Parsis say breeding with non-Parsis is like a different species, will lower the morality of the race

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Pages 161

And the discourse about the mixing of the unmixable is angry. A lower-middle-class [Parsi] man asks pointedly: "Does a horse go with a camel? Does a dog go with a mouse? No." A remark from the floor at a lecture: "if you sow potatoes, you don't get cabbages. If we cross-breed, the intelligence may be there, but the morality always goes down." 

Parsi women who bear children from non-Parsi men "biologically", "physically" "defile" the community

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Pages 161

Mixed in with this is the argument, from history, that biological impurity leads to weakness. "History testifies that mixed marriage was one of the main causes for the fall of the once mighty Sassanian empire. Do we want history to repeat itself?"" And religious purity cannot be maintained by the offending outsiders. Asa high priest explained, "A woman marrying outside the community cannot observe the rules of purity as laid down by the Zoroastrian religion. She cannot perform ritual ablutions [padyab kusti] and do prayers [farziyat and bandaj) in a non-Zoroastrian environment. When she bears children of a non-Zoroastrian seed [tokbam] and participates in Zoroastrian ceremonies, this woman does great damage to the Zoroastrian religion."12 Such women, he implies, physically defile the Parsi community.' The argument—elaborated particularly by those drawn to an esoteric interpretation of Zoroastrianism, kshnoom—is that religious prayers have to do with "vibrations," almost physical emanations. Dokhmas can purify bodies only if they have been prepared by certain ritual prayers which can only be performed on Zoroastrians. Thus the non-Parsi defiles the Parsi, and the most powerful of tools in the fight against evil is rendered useless. Zoroastrian prayers, whose aim is to purify, are rendered invalid by the non-Zoroastrian environment in which they are uttered. 

Parsi believes being born Parsi is the last and highest reincarnation before moksha - Book Review: The Good Parsi

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Pages 156

Still, he says, "I am thankful to God that I took birth in the Parsi community." Parsi birth, he thinks, is the last birth in the karmic wheel, the highest birth, before one is released from the painful demands of reincarnation.

Parsis most racist against darkest-skinned South Indians: Book Review - The Good Parsi

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Pages 153-155

But in 1984 this son married a South Indian - not only a non-Parsi, but a dark-skinned woman. His parents did not attend the wedding and have nothing more to do with him. "My boss said, you must go to the wedding and give you son your blessing. My foot, I said. Once my son even brought her to the office for my blessing. And I said, my foot." He found out about his son's interest in this outsider when his office mates started "making mischief" with him, saying that his son will marry a non-Parsi...

...Both his sons, to Cyrus, are destroying their ancestry and insulting their parents. One humiliates him by marrying out - not only a non-Parsi, but a dark-skinned woman, which throughout India is a stain upon the family.

Parsi says British rule was golden, Indian rule less than iron: Book Review - The Good Parsi

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Page 153

I asked him what he had thought of the approaching Independence. "Even now I prefer the British Rule. It was a Golden Rule, now we have less than an iron rule. I pray to the almighty that we might live to see another rule. All these politicians are chors [thieves], they are bad." 

Parsi criticizes Hindu society as selfish, indirect, dishonest and corrupt - Book Review: The Good Parsi

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Page 144

Alongside this self-criticism of Parsis India itself is criticized on the grounds that it has changed without the British, and that Parsis cannot compete within the new India because they are people of integrity. Hindus, the argument runs, live in a less dichotomous world than the "people of the book," those of monotheistic faiths, and particularly Zoroastrians. "There are gods for everything, and the poles of right and wrong are just less far apart." As one Parsi writes, criticizing Hindu society and urging it to change: "The Hindu has a much greater capacity than most to live with ambivalence, and with the gaps between aspiration and achievement, between promise and performance, and between high moral aspiration and plain human selfishness" (Moddie 5968:77). Parsis, the argument went on, need integrity, honesty, directness, and Indian society does not have this character. Now the Hindus have taken over, the argument continued, bribery and fraud are rampant, and India is in decay. Parsis cannot succeed in a corrupted world. 

Most Paris were unhappy with Indian independence - Book Review: The Good Parsi

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From: Luhrmann, T.M. "The Good Parsi: The fate of a colonial elite in a postcolonial society". Harvard University Press, 1996

Page 124

In conversation after conversation, Parsis told me that the majority of Parsis had been unhappy with Independence. Older Parsis in particular remembered that the community was uncomfortable with Gandhi and with his insults to the British. The upper class, they said, may have been nationalist, but not the majority, which generally consisted of deeply committed Anglophiles. A middle-aged Parsi woman told this story: a friend of hers was taken by her father to watch the flag-crossing ceremony on August 15, 1947. As the Union Jack descended and the Indian tricolor rose, the father said to his adolescent daughter, "With that flag going down, law and order in this country have disappeared."