Comment by xtracto 4 days ago
I've heard from people working there that Amazon tech is full of Indian managers. And the "hearsay" here in Mexico is that Indian work "ethic" is terrible. That they are terrible bosses (same with TCS and HCL who also have lots of positions here in Mexico).
A Mex programmers subredddit r/taquerosprogramadores has plenty of stories about that.
Maybe it's just the structure AZ has established for Mexico. No idea.
Ooh and I've worked with several Indian people who are great as well. I was just mentioning the stereotype of how mexican people in tech see them.
I even had a great indian engineer who emigrated from India (his parents are still there) who actually complained about Indian work culture.
It's like myself when I complain about mexican culture (for work, ethics, corruption or mediocrity)... I know that not everyone is like that, but shit where I'm from (southeast Mexico, Campeche) you'll be lucky to find someone that breaks the stereotype.
And I've several friends still there.. I just don't like the education and vslues society imparts us there
Close, that's the definition of stereotyping based on race and can lend to bigoted acts and decisions.
Racism emcompasses a bit of a different scope, including policy, institutional structures, and norms, of which stereotypes is directly related to norms and can be indirectly influential on the others.
Interesting. The word "racisme" in French has also yet another meaning: the word "race" (identical spelling in French) cannot be used for human beings in French (works for cows and dogs) as "racime" is defined by the belief that there are several human "races" (which is scientifically wrong). The word race as used in English is translated by something like "ethnical group" for example.
However, the comment I originally reacted to would be definitely qualified as being "raciste" by most French speakers (and be illegal in France)
The word definitely is completely idiomatic with regard to humans in French. Look up any dictionary definition. And there’s no law making it illegal in France. Besides, even if it had such a law, the French state doesn’t have a monopoly on the French language. It’s an official language in 29 countries.
Well, try to use the world "race" for human in France at least yes (sorry I'm talking about what I know of, I don't know for other French speaking countries), and you will see the reactions (maybe not as outraged than if you used the N word in the US, but something like that).
As for the legal part, calling all people of a given origin "bad managers" is definitely illegal here in France (once again, speaking only about what I know of)
English and America make the distinction between race and ethnic group.
That's just "structural racism" which is a subset of "racism".
If we were to believe that structural racism was the only kind of racism, we'd be forced to conclude that people can't be racist because people aren't structures.
But it's precisely the opposite as structures are composed of people and racist people are often the reason we have structural racism.
Some scholars think it's making judgement based on race. Others scholars think only those in power opinions matters and those without power can make judgements based on race and that wouldn't be considered racism. Others think it's a natural and norm thing based on tribalism.
But in your example a person of color would have a higher status in America compared to an Indian national. So the person of color is being racist.
In the future the only acceptable version will be the first because keeping track of who had power in what context is going to be impossible to track and can get easily shifted. That's the definition the law uses currently.
> To many scholars in the US racism requires institutional power to codify it.
Yes, that's because many scholars in the US are intellectually dishonest and wish to redefine "racism" in ways that benefit their arguments.
The chances of your having a manager of Indian descent are higher in tech compared to other professions. That's a function of the 'ingestion pipeline' that's built through the US education system (H1B through higher-education). In a high-expectations field (tech), coupled with a high-expectation company (Amazon), folks who manage to stay back, tend to be seen more, and will be rewarded by being managers (till Peter Principle kicks in). Most middle managers in exacting teams (for products like AWS) are likely to be demanding.
My hypothesis is that a part of what you're observing is just some form of 'survivorship bias' - changing jobs with visas isn't easy (been there done that) so folks are more willing to 'bend' to the culture being driven internally than just moving out (esp. with the long wait times).
At some point, its hard to distinguish the people from the culture, and what came first, but that's a different conversation.
heard similar things about challenges getting a lot of near-shoring tech (chip fabs, etc) set up in MX
Right. There's even an in-famous story of 3DFX lost the 3d graphic cards war: The quality of cards made in Mexico just couldn't compete with that of Asian countries. https://level2.vc/a-short-story-of-3dfx/
Beware of generalizing behaviors and qualities based off people races and origins. This is what is called racism and is frowned upon or illegal in many places.
If it helps you, I have one counter example handy: I have had an excellent Indian manager.