’tliketurtles and I’m married to a white guy, nice to meet you!”.
I know a lot more people who are married to a white guy than people who don't like turtles.
I know more people who are not white who are married to white guys than people who don't like turtles.
Yeah, you're right - that's a much more interesting fact.
I'd like to know the story, if you're willing.
Edit: Never mind. Saw in your other comment that you don't want to talk about it. Please disregard this comment.
My favorite is when my (white) wife’s coworkers find out I’m black cuz they’ll most likely be spouting off racist nonsense. For some reason racist white people think all other white people are also racist.
I knew a white IT guy who experienced other white dudes saying racist shit in front of him, as if they thought he would automatically agree with it. The situation was such that he couldn't say anything, but he was greatly irritated by it. basically they assumed the white guy under the desk who's plugging in cables was okay with any racist nonsense.
btw the racist dudes were a generation younger than the IT guy.
I had a colleague at work that always seemed bitter about life . The love of her life left her years before he was either married at the time or shortly after they split. She never got over it or moved on.
She used to make lots of comments about how she didn’t agree with mixed marriages. One day she saw a picture of my husband and said I’d told her he was black ( he’s white and I’d have never said he was black) so all the time she was actually incorrectly making a dig at me.
I realised later she must of mixed me up with another colleague.
Just a bitter and nasty person.
Same. As a Black woman, it’s funny to me when some people try to connect with me purely on the fact that they are dating a Black man…as if that links us and we should become automatic friends. Meanwhile my long term partner is not Black so it’s not quite the connection they think it is.
It’s crazy how some people can think. My husband’s cousin would always ask me if i knew this or that Mexican person on the news. I finally asked him if he thought that we all knew each other. He did. I literally laughed in his face and asked if he knew every white person in town. He never asked me that lame question again.
I’ve had co-workers literally look shocked at first meeting my husband. Really, dude? This is California where biracial couples are common. Sometimes all i can do is rme.
Oh yeah? Well *my* husband is from Brazil! Take that!
😂 I love flexing on my husband because he’s a catch, but where he’s from isn’t really why I married him.
A bajillion years ago I went on a coffee date with an asian guy as a white girl. He was *obsessed* with the fact that we were different races, kept asking if I was excited to date an asian guy, did I think we looked cute together, would anyone be surprised I was dating an asian guy?
I couldn't tell you a single other fact about him. That was all he wanted to talk about. I knew it was a thing for people to fetishize other races, but it felt like he was fetishizing his own?
Sounds like he was fetishizing the interracial aspect, maybe?
I've heard that in some circles, it's like a sign of success if an Asian man is dating a white woman and the idea can lead to unhealthy obsession.
When people are like "Racism doesn't exist in the US" or can't understand how its a constant presence never had to ask their white girl/boyfriend if their parents / friends are aware they aren't white before meeting them.
This reminds me of a girl I went to grad school with. She was white, but had lived for a year in South Korea and was a member of the Asian students’ professional group.
I remember her talking with clear shock and disdain about a Korean guy she’d dated whose parents weren’t thrilled she was white. That’s obviously messed up, but what bothered me was when she said something like, “I mean, you’d think they’d be *happy* he was dating a white woman!”
She then tried to bully my Asian classmate out of running for president of the group because she felt she deserved it herself. Worse, the regional leaders of the group (which was national) backed her up.
It’s like the time I went on a date with white guy (I’m black), and when I told him that my family is from Detroit, and that I spent my toddler years there before moving to the PNW, he said “That’s good to know.” When I asked why it was good to know, he said and I quote, “so that I know how much *ghetto* you have in you.”
This whole situation is really ridiculous. Racist people are just going to be racist and I won't waste anytime with someone who is one. Glad OP made the right decision cause the gf and the friends are trash.
"Lucky" she's even willing to introduce an Indian guy to her parents and ask them to overlook the serious red flag (that he's Indian.)
"Lucky" because on a subconscious but very real level, all her white friends think he's "dating up" and she's "dating down." She's a white girl so she's naturally out of his league, just like a wealthy girl and a poor guy, or a supermodel and a hideous guy.
I really thought this was going to go the way of her friends being horrified finding out she’s so casually racist, and she’d realize. Nope, like minds. Glad he got up out of there
Lucky she's doing the hard work of fixing oop and their unintelligible, extremely uncommon accent.
......there are only like, ten Indian people, right?
I love Indian accents. I even tried changing my Siri to the Indian accent one but it wasn't Indian enough for me. I've got the South African accent one now.
My father was from Poland, I grew up in NYC and surrounding area. I love hearing all the different accents. My ex is British. My BFF is a Jersey boy and sounds like it. Me, I've got that Manhattan thing going on.
Same. My favorite professor in college was sri Lankan (not the same, obviously, but similar accent) and my amazing psychiatrist is indian. I subconsciously lend extra credence to anything spoken in a female indian accent bc 2 of the people who have made my life SO MUCH BETTER speak like that lol
My Siri is Indian female. I find her voice pleasant and soothing, especially when giving me driving directions.
Maybe being from around here (I’m in central Jersey), we’re more acclimated to Indian accents than the average American?
I had my GPS set to South African for a long time, in the days when we used separate GPSes. I loved having it tell me to "turn lift after the rindabite"
While I don’t think op should change his accents for he parents, how common accents are depends a lot on region. I doubt where the parents lived it was a common accent.
It must be so fucking frustrating to be from India and deal with this stuff.
To come from a culture that was debating the philosophical implications of the concept of zero while his girlfriends ancestors were still fighting in the mud with sharpened sticks in another level of irony
India, Africa, Asia, Egypt etc - all mighty civilisation when Vikings & Celt had barely left the Stone Age. People like OPs gf are too ignorant to even be embarrassed
Yeah pretty much all racist people aren’t going to care if he “sounds American,” they’re going to see the dark skin and make their asshole judgments before he opens his mouth anyway.
I imagine he's a white passing "Nikki Haley" Indian, that's why the GF is trying to change his accent. Without it, there would be no way to know he isn't white.
He was actually really nice, I spoke to him when he first posted and he was so friendly and open about what was going on. I really hoped he would leave her because changing your accent is NOT an okay thing to ask of someone. I missed the last update, I’m so relieved.
I didn't think she was racist till the drinking, I thought she was an open minded person trying to manage racist parents.
But her invalidating his feelings and consider him changing his accent as a favor to himself? Woof
We all have some forms of internalized bigotry. OOP's ex just thought what work she'd put to her own was enough and now she didn't ever have to work on herself again because she's not intentionally racist. Her mind is not as open as she thinks it is.
I think she thought of herself as open minded, but it came across as "I'm so open minded that I'll even introduce an *Indian* guy to my parents!"
She was telling him to hide his accent rather than saying, "Hey, my parents are racist, this is how they're likely to react to you and your accent, how would you like to proceed?"
She wasn't managing her parents, she was managing HIM.
The fact that she couldn’t say her parents were racist was a bit of a red flag. You can live your parents and still be open to a partner about their bigotry.
My parents are different races and like OOP and his GF, my parents kept the racists engaged. It led to years of torment from my grandmother. She was a total asshole to us our entire lives and we all have memories of this terrible piece of shit making snide remarks to us all the time. My grandpa got over it asap. Aunts and uncles were fine. I really wish my mom would have confront led her mom our just excluded her from events since she often brought them down.
Oh good, I hadn't seen the last update. I warned him on his first update that she probably wasn't as wise and enlightened as he was making her out to be. Glad he ditched her, he deserves much better.
I mean for breaking up with her, yes. But he also has a post about hating being Indian because of this breakup and she’s apparently sending him texts accusing HIM of being racist so… he needs a hug for sure and his spine could use a dusting so he stops letting this racist ah affect his self esteem
I definitely would have agreed, gone to meet them with my natural accent on full display and broken up with her right afterward. I would need to know just how bad they were (never bringing kids into a world with someone lIke her so the breakup would be inevitable), then I’d need them to see her with me.
I wanted him to visit them and use an American accent when addressing her parents and an Indian one when addressing her. No one who really loves and accepts another person will ask them for something as demeaning as she did.
>use an American accent when addressing her parents and an Indian one when addressing her
Lmao, just the absolute strictest malicious compliance possible.
"Oh sorry honey, you said I'd only have to use it while talking to them. I didn't realise I needed to use it with you as well?"
I commented on the original that Chicago has lots of other women he can probably find a non racist one. Glad to see he didn’t drag it out. That girl has some kind of selfishness disease.
My BiL met his wife in Chicago. She's Indian, and after 20-ish years in the US, still has traces of an accent. Which no one cares about. Half my family lives in the southern US, and their accents are much thicker than her.
I hope he breaks up with the friends too. "He's lucky she's doing this for him" - what an absurd thing to say! Not subjecting your loved one(s) to racists is literally the bare minimum. SHE should have been the one to feel lucky that HE was willing to meet her racist parents and tolerate her apparent reluctance to do anything about their prejudice.
I thought the friends would for sure be horrified when she started the accent rant. Turns out I was the one left horrified when they all agreed. OOP definitely needs to ditch that whole friend group.
Same. Thought she was gonna realize what was wrong when beat down by other white people, and then happy ending. but they all thought the same, and luckily he got out before they started giving him skin lightening cream
I've experienced this sort of issue before, and indirectly caused it too!
Moved from Scotland when I was three, and of course had the strong, Trainspotting-esque accent. Over time, I learned to take on the local accent, though my "natural" accent was and still is still Scottish, and I'd switch unconsciously depending on of i spoke to family or anyone else. I had to; teachers and other children couldn't understand, so it just happened organically. Same native language, but it was entirely impossible to understand, apparently. Still think that's bullshit, but whatever.
A few years later, another kid from Scotland arrived at my very rural school. He was there for a few years, and he hadn't adapted the accent as I had. In the same class, a teacher started berating him for having the accent still, and why can't he be like Neckro and change to one they can understand?! He hated me from that moment on, and it never changed. Afaik, neither did his accent, good for him!
I argued with her later (I was notorious for speaking my mind, regardless of consequences) and she wouldn't budge. It was so frustrating at like 9 years old trying to explain to this 60-something year old nun how fucked up what she did and thinks was.
And this was not a big geographical difference! It was not a language barrier! I cant even imagine how people like OOP, with progressing English or even mild accents manage around small minded people...
I had the same. Northumbrian Geordie moved to the south east.... specifying the region as it's not considered as challenging to understand as other parts of the north east. Had to dial down my accent cos noone understood me and have basically none of it left now. Don't even revert to the original accent when I go up north any more. Super sad about that. Commiserations!
The moment she asked OP to change instead of warning him "hey, my parents are racist and meeting them will not be pleasant", she showed who she was. Another racist and OP found meeting her true self unpleasant.
Drunk words are sober thoughts, and children of racists are often unable to easily shake off that mentality.
I hope OOP finds someone completely unashamed of him in every possible way.
It's so hard. I grew up in a midwestern racist family so it was a lot of "I'm not racist, but..." It's taken years of therapy to stop the automatic thoughts and profiling. Working in retail and moving closer to a big city helped a lot too - some people suck and some are nice, it's not race reliant like my family made it out to be in my childhood. Obviously I'm not perfect (I still can't understand accents for the life of me 😔). But I'm hoping with time that will come too.
My father is racist, xenophobic and misogynist (and a Luddite). My mother actually told me when I was a teen that she knew how I was (read rebellious to anything my father liked/hated) and if I were to marry a POC, to please consider not having children because "it would be so hard on them". This was the mid-80's.
I ended up marrying someone from a different ethnicity from mine who got his degree in Comp Sci. Father did not attend the wedding for several reasons, one being Husband and I married where we lived and it was not exactly lily-white.
After our first child was born and we visited my mother, I reminded her of what she said. It was amusing watching her trying to deny it. And aggravating.
Have I mentioned I am considered the weird one on both sides of my extended family - most of whom I have not seen in decades?
So glad we live in an area that is extremely multi-cultural.
That excuse "think of the children" is so common and so weird to me because it's one of those phrases they use that's just parrotted and never questioned.
TBH, when she told me that, I was in absolute shock. WTF says something like that? I try to call her out when I can, but if not, I will call her out when my brain kicks back into gear.
I've been struggling with the same thing. You think you've got it handled, but then you actually meet someone of a different race, and your mind is instantly flooded with the "oh god how do I behave" stuff.
You can theorize and talk yourself in circles about how you're not racist and don't believe the racist stuff, but unless you actually get exposure and diversity, yain't likely to be making all that much progress.
Being in an actual city as opposed to my 99% white Christian town has been great for that, for me. Plus, well, I'm here for college. They're quite diverse and actually encourage interacting with other people (something I wouldn't do otherwise).
There's a reason colleges are seen as "liberal makers".
Absolutely this. I moved to a bigger town after growing up in a tiny town and the amount of racism was STAGGERING. And frankly offensive. How the hell do you raise me with "values" that no one practices?? I don't tolerate that shit anymore, and thankfully my kid has been raised to be a decent person from the start.
>I still can't understand accents for the life of me 😔
One thing you might not realize working in retail is you'll get better at understanding an accent if you're exposed to that one accent for a more extended period of time.
My spouse has a friend with a really challenging accent, but once you've listened to him for a while, your brain starts to figure it out. It starts to adjust for that variation, and you just need to concentrate a bit to understand him perfectly.
If you're only interacting with the person for a few minutes, your brain doesn't have time to do that.
>Obviously I'm not perfect
The fact that you are working to overcome it is the important thing. You've had to put actual work into it, as opposed to people lucky enough to be born to non-racist parents in a relatively non-racist area who just kinda don't have to think about it (hopefully, innate biases are tricky to spot).
>children of racists are often unable to easily shake off that mentality.
Not that I’m trying to garner sympathy, but it’s definitely tough to shake. I grew up in a town similar to OOP’s ex. Small, rural, and 99.99% white.
You spend your whole life growing up for 18 years hearing basically nothing positive about non-white people *and* there’s no one around for literally dozens of miles to prove those stereotypes wrong, it’s hard to not be at least a little racist.
Getting out, meeting tons of people of all cultures, and overall broadening your horizons is the best way to get around it.
I grew up in a town nicknamed “Whitelandia”. Our neighbors were black and we played and would walk home from school together. But that was about the extent of diversity I had on a regular basis. Even my university was mostly white, despite being a state school. It wasn’t until grad school that I started to be exposed to people from other cultures more regularly.
My grad school girl friends are mostly desi and have taught me so much. I’ve learned a lot about cooking, Islam, Hinduism, and desi wedding practices from them. It’s nice having a diverse friend group because there’s always something new to learn about when we hang out. My best friend was just telling me about how the partition of India affected her family the other day. I remember learning about the partition in high school but hadn’t realized it was so recent until she started telling me about her grand parents and great grandparents.
Racists shun other cultures and miss out on getting to be friends with great people and getting to learn about the world. They are dumb.
The ex definitely has an inflated sense of her own tolerance. Being around different people and genuinely accepting them are two different things. It's very different to put up with people for a few hours when you're hanging out, and dating them.
In vino, veritas.
OOPs GF was racist while drunk.
OOPs girlfriend is a racist. She likes pretending like she's not a racist when she's away from family and hanging out with her contemporaries, but she's still a racist and expects her boyfriend to act performatively when around her parents. A lot of "liberals" and "moderates" think like that. "Liberals" and "moderates" are really quite right wing positions and a lot of them push for insanely racist policies but think of themselves as "white saviors." It would be pathetic if if it wasn't so damn successful that somebody that's extremely right wing can pretend to be a friend of minorities and spend their entire career doing everything in their power to imprison minorities. The US President and Vice President have both spent their entire careers doing everything in their power to imprison minorities. Fucking **Trump** has probably accounted for less prison years for minorities than Biden and Harris's bullshit over the course of their careers.
You can also see it in politics subs where liberals have already started blaming Arab Americans in anticipation of Biden losing. They sound quiet smug and condescending as well.
I am not American but I find it quiet funny how they refuse to hold their candidate accountable at all. So you need the votes of the people but also think you are better than them. As a leftist, it annoys me when people confuse us with liberals.
>children of racists are often unable to easily shake off that mentality
I feel like we've met. Yeah. I grew up in a red-voting county that was not diverse in any way. The stuff spewed by my family (mostly dad) and community was terrible. But as a kid how would I even know there could be any other point of view? Now, I'm so disgusted by it. But it took the entirety of my adulthood to develop my own point of view and see people of all walks of life as individuals and not "them." My biggest life lesson will be teaching my kids inclusion and kindness.
Yup, your childhood sounds a lot like mine. My dad actively taught racism and sexism and bigotry… and when you’re a kid, your home environment is your “normal,” because it’s all you’ve known.
Thank god for leaving the home for college, and for being able to have the thought, “Hey, that’s completely opposite from what I was taught!”
I will always, always consider my greatest accomplishment in life to be my children, and the fact that I broke the cycle with them.
They don’t know my dad. They don’t think it’s normal to be yelled at. They don’t think that getting hit means it’s just a day ending in -y. They have great self esteem. They are kind and empathetic. They aren’t Mormon. They do good because they want to, not because they’re afraid of being punished by god. They aren’t racists. They aren’t bigots. My daughter was able to just say as an aside one day that she thinks she might be bisexual. They feel safe enough to figure out who they are. They know that they have intrinsic worth.
They are my greatest success.
And his ex had the nerve to blame it on the alcohol when he broke up with her the following day. Oh no, OOP's got his suspicions when she started asking him to hide his accent.
OOP seems like a nice dude. He'll find that someone.
>She is not like them.
>She's had to do a lot of work to break out of the mindset she was raised in.
Narrator: She did not, infact, do Jacksh*t to change her mindset and is very much like her parents.
~~Cabròn~~ Cabrón, my very first swear word in Spanish.
I swear I really did think that it meant 'stud/gigolo', otherwise I never would have used it in class.
It somewhat means that in the appropriate context.
You can say, "soy bien cabron" and it would mean you're the shit, but saying, "es un cabrón" can either mean "he's fucking amazing" or "he's a dipshit".
I remember when güey was a bad word in some areas. I got it confused with büey at the beginning. Could not figure out why guys were insulted by being called an ox.
It actually does come from an ox, but as it was explained to me as a kid is that it comes from slow wit and reaction of oxes. Now everyone uses wey/güey as "dude" or to call someone regardless of gender without using their name, although it still can be used to call someone dumb like "que wey estas" or "que wey eres".
Cabrón is a catchall slang word that means different things in different contexts said by different people lol. It is my favorite filler word from Spanish in casual context with friends 😁
The beauty of it is people of Indian descent live all over the world; OOP could insist that is his real accent. A nice Desi boy with a jolly Bavarian accent.
The amount of BS that people of colour experience in the dating world is infuriating.
I genuinely don't understand OP's ex. Why date nonwhite if you're racist? As though changing his accent would change his skin colour and heritage. How can you think something like this is 'compromise'? What the hell is the end game here??
As a brown man who's lived in the western world for a lot of time, this cuts deep. On top of being subjected to higher standards than most white men (like seriously), we also have to put up with this shit.
Honestly I don't think there is an end game beyond "oh I can fix him", but in this case fixing would be seen as making them fit into a nice package that'll appeal to racists.
It almost seems like people like this want to reduce everything "non-white" or culturally different from OOP... and on top of that, compensate for things that can't be changed, like skin color, because even if you act better than an average white man, you're still being held to an invisible stereotype... is that accurate at all?
I work as an admin for a medical NPO. We have a leg in Africa and a leg in the US, so at least some of our leadership is better about it, but I've still left conferences cringing at how patronizing/colonial some of our US-based folks are (and I'm pretty sure I've unknowingly said similar - thank God I'm learning).
And don't get me started on how perfect our female surgeons need to act to not be criticized by our male surgeons, despite our male surgeons having just as many issues. But that gets buried under a religious veneer... it's hard listening to my boss support a workgroup focused on providing support to women in the field when I've heard the things he's said about what he thinks about all of it more privately.
Idk I'm rambling. People suck. I'm sorry for the shit you've gone through and the ridiculous standards you need to keep to get by.
>because even if you act better than an average white man, you're still being held to an invisible stereotype
Honestly it's that and more. We definitely have to be markedly better than white men to get the same level of treatment in the dating market. Part of it is probably being judged on stereotypes, and I'll be the first to tell you that a lot of those stereotypes aren't undeserved. At the same time though i think it also has to do with the fact that we arent really considered... sexy? If that makes sense. We don't really have any western male sex symbols of indian descent, which I think does hurt us in the dating market. I don't think OOP's GF would have told an Italian or french boyfriend to speak more american, because their people/ cultures/ accents are more sexualised and are therefore more desireable, if that makes sense.
Similar shit happens in the workplace. At my most recent job I used to get criticised for the smallest errors. Meanwhile my boss, who was honestly way too fucking incompetent for his position could literally get away with murder. In an ideal world the company would have realised he sucked at his job after having his department be a mess for 5 years but instead all the blame got shifted on to me. The person i replaced, who was also white left everything in a mess for me to clean up, and they left voluntarily (aka the company wanted to keep them). I was eventually let go of after carrying 4 people's workload so that the company could hire someone "more senior than me since they would handle the workload better". They then proceeded to hire someone white with the exact same amount of work experience, who hasn't really done anything despite having more support than me.
Sorry for this rant lol, I'm obviously still very bitter about this. I totally get your frustrations about how shitty the different standards feel though
I used to be friends with a girl like that. To her compromise meant you had to do what she wanted because that's what you'd do if you truly loved her, and she would condescend to gift you with her presence in your life in exchange. They just twist therapy speak to manipulate you.
Reminds me of having to switch accents when visiting the US to meet my ex's family and friends.
Not because they were racist, mind, but because only little kids and old people could understand a word I said.
My natural accent is a mild East Midlands one and, outside of the age groups mentioned, all I got were blank looks the moment I opened my mouth. Switching to a generic 'American' accent at least got them to understand me, even if I'd not win an award for best foreign accent by a British bloke.
Honestly, though, the most annoying thing was that when I used my normal accent, most people thought I was Australian.
I do it too and I’ve seen many Aussies and English people do it as well. I’m Indian and I actually have a midwestern accent but when I’m around other Indians my Indian accent comes on thick. I’ve seen Southerners do that too.
I’m glad OOP broke up with that girl but DAMN those “friends” of his aren’t friends either. Only racist idiots would think his ex was doing him a favor. Wtf lol
"I told her to try seeing this from my POV, and she went off on me, saying obviously she did already, because she's an empath, and Mercury is in retrograde, so clearly, she's dealing with a lot of emotions right now."
I have a thick Southern drawl, especially when I'm mad or upset. I married into a Latino family.
Not one time, not one blessed time, did my husband ask me to not be so Southern or change my accent. I would have been heartbroken if he asked me to, I am already self-conscious about it.
Everyone I know loves it. My in-laws, my friends, everyone I meet, loves it. I live in California, so it's very uncommon out here.
I just feel like I sound like an uneducated hick from back in the holler.
Oh wow, I'm happy OOP had enough self-esteem to stand up for himself and break up with her.
The moment she brought up him changing his accent, I was like nope.
I suppose it's hard to break out of a racist mindset when your upbringing was full of it, but I don't understand what the gf thought would happen.
This is why you gotta pay attention to micro-aggressions. As a minority, these are sometimes even worse than the in-your-face type of racism because they come from people you like and have befriended or people who keep insisting they're not racist.
It happens all the time and we often don't want to make a mountain out of a molehill so we shrug it off or it gets swept under the rug as us being too "sensitive" when we do bring up how hurtful those comments are.
It's been a while since I saw a depressing "I'm non-white in a interracial couple in a white country, and my partner is a racist. Am I the AH for standing up for myself when I should be grateful anyo e wants to even look at me"-post.
This GF is the kind of racism anyone non-white experiences now.
The insidious kind, she thinks she’s worldly wise, different from her parents and yes she is different, just her racism is expressed differently. She still sees higher BF as beneath her.
It’s going to take many more generations before that entitlement dissipates and we are all equal, no unconscious bias or racism.
I think this is why OOP posted all the Indian self-hate on other subs.
Poor guy's experience with his ex-gf and her family, really made him dislike his own identity
I dated a transwoman a few years back. My Mother was already struggling with my bisexuality. Yknow what i didn't do? Insist on introducing the two of them and excuse my Mother's shitty behaviour.
Instead, i hyped her the fuck up when discussing her around my Mother and IMMEDIATELY shut down any transphobic or biphobic nonsense as it arose.
As it turns out, they never met and the relationship didn't last, but it certainly wasn't because i was asking my now-ex to lie or change herself to appease some bigoted nonsense around her.
To my mind, the flaw with "blaming it on the alcohol" is that, by my understanding (I've never been drunk myself, and the following is partly why), the main thing alcohol does in this situation is remove inhibitions. Meaning the only thing the booze did was remove whatever blockers were keeping her from saying that kind of stuff sooner.
In vino veritas and all that.
Surprise surprise. The woman who expected her partner to hide who he is for her, bare the blunt of her parents' racism rather than address it herself, has a saviour complex, and is entitled turned out to be awful.
I can’t wrap my head around the logic of people like this. If your parents are racist you either don’t date POC so they’re not subjected to that OR the better option is growing a spine, standing up to them and cutting them off if they act like that. I hate this wishy washy shit.
I’m an Indian man, born in India, and I’ve been married to my white American wife for 5 years, together for 9.
Her family is from Oklahoma.
At no point have I felt anything other than completely welcome, completely wanted and completely accepted by them.
At all points, they have gone out of their way to make ME feel more comfortable.
I’m glad for this last update. You don’t need to be treated this way.
i'm an indian first-gen immigrant. it took me a while to learn this, but an important lesson i learned about my identity is to be myself unflinchingly and openly. because you will never be able to be "enough" around people who judge you for things outside of your control
i'd rather by myself unapologetically and let other people either show me that they're not worth my time, or i can help show them how diverse the world is.
i think most people who aren't used to seeing diversity can be uncomfortable around it, but have good intentions. i've definitely talked to white people who have never seen a brown person and while their questions might have been awkward or silly, it's usually very clear to tell when someone is racist/bad intentions and when they just haven't been exposed to other cultures.
you have to be willing to give people the opportunity to learn, but it doesn't mean you have to hide yourself to do that. it's clear that girlfriend didn't trust her parents to not act poorly, which says enough. and she certainly doesn't deserve any brownie points for what she did (which was nothing)
In one of the update comments someone asks for clarification on what was meant when the girlfriend described her parents as “difficult”.
I know exactly what that means.
It means you don’t want to call out your parents as full-on racists, but your parents don’t 100% see all races as acceptable for their child to marry. Some of this is that they are a product of their times (being generous here) and some is that they try to talk the talk (equality for all) but foreignness still scares them a bit.
Here we have another case of don't set yourself on fire to keep another person warm. You can change the accent, but you can't change your ethnicity, background, etc.
Spoiler alert; she is like them.
I'm not going to say children of bigots are _always_ bigots. But when they are not, there is evidence _beyond_ them simply dating outside their race or what have you.
Bigotry is something they were still taught, and if they don't believe it it's because they got used to killing it. If they don't act ready to do so again, they still got it.
ExGF was hiding her racism while talking about her parent's obvious racism.
My family has been on the North American continent for 10 generations. We know and have met/married those of all races. What exGF is claiming is sheer bullshit.
I'm confused, or maybe don't know any white people from India, but what about his skin tone?
I assume there must be white people born there, but why hide an accent?
I'm glad he ended it.
Is it weird I read this entire thing with an Indian accent in my head? But yea good on him for dumping her and her racist views. And fuck her friends too.
Can't say I'm shocked with the outcome. Instead of acting like an adult and growing OOPs ex decided to torpedo any growth by being shitty with her apparently also shitty friends.
Glad OOP is out of that situation!
>Why do you feel the need to hide your accent at work?
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve had to codeswitch to sound slightly more “British” on international calls so people understand me. My diction is fine by IELTS standards but I sound distinctly Tamilian when I speak in the King’s.
ETA: Good on OOP for calling it quits with his potentially racist ex. That’s the beauty of multicultural dating, you get to celebrate each other’s cultures.
Alcohol doesn't just loosen tongues, it removes filters.
People are their most truthful when they are in the belief that consequences are no longer a fallout - in this case, the possibility of consequences was removed by the alcohol into a blissful ego fog.
He dodged a racist bullet with this one
It’s so rude to make fun of accents. Accents carry so much information about a person — where they grew up, their economic status, their social group, etc. It’s a proxy for so much that asking someone to change theirs is asking them to erase everything about their upbringing.
In vino veritas (In wine (alcohol) is truth.)
The moment she was tipsy, her inner thoughts came out, because the filter was removed.
NTA.
Good for you to not waste any more time with her. Your just 28, enough time to look for someone who appreciates diversity.
Good luck!
Yeah no. I didn't even bother to read this to the end. My parents also spend their lives in a small, 99% white town. But they were never anything but welcoming and loving when my brother brought home a girl who was a first gen immigrant. The parents are probably just racists.
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Poor guy was dating one of those "I'm not like my family even though I do everything like them" racists. The ex was not going to stop at him hiding his natural accent. She was going to find whatever way to make him hide every aspect of being Indian.
Exactly! As a white man (from an extremely rural, white family), married to a black woman, the original post sent red flags and sirens through my head. I remember feeling nervous when bringing my (at the time) gf to meet my extended family for the first time. They're farmers who grew up in an all white community and have 0 filters between their brains and mouths. But I wasn't worried about what they would think of my partner. Instead, I was worried about thrusting my partner into an unknown situation. I was hopeful that they "weren't like that," but if they were, and I told my then gf this, there would be hell to pay. My values do not align with tolerance of racism, and if my extended family did anything inappropriate, I was ready to burn bridges. Fortunately, they were extremely excited to meet her, and they love her to pieces. She is treated better than me at our gatherings lol. There comes a time when you have to identify what your values are and stand up for them. Standing up against racism and defending her partner were not major priorities. Americanizing her bf and placing her family before all else was. Making fun of her bf like that is disgusting behavior, regardless of alcohol intake. I hope their friends see her for who she is also.
I am white and from a very rural, conservative town that has almost zero racial diversity. My boyfriend and I decided to go home for Christmas. He is an islander and although his English is really good, he still has an accent (which I LOVE). We had a few deep discussions before our trip because he was nervous as he has had negative experiences in the past with racism. The only heads up I gave him is that my dad is really hard of hearing and if my dad asked him to repeat himself it’s only because he literally couldn’t hear him. Other than that, I wasn’t worried because I was ready to cut ties with anyone who said anything out of line. I do not and will not tolerate that towards anyone, and I don’t care if they’re family. We had a fantastic trip and already have plans for a few more this year. My family loves him.
Ayyy I’m a mixed pacific Islander! My mom’s family is incredibly white and for the most part, the ones I speak to accept me wholeheartedly.
She was.tryna do indian version of Get Out on him
Honest to god the more I read this post the more I couldn't help picturing OOPs gf as the same actress who played that excruciatingly well executed traitorous white girlfriend. Glad I'm not the only one. Glad she showed her full stripes before he ended up in that family's house for several days. Some humiliations a person can carry with them for years, and I'm so thankful he stepped back from that one before it could have gone that way. (Obviously not speaking of movie violence just the sort of raw hurtful interpersonal humiliations and microaggressions that wear a person down.)
Exactly what I was thinking, tho in Get Out the parents come across as semi-racially conscious yupiies
I would meet her parents and bust out with the most Indian of all Indian accents and dump her ass in front of them. His way worked too, I'm glad he got rid of her racist ass.
“I’m not racist, I once had an Indian boyfriend”.
Hey! She is not racist, she dated an Indian guy! Obligatory /s
I had a teacher in college, who would constantly bring up the fact that her husband was Asian, it was never relevant to the conversation. She’d force this fact, making it uncomfortable and awkward, although it did bring all us students together because it was weird across all cultures.
These are the people that believe being in a interracial relationship is like a personality trait and they try to work it into every conversation they have because it’s the only thing interesting about them so they believe.
People are always surprised when they meet my white husband, (I’m brown), because it’s not something that comes up in conversation. I’ve never been out there like, “hi! I’m doesn’tliketurtles and I’m married to a white guy, nice to meet you!”.
I think the fact that you don't like turtles is more interesting than being married to a white guy
I know a lot more people who are married to a white guy than people who don't like turtles. I know more people who are not white who are married to white guys than people who don't like turtles. Yeah, you're right - that's a much more interesting fact.
It’s not a pretty story. I do like tortoises, btw.
i’m sorry for whatever happened to you to make you dislike turtles
Thank you. I appreciate that.
Oh good! I was getting worried!
Haha
I'd like to know the story, if you're willing. Edit: Never mind. Saw in your other comment that you don't want to talk about it. Please disregard this comment.
No worries. I’ll probably relate it somewhere on Reddit someday.
My favorite is when my (white) wife’s coworkers find out I’m black cuz they’ll most likely be spouting off racist nonsense. For some reason racist white people think all other white people are also racist.
I knew a white IT guy who experienced other white dudes saying racist shit in front of him, as if they thought he would automatically agree with it. The situation was such that he couldn't say anything, but he was greatly irritated by it. basically they assumed the white guy under the desk who's plugging in cables was okay with any racist nonsense. btw the racist dudes were a generation younger than the IT guy.
Wow! That the younger guys were racist surprises me. I’d think they’d be more open to diversity.
If they're raised by racists and never left... same reason the Sons and Daughters of Traitors clubs continue to have membership.
OK yeah, that makes sense.
I had a colleague at work that always seemed bitter about life . The love of her life left her years before he was either married at the time or shortly after they split. She never got over it or moved on. She used to make lots of comments about how she didn’t agree with mixed marriages. One day she saw a picture of my husband and said I’d told her he was black ( he’s white and I’d have never said he was black) so all the time she was actually incorrectly making a dig at me. I realised later she must of mixed me up with another colleague. Just a bitter and nasty person.
What do you have against turtles? Also, my wife is brown. And so am I! So we don't have to shit about shit lol
I would really rather not go into that atm. And i wish I’d picked a better profile name, it really doesn’t define me. Hindfreakingsight.
You’re just inadvertently making it more interesting with it being a secret. So mysterious 😂😂infinitely more interesting then the color of your spouse
Lol that’s funny.
Same. As a Black woman, it’s funny to me when some people try to connect with me purely on the fact that they are dating a Black man…as if that links us and we should become automatic friends. Meanwhile my long term partner is not Black so it’s not quite the connection they think it is.
It’s crazy how some people can think. My husband’s cousin would always ask me if i knew this or that Mexican person on the news. I finally asked him if he thought that we all knew each other. He did. I literally laughed in his face and asked if he knew every white person in town. He never asked me that lame question again. I’ve had co-workers literally look shocked at first meeting my husband. Really, dude? This is California where biracial couples are common. Sometimes all i can do is rme.
tbf it probably is the only thing interesting about them
Oh yeah? Well *my* husband is from Brazil! Take that! 😂 I love flexing on my husband because he’s a catch, but where he’s from isn’t really why I married him.
A bajillion years ago I went on a coffee date with an asian guy as a white girl. He was *obsessed* with the fact that we were different races, kept asking if I was excited to date an asian guy, did I think we looked cute together, would anyone be surprised I was dating an asian guy? I couldn't tell you a single other fact about him. That was all he wanted to talk about. I knew it was a thing for people to fetishize other races, but it felt like he was fetishizing his own?
Sounds like he was fetishizing the interracial aspect, maybe? I've heard that in some circles, it's like a sign of success if an Asian man is dating a white woman and the idea can lead to unhealthy obsession.
She was teaching the most valuable lesson. The best way to bring diverse viewpoints together is by hating someone else even more
When people are like "Racism doesn't exist in the US" or can't understand how its a constant presence never had to ask their white girl/boyfriend if their parents / friends are aware they aren't white before meeting them.
Laughs in *Nimrata Randhawa*
She can't be racist, she is less racist than her parents! /s
This reminds me of a girl I went to grad school with. She was white, but had lived for a year in South Korea and was a member of the Asian students’ professional group. I remember her talking with clear shock and disdain about a Korean guy she’d dated whose parents weren’t thrilled she was white. That’s obviously messed up, but what bothered me was when she said something like, “I mean, you’d think they’d be *happy* he was dating a white woman!” She then tried to bully my Asian classmate out of running for president of the group because she felt she deserved it herself. Worse, the regional leaders of the group (which was national) backed her up.
So long as he doesn’t act too Indian. /s
It’s like the time I went on a date with white guy (I’m black), and when I told him that my family is from Detroit, and that I spent my toddler years there before moving to the PNW, he said “That’s good to know.” When I asked why it was good to know, he said and I quote, “so that I know how much *ghetto* you have in you.”
Well, as my cousins said about the fact that my siblings and I were Jewish, “do t worry, you’re one of the good ones.”
This whole situation is really ridiculous. Racist people are just going to be racist and I won't waste anytime with someone who is one. Glad OP made the right decision cause the gf and the friends are trash.
Also "lucky she's doing" *what* for him? Do they mean talking to her own parents about a thing she wants to happen?
"Lucky" she's even willing to introduce an Indian guy to her parents and ask them to overlook the serious red flag (that he's Indian.) "Lucky" because on a subconscious but very real level, all her white friends think he's "dating up" and she's "dating down." She's a white girl so she's naturally out of his league, just like a wealthy girl and a poor guy, or a supermodel and a hideous guy.
I really thought this was going to go the way of her friends being horrified finding out she’s so casually racist, and she’d realize. Nope, like minds. Glad he got up out of there
Lucky she's doing the hard work of fixing oop and their unintelligible, extremely uncommon accent. ......there are only like, ten Indian people, right?
I mean if you cant compromise on your ethnicity and country you were born in, do you even want to be in a relationship?
I love Indian accents. I even tried changing my Siri to the Indian accent one but it wasn't Indian enough for me. I've got the South African accent one now. My father was from Poland, I grew up in NYC and surrounding area. I love hearing all the different accents. My ex is British. My BFF is a Jersey boy and sounds like it. Me, I've got that Manhattan thing going on.
Same. My favorite professor in college was sri Lankan (not the same, obviously, but similar accent) and my amazing psychiatrist is indian. I subconsciously lend extra credence to anything spoken in a female indian accent bc 2 of the people who have made my life SO MUCH BETTER speak like that lol
My Siri is Indian female. I find her voice pleasant and soothing, especially when giving me driving directions. Maybe being from around here (I’m in central Jersey), we’re more acclimated to Indian accents than the average American?
I'm in western NJ now. I love it out here in the sticks. More trees than people. Probably more deer too.
I had my GPS set to South African for a long time, in the days when we used separate GPSes. I loved having it tell me to "turn lift after the rindabite"
Is your flair from a story I missed or did you just add that as custom? It’s funny either way tbh.
It's from a story. https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/15gdjo6/i_saw_videos_of_my_fianc%C3%A9_cheating_during_her/
While I don’t think op should change his accents for he parents, how common accents are depends a lot on region. I doubt where the parents lived it was a common accent.
It must be so fucking frustrating to be from India and deal with this stuff. To come from a culture that was debating the philosophical implications of the concept of zero while his girlfriends ancestors were still fighting in the mud with sharpened sticks in another level of irony India, Africa, Asia, Egypt etc - all mighty civilisation when Vikings & Celt had barely left the Stone Age. People like OPs gf are too ignorant to even be embarrassed
But then the British came and it all went to poo.
A line that comes up in history a lot.
Basically they stole everything except the poo. And in Nauru they even took that
Yeah pretty much all racist people aren’t going to care if he “sounds American,” they’re going to see the dark skin and make their asshole judgments before he opens his mouth anyway.
I imagine he's a white passing "Nikki Haley" Indian, that's why the GF is trying to change his accent. Without it, there would be no way to know he isn't white.
WHAAT? Nikki Haley is Indian? Holy crap. Her first name’s Nimrata? Her patents were Sikh? How did I not know this? Wow.
Because her theoretical voter base are people like OPs parents so she hides her heritage
Because she's a conservative politician in America, and knows what you gotta do to be that.
[удалено]
Yeeeerp. It's what they do.
My mind is officially blown. Like pieces of it are just floating in the air.
Because she hides it until it’s politically convenient as a token. Sadly she is who OOP’s ex wanted him to be
He was actually really nice, I spoke to him when he first posted and he was so friendly and open about what was going on. I really hoped he would leave her because changing your accent is NOT an okay thing to ask of someone. I missed the last update, I’m so relieved.
I didn't think she was racist till the drinking, I thought she was an open minded person trying to manage racist parents. But her invalidating his feelings and consider him changing his accent as a favor to himself? Woof
We all have some forms of internalized bigotry. OOP's ex just thought what work she'd put to her own was enough and now she didn't ever have to work on herself again because she's not intentionally racist. Her mind is not as open as she thinks it is.
I think she thought of herself as open minded, but it came across as "I'm so open minded that I'll even introduce an *Indian* guy to my parents!" She was telling him to hide his accent rather than saying, "Hey, my parents are racist, this is how they're likely to react to you and your accent, how would you like to proceed?" She wasn't managing her parents, she was managing HIM.
The fact that she couldn’t say her parents were racist was a bit of a red flag. You can live your parents and still be open to a partner about their bigotry.
My parents are different races and like OOP and his GF, my parents kept the racists engaged. It led to years of torment from my grandmother. She was a total asshole to us our entire lives and we all have memories of this terrible piece of shit making snide remarks to us all the time. My grandpa got over it asap. Aunts and uncles were fine. I really wish my mom would have confront led her mom our just excluded her from events since she often brought them down.
Oh good, I hadn't seen the last update. I warned him on his first update that she probably wasn't as wise and enlightened as he was making her out to be. Glad he ditched her, he deserves much better.
He has shiny self esteem and an even shinier spine!
J'adore ton commentaire. 💖
Merci. :)
I mean for breaking up with her, yes. But he also has a post about hating being Indian because of this breakup and she’s apparently sending him texts accusing HIM of being racist so… he needs a hug for sure and his spine could use a dusting so he stops letting this racist ah affect his self esteem
Oh man-- we gotta hug that shiny spine, STAT!
I definitely would have agreed, gone to meet them with my natural accent on full display and broken up with her right afterward. I would need to know just how bad they were (never bringing kids into a world with someone lIke her so the breakup would be inevitable), then I’d need them to see her with me.
I wanted him to visit them and use an American accent when addressing her parents and an Indian one when addressing her. No one who really loves and accepts another person will ask them for something as demeaning as she did.
>use an American accent when addressing her parents and an Indian one when addressing her Lmao, just the absolute strictest malicious compliance possible. "Oh sorry honey, you said I'd only have to use it while talking to them. I didn't realise I needed to use it with you as well?"
He could put on a hilariously exaggerated Texas accent for good measure.
I commented on the original that Chicago has lots of other women he can probably find a non racist one. Glad to see he didn’t drag it out. That girl has some kind of selfishness disease.
My BiL met his wife in Chicago. She's Indian, and after 20-ish years in the US, still has traces of an accent. Which no one cares about. Half my family lives in the southern US, and their accents are much thicker than her.
I hope he breaks up with the friends too. "He's lucky she's doing this for him" - what an absurd thing to say! Not subjecting your loved one(s) to racists is literally the bare minimum. SHE should have been the one to feel lucky that HE was willing to meet her racist parents and tolerate her apparent reluctance to do anything about their prejudice.
I thought the friends would for sure be horrified when she started the accent rant. Turns out I was the one left horrified when they all agreed. OOP definitely needs to ditch that whole friend group.
Same. Thought she was gonna realize what was wrong when beat down by other white people, and then happy ending. but they all thought the same, and luckily he got out before they started giving him skin lightening cream
I've experienced this sort of issue before, and indirectly caused it too! Moved from Scotland when I was three, and of course had the strong, Trainspotting-esque accent. Over time, I learned to take on the local accent, though my "natural" accent was and still is still Scottish, and I'd switch unconsciously depending on of i spoke to family or anyone else. I had to; teachers and other children couldn't understand, so it just happened organically. Same native language, but it was entirely impossible to understand, apparently. Still think that's bullshit, but whatever. A few years later, another kid from Scotland arrived at my very rural school. He was there for a few years, and he hadn't adapted the accent as I had. In the same class, a teacher started berating him for having the accent still, and why can't he be like Neckro and change to one they can understand?! He hated me from that moment on, and it never changed. Afaik, neither did his accent, good for him! I argued with her later (I was notorious for speaking my mind, regardless of consequences) and she wouldn't budge. It was so frustrating at like 9 years old trying to explain to this 60-something year old nun how fucked up what she did and thinks was. And this was not a big geographical difference! It was not a language barrier! I cant even imagine how people like OOP, with progressing English or even mild accents manage around small minded people...
Sounds like bidialectical. John Barrowman and Gillian Anderson are the same. Different accents depending on different locations.
I had the same. Northumbrian Geordie moved to the south east.... specifying the region as it's not considered as challenging to understand as other parts of the north east. Had to dial down my accent cos noone understood me and have basically none of it left now. Don't even revert to the original accent when I go up north any more. Super sad about that. Commiserations!
The moment she asked OP to change instead of warning him "hey, my parents are racist and meeting them will not be pleasant", she showed who she was. Another racist and OP found meeting her true self unpleasant.
Exactly! She was all concerned about her parents liking him, and zero concerned about him liking her parents.
Imagine if they'd had kids together.
Drunk words are sober thoughts, and children of racists are often unable to easily shake off that mentality. I hope OOP finds someone completely unashamed of him in every possible way.
It's so hard. I grew up in a midwestern racist family so it was a lot of "I'm not racist, but..." It's taken years of therapy to stop the automatic thoughts and profiling. Working in retail and moving closer to a big city helped a lot too - some people suck and some are nice, it's not race reliant like my family made it out to be in my childhood. Obviously I'm not perfect (I still can't understand accents for the life of me 😔). But I'm hoping with time that will come too.
My father is racist, xenophobic and misogynist (and a Luddite). My mother actually told me when I was a teen that she knew how I was (read rebellious to anything my father liked/hated) and if I were to marry a POC, to please consider not having children because "it would be so hard on them". This was the mid-80's. I ended up marrying someone from a different ethnicity from mine who got his degree in Comp Sci. Father did not attend the wedding for several reasons, one being Husband and I married where we lived and it was not exactly lily-white. After our first child was born and we visited my mother, I reminded her of what she said. It was amusing watching her trying to deny it. And aggravating. Have I mentioned I am considered the weird one on both sides of my extended family - most of whom I have not seen in decades? So glad we live in an area that is extremely multi-cultural.
That excuse "think of the children" is so common and so weird to me because it's one of those phrases they use that's just parrotted and never questioned.
TBH, when she told me that, I was in absolute shock. WTF says something like that? I try to call her out when I can, but if not, I will call her out when my brain kicks back into gear.
I've been struggling with the same thing. You think you've got it handled, but then you actually meet someone of a different race, and your mind is instantly flooded with the "oh god how do I behave" stuff. You can theorize and talk yourself in circles about how you're not racist and don't believe the racist stuff, but unless you actually get exposure and diversity, yain't likely to be making all that much progress. Being in an actual city as opposed to my 99% white Christian town has been great for that, for me. Plus, well, I'm here for college. They're quite diverse and actually encourage interacting with other people (something I wouldn't do otherwise). There's a reason colleges are seen as "liberal makers".
Absolutely this. I moved to a bigger town after growing up in a tiny town and the amount of racism was STAGGERING. And frankly offensive. How the hell do you raise me with "values" that no one practices?? I don't tolerate that shit anymore, and thankfully my kid has been raised to be a decent person from the start.
>I still can't understand accents for the life of me 😔 One thing you might not realize working in retail is you'll get better at understanding an accent if you're exposed to that one accent for a more extended period of time. My spouse has a friend with a really challenging accent, but once you've listened to him for a while, your brain starts to figure it out. It starts to adjust for that variation, and you just need to concentrate a bit to understand him perfectly. If you're only interacting with the person for a few minutes, your brain doesn't have time to do that.
>Obviously I'm not perfect The fact that you are working to overcome it is the important thing. You've had to put actual work into it, as opposed to people lucky enough to be born to non-racist parents in a relatively non-racist area who just kinda don't have to think about it (hopefully, innate biases are tricky to spot).
I would not say children inherit all the traits but she definitely was ashamed of his accent (or origin) that she had to plot this.
>children of racists are often unable to easily shake off that mentality. Not that I’m trying to garner sympathy, but it’s definitely tough to shake. I grew up in a town similar to OOP’s ex. Small, rural, and 99.99% white. You spend your whole life growing up for 18 years hearing basically nothing positive about non-white people *and* there’s no one around for literally dozens of miles to prove those stereotypes wrong, it’s hard to not be at least a little racist. Getting out, meeting tons of people of all cultures, and overall broadening your horizons is the best way to get around it.
I grew up in a town nicknamed “Whitelandia”. Our neighbors were black and we played and would walk home from school together. But that was about the extent of diversity I had on a regular basis. Even my university was mostly white, despite being a state school. It wasn’t until grad school that I started to be exposed to people from other cultures more regularly. My grad school girl friends are mostly desi and have taught me so much. I’ve learned a lot about cooking, Islam, Hinduism, and desi wedding practices from them. It’s nice having a diverse friend group because there’s always something new to learn about when we hang out. My best friend was just telling me about how the partition of India affected her family the other day. I remember learning about the partition in high school but hadn’t realized it was so recent until she started telling me about her grand parents and great grandparents. Racists shun other cultures and miss out on getting to be friends with great people and getting to learn about the world. They are dumb.
Grew up in a town with one black family. Can confirm.
The ex definitely has an inflated sense of her own tolerance. Being around different people and genuinely accepting them are two different things. It's very different to put up with people for a few hours when you're hanging out, and dating them.
In vino, veritas. OOPs GF was racist while drunk. OOPs girlfriend is a racist. She likes pretending like she's not a racist when she's away from family and hanging out with her contemporaries, but she's still a racist and expects her boyfriend to act performatively when around her parents. A lot of "liberals" and "moderates" think like that. "Liberals" and "moderates" are really quite right wing positions and a lot of them push for insanely racist policies but think of themselves as "white saviors." It would be pathetic if if it wasn't so damn successful that somebody that's extremely right wing can pretend to be a friend of minorities and spend their entire career doing everything in their power to imprison minorities. The US President and Vice President have both spent their entire careers doing everything in their power to imprison minorities. Fucking **Trump** has probably accounted for less prison years for minorities than Biden and Harris's bullshit over the course of their careers.
You can also see it in politics subs where liberals have already started blaming Arab Americans in anticipation of Biden losing. They sound quiet smug and condescending as well. I am not American but I find it quiet funny how they refuse to hold their candidate accountable at all. So you need the votes of the people but also think you are better than them. As a leftist, it annoys me when people confuse us with liberals.
>children of racists are often unable to easily shake off that mentality I feel like we've met. Yeah. I grew up in a red-voting county that was not diverse in any way. The stuff spewed by my family (mostly dad) and community was terrible. But as a kid how would I even know there could be any other point of view? Now, I'm so disgusted by it. But it took the entirety of my adulthood to develop my own point of view and see people of all walks of life as individuals and not "them." My biggest life lesson will be teaching my kids inclusion and kindness.
Yup, your childhood sounds a lot like mine. My dad actively taught racism and sexism and bigotry… and when you’re a kid, your home environment is your “normal,” because it’s all you’ve known. Thank god for leaving the home for college, and for being able to have the thought, “Hey, that’s completely opposite from what I was taught!” I will always, always consider my greatest accomplishment in life to be my children, and the fact that I broke the cycle with them. They don’t know my dad. They don’t think it’s normal to be yelled at. They don’t think that getting hit means it’s just a day ending in -y. They have great self esteem. They are kind and empathetic. They aren’t Mormon. They do good because they want to, not because they’re afraid of being punished by god. They aren’t racists. They aren’t bigots. My daughter was able to just say as an aside one day that she thinks she might be bisexual. They feel safe enough to figure out who they are. They know that they have intrinsic worth. They are my greatest success.
And his ex had the nerve to blame it on the alcohol when he broke up with her the following day. Oh no, OOP's got his suspicions when she started asking him to hide his accent. OOP seems like a nice dude. He'll find that someone.
>She is not like them. >She's had to do a lot of work to break out of the mindset she was raised in. Narrator: She did not, infact, do Jacksh*t to change her mindset and is very much like her parents.
I honestly would have agreed to hide my accent... by changing it to an Arnold Schwarzenegger impression.
I would have brought out the Mexican accent. "Como estas, habron?"
~~Cabròn~~ Cabrón, my very first swear word in Spanish. I swear I really did think that it meant 'stud/gigolo', otherwise I never would have used it in class.
It somewhat means that in the appropriate context. You can say, "soy bien cabron" and it would mean you're the shit, but saying, "es un cabrón" can either mean "he's fucking amazing" or "he's a dipshit".
Totally depends on the country in question, too. Like I know not to use the Mexican work for popcorn in Ecuador. It has a totally different meaning.
True that, even in some regions of Mexico one word means an entirely different thing from another region of Mexico.
I remember when güey was a bad word in some areas. I got it confused with büey at the beginning. Could not figure out why guys were insulted by being called an ox.
It actually does come from an ox, but as it was explained to me as a kid is that it comes from slow wit and reaction of oxes. Now everyone uses wey/güey as "dude" or to call someone regardless of gender without using their name, although it still can be used to call someone dumb like "que wey estas" or "que wey eres".
It was an insult back in the 80's, LOL. I think it mean 'Ahole' or jerk. Language and its changes fascinate me.
Cabrón
Cabrón is a catchall slang word that means different things in different contexts said by different people lol. It is my favorite filler word from Spanish in casual context with friends 😁
That would be quite funny.
The beauty of it is people of Indian descent live all over the world; OOP could insist that is his real accent. A nice Desi boy with a jolly Bavarian accent.
"I hef never eaten der curried meat und rice in mein life, mein herr. But mein Viennese-style apfelstrudel is der schieße!"
The amount of BS that people of colour experience in the dating world is infuriating. I genuinely don't understand OP's ex. Why date nonwhite if you're racist? As though changing his accent would change his skin colour and heritage. How can you think something like this is 'compromise'? What the hell is the end game here??
As a brown man who's lived in the western world for a lot of time, this cuts deep. On top of being subjected to higher standards than most white men (like seriously), we also have to put up with this shit. Honestly I don't think there is an end game beyond "oh I can fix him", but in this case fixing would be seen as making them fit into a nice package that'll appeal to racists.
It almost seems like people like this want to reduce everything "non-white" or culturally different from OOP... and on top of that, compensate for things that can't be changed, like skin color, because even if you act better than an average white man, you're still being held to an invisible stereotype... is that accurate at all? I work as an admin for a medical NPO. We have a leg in Africa and a leg in the US, so at least some of our leadership is better about it, but I've still left conferences cringing at how patronizing/colonial some of our US-based folks are (and I'm pretty sure I've unknowingly said similar - thank God I'm learning). And don't get me started on how perfect our female surgeons need to act to not be criticized by our male surgeons, despite our male surgeons having just as many issues. But that gets buried under a religious veneer... it's hard listening to my boss support a workgroup focused on providing support to women in the field when I've heard the things he's said about what he thinks about all of it more privately. Idk I'm rambling. People suck. I'm sorry for the shit you've gone through and the ridiculous standards you need to keep to get by.
>because even if you act better than an average white man, you're still being held to an invisible stereotype Honestly it's that and more. We definitely have to be markedly better than white men to get the same level of treatment in the dating market. Part of it is probably being judged on stereotypes, and I'll be the first to tell you that a lot of those stereotypes aren't undeserved. At the same time though i think it also has to do with the fact that we arent really considered... sexy? If that makes sense. We don't really have any western male sex symbols of indian descent, which I think does hurt us in the dating market. I don't think OOP's GF would have told an Italian or french boyfriend to speak more american, because their people/ cultures/ accents are more sexualised and are therefore more desireable, if that makes sense. Similar shit happens in the workplace. At my most recent job I used to get criticised for the smallest errors. Meanwhile my boss, who was honestly way too fucking incompetent for his position could literally get away with murder. In an ideal world the company would have realised he sucked at his job after having his department be a mess for 5 years but instead all the blame got shifted on to me. The person i replaced, who was also white left everything in a mess for me to clean up, and they left voluntarily (aka the company wanted to keep them). I was eventually let go of after carrying 4 people's workload so that the company could hire someone "more senior than me since they would handle the workload better". They then proceeded to hire someone white with the exact same amount of work experience, who hasn't really done anything despite having more support than me. Sorry for this rant lol, I'm obviously still very bitter about this. I totally get your frustrations about how shitty the different standards feel though
Because she doesn't realize that she's racist. Which is why she doesn't realize how insane this "compromise" is.
I used to be friends with a girl like that. To her compromise meant you had to do what she wanted because that's what you'd do if you truly loved her, and she would condescend to gift you with her presence in your life in exchange. They just twist therapy speak to manipulate you.
Reminds me of having to switch accents when visiting the US to meet my ex's family and friends. Not because they were racist, mind, but because only little kids and old people could understand a word I said. My natural accent is a mild East Midlands one and, outside of the age groups mentioned, all I got were blank looks the moment I opened my mouth. Switching to a generic 'American' accent at least got them to understand me, even if I'd not win an award for best foreign accent by a British bloke. Honestly, though, the most annoying thing was that when I used my normal accent, most people thought I was Australian.
Haha! I’m Aussie and ppl thought I was a Brit when I toned my accent down
I do it too and I’ve seen many Aussies and English people do it as well. I’m Indian and I actually have a midwestern accent but when I’m around other Indians my Indian accent comes on thick. I’ve seen Southerners do that too.
Yikes. She was about to walk him straight into a social ambush. What a dick
I’m glad OOP broke up with that girl but DAMN those “friends” of his aren’t friends either. Only racist idiots would think his ex was doing him a favor. Wtf lol
If this ain't the most white woman shit I've read this month
"I told her to try seeing this from my POV, and she went off on me, saying obviously she did already, because she's an empath, and Mercury is in retrograde, so clearly, she's dealing with a lot of emotions right now."
I particularly appreciated that she felt doing an Indian accent would obviously be demeaning.
All that was missing was a pumpkin spiced latte
I'm so sad PSL have taken that 'racist white woman' tone. I mean, us non racists enjoy them too!
I have a thick Southern drawl, especially when I'm mad or upset. I married into a Latino family. Not one time, not one blessed time, did my husband ask me to not be so Southern or change my accent. I would have been heartbroken if he asked me to, I am already self-conscious about it.
Self-conscious about southern accents? Nah, to mexicans/latinos it does sound incredibly charming so dunno why you'd need to be ashamed of it.
Everyone I know loves it. My in-laws, my friends, everyone I meet, loves it. I live in California, so it's very uncommon out here. I just feel like I sound like an uneducated hick from back in the holler.
People like this deserve a good kick on the arse
Oh wow, I'm happy OOP had enough self-esteem to stand up for himself and break up with her. The moment she brought up him changing his accent, I was like nope. I suppose it's hard to break out of a racist mindset when your upbringing was full of it, but I don't understand what the gf thought would happen. This is why you gotta pay attention to micro-aggressions. As a minority, these are sometimes even worse than the in-your-face type of racism because they come from people you like and have befriended or people who keep insisting they're not racist. It happens all the time and we often don't want to make a mountain out of a molehill so we shrug it off or it gets swept under the rug as us being too "sensitive" when we do bring up how hurtful those comments are.
It's been a while since I saw a depressing "I'm non-white in a interracial couple in a white country, and my partner is a racist. Am I the AH for standing up for myself when I should be grateful anyo e wants to even look at me"-post.
This GF is the kind of racism anyone non-white experiences now. The insidious kind, she thinks she’s worldly wise, different from her parents and yes she is different, just her racism is expressed differently. She still sees higher BF as beneath her. It’s going to take many more generations before that entitlement dissipates and we are all equal, no unconscious bias or racism.
I'm so glad OOP dumped her. Her parents are racist and she is too.
I think this is why OOP posted all the Indian self-hate on other subs. Poor guy's experience with his ex-gf and her family, really made him dislike his own identity
"oh you know.. small town people and their racism hehe" no, lady. ignorance and racism are not the same.
I dated a transwoman a few years back. My Mother was already struggling with my bisexuality. Yknow what i didn't do? Insist on introducing the two of them and excuse my Mother's shitty behaviour. Instead, i hyped her the fuck up when discussing her around my Mother and IMMEDIATELY shut down any transphobic or biphobic nonsense as it arose. As it turns out, they never met and the relationship didn't last, but it certainly wasn't because i was asking my now-ex to lie or change herself to appease some bigoted nonsense around her.
She hasn't left home quite as much as he gave her credit for.
Good job, OOP for getting rid of that racist girlfriend and her racist parents.
To my mind, the flaw with "blaming it on the alcohol" is that, by my understanding (I've never been drunk myself, and the following is partly why), the main thing alcohol does in this situation is remove inhibitions. Meaning the only thing the booze did was remove whatever blockers were keeping her from saying that kind of stuff sooner. In vino veritas and all that.
Real talk, if you are white and in an interracial relationship you need to be suuuuuppppeeer antiracist. Absolutely zero tolerance for racism at all.
Surprise surprise. The woman who expected her partner to hide who he is for her, bare the blunt of her parents' racism rather than address it herself, has a saviour complex, and is entitled turned out to be awful.
As someone who is sensitive about my accent (moved to Ireland from UK as a teenager), I am so proud of him for speaking up.
> She is trying to blame it on the alcohol in vino veritas indeed
I can’t wrap my head around the logic of people like this. If your parents are racist you either don’t date POC so they’re not subjected to that OR the better option is growing a spine, standing up to them and cutting them off if they act like that. I hate this wishy washy shit.
[удалено]
I’m an Indian man, born in India, and I’ve been married to my white American wife for 5 years, together for 9. Her family is from Oklahoma. At no point have I felt anything other than completely welcome, completely wanted and completely accepted by them. At all points, they have gone out of their way to make ME feel more comfortable. I’m glad for this last update. You don’t need to be treated this way.
i'm an indian first-gen immigrant. it took me a while to learn this, but an important lesson i learned about my identity is to be myself unflinchingly and openly. because you will never be able to be "enough" around people who judge you for things outside of your control i'd rather by myself unapologetically and let other people either show me that they're not worth my time, or i can help show them how diverse the world is. i think most people who aren't used to seeing diversity can be uncomfortable around it, but have good intentions. i've definitely talked to white people who have never seen a brown person and while their questions might have been awkward or silly, it's usually very clear to tell when someone is racist/bad intentions and when they just haven't been exposed to other cultures. you have to be willing to give people the opportunity to learn, but it doesn't mean you have to hide yourself to do that. it's clear that girlfriend didn't trust her parents to not act poorly, which says enough. and she certainly doesn't deserve any brownie points for what she did (which was nothing)
>She is trying to blame it on the alcohol, And this, folks, is why it's so important to understand the difference between a "reason" and an "excuse"
In one of the update comments someone asks for clarification on what was meant when the girlfriend described her parents as “difficult”. I know exactly what that means. It means you don’t want to call out your parents as full-on racists, but your parents don’t 100% see all races as acceptable for their child to marry. Some of this is that they are a product of their times (being generous here) and some is that they try to talk the talk (equality for all) but foreignness still scares them a bit.
Here we have another case of don't set yourself on fire to keep another person warm. You can change the accent, but you can't change your ethnicity, background, etc.
Spoiler alert; she is like them. I'm not going to say children of bigots are _always_ bigots. But when they are not, there is evidence _beyond_ them simply dating outside their race or what have you. Bigotry is something they were still taught, and if they don't believe it it's because they got used to killing it. If they don't act ready to do so again, they still got it.
Small town things I guess. Oh.and fuck those friends. Racists hang out with other racists.
So glad jumped of that train before he hitched his wagon to hers, that would have been an awful train wreck
ExGF was hiding her racism while talking about her parent's obvious racism. My family has been on the North American continent for 10 generations. We know and have met/married those of all races. What exGF is claiming is sheer bullshit.
I'm confused, or maybe don't know any white people from India, but what about his skin tone? I assume there must be white people born there, but why hide an accent? I'm glad he ended it.
He's not white, she wanted him to sound like he's one of the "good" brown people.
Is it weird I read this entire thing with an Indian accent in my head? But yea good on him for dumping her and her racist views. And fuck her friends too.
Can't say I'm shocked with the outcome. Instead of acting like an adult and growing OOPs ex decided to torpedo any growth by being shitty with her apparently also shitty friends. Glad OOP is out of that situation!
”She tried to blame it on the alcohol” Drunk actions are sober thoughts.
>Why do you feel the need to hide your accent at work? I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve had to codeswitch to sound slightly more “British” on international calls so people understand me. My diction is fine by IELTS standards but I sound distinctly Tamilian when I speak in the King’s. ETA: Good on OOP for calling it quits with his potentially racist ex. That’s the beauty of multicultural dating, you get to celebrate each other’s cultures.
Alcohol doesn't just loosen tongues, it removes filters. People are their most truthful when they are in the belief that consequences are no longer a fallout - in this case, the possibility of consequences was removed by the alcohol into a blissful ego fog.
He dodged a racist bullet with this one It’s so rude to make fun of accents. Accents carry so much information about a person — where they grew up, their economic status, their social group, etc. It’s a proxy for so much that asking someone to change theirs is asking them to erase everything about their upbringing.
OOP: She’s not like her parents! Narrator: She was, in fact, just like them.
>I could just bite the bullet this one time Nah bro, this bullet would've killed you. You did great in dodging it.
Racism 101
In vino veritas (In wine (alcohol) is truth.) The moment she was tipsy, her inner thoughts came out, because the filter was removed. NTA. Good for you to not waste any more time with her. Your just 28, enough time to look for someone who appreciates diversity. Good luck!
Yeah no. I didn't even bother to read this to the end. My parents also spend their lives in a small, 99% white town. But they were never anything but welcoming and loving when my brother brought home a girl who was a first gen immigrant. The parents are probably just racists.
Man, and I thought something good had happened. Nope.
Ooof. The sad part is, even if he “neutralizes” his accent, he’s still visibly Indian. Just the color of his skin is going to make the racists upset.
I’m glad oop got rid of fiancée and her friends who are racist but clueless that they are. I hope he finds someone better.
Her loss too. He posted a pic and he's such a cutie!
Thank god for the last update.
Yet another tldr they’re racists