I’d argue that generally speaking “white” culture is the appropriative, oppressive cultures that have come to dominate much of the consciousness of many Europeans and European-Americans. But yeah, there is an ongoing scholarly discussion on whiteness, what it means, and how it was created. For many of us white people, it’s so pervasive that we have a hard time analyzing it in our daily lives. It also provides us with particular kinds of privileges that people who are considered to be in other races lack in American life (or wherever - Europe, North America, etc).
I think one way to think about it, is to think about some of the critiques of “mainstream” culture that came out of the postwar youth counter-cultures which I saw someone argue once was largely an attempt to redefine or at least interrogate what it meant to be white.
Also, consult this thread - which has a lot of debate and discussion on whiteness:
What I find problematic, though, is that it’s often white supremacists who are wrestling with the question of whiteness and offering up people definitions that they find appealing (mainly that whiteness equals supremacy just by existing). The category of white is a made up category that has changed over time, and new people are being included in that definition when it’s politically expedient (the Irish or Italians in America, Slavic people now, as they are being seen as being on the cutting edge of creating white ethno-states). It’s a constantly moving definition because it’s not a thing that has any basis in science or genetics, but in social relations.
