3 Groups of People who want to keep the Caste System and their Reasons

Yesterday I wrote five ideas that could help getting rid of the caste system. If it was only necessary to have such ideas, I am sure the caste system would have been extinct from society already. If everyone really wanted to get rid of this system, we would not see it in today’s society anymore. Today I would like to write a bit about the three different groups of people who don’t want the caste system to be forgotten.

1. Politicians – because it is useful for them

I already mentioned that politicians and the government will never try to make my ideas reality. They would not because it would destroy the base of being elected for so many politicians. They get elected in their area often not because people like their ideology or their ideas for the country but because they belong to the same caste. Politicians know that especially uneducated people vote with this thought and they don’t want to lose those votes. They would have to work much harder. So although politicians may not actually believe that this is God’s will, they use the caste system for their purpose.

2. Higher Castes – because they honestly believe in it or they simply like the benefits

Another group of people who would not like the caste system to finish seems kind of obvious: the people of the higher castes who believe in the caste system. That is of course Brahmans, people of the highest caste, but also people of the other castes which are considered high. Nowadays this attitude is called ‘Brahman mentality’ because there are Brahmans who don’t believe in the caste system and there are people of other castes who absolutely want to keep it.

The strange reality is that there are people who really and actually believe that the caste system is a valid system, that it should be like this and that it is meant to be like this. God wanted some humans to be untouchable by others. This is seriously what they believe.

Other people with Brahman mentality may not fully believe that this is really the case. They don’t actually think that God meant it to be like this but they like the special status that they have. There are advantages and they like to keep it like this. They are not honest believers in the caste system but simply take advantage of this wrong system.

3. Lower Castes – because of caste pride and the victim mentality

Further there is a group of people of whom you may have least expected to be in favour of the caste system: people of the lower and lowest caste. Yes, there are people in the lower castes who have no interest in finishing the caste system.

You have to see that each caste has developed a kind of pride for their caste. Even in the lowest, the untouchable caste, people are in some way proud of belonging to their caste. It is just a part of human psychology. They identify with being a person of this caste, it is who they are and they are proud of their community, of their ‘type’ of people. Destroying the caste system would mean to them to lose a part of their identity. It is an illusion but to them it is real.

The second and maybe biggest reason for lower caste people to be against abolishing the caste system is that they enjoy being victims. I have written about people who enjoy being victims before, too, and many lower caste people belong to this category. They like to complain, to find injustice, to demand more but in the end they are not really keen on having a change. How ironic that even these people, who are being discriminated, often don’t have the courage to get out of their role of being a victim!

So you see, while there may be many activists and many people like me who abhor the caste system and want it to finish once and for all, there are quite a lot of people who don’t want to even think about how to do this. As long as this is the case, as long as politicians and Brahmans think only of themselves, as long as people stupidly believe that this is how it is meant to be and as long as lower caste people don’t want to stop being victims, the caste system will go on. Change has to come from within the society. I am ready for it, are you?