Why Mindy Kaling Refuses to Talk about Race—and Why I Care So Much

Why Mindy Kaling Refuses to Talk about Race—and Why I Care So Much:

I’m also a feminist who cares about racial justice, so it’s impossible to ignore Mindy’s often defensive, flippant responses to questions about race, or her flat-out refusal to discuss how her identity impacts her character and her own career. Kaling is hardly the first South Asian in the public eye who avoids talking about race in an attempt to be “just
like the rest.” Conservatives like Bobby Jindal and Nikki Haley (who,
like Kaling, tweaked their names to sound more American) have worked
very hard at constructing an identity that is explicitly not Indian.