In America the Founding Fathers are often seen as some sort of Supermen who miraculously won a war with England and then wrote the document on which all world governments should be based.
But the truth is as good as the constitution is the founding fathers basically just set the stage for the Civil War. They also gave, and denied rights that others already had.
I understand the emotion but I disagree completely. It doesn’t work like that. Wealth and class are just part of the normal life isn’t fair.
Think of life as made up of tons of little rolls for success and failure. Skill checks, knowledge checks, reaction checks, random encounters and so on. Think of privilege as weighted dice. Often very slightly weighted. Sometimes more heavily. There are some roles that aren’t weighted and a few that are weighted against you but privilege means that most of the rolls are slightly in the privileged’s favor. If you started out wealthy, talented, or higher class you have better stats to use in passing the checks anyway but with or without the great starting stats the dice are not equal.
As I have previously written here, while I hate the term “White Privilege”, and believe it does as much harm as good, I do not deny that it actually exists. However, it is very hard to explain that to the poor white guy whose family lives in poverty.
The Civil War is an interesting thought. The US went to a war to end slavery. England didn’t. Yes, there were very different economic factors but the Civil War 2.0 thread title makes me wonder if there is something to be gained by looking at how England passed through some of the similar troubles.
Well, I am not an expert on English history but there is a lot of blood shed and internal war in their history as well.
But abolishing slavery was done much more easily for them, as they had colonies they could abuse.
I submit it’s hard to tell them because it doesn’t exist for them. When people think “white privledge” they should think of Larry Ellison, Donald Trump, and the Walton family. Until we drop this “privledge” thing when it comes to race and transfer it to class and wealth, you’ll never convince anyone because you’ll be wrong.
If by people you mean… white people. That’s not really true for everyone else. White privilege has nothing to do with money or status.
I think it is hard to deny that a poor white guy still has more socially and culturally going for him than a poor black guy, or in some cases even a well to do black guy.
I heard Sen. Tim Scott, a republican, talk over the weekend about how he has been stopped 7 times while trying to enter the Senate building. He also talked about how he has been pulled over several times, basically for the crime of being black.
It is pretty hard to deny those kind of things aren’t racially motivated.
Saying the average white guy will get a better break from society than the average black guy doesn’t mean that every white guy lives a life of luxury (one reason I dislike the privilege word), but it does mean he won’t have to fight the system as much.
I think what you are describing is racism, not white privledge. Unless you are arguing all white people are racist, which I hope you are not…
Using terms like “white privilege” run into issues because it’s such a simplified term. It tries to make a singular term encapsulate a huge systematic problem, and unless you already know what it’s intended to mean, it just creates confusion.
It’s more effective to talk about a specific advantage, because it’s easier to get your head around. Like, “Do you fear that cops are going to shoot you?”
Because that’s a very real thing, that white folks, ANY white folks for the most part, just don’t really deal with. It’s easier to get your head around that kind of stark difference between your world and a black guy’s world. And once you do that, you can see other stuff.
It’s not that everything is easy for you. Your life isn’t easy-mode. But there are certain significant aspects of your life that you take for granted, that a black guy doesn’t get to.
And an important aspect is that you aren’t at FAULT for not being afraid that cops are going to shoot you. Your experience really should be the default. The unfairness stems from the fact that it’s not.
You don’t have to be racist to benefit from institutional racism.
Also, OMG I can’t believe that I still need to type that sentence.
The point is that he may never run into a racist, but the system in which he lives does see color.
One of my jobs is for a government agency that hires via the mail, so to speak. You are not hired based on an interview with someone in a company, you are hired based on experience and a resume.
One look at the employee base would tell you that, as the numbers of minorities and well, to be honest, extremely obese people, is amazing compared to a public HR hiring experience.
The way I’ve seen it put best is that white privilege doesn’t mean your life isn’t difficult – it just means that your skin color was never the thing that made it difficult.
Yea, that is an easy way of saying it.
The problem with this is you will then wind up with people explaining to you they grew up in a neighborhood where they were the minority and now they think for the rest of their life they can’t have white privilege. It’s true they would have faced different challenges in this situation, but they’re still white when they interview, apply for a mortgage or wait for a tip, or you know drive a fancy car past a cop.
Sure, you’re always going to get people who just can’t understand that someone else could have it harder. And maybe for a handful of people in this country, their lives were harder because of their whiteness. But if I’m talking with someone and they really can’t see that their situation would have been more difficult for a person of color, then I don’t think they can be brought around at all.
I’m glad to find out only minorities get harrassed by the cops. All the harrassment I’ve seen and suffered through must have been my imagination! Whew! Glad I can let those memories go since none of them happened.
This is a discussion about over the racists acting subtle and it jumps right into the deep end with “white people don’t get treated bad, ever”.
Do you guys realize how silly that sounds?
You have to be in the shoes of a POC to truly understand this.
Nobody said that.
I don’t think anyone here has actually written “white people don’t get treated bad,ever”. Nor has anyone even hinted that being white means you get a free pass in life.