Rising Hinduphobia : Countering Misrepresentation and Fear-Mongering Against Hindu Americans

“It is easy to hate and it is difficult to love. This is how the whole scheme of things works. All good things are difficult to achieve, and bad things are very easy to get.”

― Confucius

As an ordinary Hindu, whenever I perceive covert aggression against the minority Hindu community in the U.S. under the veneer of Hindutva, Confucius’s words come to mind. 

Sadly, this hostility towards Hindu Americans isn’t novel but rather evolving. Its recent iteration was spotlighted in American Kahani’s lead story titled “Red, White and Saffron: Over 100 Civil Organizations Express Concern Over Alarming Rise of Hindu Supremacy in the U.S.,” dated March 27, 2024. The original press release (PR) titled “100+ Organizations Stand Against Hindu Supremacy” thinly veiled its bias by excessively employing the term “Hindu” throughout the text—21 times to be precise. Hence, it is imperative to address the misleading narrative and unfounded accusations against the Hindu-American community. 

This PR merely serves to foment animosity towards the Hindu-American community without any substantiated evidence of antisocial behavior by its members. It’s a blatant attempt at fear-mongering, a tactic commonly employed by such activists to vilify the Hindu-American community. However, this narrative lacks substantiated evidence and relies heavily on sensationalism rather than facts. 

It’s noteworthy that in their press release, the same group that falsely labels Hindus and routinely denounces majoritarianism revealed their own predisposition towards it by claiming “…a new united front that represents the true Indian-American majority…” It also means that they consider Hindu Americans only as Indians which is contrary to Hindu philosophy’s acceptance and celebration of diversity. However, such errors in judgment are inevitable when the mind is consumed by animosity or lacks confidence in its own beliefs. 

The recent spike in tragic incidents involving Indian-origin students, regardless of their faith, is cause for alarm.

The entire press release fixates on the notion of “Hindu supremacy” as a purportedly “acute concern” in the U.S. — an assertion that defies logic given that Hindus constitute only about 0.7% of the total U.S. population. For, one wonders about the rationale behind this assertion and the motivations of the organizations that endorsed it. Does it genuinely suggest that the micro-minority of Hindu Americans is becoming a dominant force in the U.S.? It appears that hatred not only blinds individuals but also impairs their ability to reason logically.  The reality is far from different. Hinduphobia is on the rise in the real and the virtual world and hence Indian American congressional representatives ask the DoJ for briefing on the status of anti-Hindu crimes. 

For many individual American Hindus, including myself, the issue isn’t about the logic behind such assertions but rather the negative activism that fuels hatred in American society. By incessantly tethering American Hindus to Indian politics, these activists blur the distinction between Hindus and Indians, thereby spreading hatred not only against Hindu Americans but also equally spreading hate against the broader Indian diaspora. The recent spike in tragic incidents involving Indian-origin students, regardless of their faith, is cause for alarm. Such vitriolic press releases and activism only serve to perpetuate hatred, posing a threat to the safety of the Indian diaspora and Hindu Americans while also exacerbating societal divisions.

Contrary to the portrayal in the press release, Hindu American society embodies a fundamentally different and philosophically grounded ethos, as espoused in the Bhagavad Gita. 

अद्वेष्टा सर्वभूतानां मैत्र: करुण एव च |

निर्ममो निरहङ्कार: समदु:खसुख: क्षमी || 12-13||

सन्तुष्ट: सततं योगी यतात्मा दृढनिश्चय: |

मय्यर्पितमनोबुद्धिर्यो मद्भक्त: स मे प्रिय: || 12-14||

(Those devotees are very dear to Me who are free from malice toward all living beings, who are friendly, and compassionate. They are free from attachment to possessions and egotism, equipoised in happiness and distress, and ever-forgiving. They are ever-content, steadily united with Me in devotion, self-controlled, of firm resolve, and dedicated to Me in mind and intellect.)

Rather than succumb to hatred, Hindu Americans remain focused on constructive endeavors and raising awareness about the consequences of divisive rhetoric. Their collective work for the needy families during Sewa Diwali as well as several other occasions around the year is well known and appreciated from the town halls to Capitol Hill. They continue working actively in interfaith organizations as well as diverse American society during Black History Month celebrations, teaching in inner cities to those who really need help in learning, promoting health awareness through programs like Health for Humanity Yogathon, and also making sure to inculcate age-old Hindu values in their next generation to make sure they will continue contributing to making the world noble place. This and more selfless contribution of the Hindu-American minority community has always been appreciated by the American society building mutual trust. 

Unfortunately, those who seek to undermine these healthy relationships resort to fear-mongering tactics, perpetuating baseless fears of imaginary supremacy. However, such efforts only serve to recycle old prejudices in a new guise, failing to diminish the resilience and goodwill fostered by the Hindu-American community.

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Vikas Deshpande is a member of the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh USA.