Does this offend you? Or would you not be offended at all?

[shaasavera]

Re: Does this offend you? Or would you not be offended at all?

@redvelvet

Okay, first of all…how likely is it for a Pakistani to be taken as a Haitian? Even if it is a very dark skinned Pakistani, there is still a marked difference between the features of the two races. Same with Burundi. To an extent, same with Nepal…if you take the eyes. How often would a Desi be taken as a Nepali? You did not factor this in, it seems.

The most common assumption assumption I’ve gotten for my looks is Indian, a few times a person guessed correctly that I’m Pakistani, A few times I’ve gotten Arab..more specifically Saudi…I’ve gotten Hispanic…and maybe even Trinidad or Guyana. These guesses didn’t bother me. If someone thought I was Haitian, I think I’d be more confused/surprised by their deduction skills than offended. I think some of the countries on your list don’t make sense for the reason I’ve mentioned above.

Now, though there will be exceptions…I think the general tendency of people would be to feel more pleased with the latter group. I don’t know what the purpose of the this thread is though it appears to be a favorite and redundant topic. Is it to prove that people are biased? Yup, they are. You already knew that, OP. It’s not right and even the best among us have biases, sometimes we’re not even aware of them. But, yes, people are biased and you already knew that, don’t think an online experiment was necessary.

True it would be rare for people to be mistaken for a Haitian or Nepali. Nepalis are also desis. But even then people from those countries have diverse features and people do migrate from different countries to different places. Some people in the US cannot differentiate desis from arabs or middle eastern people. Some people don’t even know how those of other cultures look like. Now if someone like that mistakes you then how would you feel is what i am after.

Why do you think people would be happier with the latter group? I guess it includes more well to do countries. We all have biases but how many of us question why those biases exist? What do we know about those little known countries that makes us prefer to dissociate with them and be associated with 1st world countries? Maybe category A may have different features but what if they have a heart of gold?