Well, if we’re going to go based on who is doing quite well and who isn’t, shouldn’t we at least call it white and East-Asian privilege? Well and I suppose anyone-who-is-middle-class+ privilege.
I can also say: “Racism exists. I am fortunate to not suffer from it.” That’s acknowledgement of my white privilege, and I think that’s what people are asking for.
“White privilege” is a way of exposing people to systemic racism, which is not acknowledged in the same way as other forms of racism. Admitting that racism is still at play is all most people want when they talk about white privilege. I don’t think many real people want white people to be deprived of rights. They just want acknowledgement. But, as you can see in this thread, there are a lot of people who refuse to believe that racism (or any other form of luck) may have influenced their position in life. That’s where it gets contentious.
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No
Right now, the only agreed upon action seems to be to acknowledge it.
That is, to stop pretending that things are equal and that if things are bad for people of color, its because of traits that are inherent to that group.
How does this help?
Right now, most white people believe they got it better because they are better, the goal is to have it understood that this is not true.
The goal is to stop the confabulation of social structures with racial traits
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There’s a place in County Durham called No Place. There’s also one called Pity Me,.
(we have a strong cultural heritage of communism and wry humour in the north-east, mind. There’s a place cheerily referred to as ‘Little Moscow’ as well…)
based on who is doing quite well and who isn’t
That’s not what it is. Look for the White Privilege checklist (like the numbered section here: http://ted.coe.wayne.edu/ele3600/mcintosh.html) and you’ll see that it’s not just an economic thing.
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Actually, we almost always use the word to mean “not having rights trampled upon, while other people are having theirs trampled upon,” rather than, say “doing the trampling.”
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The comic indicates it is economic past your grandfather. Once your family owns property and is well educated, you benefit well over poor people which is kind of obvious if you think about it.
Sure, racism by people in power exists, but once you have significant enough assets, your risk by people who think your race is scary goes waaaaay down for things like mortgages for your kids. For example, most sub-Saharan African immigrants do quiet well compared to other African Americans.
That comic isn’t going to communicate everything about white privilege. It’s a comic.
And nothing about white privilege implies that racism is the only factor in one’s status. There are plenty of other factors including classism, sexism, access to education, good-ole-fashioned-gumption, etc.
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So you think the playing field between a Polish or Irish immigrant is level with that of a Black American, historically? Got it. No differences at all.
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Yes but the checklist you provided is equally ridiculous. I mean, some of it is based purely on being a minority or on being a minority that groups rarely interact with.
I am Jewish and I can’t even hit a good number of the items on that checklist (oh do I love speaking for all Jews). I sure as hell benefit from the positive perception of Jews though and I’m able to stay away from all the places where my ethnicity would get me into trouble.
People also tend to have a very good perception of people with money (which sadly may be the source of the positive perception of Jews) and the educated. Middle class+ privilege is real.
I’d call that a strange footrace indeed. But then maybe that 10-meter-back runner is Usain Bolt?
To me privilege is more like something where everyone in a group gets the same basic rights, stuff, amenities, etc., but then some people get more, or even vastly more, based on things like wealth and class. So, like, one is privileged to be able to travel and attend expensive schools and whatnot, but it’s not necessarily a crime to not have the privilege to travel a lot and afford Harvard. Whereas abridging someone’s voting rights because of their race or ethnicity is unambiguously a violation of their human and legal rights. Put your way, one would have to argue that voting is a privilege: semantics indeed!
It’s not just about being a minority. It’s about being a minority in a place where the majority has more access. Why wouldn’t minorities be on TV? Why would the majority think that the way you drive has anything to do with your race? Because racism.
Yes, middle class privilege is real, too. So is skinny-people privilege, pretty-people privilege, and so on. Admitting that someone suffers from racism doesn’t mean denying there is any other way to suffer or to be stereotyped.
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Yeah because non-whites in, say, Australia or New Zealand don’t have to deal with racism from white descendents of settlers at all!
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Now imagine that all of these same things happened to you and you were black too. Would your situation be the same or worse? That is what we’re talking about. The shittiest situation in America is generally still better if you’re white than if you’re a minority.
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Citation wanted…
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Think of it as a comic about Bob. It’s not a generalisation - it’s an example.
Yes. Stereotypes exist and they are often ridiculous for groups that people doesn’t interact with. Asians are smart. Jews are cheap. Blacks are dangerous. When people act on these stereotypes instead of on the person it is racism.
But it isn’t just the majority who think the way you drive has anything to do with your race. Black people think Asians drive terribly. Asians think black people are dangerous. Everyone thinks Jews are cheap. If you have an Asian loan officer, they’ll give “privilege” to anyone who they interact with regularly - usually white people and other Asians.
I still argue that money and education though tend to trump everything though. Some groups will still get discriminated against because of racism, but there are enough people who are swayed by money and education that it is possible to ensure your kids and grand kids will also have money and education.
Really the only way to reduce racism is to increase exposure. The segregation of where people live and who they interact with by race in America is pretty sad.
Maybe. But when you say you are willfully abusing a term to make a point, it could be supposed that you (and others) are the ones playing semantic games.
Minorities participating in your economy is the same as you subjecting them to imperialism. Minorities are better off out-competing you with their own economies. Don’t prostitute yourselves to those who you know are exploitive. They don’t deserve you.
It’s an inappropriate name being applied to a very real problem, so that doesn’t help matters. One needn’t even be white to know that “white privilege” is not an accurate or effective way of describing the problem. What’s boggling is that we have had better terms for this, and there’s no reason not to use them.
If being seen as a Jew is such a positive, why did my father-in-law change his name to make it less Jewish? Why do my wife’s cousins (who are observant) still report antisemitism, even here in California? As one of my good friends, who is a Jew, tells me, Jews get the positives and negatives of being both the epitome of whiteness and the very opposite of it, often in back to back circumstances depending on the situation and speaker. They’re both “white” and “other” at the same time.
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ha ha ha ha
Aren’t you the very person that makes up your own usage for common terms? How can you potentially criticize others for this or a lack of semantic clarity?
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