I'll never forget the burning sensation prickling across my face as I overheard condescending laughter when my mother, an Indian immigrant, first volunteered at my elementary school cafeteria.
I didn't push back against my classmates' snide commentary on her nose ring — a style of adornment believed to have been introduced by the Mughals when they arrived in India in the 16th century.
Instead, I directed my anger and humiliation toward my poor mother, demanding she take the colorless stud out of her nose the next time she showed up at school.
I learned to perfect the art of flinching internally at every anti-Indian slur and bigoted, tone-deaf remark lobbed my way when I came of age in the 1980s in a mostly white north suburb that bordered the city.
"No offense," a so-called junior high school friend once prefaced before claiming the presence of Indians at a Marshall Field's was a definitive sign the iconic department store chain's prestige was plummeting.
Another time, a teacher pulled me aside and suggested my mom give a classroom presentation on why she wears a red dot on her forehead.
My mother used to create makeshift bindis above her eyes with lipstick and kajal as a fashion statement when she first arrived in the United States. But as a Muslim woman, she'd hardly be an expert on bindis and other forehead markings' spiritual significance in Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.
Watching the rise of immigrants and U.S.-born Americans of South Asian descent, many of my Gen X friends and I find ourselves fantasizing about what it would have been like, as teenagers, to watch someone like Zohran Mamdani, who was born in Uganda, run New York City or see model Bhavitha Mandava, a native of Hyderabad, open a Chanel runway show.
Unfortunately, the same visibility we cheer on, coupled with xenophobic narratives about H-1B visas and "job-stealing foreigners," has unleashed a tidal wave of anti-South Asian hate, which allegedly motivated an attempted mass shooting at a Hindu temple in Aurora last weekend.
Online vitriol against South Asians — Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and others — proliferated by 240% between January 2024 and June 2026, according to a recent report by the Center for the Study of Organized Hate.
Just a month ago, Bo French, an anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant Republican running for a seat on the Texas Railroad Commission, spewed such hate when he shared a photo on X of South Asian University of Texas at Austin students celebrating a football victory.
"I heard UT graduation this year looked like this. I didn’t believe it. The problem is now obviously far worse than anyone imagined," wrote French, who has promoted the racist "Great Replacement" conspiracy theory.
Hate targeting South Asians never disappeared. The ugliness has only been repackaged, and like previous smear campaigns, it doesn't spare the most prominent members of our communities.
"We must come together to confront the hatred that put so many innocent lives at risk," said U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., who was at the west suburban Sri Venkateswara Swami (Balaji) Temple when the alleged gunman's AR-style rifle jammed, foiling the deadly plot.
I agree. Speaking up is key. If Alexandros Paporakis' co-workers at an Arlington Heights Taco Bell hadn't alerted authorities, the 19-year-old neo-Nazi might have tried again to carry out his alleged plan and succeeded.
More Americans need to similarly raise their voices, including the South Asians who are in proximity to the poison.
Too often these desis wilt before bigots and are willing to throw other marginalized communities under the bus, including South Asians who don't share the same motherland, religion or caste.
Less than 10 years after Donald Trump blurted "I’m a big fan of Hindu," his foe turned second-in-command, JD Vance, defended a government employee who had made a social media plea to “normalize Indian hate."
Vance's wife, Usha Vance, the daughter of Indian immigrants and a Hindu, called the post “terrible” but hasn't publicly said much about her husband's stance on the matter or his other positions that can potentially harm South Asian communities.
I was only a child when I was unable to muster the courage to respond to my juvenile tormentors.
Vivek Ramaswamy was 40 when he meekly countered white Christians half his age who questioned how he — a Hindu — could serve as Ohio governor at a Turning Point USA event in 2025.
My siblings and I wish we could go back in time and tell our younger selves that many of our bullies would eventually go on to embrace many aspects of our culture.
For example, a boy who pestered my brother over our mother's nose piercing, ended up dating a man with a nose ring.
Karma is a boomerang, as they say.
I have since apologized to my mom for my no-nose ring request.
My mom said she didn't mind.
But I do remember she forgot to ice my skin when she gleefully pierced my nose with a heated needle when I was in college.
Perhaps it was payback. Or maybe it was an on-the-nose reminder to never remain numb.
Rummana Hussain is a columnist and leads the opinion coverage at the Sun-Times.
