[darkrabbi]

nice writeup

"I seemed alien to them somehow, with a weird background that was just too different from their own… so they didn’t know what to make of me on a purely emotional level."

Not saying this was the case here, but I feel like this effect, even if it occurs subliminally, plays such a staggering role in business relationships and decisions that it can be discouraging for anyone outside of the "main" group. Aaron Swartz talked about this in some of his blog posts but it wasn't until I was thrown into the corporate workforce that I saw it for myself first hand.

I don't think it's a conscious malicious effort to keep minorities/non-americans out of executive positions, just a consequence of the reality that people are more comfortable dealing with others that share a similar cultural background. This becomes doubly true when dealing with extremely high value contract negotiations and business decisions - you want to know exactly where the other person is mentally and emotionally - and that's much easier to decipher if you share a culture/race with that person.