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Mar 14 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
But central question remains.

Kiske baap ki gaadi hai?

Both TTE & cops like to pretend like it is their father's railway, not Indian Railway. The passenger is at the lowest end of the pyramid in #IndianRailways.

So which of these is alpha predator?

It's like Bear vs Tiger
Us passengers, who are the least important people in #IndianRailways
Would like to know if we should pay obeisance to the TTE or UP cops in such a scenario?

TLDR for those who can't follow.

These cops are traveling without a ticket. Which they should not be. They are accosted by the ticket checker. Who as a central government employee technically outranks them. But they push back. He pushes back more.

Caste Slurs fly around.
Even in a fight between two powerful arms of the government run by the same high caste right wing party, the guy first says "mind your language, women here" and his partner says "bhangi sala".
@AbbakkaHypatia

Profession based insults are unique to India.

I've never heard two guys getting in a fight in the West call each cobbler and tanner and street cleaner and sanitation worker as insults.
The cop in this video insults the Ticket Checker , who outranks him btw, a "bhangi", which is sanitation worker.

Please tell me how casteism is dead in India.
How others fight: genitalia based insults plus mother sister based insults & LGBT insults.

Not great. But.

How brahmins fight:

"Janitor!"

"Roofer!"

"Cobbler!"

"Tanner!"

"Motherfucker!"

"Hey, let's not get too offensive!"
A few days ago a cricket account used Roofer as an insult. @AbbakkaHypatia rightly asked, why are you using Roofer, a profession and also an oppressed caste, as an insult? Instead of saying my bad, that vile woman doubled down on "chhapri" as an insult. And her fans applauded.
If you are using "chhapri" or "bhangi" as an insult, ask yourself, if when speaking in English, you use Roofer and Janitor as insults.

And think about it. Instead of getting touchy.
There is nothing "too woke" about introspecting on why our vocabulary includes so many casteist slurs. Uniquely in the world.

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More from @gauravsabnis

Gaurav Sabnis Profile picture
Mar 14
This written between Trump's loss and the insurrection, is one of the best things written in this decade.

It pretty much predicts the insurrection and makes us rethink how we view democracy.

As a pickle to be preserved tho it's a dough to be kneaded.

newyorker.com/magazine/2021/…
"The interesting question is not what causes authoritarianism but what has ever suspended it."

This itself makes you do a double take if you think about it.

Like yeah, what on earth made us think benign democracy is the normal?
What I love about this essay is that it applies just as easily to the Indian context as it does to the American one.

Indian democracy is in much more of an existential crisis than American democracy.

And it's because we never quite finished building our institutions.
Read 6 tweets
Gaurav Sabnis Profile picture
Mar 14
Bosskar food travel threads are the best. 🥰
I've never met Ajit but I seek out his food posts and threads because he is my kinda foodie. Someone who is always searching joy and excitement in food, not deciding what is overrated and what is missing and what is wrong.

The latter dominate foodies.

I'm always on the lookout for foodies focused on what more to eat, not what not to eat.

Too many Indian foodies are focused on what not to eat or what is overrated. I have no use for such foodies who are disappointment junkies.

I like Ajit like accounts, excited at good food.
Read 4 tweets
Gaurav Sabnis Profile picture
Mar 14
Personal introspective story 🧵

A few weeks ago, we were with a Desi friend and his US born and raised 11 at a downtown sushi place.

I told them how I once took a bunch of my college students out for sushi, also in downtown. And how it was interesting to observe differences.
A bunch of students ordered whatever sushi they wanted instantly.

A few waited and looked at the menu until I said "it's all on the school tab folks, don't look at prices", and they ordered.

A few took longer. I helped them. These students had never ordered sushi before.
When you grow up in a family that's getting by paycheck to paycheck, you aren't experienced in sushi ordering. Was something I realized and shared with my friends.

Me: Rich kids like you have a different childhood

Friend's 11: I'm not a rich kid!!
Read 7 tweets
Gaurav Sabnis Profile picture
Mar 14
Someone commenting on Nadella describing his challenging middle upbringing said this is a largely if not exclusively a Brahmin American thing!

True. Have y'all seen the Aziz episode of Comedians in Cars getting Coffee? It is like the exact opposite of this!
Seinfeld's questions about his childhood, parents, are designed to get Aziz to share all his struggles. But Aziz was like, nah, my parents were qualified, we were well off, and they supported my career choice. In general Aziz doesn't treat his childhood as material source.
Hasan Minhaj mines his childhood and upbringing for his material. But even there, he talks about how qualified his parents were. How quasi white his life was. It was the very real post 9/11 muslimphobia he talks about. There is no glorification of growing up not super rich.
Read 46 tweets
Gaurav Sabnis Profile picture
Mar 14
Most people have enjoyed my lecture excerpt threads about the Oscars. A few people are randomly snarking and asking for cites and "proof" and all. Some saying it's all made up

🤦🏽‍♂️🤦🏽‍♂️🤦🏽‍♂️

These are lecture excerpt threads not an actual lecture or research article or thought piece.
Everything in those threads is public knowledge. In my actual lectures, running into dozens of slides plus an average of 40 pages of PDF reading per class, EVERYTHING is cited. For the audience that pays my salary. My students.

This is Twitter. It's for my leisure.
If you trust that I know what I'm talking about, read and enjoy. If you don't trust it, scroll on.

You have no reason to trust me. But I also have no reason to work extra to make random Twitter folks trust me. 🤷🏽

I work in a job that punishes making stuff up harshly!
Read 10 tweets
Gaurav Sabnis Profile picture
Mar 13
Personal story 🧵

This happened a couple of weeks ago.

It was a windy day in Hoboken. I was walking along the Hudson from the Stevens campus to the terminal to take the path back home to the city.

Of course I was on my phone.

A young woman strode past me walking fast.
"Cathy?" I said instinctively.

She seemed to pause for half a second and kept walking, very fast.

I thought it was an old student of mine named Cathy. Maybe I was mistaken. Wait, was her name..

"Katie?"

I said, not too loudly. But loud enough that she would hear. She paused.
She paused for a second.

Then took two more rapid steps.

Then stopped and turned around and looked at me.

"Professor Sabnis!"

Her body language changed right away. As soon as she recognized who I was.

She did go by Katie (names changed but you get the gist).
Read 7 tweets

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