I’ve always believed you can tell a lot about someone from how they treat people who can’t do anything for them. Back in India, I saw something that stayed with me. Some women I knew, from privileged homes, would speak fluent English to rickshaw pullers, vegetable sellers, and waiters. They spoke English to perform, to show their class and draw a line that said, I am above you. The language itself bothered me less than the lack of empathy behind it. They refused to meet people where they were, and they believed English made them better, even when Hindi or Bengali would have worked perfectly well. I’ve seen it again and again, and even more since I moved to the US. Some people answer in English even when you speak to them in a mother tongue you share. Sometimes it’s an accent they picked up for display, something they put on to sound different, superior, Western.
This obsession with sounding right, speaking well, and blending in has sunk so deep into us that it shapes how we see each other. People whose accents are rough or unpolished get mocked, dismissed, and laughed at. It hurts, because language is meant to connect people and make them feel warm. India has hundreds of languages and dialects, each with its own rhythm, and we still use one of them to measure a person’s worth. To me, sophistication means empathy: sitting across from anyone, wherever they come from, and making them feel seen. It means feeling secure enough to skip proving how cultured you are, and listening more than you perform.
I want to be around people who use language like a hug, who are comfortable without showing off, who understand working people, and who stand against this bourgeois obsession with packaging, perfection, and power. The classiest people I’ve met ask the waiter’s name. They laugh without checking how they look, and they listen to an accent for the meaning behind it. We need to grow out of this. Kindness works in any language, and all it asks for is presence. More and more, I’m learning that the point is to stand with people.
