Dirty. Uncivilized. Smelly. Not pretty enough.
This is the message that is being ingrained into the minds of young South Asians who consume any digital content about their country, parents, or themselves. As more and more videos of content creators seek out food from “unhygienic” Indian street vendors, or post interviews of others saying they’d be least interested in dating an Indian, an extremely bigoted and racist viewpoint is being portrayed of all South Asians. The negative real life translations of this online behavior is not only harmful to the mental wellbeing of South Asians, but also the physical.
Just like most, if not all, minority groups in America, South Asians have long faced undeserved stereotyping and microaggressions. However, in the past year, anti-South Asian rhetoric has dramatically increased online, with the number of hate comments surging from 23,000 to over 46,000, peaking in August 2024. But why is this happening now?
One of the factors contributing to this rise in hate comments can be attributed to the dual rise in South Asian representation in political spaces and anti-South Asian sentiment in the 2024 presidential election. During the Republican primaries, Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy were in the spotlight. Then, after Usha Vance appeared at the Republican National Convention and Kamala Harris was declared a presidential nominee at the Democratic National Convention, online threats of violence towards Asian communities reached their highest levels.
Additionally, as public figures spread anti-immigrant rhetoric as well as racist and Islamophobic rhetoric surrounding violence in the Middle East, including in Gaza and Lebanon, supporters of these figures will become more incentivized to make disparaging comments about South Asian communities.
On social media, it has become a trend to spread hate towards South Asians. Due to the allure of virality, creators know that if they spread anti-South Asian rhetoric, they will garner hundreds of thousands of views and comments.
The worst instance I have seen of this is creators visiting underprivileged areas of India and mocking the hygiene of street food. These videos reinforce the stereotypes that Indians are dirty, uncivilized, and unhygienic, by hyper fixating on the quality of food and cleanliness of the stall. However, what these creators fail to share with audiences is that they are seeking out these vendors who have little to no resources and are from the poorest areas of the country. Creators know this fact but still seek out these stalls to make a mockery of these vendors for the instant gratification of likes and shares. Everyone should be educated on proper hygiene practices, but not ridiculed online for not having the resources to do so.
Another trend that has become popularized on TikTok is the “Great Shift”, a trend celebrating the recognition of South Asians finally being perceived as attractive. Under videos of South Asian creators, hundreds of accounts will flood their comment sections saying “this is the great shift”, implying that South Asians have now become beautiful. Not only is this trend a backhanded compliment, but it also promotes white validation over South Asian appreciation. South Asians have always been beautiful and diverse, and this is another way to make people feel uncomfortable about their appearance and identity.
Instagram comment sections have become an extremely negative space in general, and in the case of hate towards South Asians, they do not hold back. Comment sections reaffirm what the creator is saying, or aid in spreading misinformation by treating stereotypes as fact. I have watched a harmless video on Instagram by a South Asian creator, and opened up the comment section to be absolutely shocked by what they have to say about my community. As they encourage hateful rhetoric, commenters have created a new trend to grow: spreading hate on any video related to, or even unrelated to, South Asians. They know that many people will agree or find it comical, and that they will garner thousands of likes, however, hundreds of comments in a row reinforcing the same hateful ideas is extremely difficult to read through as someone who they are attacking. These comments can give the idea that everyone is in agreement of South Asians being true to the stereotypes given to us.
“I feel like I see a lot of content mostly on Instagram and TikTok, and obviously Instagram comments, that not only further perpetuates already standing stereotypes but creates new stereotypes and things to hate on Indian people for, for no reason at all,” senior Anshika Srivastava said. “And people go out of their way to find reasons to prove those stereotypes.”
With constant consumption of racist content, individuals who are being attacked experience mental health issues. This applies to every minority group who has experienced microaggressions, racism, and stereotyping, and the consequences for South Asian communities can be just as serious. Studies have shown that everyday racism is negatively linked with anxiety related symptoms and frequent depressive symptoms among South Asians.
Additionally, younger people who consume this content can be more negatively affected due to their naivety, as they are more susceptible to believing what they see online, potentially leading to misinterpretations of reality. This can have extremely detrimental effects in person, as someone who believes the stereotypes they see online can then turn into instances of perpetuation in real life.
Of 973 threats of violence against Asians observed in August 2024 alone, 75% were directed at South Asian communities. The growth rate of these anti-Asian and South Asian online threats is outpacing those directed towards other groups. Online threats of violence increased by 52% toward Asian communities, 45% towards Jewish communities, 14% towards Black communities, and 10% towards women. Additionally, 43% of South Asians adults experienced a hate act due to their race, ethnicity, or nationality in 2023. The most common form of hate directed towards South Asian adults is harassment.
Not only does online hate have negative repercussions towards the recipient’s mental health, but it also can directly correlate with hate crimes offline. It can take several months or years for data on in-person hate acts to be released, so online spaces serve as an important early warning system for what’s happening in real time. Jaahnavi Kandula was a 23 year old graduate student from India who got fatally struck by a police officer with his patrol car in Seattle, and after being hit, another officer made disgusting comments about her such as “She had limited value”. With the only consequences they received for their actions were being fired from their department, it reinforces that acts of hate against our community can fly by without serious repercussions.
Many have forgotten that racism takes all shapes and forms. The extreme rise in online microaggressions and stereotypes towards South Asians is racism that should not be taken as another internet joke. The impacts that hate of any form can have on a person can be as extreme as in person violence, to also mental health impacts of people simply scrolling through social media. It should not be normalized to have hate constantly spread toward one’s community, especially comments and stereotypes that trickle its way into real life.
When scrolling through online spaces, remember that hate can take all kinds of forms, and do not engage with behaviors that can have negative impacts on friends, peers, and members of your community. From mocking accents to calling South Asians smelly to even eliciting acts of violence against members of the community, online behavior can bring its way into real life in big and small ways. This behavior must be stopped before it becomes something even bigger than it already is.
“Assumptions need to stop towards the South Asian community because if people stopped assuming and judging just by looking at something, all of the discrimination and stereotypes wouldn’t exist,” SASA Co-Secretary Shaivi Shah said. “Another important step people should take to stop hate of South Asians is to learn more about the culture rather than just the information they’ve heard. I think hearing something and learning something are obviously two different things, but people tend to merge them into one and that’s not fair.”
