Dheepa Sundaram, PhD (she/her): Yes this. In 2021, some US Hindu groups filed a Title VI complaint against UPenn charging that Hindu students were unsafe on campus. Why? Bcuz Penn was 1 of several sponsors of an online academic conference called Dismantling Global Hindutva that sought to discuss the threat of Hindu nationalism./1

Yes this. In 2021, some US Hindu groups filed a Title VI complaint against UPenn charging that Hindu students were unsafe on campus. Why? Bcuz Penn was 1 of several sponsors of an online academic conference called Dismantling Global Hindutva that sought to discuss the threat of Hindu nationalism./1

feeling unsafe and being unsafe are not the same thing

There was scant evidence that Hindu students were being targeted or unsafe. The conference focused on a political ideology (Hindutva) which these groups conflated with Hinduism. It was a bad faith argument; one which has proliferated in India where anti-Hindutva folks are called anti-national./2

The Hindu American Foundation which filed the complaint seeks to make the case that any discussion of Hindu nationalism is anti-Hindu. Sound familiar? They argue that they are inseparable and therefore, such a conference was a violation of Hindu students’ civil rights. /3

As a Hindu, I can tell you that such arguments are specious and dangerous. What I see happening now reminds me of what happened then. US Hindus were at risk from Hindu nationalist pols, community members, (mostly liberal) who targeted the speakers & organizers of the conference. /4

I was an organizer alongside many of my anti Hindutva colleagues in the South Asian studies. Many of us were Hindu. We received death threats, bomb threats, and rape threats, mostly from other folks who were Hindu. It was terrifying & incredibly depressing. /5

When trying to explain to family members and others in the community who only were hearing about anti Hindu hate from community orgs and Hindu politicians that this was an academic conference about a dangerous political ideology, I was often met with skepticism and bad faith arguments. /6

I left several family WhatsApp groups. Many of us were also targeted by groups in India associated with the Hindu nationalist government. We watched as Indian international students in the US were threatened with arrest if they returned to India, their families threatened, all by other Hindus. /7

one of the stupidest conflations ever

White people: "Abraham Lincoln made me feel unsafe."

I remember this--there were emails targeting the Center for South Asia here at Wisconsin because we co-sponsored the conference. Really hateful stuff.

Starting to get a sense of some sort of commonality with these 'criticism is disloyalty' groups, despite the varied national and ethnic origins.

I’ve come to believe that there’s a hard core 20% of any group who are basically authoritarian assholes, and it’s our job to keep them from doing crazy shit.

Care to tell readers how Penn responded to said Title VI complaint?

Hi Evan! I have a piece coming out in Drexel Law review about this actually. I’m happy to share. I don’t think Penn did much because the Dept of Ed declined to pursue it from what I understand or least hasn’t pursued it to this point.

what seems to get people in trouble with this is that they perhaps don't emphasize the POLICY aspects of the political movement, which allows bad actors to pretend that you are advocating against the nation and its people that are Hindu, rather the policies of SOME Hindus that marginalize others.

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