Servants as a sub-class

I have commented to my colleagues that I think maids in India are treated a notch better than slaves; my colleagues have staunchly disagreed. They point out that maids now dictate their terms of employment much more than they did in the past, and there is a more equitable negotiation.

A few anecdotes, though, reinforce my view of profound inequalities.

Amnon was talking to one of the merchants in the marketplace. The merchant commented that it is inappropriate for household help to use a bathroom that is used by other members of the family. They are expected to use the bathroom that is in their servant area, if they are live-in maids. (And I don’t know which bathroom they are expected to use, if they aren’t live-in with a dedicated servant’s bathroom... For men in India, it is easier….One always sees men urinating in the streets against random walls….but I have never seen women using public spaces that way…) There are rationalizations for this…the merchant told Amnon that maids that live in slum areas can bring diseases into the house. I am reminded of driving down to Florida with my parents as a child. Somewhere in Georgia, I used a gas station bathroom, and saw that there was a door that said “white” and a door that said “colored.” It was horrifying to see this up close, even as a kid. And I would bet that black/white segregation had similar rationales…”it’s not that we are prejudiced, but this other class of people carries disease.”

Another tidbit on treating servants as a subclass comes from a Hindi phrasebook that Jordan was using. He pointed out the section to me that provides useful sentences for talking to servants. I include this below. I think the phrases, and the tone of those phrases, are very revealing about the expected relationship between employer and a servant employee.