Observations: In Praise of Hybrids

Barack Obama has won the U.S. Presidential election. Plenty has already been said about his historic victory, so I am not going to give you my take on it. Suffice to say, the challenges facing him are daunting. The most important and immediate challenge he faces is finding ways to resuscitate the U.S. economy. A normal remedy would include a massive increase in public spending, which is what Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) did during the Great Depression, seventy years ago. However, Obama will find this difficult to do since the U.S. federal deficit is already at an all-time high. Besides, any additional public spending would probably mean an increase in taxes as well as the potential threat of higher inflation. In a time where people are losing jobs, this will be an extremely unpopular thing to do. It will be interesting to see how he deals with the global economic crisis. A silver lining will be the fact that the Democrats have gained substantially in the races for the Senate as well as the House of Representatives. This should make it easier for him to introduce any legislation he has in mind to improve the world’s economic situation. Yes, it is the world’s economic situation that will be determined by Obama’s policies, and not just America’s.

But I digress. This blog is not about Obama’s victory. Instead, it is about something that many people do not know or consider important. The media all over the world has been waxing eloquent about Obama being the first “black/African-American” person to become the U.S. President. Actually, Obama is not black. He is of mixed race. His father was an African-American, while his mother was white. The media always needs to categorise whatever they report, so it is convenient to slot Obama as a black man. Like I said a little earlier, this is not a fact.

Obama (like Yours Truly) is a hybrid. He is a racial hybrid; while I am an ethnic hybrid (my father is a Bengali, while my mother is a Kannadiga). In my own small way, I have faced similar problems. Indians I meet always ask me my ethnic background. There is no simple way to answer this question. I either say “Bengali” if I want to give them a short answer. If I am in a chatty mood, I give them the long answer, which is: “My father is a Bengali who grew up in Mumbai. My mother is a Konkani-speaking Kannadiga who grew up in Karnataka. I was born and raised in a Roman Catholic neighbourhood in Bombay, so I frequently went to church. In the impressionable years of my youth, I spent six years living and studying in America, which made me very independent-minded and shaped my identity”.

This last encyclopaedic answer effectively shuts people up. It is also the correct answer. There are many people who find it difficult to categorise me. In their minds, I am a “Bengali”. This is incorrect, but I guess it works for them. Understanding the truth sometimes requires patience, the ability to listen and the realization that every question in the world does not have a neat answer which can be put into a box. Many people aren’t interested in the truth; they only need an answer that can be easily categorised.

I can vouch for the fact that there are plenty of positives about being a hybrid. For Obama, it is being able to reach out to people across races and classes, Democrats and Republicans, to develop consensus. He can relate to blacks as well as whites. He has enough of a perspective to understand the unique challenges and advantages faced by both races. In my own small way, I can relate. I can understand the Bengali language as well as its customs, traditions and rituals. I can also understand my mother’s language and heritage. Add to that the fact that I grew up in cosmopolitan Bombay, and lived and worked across cultures and countries, and this puts me in a pretty unique position.

There are narrow-minded Indians who feel that the ethnic group they belong to is somehow superior to other ethnic groups in the country. There have been enough instances of this in the national news lately. Frankly, I find this laughable. Obviously, these individuals and groups have their heads buried in the sand.

My advice to them is simple – pull your head out of your ass and take a look around you. The world is large and diverse. India is only a small part of what the world has to offer. Take the time out to learn and understand the various cultures and ethnic groups in India. You may be astonished to learn that many of your deep-rooted beliefs are inaccurate and just plain wrong. You may be surprised to find that some of the traditions and histories of other ethnic groups are actually richer and more interesting than your own.

For my outlook on life, I have my parents to thank. They brought me up to be an Indian and a citizen of the world. They taught me to be independent minded, to search for the truth, and to refuse to settle for easy, incorrect answers. Sometimes, the search for the truth can be a frustrating and unsettling experience. It can also be lonely. It requires the searcher to constantly learn new things, and to frequently challenge cherished long-standing beliefs. Each person’s search for the truth is his or her own, and there are no prefabricated paths for you to walk on. To quote the lines of an old song by Van Morrison; “No Guru, No Method, No Teacher”.

So I wish Barack Obama all the best in his quest to rejuvenate America, the greatest country in the world. He is faced with some formidable problems – an ailing economy, an unpopular war and an empty treasury. But he also has a unique set of qualities and a diverse background. He is neither black nor white; he grew up in the American heartland of Chicago, but also in Indonesia and Kenya, he understands the problems of poor inner cities in America, but also studied at Harvard. He is a hybrid, and like all hybrids, he can understand issues that many others cannot. He may or may not succeed in his quest. But as a hybrid, I am rooting for him.

Thanks for listening!!