Can we please stop conflating casteism as racism? While both equally horrible, one is not same as the other. One can possibly hide their caste. But a person cant change their racial phenotypes.
People that can pass of as white are more often of mixed heritage. Even then its really rare for them to be passable into the majority racial population. It all depends on their racial/ethnic composition. If one is half-latino/half-North African/levant and half-white, chances are they're going to be passable and most likely identify as white. Even the U.S census considers people from MENA as white. There are also white-Hispanics. But same can't be said of people that are a mix of African-American + Caucasian. See Barack Obama, Jordan Peele or Keegan-Michael Keys as examples. What you consider "high" for passable are still a small fraction of the minority population.
Also passable isn't a think most people do these days. At least not since the 1960s where racial barriers were much higher. These days people of mixed heritage will most likely identify with the minority side of their heritage. (For many reasons).
As a Brazilian friend of mine once told me - Racial classification and categorization in the United States is just weird.
I know I might be oversimplifying this. But you can legally change your last name. But you cannot change your race. Unless, your phenotype is somewhat ambiguous and can pass as a person of the majority racial group. But that is rare. By conflating casteism with racism, you're diluting the meaning of what racism is and systemic effects it has had on minorities in the United States.
By the way I'm a person of Indian ancestry born and raised in the U.S. According to my grandparents, we're of lower caste as well. But no one has ever asked me what my caste is simply based on my last name. I'm not denying that casteism isn't a problem within the Indian diaspora. But it is entirely different societal problem within the United States compared to racism. In India , it might be similar to racism. But not the same in the U.S.
Let me put it this way - a person who hates all minorities or specific ethnic groups, isn't going to care what caste you belong into. He's going to hate you and the higher caste Indian person equally.
If your argument is that one is worse than the other because you can hide then you didn't take into account things like plastic surgery or bleaching one's skin or straightening one's hair. If you're going to tell someone to just abandon their family name then why not tell them to get plastic surgery or anything else to modify their appearance?
If simply bleaching one's skin or straightening hair allowed one to hide their racial phenotype ,then millions would be doing it and we wouldn't have all these problems. Race is immutable in most parts of the world.
> If simply bleaching one's skin or straightening hair allowed one to hide their racial phenotype
Lots of people do do this. Aren't you aware of skin creams to whiten the skin, hair straightening products, eye lid surgeries, etc. The list goes on and on.
> then millions would be doing it and we wouldn't have all these problems
But those alone aren't enough. You need massive amounts of plastic surgery.
Financial cost is one but also the cost to one's identity.
But more importantly, millions of people wouldn't just throw away their identity. For this same reason, telling someone they can just change their last name is makes no sense.
> Race is immutable in most parts of the world.
Identity is just as immutable. You can tell someone to change their last name but that is about as effective as wearing different clothes. You cannot change a person's upbringing, how they were socialized, their memories, how they view the world. All of that is more or less set in stone from childhood.
You're better off getting plastic surgery. At least that will be effective.
And this is why I am so thankful to Periyar and the social justice movement in the 60s in South India. The only state where it caught on with a fervor was TamilNadu, and thanks to the vast majority of the population opting to shift from caste-based surnames to Patronymical surnames, it is very difficult to identify caste from the name alone in today's Tamil Nadu.
