A lot of Hinduism is a bunch of chants, rituals & stories that act as software to support the idea of a hierarchical society that functions along the lines of division of labour.
There are categories for the priests/ educators ie the brahmins, the warriors kshatriyas, the trading class the vaishyae & the Dalits who are the lowest category who do the menial jobs. This was how it was for close to three thousand years. Affirmative action aka reservations has changed things marginally. Caste related violence is an everyday reality. Especially in the rural heartland.
If you look at the lower castes along most social & economic parameters they would be very marginalised. Also the caste system is so sophisticated that each caste has somebody above or below them. If the Brahmins have respect & education, the Khatriyas have political power, the Vaishyas have business clout. The lower castes have sub caste divisions so there is always someone above or below.
Add to that, in the new political climate now, there is this feeling that Hindus are in danger from Muslims. This is unfounded & a political ploy to divide largely uneducated masses who do not understand the mechanisms of oppression surrounding them. So there is an atmosphere of hate around the very idea of being Hindu. The idea of being Hindu is also married to the idea of the Nation. So secular thinkers are seen as anti national. The number of hate crimes have risen.
Mob lynchings & riots are par for course. A lot of the hate plays out on a totally subservient ( with some exceptions ) media that tows the Govt line).
Also Hinduism does not work like Abrahamic religions where conquest & missionary work increase the numbers. Hinduism co opts. This is the DNA. So for example if I am a feudal King following a certain God, lets say Vishnu. If this feudal king wants to take over some tribal forest land, conquest is not the only option. He'll build a temple there with Vishnu as the main deity & in that temple the tribal God will become the susidiary deity. An organic mythology retrospectively springs around it in such a way that the Hero of the tribal narrative becomes a sidekick in the Hindu narrative. This is the way we have a living mythology.
Also we do not much recorded history so we have a greater relationship with mythology more than history.
In the present atmosphere of hate the battle for the future is being fought about the past. All secular history is disregarded & mythology is often seen through a very literal lens. This makes it very easy to manipulate the masses & misdirect their energies into hating the other rather than questioning ineffective Govt policies that are not citizen friendly. The church state distinctions are becoming fuzzier by the day. So the identitity if Hindu carries with it all these complex layers that I have barely scratched the surface off. If you want to help him, ask him open ended questions about his experience of being Hindu, perhaps you might get somewhere.
