posted
I read the following article a few days ago as part of an anthropology assignment on ethnicity. This class as a whole has truly been an eye-opener for me. I can't tell you how much it's made me 1. simply think analytically to begin with and 2. reevaluate all my previous ideas on how and why we think, believe, have, and do the things we do (or, similarly, why others do, have, or are otherwise). This article in particular, however, I think, is what has helped me the most in removing at least some portion of that proverbial or Biblical log from my eyes. Though the author does come off rather strongly, I thought it was still something that you all might enjoy or at least appreciate.
quote: White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack
I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance on my group.
Peggy McIntosh
Through work to bring materials from women's studies into the rest of the curriculum, I have often noticed men's unwillingness to grant that they are overprivileged, even though they may grant that women are disadvantaged. They may say they will work to improve women's status, in the society, the university, or the curriculum, but they can't or won't support the idea of lessening men's. Denials that amount to taboos surround the subject of advantages that men gain from women's disadvantages. These denials protect male privilege from being fully acknowledged, lessened, or ended.
Thinking through unacknowledged male privilege as a phenomenon, I realized that, since hierarchies in our society are interlocking, there are most likely a phenomenon of while privilege that was similarly denied and protected. As a white person, I realized I had been taught about racism as something that puts others at a disadvantage, but had been taught not to see on of its corollary aspects, white privilege, which puts me at an advantage.
I think whites are carefully taught not to recognize white privilege, as males are taught not to recognize male privilege. So I have begun in an untutored way to ask what it is like to have white privilege. I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was "meant" to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools , and blank checks.
Describing white privilege makes one newly accountable. As we in Women's Studies work to reveal male privilege and ask men to give up some of their power, so one who writes about having white privilege must ask, "Having described it, what will I do to lessen or end it?"
After I realized the extent to which men work from a base of unacknowledged privilege, I understood that much of their oppressiveness was unconscious. Then I remembered the frequent charges from women of color that white women whom they encounter are oppressive. I began to understand why we are justly seen as oppressive, even when we don't see ourselves that way. I began to count the ways in which I enjoy unearned skin privilege and have been conditioned into oblivion about its existence.
My schooling gave me no training in seeing myself as an oppressor, as an unfairly advantaged person, or as a participant in a damaged culture. I was taught to see myself as an individual whose moral state depended on her individual moral will. My schooling followed the pattern my colleague Elizabeth Minnich has pointed out: whites are taught to think of their lives as morally neutral, normative, and average, and also ideal, so that when we work to benefit others, this is seen as work which will allow "them" to be more like "us".
I decided to try to work on myself at least by identifying some of the daily effects of white privilege in my life. I have chosen those conditions which I think in my case attach somewhat more to skin color privilege than to class, religion, ethnic status, or geographical location, though of course all these other factors are intricately intertwined. As far as I can see, my African American coworkers, friends and acquaintances with whom I come into daily or frequent contact in this particular time, place, and line of work cannot count on most of these conditions.
I usually think of privilege as being a favored state, whether earned or conferred by birth or luck. Yet some of the conditions I have described here work to systematically overempower certain groups. Such privilege simply confers dominance because of one's race or sex.
1. I can if I wish arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
4. I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.
5. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
6. When I am told about our national heritage or about "civilization," I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
7. I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.
8. If I want to, I can be pretty sure of finding a publisher for this piece on white privilege.
9. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods which fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser's shop and find someone who can cut my hair.
10. Whether I use checks, credit cards, or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.
11. I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like them.
12. I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals,the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
13. I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial.
14. I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.
15. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.
16. I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color who constitute the world's majority without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
17. I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.
18. I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to "the person in charge," I will be facing a person of my race.
19. If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven't been singled out because of my race.
20. I can easily buy posters, postcards, picture books, greeting cards, dolls, toys, and children's magazines featuring people of my race.
21. I can go home from most meetings of organizations I belong to feeling somewhat tied in, rather than isolated, out-of-place, out numbered, unheard, held at a distance, or feared.
22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having coworkers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
23. I can choose public accommodation without fearing that people of my race cannot get in or will be mistreated in the places I have chosen.
24. I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help, my race will not work against me.
25. If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether it has racial overtones.
26. I can choose blemish cover or bandages in "flesh" color and have them more or less match my skin.
I repeatedly forgot each of the realizations on this list until I wrote it down. For me white privilege has turned out to be an elusive and fugitive subject. The pressure to avoid it is great, for in facing it I must give up the myth of meritocracy. If these things are true, this is not such a free country; one's life is not what one makes it; many doors open for certain people through no virtues of their own.
In unpacking this invisible knapsack of white privilege, I have listed conditions of daily experience which I once took for granted. Nor did I think of any of these prequisites as bad for the holder. I now think that we need a more finely differentiated taxonomy of privilege, for some of these varieties are only what one would want for everyone in a just society, and others give license to be ignorant.
I see a pattern running through the matrix of white privilege, a pattern of assumptions which were passed on to me as a white person. There was one main piece of cultural turf; it was my own turf, and I was among those who could control the turf. My skin color was an asset for any move I was educated to want to make. I could think of myself as belonging in major ways, and of making social systems work for me. I could freely disparage, fear, neglect, or be oblivious to anything outside of the dominant cultural forms. Being of the main culture, I could also criticize it fairly freely.
In proportion as my racial group was being made confident, comfortable, and oblivious, other groups were likely being made unconfident, uncomfortable, and alienated. Whiteness protected me from many kinds of hostility, distress, and violence, which I was being subtly trained to visit in turn upon people of color. For this reason, the word "privilege" now seems to me misleading. We want, then, to distinguish between earned strength and unearned power conferred systematically. Power from unearned privilege can look like strength when it is in fact permission to escape or to dominate. But not all of the privileges on my list are inevitably damaging. Some, like the expectation that neighbors will be decent to you, or that your race will not count against you in court, should be the norm in a just society. Others, like the privilege to ignore less powerful people, distort the humanity of the holders as well as the ignored groups.
We might at least start by distinguishing between positive advantages which we can work to spread, and negative types of advantages which unless rejected will always reinforce our present hierarchies. For example, the feeling that one belongs within the human circle, as Native Americans say, should not be seen as privilege for a few. Ideally it is an unearned entitlement. At present, since only a few have it, it is an unearned advantage for them. This paper results from a process of coming to see that some of the power which I originally saw as attendant on being a human being in the U.S. consisted in unearned advantage and conferred dominance.
I have met very few men who are truly distressed about systemic, unearned male advantage and conferred dominance. And so one question for me and others like me is whether we will be like them, or whether we will get truly distressed, even outraged, about unearned race advantage and conferred dominance and if so, what we will do to lessen them. In any case, we need to do more work in identifying how they actually affect our daily lives. Many, perhaps most, of our white students in the U.S. think that racism doesn't affect them because they are not people of color; they do not see "whiteness" as a racial identity. In addition, since race and sex are not the only advantaging systems at work, we need similarly to examine the daily experience of having age advantage, or ethnic advantage, or physical ability, or advantage related to nationality, religion, or sexual orientation.
Difficulties and dangers surrounding the task of finding parallels are many. Since racism, sexism, and heterosexism are not the same, the advantaging associated with them should not be seen as the same. In addition, it is hard to disentangle aspects of unearned advantage which rest more on social class, economic class, race, religion, sex and ethnic identity than on other factors. Still, all of the oppressions are interlocking, as the Combahee River Collective State-ment of 1977 continues to remind us eloquently. One factor seems clear about all of the interlocking oppressions. They take both active forms which we can see and embedded forms which as a member of the dominant group one is taught not to see. In my class and place, I did not see myself as a racist because I was taught to recognize racism only in individual acts of meanness by members of my group, never in invisible systems conferring unsought racial dominance on my group from birth.
Disapproving of the systems won't be enough to change them. I was taught to think that racism could end if white individuals changed their attitudes. But a white skin in the United States opens many doors for whites whether or not we approve of the way dominance has been conferred on us. Individual acts can palliate, but cannot end, these problems.
To redesign social systems we need first to acknowledge their colossal unseen dimensions. The silences and denials surrounding privilege are the key political tool here. They keep the thinking about equality or equity incomplete, protecting unearned advantage and conferred dominance by making these taboo subjects. Most talk by whites about equal opportunity seems to be now to be about equal opportunity to try to get into a position of dominance while denying that systems of dominance exist.
It seems to me that obliviousness about white advantage, like obliviousness about male advantage, is kept strongly inculturated in the United States so as to maintain the myth of meritocracy, the myth that democratic choice is equally available to all. Keeping most people unaware that freedom of confident action is there for just a small number of people props up those in power, and serves to keep power in the hands of the same groups that have most of it already.
Though systemic change takes many decades, there are pressing questions for me and I imagine for some others like me if we raise our daily consciousness on the perquisites of being light skinned. What will we do with such knowledge? As we know from watching men, it is an open question whether we will choose to use unearned advantage to weaken hidden systems of advantage, and whether we will use any of our arbitrarily awarded power to try to reconstruct power systems on a broader base.
Peggy McIntosh is associate director of the Wellesley Collage Center for Research on Women. This essay is excerpted from Working Paper 189. "White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming To See Correspondences through Work in Women's Studies" (1988), by Peggy McIntosh; available for $4.00 from the Wellesley College Center for Research on Women, Wellesley MA 02181 The working paper contains a longer list of privileges.
*NOTE* I'm sure there are other things I've missed but please note that "people of color" in anthropology refers not to any specific race or ethnicity but, rather, to any such group that is not generally considered to be "white".
Any additional thoughts or comments as to the general theory or idea behind the article? Additions to the author's list? What, if anything, ought to be done?
I know that I, personally, had never really thought about any or most of those things before - at least not in that light. The whole idea of thinking about racism in terms of not only disadvantages but in terms of advantages as well totally blew my mind away. Now, in retrospect, it seems almost commonsense since, if one group is unfairly disadvantaged, doesn't it stand to reason that another group is proportionally unfairly advantaged?
Postscript:
quote: What, if anything, ought to be done?
I'd like to be able to say that posting this here was my own little way of doing something, of raising consciousness. The distinctions people make between race and ethnicity differ throughout the world and are far more complex than simply "black and white" as it (mostly) is here in the US. Thus, I think this is a serious issue for all nations and peoples. Others may and probably do disagree but, personally, I think something ought to be done about this.
Yes, distinctions will always be made - it's simply the way we work, the way we function, the way we think. But that doesn't necessarily mean it's the best way.
For my part, at the moment, I think all we can do to bring about change is to simply raise awareness that race in America (and the rest of the world as well) is actually a major issue. Approximately 340 ethnic wars are being fought right now. Maybe if more people knew about it they'd actually start caring enough to do something to stop it or, at the very least, attempt to improve/alleviate the situation.
(My apologies for the length of this post. I suppose you could say that I finally found an issue that I genuinely care about: people.)
posted
...Is that a "Wow, I agree"-oh boy or an eyes-rolling-oh boy?
... Or maybe a suggestion that it's time to find some cover before the big posters with strong opinions come in here? Posts: 1548 | Registered: Aug 2002
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Personally, I'm more interested in the racial implications of the article than I am in those regarding gender. At the moment, there's already at least one other thread on feminism and all that so, if you could, please take that discussion elsewhere. I'm honestly up for grabs on anything but still - what hit me the most was the abbreviated list of advantages McIntosh wrote and, if it's not too much to ask, I'd like to focus in that general direction.
Posts: 1548 | Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Here's the thing: do we believe equality is an important enough goal that we would seek to aggressively eliminate any advantages possessed by an ethnic group through both legal and social action? If so, do we do this by seeking out and eradicating the manifestations and products of those advantages?
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posted
Just to play devil's advocate: Who is "we"?
Seriously, though, in terms of taking aggressive action... Social, yes. Legal, no.
Legal action would never be santcioned by the present majority and, in this case, would have to branch off of social change for it to be effective in the long-term. Thus, for now, as I tried to get at in my original post, the only change that is realistically possible would be and increase in general consciousness of the issue. Then, as inactive as it may seem, all we can really do is wait and see what society does once it's found awareness. Then, if this is "successful"... "do we do this by seeking out and eradicating the manifestations and products of those advantages?" I don't know.
I'd like to think that changes in individual awareness alone would be enough to cause a greater shift in the encompassing society but then McIntosh's paper is based on the whole idea that this isn't entirely true...
Edit: If you all turn this into a debate over capitalism, democracy, socialism, communism, etc I will... Well, I probably won't delete the thread but I'd be highly tempted since it would likely explode into another arguement that goes completely off-topic. Please, don't. Or, if you do, confine it to the topic at hand. Just... even morally, I suppose, what is your position?
The privilege of standing up for your due is a dynamic between internal and external forces. Privilege in addition to being a situation, is also an attitude.
Pix, I apologize for making the jump to gender roles, but it's what I have experience of fighting from the inside, from the position of less power. Perhaps it will apply as well to skin color.
The "Invisible Engineer" syndrome is alive and well. I am simply not seen again and again in the course of my job. I speak, and it's as though nothing were said. I've found that I must deal with this one person at a time, one group, one event. I do it by continuing to calmly repeat my requirements, my position, or my idea, over and over, to different people, with different phrasings. By never letting go of a question, like The Little Prince. I just persist, and finally I am heard.
Or if it's a supplier and they don't ever hear, then I go to their competition. If THEY don't hear either, I go round robin, possibly even back to the original supplier who is still wondering why they lost the business and maybe now can hear. If it's a customer and they don't hear what I require from them, then I say, "that is fine but it will cost this much and you must approve the extra expense, please sign right here". And they hear the dollar signs, and see the paper they must sign, and then they understand.
You have to be willing to oppose. To be unpopular sometimes. To be seen as the intransigent one. And then they gradually learn and accept and finally you are an individual to them, known, trusted, and not that invisible female anymore. You are Anne Kate. The one who understands the technical side, who knows how the machine works, who can make it run. Then you coalesce finally out of the mist.
And then the next group you interact with enters from the wings and you begin again invisible.
The idea that you can just relax and be, that is an error. You must always be willing to butt heads. It is required. The reward is that you do make headway with people who know you. It does work, you are finally seen. Some new people even can see you without any arm waving or need for insistence. That is very nice. And finally, you make it easier for the next person behind you. You are constantly leaving behind you a stream of people who will maybe be a little more likely to look at a female engineer and see simply an engineer.
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posted
So the answer to white privilege, to male privilege, is maybe for all of us to be simply unwilling to accept the situation. To be simple minded in not understanding what the problem can possibly be. To insist politely and repeatedly on whatever it is that we need to happen.
[ April 28, 2004, 01:35 AM: Message edited by: ak ]
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posted
Eh, not very convincing, if you ask me. Many of the items on her list are just a product of there being more whites in this nation than minorities, and the only way to change them is to equalize the numbers of each ethnicity in the US. She bases many of them on anecdotal evidence, and fails to take into account any factors other than race, economic standing being the biggest one. She also lists some things that are just as true for minorities as for the majority. Let's take a look at a few.
quote:1. I can if I wish arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
Most minorities also tend to associate in large part with those of their race.
quote:2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
This has nearly nothing to do with race and everything to do with education and economic well-being. Yes, minorities are statistically worse off financially than whites, but to say it's entirely because of race is ignoring a host of other issues.
quote:3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
Question - whose neighbors will be more hostile, a black man living in the white suburbs, or a white man living in the inner-city ghetto?
quote:4. I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.
This statement can be equally true or false for a white person or a minority depending on the area where they go.
quote:5. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
Well, yeah, when you're race makes up 70% of the population you would expect that, wouldn't you?
quote:6. When I am told about our national heritage or about "civilization," I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
And you also learn that people of your color brutally subjugated another race to do it. Knowledge about slavery certainly isn't repressed.
quote:9. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods which fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser's shop and find someone who can cut my hair.
Simple economics. Supply and demand.
quote:21. I can go home from most meetings of organizations I belong to feeling somewhat tied in, rather than isolated, out-of-place, out numbered, unheard, held at a distance, or feared.
I don't even know what to say about this. Nobody goes to meetings of organizations they belong to in order to feel isolated.
quote:22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having coworkers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
This is one of the best arguments I've heard of to end affirmative action. Racist policies lead to racist behavior.
Some of the points she brings up are valid, and we need to work to fix them. Most of the time being white will not factor in negatively to people's assessments of you (for jobs, at banks, etc.) and that is not always true for minorities. However, as has been brought up, that's not something you can easily legislate (because we already have laws prohibiting things like that and it hasn't been completely effective in eradicating them). Changing individual attitudes is the way to solve this problem.
I have to take issue with one more statement in that essay.
quote: For example, the feeling that one belongs within the human circle, as Native Americans say, should not be seen as privilege for a few. Ideally it is an unearned entitlement. At present, since only a few have it, it is an unearned advantage for them.
Where in the world does she get this from?! Since when does she speak for minorities in saying they feel like they're outside the human circle? That statement needs a lot more to back it up to even be considered as possible truth.
Pixie,
quote:For my part, at the moment, I think all we can do to bring about change is to simply raise awareness that race in America (and the rest of the world as well) is actually a major issue. Approximately 340 ethnic wars are being fought right now.
Actually, race is a much more serious issue in many other parts of the world than it is here in America. Unfortunately, the essay you cited does not deal with that. The essay was only talking about how things are in this country, so if you want to discuss the issue of race worldwide, you're going to have to bring in some different data (and at least partially ignore that essay).
posted
This is yet another example of someone with an agenda inventing inequality and then claiming everyone else would see it if only they were just taught correct. Once again, the Emperor has no clothes. The reason many people don't see this inequality is the same reason many people don't see many of the inequalities claimed by feminists - because they simply do not exist, or at least if they do exist, they are not inequalities.
Look at that list: 1, 5, 6, 9, 16, and 18 are unimportant abilities to have, unless you are a racist or have some bizarre desire to only interact with people of your own skin color. 2, 3, 4, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, 23 and 24 are flat out false, even for whites, or at least no more true than they would be for black people in my situation. 7, 13, 14, 20, 21, and 25 are just as true for blacks as whites. 10 rests entirely on the existence of racist exceptions to the rule that you can "count on" not be discriminated against. 22 is just the result of affirmative action laws supported by people like the author of this article. And 8 is just something this particular author is capable of, having nothing at all to do with race.
That leaves having difficulty finding the right color bandages as the only legitimate and meaningful inequality list, and if that one is true, it's just a matter of getting some business to start selling them.
One fundamental assumption that is flawed here is the idea that having a certain skin color means you must be uncomfortable among people with different skin colors, and that you are by virtue of your skin in a different culture. That is no more true than having red hair means you can't be comfortable with blonde people.
The next step in solving the race problems in America is acknowledging that the sort of inequalities list here are largely imagined. While people continue to think they exist, fighting between the races will continue, and we won't be able to move beyond a race-conscious mentality. As long as people think there are "invisible systems conferring dominance" on one group or another, they will be unable to drop the distinctions between the groups. It's like an invisible boogeyman that keeps us fighting. Thus we need to reach a point where everyone recognizes that this is not a battle between two sides, and instead realizes that there are no sides. If we can't, then we are doomed to our current level of racial tension for as far as the eye can see.
To be frank. In all actualityhood, at the end of the day when faced with the question "Where have you lived?" can you, to be honest, state that the bottom line is "yes, I have lived in worse situations than the one I currently enjoy?"
posted
Fallow, I don't understand your point. My answer to your question is "sort of." Financially speaking, I have lived in worse situations than I am now in, but I was too young to recognize. As a young married college student, I'm poorer than I was living at home for most of my life, but I enjoy my current situation more. What does that have to do with racism? Posts: 134 | Registered: Mar 2004
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quote: Yes, minorities are statistically worse off financially than whites, but to say it's entirely because of race is ignoring a host of other issues.
What other issues? That minorities are lazier? Dumber? Worse at saving? More greedy?
12 falls into several categories. For one thing, who cares what people attribute my decisions to? For another thing, how many people actually do think an black individual's decisions are a result of their race's poverty? I'd suspect that is a minority. And for yet a third thing, the same thing can happen to white kids in areas where their "race" is considered poor and illiterate, such as the rural south. I've heard that sort of stereotype myself.
posted
fallow, Actually, that was Pixie's statement. She's the one that brought up the 340 ethnic wars around the world. Last I checked, we weren't having one of those here.
I didn't say that it's better here than everywhere else, just that some places it's a lot worse.
I still don't see what that has to do with your question, though. Maybe if you would post more than one or two sentences at a time your points would be more clear.
edit for imogen: I can't say all the reasons why some minorities are so much worse off than whites. I should have made this clear in my first post, that it's only some. Not all minorities are. Why are blacks and hispanics poorer on average than whites and asians? If it were just due to their being minorities then japanese and chinese-Americans would be just the same. Maybe different work ethics in their cultures? Maybe children of poor parents tend to be poor? I don't know all the reasons why, but saying it's just because of racism is too simplistic.
quote:"2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live."
This has nearly nothing to do with race and everything to do with education and economic well-being. Yes, minorities are statistically worse off financially than whites, but to say it's entirely because of race is ignoring a host of other issues.
It would be wrong to say it is entirely due to racial prejudice, but to say such conditions has "nearly nothing" to do with race is equally wrong.
quote:22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having coworkers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
I'm confused. So the author wants affirmative action but does not want people to know that affirmative action is working?
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posted
Beren, I can assure you that the amount of money in your bank account is a lot more important to the real estate agent than the color of your skin.
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you're right! I'll post my manifesto just as soon as it's done. Needs a little work. I let a few friends read it and, "apparently"... (HUFF!) ... I'm verbose!
quote:U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Andrew Cuomo challenged the nation's mayors Saturday to find a way to end the racism that still divides America. In a fiery speech, Cuomo expressed horror that a black man in 1998 could be chained to a car in Jasper, Texas, and dragged to his death. He added that an apartment house in New Orleans puts whites in one wing and blacks in the other and provides separate swimming pools. And that a cross was burned in the yard of a Portuguese woman in Missouri because her dark skin caused people to think she was Hispanic.
quote:One Worcester case received national attention in 1997 when Secretary of HUD, Andrew Cuomo, showcased it as part of a press conference on discrimination. A former employee of Choice Property Consultants, Inc., reported to HDP that the company had a practice of writing "Archie" on property information sheets of owners who did not want to rent to racial and ethnic minorities. ("Archie" refers to the reactionary father in the 1960s television show All in the Family. This case has since been taken over by the Department of Justice.
Discrimination based on race and national origin takes many subtle forms in addition to refusal to rent. In a Hampden County case, the owners and managers of a rental complex were found to have an explicit policy of charging higher rents to Black and Latino tenants than to White tenants. They even kept a separate list of White applicants and called them repeatedly when there was an available unit, in an attempt to decrease the percentage of racial/ethnic minorities in the complex.
posted
In order to get to the money in the bank account, there is usually an in-person meeting first. This CAN be a show stopper for many.
Unfortunately, how you look does affect people's reaction. For instance, when I wear a wedding band while shopping with my son, I am addressed as Mrs. and when I don't (still shopping with my son) I am lucky to get a "Miss".
- - - - - - - - - -
Oddly enough, my neighbor and I were talking the other day. Granted, she's elderly - but she lives with her son and they are . . . how do I put this? They're old school racist/bigoted/paranoid. Outside of that, they're pleasant enough neighbors.
Her latest conversation wound into a "shocking confidence" - whites are being systematically bred into non-whiteness by black people. I smiled sweetly and told her that while it might seem that way, over 70% of the earth's population were people of color and caucasians were a distict minority in most places.
The fact that this sort of ideology still exists is a wee bit concerning to me. And makes me ponder the question of who has the privilege a bit more carefully.
I agree that some of those questions were clearly leading the unwary questionee - but they do provide good food for thought.
posted
"Over 70% of the earth's population were people of color and caucasians were a distict minority in most places."
This is exactly why I've always found it extraordinarily ironic that Western/American caucasions refer to any other race or ethnicity as minorities when, in global or numerical terms, they themselves are in the minority.
Perhaps, then, the present definitions of minorities and majorities are in need of revision? In the US at least, the definition of the majority seems to be much closer in meaning to 'the group who has the most access to and control over power, wealth, and prestige' than it is to a majority simply in terms of numbers.
Posts: 1548 | Registered: Aug 2002
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quote: I have often noticed men's unwillingness to grant that they are overprivileged, even though they may grant that women are disadvantaged. They may say they will work to improve women's status, in the society, the university, or the curriculum, but they can't or won't support the idea of lessening men's. Denials that amount to taboos surround the subject of advantages that men gain from women's disadvantages.
Since the above quote was in the original post and we are now talking about racism, lets replace men with caucasions and women with minorities.
quote: 1. I can if I wish arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 4. I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 5. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 6. When I am told about our national heritage or about "civilization," I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
I have never heard that caucasions made up our national heritage. I guess from pictures I realize our founding fathers were white men, but I was never taught the constitution was our history. I was taught we are a melting pot. Maybe there is more work to be done, but living in a white-hick town, I was never taught that civilization is the result of caucasions.
quote: 7. I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote:8. If I want to, I can be pretty sure of finding a publisher for this piece on white privilege.
Yeah, I agree. I have NEVER seen a work published on white priviledge. Must be really difficult.
quote: 9. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods which fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser's shop and find someone who can cut my hair.
Market forces. But maybe we should take Vanella Ice of the music shelves and replace him with black rappers to be make sure minorities are represented in a capitalist market.
quote: 10. Whether I use checks, credit cards, or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 11. I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like them.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote:12. I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals,the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
So are you stating that raves CAN be identified by bad morals, poverty, and illiteracy?
quote: 13. I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial.
Ironic, don't you think?
quote:14. I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote:15. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 16. I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color who constitute the world's majority without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
So, is this a good thing? If not, what should be the penalty? If this is good...What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 17. I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.
what is a "cultural outsider?" What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 18. I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to "the person in charge," I will be facing a person of my race.
We do have laws to battle discrimination.
quote: 19. If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven't been singled out because of my race.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 20. I can easily buy posters, postcards, picture books, greeting cards, dolls, toys, and children's magazines featuring people of my race.
Market forces.
quote: 21. I can go home from most meetings of organizations I belong to feeling somewhat tied in, rather than isolated, out-of-place, out numbered, unheard, held at a distance, or feared.
??? Is it other's responsibiliteis to make you feel comfy?
quote: 22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having coworkers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
I agree. That would be rough.
quote: 23. I can choose public accommodation without fearing that people of my race cannot get in or will be mistreated in the places I have chosen.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 24. I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help, my race will not work against me.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote: 25. If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether it has racial overtones.
What advantages do caucasions gain by repressing minorities here? What power should caucasions give up?
quote:26. I can choose blemish cover or bandages in "flesh" color and have them more or less match my skin.
Market forces and matched with stupidity. Hopefully these clear bandaids and the glue that holds cuts together will replace this travisty.
My point is, caucasions do not "gain" from minority disadvantages. Everyone who does well drives our national economy and raises quality of living for everyone.
There are racist attitudes in the nation, but by artificially dragging caucasions down to make everyone equal seems silly to me. IE> Does it *require* giving up quality health care to caucasions in order for minorities to get better health care? Instead of focusing on the divide, we should focus on how to lift people up--unless you truley believe that there is something caucasions need to *give up* to make that possible.
I do agree we need to be educated on the issues in our society. Information is the most efficient way to change behavior.
Posts: 1034 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
Growing up white in the United States, and in one of the whitest States in the Union, I found living in Central America, where I was very obviously in a racial minority, to be a very interesting and educational experience. I am not saying that I experienced a lot of discrimination, but for the first time I was made to be quite aware of my race on a regular basis.
I recommend a similar experience for anyone who is in the majority in their own place of residence.
Posts: 1652 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
Beren and Shan, I'm not saying that there aren't some people who do disctriminate as you said. But, like Tres said, they're the exception, not the rule. We should work as hard as we can to eliminate things like that, but it's only counterproductive to say that things are always or mostly like that.
And Shan,
quote:The fact that this sort of ideology still exists is a wee bit concerning to me.
Concerning, yes. Surprising, no. You shouldn't really be surprised that some people who grew up in the days when segregation was still law still holds attitudes like that. It's disheartening that they won't change, but not very surprising. And the fact that they've passed that on to younger generations is very unfortunate, but also, thankfully, getting much rarer. This is evidence that we are improving. Each generation is better at tolerance than the last.
We still have room to improve, but making the situation seem to be worse than it is is not the way to do that.
UofUlawguy, I second that post. I had a similar experience in South America. I did experience some discrimination, (I once had a complete stranger cuss me out and slap me in the face for no other reason than that I was American) but by and large, the people were good and decent and very interested in learning the distinctions between our cultures.
Posts: 134 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
"Instead of focusing on the divide, we should focus on how to lift people up..."
That is exactly what I was looking for. Many people read the article and think it's all about equalizing by lowering caucasian status but I thought it should be more about bringing people of color up to the same level. Then, maybe, we can go from there.
Americans are often viewed as hypocrites because, while we give lip-service to equality and freedom, we give reality up to inequality. I'm not saying that everyone should be entirely equal - one, there's always going to some differentiation or other and, two, I don't really think that's the best idea anyways. I do, however, think that people who are in otherwise similar circumstances should not be treated or made to live differently simply because of something of as little consequence as phenotype, which has no bearing whatsoever on their being a human being.
Edit to reply to "Each generation is better at tolerance than the last."
I used to live in Fairfax, a relatively wealthy area just South of DC. The addresses and phone numbers of other nations' embassies were in my phone book. While race is not much of an issue there, it is here, just a 30 minute drive further South and West. The area where I live now, being on the very edge of the suburbs, has a rather high influx of immigrants who are mostly looking for work in a still growing market. Hispanics and Latinos, in particular, are very much discriminated against in my city.
At my school, I'm afraid to go into the lower floor cafeteria alone because I'd likely be harassed for being white - again. Staff at my high school have even refused to work with students who don't yet speak English well, even when they have other students translating for them. There are multiple gangs at my school for which acceptance into is based solely on race. I have been called names by blacks, hispanics, latinos, and asians in the hallways simply for being white (I love that the Spanish speaking students think I don't understand. After five years of study, I know enough of the language to talk with them about it in their own native language - which is more courtesy than they afforded me). But anyways...
My point is that the situation is not necessarilly getting any better. Among the educated, yes; but in a school filled of average, mostly ignorant Americans, the issue still looms large.
This is our future. What are we going to do about it?
As someone else already said: "Information is the most efficient way to change behavior."
quote:I must give up the myth of meritocracy. If these things are true, this is not such a free country; one's life is not what one makes it; many doors open for certain people through no virtues of their own.
No matter what you may think of the importance or relevance of the authors list, this one statement exudes truth. In America we are taught to believe an indefensible myth that we are self-made men and women, that those who are rich and powerful are rich and powerful because they have earned it and those who are poor and powerless, deserve it. These are baldfaced lies. Recognizing this is the first step to moving toward a just society.
Injustice is a double edged sword. What is a disadvantage to one is and advantage to others. That is why injustice is so hard to eliminate. We are all quick to recognize injustice when we are on the loosing side, but we are usually blind to injustice when it favors us.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
Kamakazi, I do not disagree with everything you have said. I merely disagree with your earlier characterization that racial discrimination has "nearly nothing" to do with a person's housing choices and Tres's assertion that number two is "flat out false."
I don't think we are interpreting number two the same way:
quote:2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
To me, this paragraph means that a White person can move into any neighborhood that he could afford to live in without any extra consideration over whether he would be welcome there.
A Black person with similar economic background is more limited in his housing choices because he may not be welcome in certain neighborhoods and he may have a harder time getting loans.
So it does not all boil down to the "amount of money in your bank account." The hypothetical Black person described above can have the same amount of money as his White counterpart and still get denied equal access to the same housing choices.
Posts: 4116 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:A Black person with similar economic background is more limited in his housing choices because he may not be welcome in certain neighborhoods and he may have a harder time getting loans.
And it goes deeper than that. During the 1950's, there was a mass movement of working class American's out of inner cities and into the new suburbs. This movement was funded by tax payer dollars in the form of VA and FHA loans and housing developments. In most cases, blacks were specifically forbidden from purchasing houses in these subdivisions under federal guidelines. So in the 1950s white people got tax subsidies to buy homes and people of color did not. There was, or course, no special lower tax bracket for people of color, so it is fair to say that white people benefited from taxes payed by black people and benefits are far reaching. Over the past 50 years, real estate values across the country have far exceeded the inflation rate. As a result, those families who were able to buy houses in the suburbs in the 1950s have significantly greater real wealth today than those who did not. What's more, the movement of middle class whites away from the inner cities, resulted in degradation of inner city neighborhoods. Whites who were able to move to the suburbs had access to better schools and thus more opportunities for higher education. The effects of that single racist policy are still widespread in America. Even though the policy was changed decades ago, people of color are still less likely to have the economic means to live in the neighborhood of their choice because of that policy.
This is only one example. The effects of racist laws in our past have not been erased. As white people, we have more opportunities, we are privileged, because our the racism of our forefathers. Recognizing that is the first step to creating a just society.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
My problem with the list is that, aside from the entries that were just plain silly, most of them were pretty fundamental rights that everybody OUGHT to have. (Accessible housing, lack of discriminaiton in the workplace, etc.) I mean, why should we see these as rare and special advantages that need to be removed from white people? These are basic things that everyone in the country SHOULD have, regardless of race. How does it help anybody to start stripping them away?
Well, that's my first problem with the list. My second problem is, yeah, that most of the entries are just plain silly, for reasons already well-stated by other people Posts: 1907 | Registered: Feb 2000
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quote: I mean, why should we see these as rare and special advantages that need to be removed from white people? These are basic things that everyone in the country SHOULD have, regardless of race. How does it help anybody to start stripping them away?
Geoff - I think that's kind of the point.
Everyone SHOULD have these advantages.
A majority of the people who DON'T have these advantages disproportionatly belong to a racial minority.
The original question wasn't 'How can we remove these advantages from white people?' but rather 'How can we get the majority white American population who haven't experienced racism to think about what racism means and feels like?'
quote:To me, this paragraph means that a White person can move into any neighborhood that he could afford to live in without any extra consideration over whether he would be welcome there.
I can tell you for sure that I have a white friend who has moved into a predominantly hispanic neighborhood and does NOT feel welcome there at all. So, #2 is false by counterexample.
Posts: 2432 | Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
As a biracial (chinese/white most of you know this, but just in case): Is an adhesive bandage invisible on anyone's skin? I think it was okay to change the flesh colored crayon to "peach" because similarly, almost no one's flesh is really that color and artistically, it stunts kids to not analyze the color of something they are trying to depict. So I agree with the crayon thing, but I don't want to pay more for bandages so there can be 57 shades on the shelf. Make 'em all blue. Most have prints now anyway.
I'd like to think America is distinct from any of the European nations that donated our forefathers. For one thing, we're much more prude.
quote: In America we are taught to believe an indefensible myth that we are self-made men and women, that those who are rich and powerful are rich and powerful because they have earned it and those who are poor and powerless, deserve it.
I maintain that imperfect as the system is, America still provides the best opportunity for a person to rise of any society in the world. Because some are self made does not mean that all the wealthy are self made. Sure most are born into it. But at the outset of the Civil War, the ideal of opportunity was what Abraham Lincoln sought to preserve with the Union. Slavery only became an issue (for him) later. He originally sought compromise.
But I think that there are doctors and lawyers and legislators who are minorities born to immigrants. Besides Asians. I know that there is a systemic problem with minority children believing this and seeking the opportunity.
I heard on a telecourse recently that the year California phased out Affirmative Action in med school applications, no blacks were admitted. I was floored, but when you consider the weight of the interview process it does come down to the interviewer's comfort with the applicant. So much as I hate to admit it, I guess we still need quotas.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I think there is a disagreement between the examples given and the thesis of the paper.
The thesis is saying, "Its easy to fight discrimination when we are removing disadvantages, but is difficult when we must tackle unfair advantages."
What follows is mostly a list of disadvantages, but read from the advantageous side.
Lets go to a new example: In the 1950's black people were forced to ride in the back of the bus. This is an obvious disadvantage.
Even if its read that White People gained the advantage of riding in the front of the bus, we realize that is just another way of saying the same thing.
To say this is an advantage that should be surrendered in the name of equality can be seen as saying its only fair if everyone rides in the back of the bus.
What we want to do is not determine your seat on the bus by skin color. Sometimes you can sit in the front of the bus, sometims you can sit in the back.
To say that a white mans ability to buy a home anywhere is a disadvantage he must give up is wrong. To make it so any person can buy a home anywhere they wish, regardless of skin tone is what is right. The white man doesn't give up any advantage, accept the fact that the housing market in prime areas has become tighter.
This is not to say the thesis of the essay is wrong, just that the list of proofs were poorly chosen.
Lets try another one. In many parts of the US, the majority of the people are Christian. Non-Christians are often described by their religion. He's the jew. She's Wiccan. Those Muslims. He's our Aethist.
They have used this majority status to get their Christian icons into public places. Yet this is against the ideals and beliefs of a minority of the people. They don't want to bow to Christ before voting, or being judged, or visiting the mayor.
Burning down a synagogue would be considered a hate crime, a low and disgusting act attempting to stop people from practicing their religion. It would be seen as the most obvious disadvantage to the Jewish people in that area.
Yet the same people who would protest that disadvantage defend to the end, the right to maintain their advantage of majority, and keep their icons on public property--whether that is a Manger Scene at Christmas, the 10 Commandments in the court house, or the fact that they can't put up "Merry Christmas" on the faculty door.
Attempts to remove this "majority advantage" that they see as "the Norm" is dangerous.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
A personal example relative to the Housing topic. Yes, the real estate agent doesn't care about the color of your skin. They want to sell houses to make money. The people in the neighborhood where you move, might very much care about the color of your skin regardless of the rosy picture the real estate agent paints.
I was told by a neighbor, when Steve and I moved into our neighborhood, "We are so glad you guys moved in, instead of another noisy Mexican family." Yet, Steve is actually the token "Black" man in the neighborhood. Except when they meet him they don't realize his Black-Cuban ethnicity. The irony is fantastic. The suburb that we live in does have a significant Hispanic presence. This is probably why I feel very comfortable since I grew up a lone white child in a Hispanic neighborhood.
However people of Mexican descent (specifically Mexican) to distinguish from the more generic "latino" or "hispanic" do have a different sense of community with extended family than most of the more straight-laced types in our neighborhhood. They are generally noisier as well. For people who were used to their nice quiet little neighborhood, the strains of mariachi wafting by on a Saturday afternoon is the height of rudness. Yet I who grew up with it view it quite fondly, with memories of playing with my neighbors and neighbor's cousins at family gatherings where they graciously invited me in and treated me like one of their own. The Mexican-American family that acutally lives in our neighborhood seems quite tame to me by comparison.
Was the intent rudness, on the part of the mexican americans in either the neighborhood I grew up in or the neighborhood I live now? Absolutely not. If anything, not being hospitable to their extended family and friends is the ruder act in the mind of the Mexican-American family. Yet their neighbors view them as ignorant rude and crass, becuase they are being forced to deal with a culture that does not fit their own.
I do think the particular the Mexican family on the other side of the block (not actually the same family that my neighbors object to) takes it to a slight extreme with the giant tree stump in their front yard painted the colors of the mexican flag, and their Christmas light displays that are clearly arranged in the color order of the Mexican flag. Yet at the same time, I understand them throwing their heritage in the face of their stuffy neighbors as a form of protest.
Personally, I have experienced much less discrimination as a white among Latinos, then I have ever experienced being an odball white among whites, or being a female engineer. Yet I'm certian the Latino experience is exactly the opposite and it saddens me.
I am glad you brought that up. You said it better then I did. The thesis acts like whites/men have an unfair advantage and they need to "give" it up. Quotes like
quote:Describing white privilege makes one newly accountable. As we in Women's Studies work to reveal male privilege and ask men to give up some of their power,
and
quote: much of their oppressiveness was unconscious
paints the picture that whites are oppressing minorities and need to give up power or share the wealth--which suggests that Caucasian benefits are only derived from a type of abuse to minorities.
So when Pixie says,
quote:Many people read the article and think it's all about equalizing by lowering caucasian status but I thought it should be more about bringing people of color up to the same level
I don't buy it. If that is truly what she thinks, then how we lift up people is not race related in the context of subjugation, which is the picture the article suggests.
Pixie,
How then can we help minorities?
Posts: 1034 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
::shrugs:: I have no idea. As I said in my original post, I mostly just wanted to put the idea out there and get people thinking. Honestly, I think the article's entirely ridiculous if you hack it to bits in its individual components as multiple people have done here. But...
I still think if you read through that list not so much in an intellectual framework but an empathetic one, the general feeling of the article shifts greatly - or you could even just ignore the rest of the article, which I basically did because the author's tone annoyed me to no end. Still, I went through that list and tried to see how I would feel or have felt in similar situations and came out of it with the resulting opinion that no one should have to live like that.
Again, that's just me. Where you all take this is up to you.
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