"Excuse me, but do you know what schools I've been to and how well-educated I am?"
By now, you've seen the video. Things seem to be going normally on an evening Metro North train from Manhattan to Connecticut when a passenger flips her sh*t when asked to refrain from using profane language during a mobile phone conversation with a friend. What happens next is the stuff that Saturday Night Live skits are made of (and I am sure that there is a parody of this on the horizon penned by SNL's staff of seventeen-year-old writers). The passenger, Hermon Raju, a woman that apparently graduated from New York University no less than three times (according to her LinkedIn profile), immediately informs the conductress that she is highly-educated and not a hoodlum. She asks the conductress if she knows "what schools I've been to?" What's interesting is that many viewers of the now infamous video are attempting to read into the incident based on the origins of Ms. Raju on the Indian subcontinent; references to the Indian caste system and the need for Indian-American princesses to show that they are a class apart have been made. Is there any truth in this sort of interpretation?
"Don't put your hands on me!"
Lots of us have Indian friends and it is very easy to fall into the trap of using some sort of anecdote to analyze what might be an entirely different situation. A good friend of mine from graduate school was the type to announce within two minutes of meeting her that she had graduated with a Philosophy degree from the University of Pennsylvania, what neighborhood she had grown up in, what her parents did for a living, and how her university was infinitely better than yours. I have another Indian colleague who makes it clear to everyone that she is a "Brahmin" and expects to marry another "Brahmin". I could say that in my experience young women of this background are prone to find in education a substitute for the caste system of their native land (when they realize that formal caste is irrelevant in this country) but that would be a gross oversimplification. For one thing, Indians are not the only ones to brag about educational background. Many people of, lets be frank, recent immigrant origin, may be inclined to attach a great degree of importance to this sort of accomplishment because, in their minds, it is important for them to make clear to everyone that they are not among the rabble but are, in fact, a class above "less-educated" people. It would be easy to assume that the link here is the origin of such individuals in a rigid class system, but that is not necessarily true.
Hermon Raju during an NYU trip with colleagues
Hermon Raju during a fashion event in NYC
So what happened to Hermon? Clearly, this is a blog so everything written (or typed) here is nothing more than my opinion but, as I commented on TheDailyWhat article about this incident, I formed the impression that Ms. Raju, when cornered about her profane language by the train conductress, felt the need to show that she was a class above the ordinary passenger and therefore deserved to be treated differently. Her query: "Do I look like a hoodlum?" is telling. It's as if she's saying, "Yes, I am brown-skinned, but I am not the run of the mill brown-skinned person. I am, in fact, highly-educated." She believes that her education entitles her to be treated differently and, clearly, as denizens of a nation in which class is supposedly nonexistent (a myth) this sort of behavior is guaranteed to inspire feelings of extreme derision in her interlocutors. In my musings on Ms. Raju's behavior, I like to think that she was having a bad day, filled with rejected business opportunities, job offers, etc. and therefore she was perfectly poised to say something impertinent when placed in a stressful position. Thankfully, Hermon did not resort to saying something more egregious than what she did as, rather than chuckling and ridiculing her for effrontery, we might instead be inclined to censure her for resorting to prejudice. Perhaps Ms. Raju deserves a round of applause for allowing us to ridicule her rather than forcing us to do something worse. I bear Ms. Raju no ill will; in fact, I hope she finds an Indian gentleman as highly-educated as herself to give her a comfortable life in Westport, Connecticut.
[NOTE: This video keeps getting taken down, but I will be vigilant and put up the reposts if I notice that the vid is down or someone let's me know!]
