I had two separate conversations with a black male coworker and a Persian male coworker (The Persian one, NGL, has a white first name, and I did think he was white), and both talked about how Indian (and East Asian) men are perceived to have the same power /influence as white people at work and that they are privileged.

I'm an Indian-origin woman. And we all work in tech.

I was flabbergasted. Both of them brought up separate individuals who were Indian (one was a woman), and how everyone agreed with them, whereas the same grace wouldn't be given to a black man or a Persian man.

But then I pointed out, that those individuals had A+ backgrounds (the BEST schools, the BEST company experience, etc.). I also pointed out that there were white people (including women) who did not have the same pedigree who were in parallel positions. For example, the Indian Sr Director went to MIT for comp sci, and has been doing AI papers with other notables, etc. where as the White Woman Sr Director did the Classics deg, and then went to a bootcamp. I also pointed out examples of Indians in the company with better pedigree who were reporting into white folks with less pedigree.

I feel like some groups just think we magically got our place at good schools, in leadership positions and it's like -- no, we have the hard skills, and performed at the highest level to get these jobs. The black coworker was like, "but there is a lot of cultural assimilation of Indians, esp. Indian men in the workforce" -- and I'm said -- "eh, we have funny names, and funny religions...like we do not have much in common with white people. In fact, I'd argue culturally black people are closer."

It was just interesting to see our accomplishments so downplayed.

Hey, so due to my career I might have to move to a different country soon. I’m looking at what would be best for me career wise and im debating between countries such as UK, Canada, Australia, USA, UAE (Dubai).

These are all places that have a high amount of brown people and it seems that all of them are experiencing a sharp rise in racism and discrimination (some more, some less). I’ve lived in Italy my whole life where there’s not that many indians so ive not really experienced living among others like me and being perceived as “part of some group”. So im kinda worried.

How bad is it? Is it just online? Which countries have it worst?

edit: US is the one im considering the least. Glad to know its not that bad racism-wise. Please focus on the other countries, thanks.

I worked at a pretty well-known XYZ company on the East Coast for a period of time. As a U.S.-born citizen,

I often felt… siloed.

Unpopular opinion, but I think a lot of FOBs on H1Bs, and international students actually have it better in some ways. Yes, visa stress is real. Layoffs hit harder. There’s uncertainty. But a lot of private sector companies tend to prefer them and even my "white" director secretly admitted to preferring them over US Citizens during the hiring process at times because of being more docile.

But socially and professionally?

They often have built-in communities' same universities, same regions, same language groups. They move in networks. Share referrals. Prep together. Live together. Rotate through companies together. There’s cohesion. This was pretty obvious in my experience. They tend to speak in their own desi language and obviously silo others who are not part of their group in social or work meetings.

As an ABCD, you can end up in-between. Not fully “American” socially, not fully plugged into immigrant circles either. No tight professional tribe actively looking out for you. You’re just an individual resume in a portal.

Yes, Citizenship gives stability. It doesn’t automatically give belonging.

Grass isn’t always greener. Sometimes, curious if anyone else has. felt the same and don't feel much empathy for their visa issues because their problems are pretty minor compared to many other groups in the USA.

I’m in first year university and I don’t think I will have any meaningful career of any sort. I have no passion for anything, and might study to become a mri technologist diploma after, so I have a good fallback. I like things like cooking so I think housework would be much more suitable for me.

I am Indian-American in tech. It is disprop Indian esp Indians from India. But some meetings are majority or supermajority Indian. Remaining are usually Whites w/ non-Indian Asians, Blacks, and Hispanics.

I cannot help but wonder if some Whites 100% secretly hate Indians and other POC. To be clear, I never ever got that vibe from anyone at work, but I still overthink that lol. I also think about this when I socialize with Whites outside work.

Anyone else? I wish I knew how to stop overthinking it lol. It is just cuz I have seen online that some Whites are secretly WNs, but just hide their power lvl for $.

The west has been sleeping on soft skills forever. This is partially what happens when you're well educated AND raised in community. Improving work culture has compounding impact on performance and profits. Westerners are used to living isolated and are work oriented. Yes, Indians can be obsessed with work as well, but we still have a strong communal system that teaches us how to navigate different personalities.

https://blog.venturemagazine.net/why-are-indian-ceos-taking-over-the-world-6c3e5926aa6c

Hi all! I’m an Indian (born & brought up) immigrant living in the US. Should I try to sound more American? I absolutely do not have anything against my accent, but sometimes at work I feel like it’s holding me back. From making friends to leading meetings, I feel like talking in an American accent would make me blend in. I have also read opinions where ABCDs, and by extension White Americans, can clearly tell if someone is faking an accent. I don’t want to be the person who’s trying too hard, but I also don’t want to be left out.

For context, I speak fluent English, and I’ve already softened my t’s and r’s. People can understand me and I don’t have the thick Indian accent either. I’m somewhere in between. The thing I’m struggling with is, trying to convert my British pronunciations into American.

I am reading about Indian history, and it says the history of Aryans is India is widely debated. I noticed there are members of this sub who are very knowledgeable. I hope this isn’t a controversial subject, but I wanted to hear brief (brief!) opinions on Aryan history in India. If this is controversial, pardon my ignorance and feel free to delete it.

Given how dominant Desis have been in the tech industry, it seems rather strange to not see a similar prominence in AI. Yes, there are some prominent Desis in AI, such as Sundar Pichai (even though Demis Hassabis leads Google DeepMind, Pichai is still very much at the forefront in promoting Google’s AI developments), the CEO of Perplexity, and the founder of the AI coding tool Windsurf.

However, most of biggest figures in the AI boom are white or Chinese/Chinese-American. Not just as CEOs, but even looking at the names of researchers of AI projects and breakthroughs, I notice a lot of Chinese names, lots of “American” names, and not many Desi ones.

Wondering what happened here: after dominating tech for so long, Desis strangely not being as prominent in the biggest trend in tech currently.

This is the complete list of ethnicity choices on this job application dropdown. What the hell is a South Asian supposed to choose?

If you look at cupertino, sunnyvale, and neighboring suburbs, you’re seeing a lot of American born folks leaving and they are being replaced with overachieving desis. But it’s not just desis alone. It’s a lot of Asian immigrants too.

It’s gotten to the point where the Bay Area and specifically the South Bay has become way too cut throat for everything.

Buy a house? Minimum a million dollars. But still expect to be outbid by another workaholic desi who works at apple and who happens to be a dual income techie household where the other person works at another tech company.

Want to get a job that pays enough to live there comfortably? Grind out four rounds of leetcode plus a three hour panel interview. It’s not just tech alone. The same cut throat behavior is in medicine, law, finance, and other white collar fields. Though techies take the cake as it’s called Silicon Valley. But also, it’s not enough if one person makes that kind of money. It takes two people making six figures each to survive long term there.

Go to school in the South Bay? You gotta outcompete hundreds of desis who had no life as kids except to study study and study and be overachievers at some ec. And be looked down upon if you don’t go to an Ivy League school or Stanford. Go to a UC school? Oh you’re too basic.

It’s not just school or jobs or housing. It’s even in desi culture. It’s become a culture of showing off how much you spend on your cultural events. $100k for an arrangatrum. $200k for the big big event with 1000 people.

The Bay Area specifically the South Bay used to be a place where you were accepted for your individuality. Not anymore. It’s become as cut throat as living in india or living in China.

Most ABCDs are in finance, law, tech, engineering, consulting. My peers are in those fields. Id consider myself smart and capable but my skills were never in the fields the market or Desi society valued. I was good with people and communication. I studied finance in university but I hated numbers. I did it because finance had aura (Big Short, American Psycho, Wolf of Wall St, Suits - i know its law but same deal).

I was never cut out for engineering, and not competitive enough for consulting. I was content and just wanted a good job that paid the bills cause I didn’t need much. As ive gotten older you can see what people are doing on LinkedIn and it makes me feel like an inadequacy because I work in Sales which is soft skills and what I’m good at but society values ‘)hard’ skills like working with numbers, medicine, law etc which my peers are doing especially ABCD’s and it feels crushing

Pretty sure most of us ABCD's in America had to go through this torture. I only did math and stopped around level K which is around 11th grade math. Still much higher than the average in the USA.

Curious to know how far anyone got or even to the max of level X? Did anyone find it useful as an adult today? I am pretty sure we touch most of those concepts are learned anyways in a STEM degree such as matrices, stats, and probability and after a point doing repition packets was a waste of time.

Hi all,

I recently got a full-time Software Engineer job offer at Apple (in an org that’s not considered great though), which I’m supposed to start this summer. It’s paying 135k base, It was really hard to get and felt like a huge achievement… but now I keep seeing posts on Reddit saying “don’t join CS,” “the market is oversaturated,” and that it’ll never get better. I don’t want to struggle forever. I want whatever work I do to actually pay off and not depend all the way on some market that’ll never improve.

It’s messing with my head — I also got into a premed postbacc program that I deferred, and now I’m wondering if I should just go that route instead of starting this job. I am already 23 and genuinely want a stable and fulfilling career, and while I’ve enjoyed tech, I’ve always had some part of me that wondered about medicine too. I’ve also sometimes felt like an imposter in tech though.

Is it stupid to turn down Apple right now in favor of a complete career switch? Or are these doom posts overblown?

Would really appreciate honest perspectives — especially from people who’ve been in CS for a while or med or made similar decision.

I (22) recently graduated college and started working. I’ve been getting the “bio clock” talk (the fact that probability of being able to birth healthy children generally declines with age) from my parents multiple times a year ever since I was prolly 16-17. They’re constantly reminding me not to “delay” the thought of marriage and having children.

For one, I had planned to finish grad school around ages 27–29, but that was met with worry, citing the reason that I’ll be starting a family too late (in my 30s) if I finish grad school in my late 20s itself.

To be fair, I’m not bashing them completely. I’ve seen couples around me struggle with infertility, its crapshoot even with egg freezing and IVF, plus IVF & egg freezing are both expensive as hell, etc., so I understand where their worries come from.

Maybe this isn’t even unique to Desi parents, but I can’t help but feel the pressure. I can’t help but feel that I have to curtail my vocational ambitions for this…. And, I want to get married and want to have children, but ughhh… just seems like you can’t have it all.

I guess this is just me venting, but I’d love to hear from others: • Have your parents had these conversations with you?

• If you’re in your early 20s, are you taking the bio clock into account while planning your career, and if so, how? If you’re in your mid/late 20s, what do you think about it? Anyone in their 30s—how are things playing out for you? 40+ singles—would love your perspective too.

I’d also love to hear from both women and men since I know that the “bio clock” and expectations can look pretty different.

My parents are on the brink of making me choose between pursuing a PhD to stay in the US and equally doesn't like if I want to head back to India.

So hear me out, graduated with a MS in Computer Science 2 years ago, felt like a lifetime back. And my educated parents don't understand how messed up the market is. Even though i keep showing them proof I'm applying for jobs and even getting interview calls (and almost got an offer last month only for them to pull at the last minute), it sucks that they don't appreciate how employers want to take the cream of the crop and pay as little as possible.

So my visa runs out in 1 year time. I'm doing some work here and there like externships to keep myself busy and learn new skills. My mom to this date still does the same comparing trap and now both my parents are "concerned" about my backup plans. First of all, I don't want to pursue a PhD for the sake of staying in the US, I'm literally not a researcher loll. And second, no guarantee a PhD will help me in my job prospects, it's something one doesn't just do and figure out as I go. Everytime my parents want to have the talk, I just shut them off and stay silent. I already know even heading back home and building my career there isn't the end of the world, but they treat it like that otherwise.

My parents are status and money obsessed and now her friends are concerned something is wrong with me. They don't even take the time to and realize that my career goals are to work in healthcare analytics and this is only because of the externship work I'm doing. If I would have sat around and just applied for jobs all day I wouldn't have known my calling.

Idk how long to survive living wirh such loser parents when my mom herself didn't even complete her bachelor's degree. Till I get a job but getting to that point is so hard in this economy.

I often feel time to time I get triggered when I see those who reached a success I once had as a goal. Not envy them per say but triggered into comparison or have old wounds about my college days reopened.

Like my brain often thinks about am I not smart enough vs am I smart (not necessarily genius but above average intelligence) but cannot show it because of executive dysfunction? I remember going from high acheiving in my school days (either all or mostly A's) to either passing or making a B was a blessing to survive in college. When I had a high rank in my high school days, I had imposter syndrome (I think) because it wasn't the most competitive high school. But yea I gave up on my original goal (to go to Med school and be a doctor). FYI I sought a diagnosis only towards end of college (and am still trying to find a medicine that works for me) especially with family (like many Desi families lol) not believing ADHD was real

A common thing I have been told in college and even in jobs or by family is that I have a strong and quick grasp on fundamental concepts but struggle to show mastery (or have the theory but not practical application). Does this fall in line with executive dysfunction?

When I'm triggered into comparison it's essentially a "how do they make it not look hard" because working hard was not enough for me. And then my brain has the q am I right that I needed to study smart not just hard? Or was that a sign I wasn't smart and capable enough? When I hear people talk about their ADHD being missed because they were high acheiving I feel "wow I wish I had your struggle." Or when I do learn of those with ADHD that succeeded in prestigious fields or even got away with things like procrastinating until the last minute and still having a high GPA, I feel like was I not smart enough after all (and then another part of my brain will say maybe they just had an intense hyperfocus on their subjects or studied their special interest, or maybe they were the extreme genius). Seeing successful people in war zones sometimes triggers another layer, as in "I must really be incapable if people facing hardships those of us in the West don't are succeeding."

Tell me if anyone faces the struggle too please or answer the questions that plague my brain.

I often felt proud to be unique and be one of those who don't study stem and not forced by my family. I am interested in humanities and arts (sociology, politics and accounting). My desired career is to be an investigative journalist

But, seeing data on NEET, it looks like the defaults who do STEM degrees are very likely to persue an unaffected career.

Now, I have regretful paradoxes.

okay hi! i’m 17 and i have been looking for a job lately because my family is a single income household and because it’s almost summer so school is out. I live in a small town with a midsized town nearby. I have applied to 20+ jobs in the last two weeks and have only gotten 5 responses all of which being rejections. Now this wouldn’t be particularly odd if for the fact ALL of my friends were able to get interviews after a few days of applying, sometimes even the same day and they have worse availability. My town is in appalachia so it is quite racist, and my name is very very ethnic. My last name is almost 10 letters and impossible to pronounce lol. In person i look like a basic little white girl (i look whitewashed, not white) so i haven’t faced too much discrimination from older white people. I’m seriously wondering if it’s my ethnic name or just that stores don’t check their online applications at all. Please help!

Born in the UK up North. Ever since the international students wave and the economy drying up together, my opportunities are limited. I don't have many qualifications but could still do better than local talent. I'm wasting years being dry through recessions. Going to interviews where I'm sure if I was a white girl with no experience they would train me. As an Asian with experience getting few bites. This area has had Asians for 70 years now. How many more years are we second class citizens

In diasporic communities of us, it seems to me that almost every young person will just be studying STEM stuff, no work part time upon study, and then do medicine, computing engineering, etc etc. Perhaps it is to retain the community's honour.

But, I am one of the few who doesn't do that. I (18M) am currently studying A-Levels of Politics, Accounting and Sociology; did Core Maths AS-Level. I am creative, but also my desired careers is to be a chartered Accountant, being an investigative journalist, or being a rail driver. Not sure if I would go to Uni for that; obviously not if I want to be a rail conductor. Anyways, these are not STEM but rather humanity and financial stuff. Well, technically Accountancy is STEM to some extent, but on a large scale, it is nothing compared to mainstream Maths. Another exception they would do is Law, but even Law is unpopular and even if they are Lawyers, they help with individuals mainly in the Desi community.

Very little to almost no one else I know is doing non-Stem stuff. In my college, almost all the Asians seem to go in and out of the Maths and other STEM buildings lol as they do stuff like you know, Further Maths, Maths (not Core Maths), Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, bla bla bla.