{"id":416834,"date":"2026-08-26T03:00:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T03:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/416834\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T03:00:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T03:00:09","slug":"who-benefits-from-blaming-indians-the-daily-texan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/416834\/","title":{"rendered":"Who benefits from blaming Indians? \u2013 The Daily Texan"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Who<\/a> <\/p>\n

Throughout history, \u201cdivide and conquer\u201d has been used to prevent people from turning against a higher power. Your legitimacy is unlikely to be challenged if you redirect blame toward vulnerable groups.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Today, that someone to blame is minority groups, such as Indians.<\/p>\n

In Texas, there are over 40,000<\/a> people authorized to work under H-1B visas. H-1B visas are a competitive, non-immigrant visa<\/a> that is typically granted to workers in technical and research-based industries, with Indian nationals holding 72%<\/a> of them nationwide. Simultaneously, anti-Indian sentiment<\/a> is on the rise. Indians are called<\/a> slurs online and taken photos and videos of in public, accused of invading local communities.<\/p>\n

Tech companies have increasingly relocated to Texas. Austin alone added 81<\/a> corporate headquarters between 2018 and 2024, including companies like Tesla, Oracle and X, promising new jobs. However, when the existing population cannot meet the labor demand an emerging industry is looking for, companies recruit workers whose skills are not widely available in the local labor force. The result is greater demand for housing and local services, which can raise costs faster than wages of current residents can match.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cA capitalist economy welcomes labor,\u201d said N\u00e9stor Rodr\u00edguez, a sociology professor whose research focuses on international migration. \u201cThat\u2019s why companies are hiring people from India or other places \u2014 because they need those workers. Not that nobody else will do the job, but (a U.S. worker) will do the job at a higher cost. That\u2019s one of the laws of capitalism: control your costs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Public discussions often point to changing neighborhood demographics as the issue, even though economic restructuring and labor-market dynamics are the driving forces.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSome people may see this (immigration) as a threat. They\u2019re taking our jobs, etc.,\u201d Rodr\u00edguez said. \u201cThey\u2019re not looking at what\u2019s happening in the social structure that companies are moving in. They\u2019re the ones who are bringing in the immigrants. They\u2019re the ones who are recruiting H-1B workers. But what\u2019s visible to the public and supported by growing public sentiments (about) immigration is that newcomers are here (and) they\u2019re taking over.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite UT\u2019s large Indian community, anti-Indian public sentiment has seeped into our culture and affected social dynamics.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like because I am very confident in (where) I came from, I have no problem talking about my interests with being Indian, like my culture, Bollywood, cultural traditions (and) speaking the language,\u201d said Deeya Shah, a human dimensions of organizations junior that has noticed other Indian students wanting to distance themselves from the Indian community. \u201cI think a lot of reasons why a lot of Indian people don\u2019t interact outside of their race is also just because of fear of rejection, especially since recently, the way Indians are being portrayed in the media (has) caused additional scrutiny.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are legitimate sources of frustration some have, such as cliquiness and differences in norms. However, members of a marginalized group are less likely to be receptive to criticism when the loudest voices come from a place of contempt rather than good faith.<\/p>\n

Whether your frustration with the rapid changes in affordability or culture comes from your experiences here at UT or back in your hometown, blaming Indians isn\u2019t the solution. If we can recognize the shared hand behind both, then perhaps we can reject the divisions allowing us to be conquered.<\/p>\n

Chatterjee is a government junior from Allen, Texas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Throughout history, \u201cdivide and conquer\u201d has been used to prevent people from turning against a higher power. Your…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":416835,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-416834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/416834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=416834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/416834\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/416835"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=416834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=416834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=416834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}