white privilege

[M Dogg™]

white privilege, a social relation
 1. a. A right, advantage, or immunity granted to or enjoyed by white persons beyond the common advantage of all others; an exemption in many particular cases from certain burdens or liabilities.
 b. A special advantage or benefit of white persons; with reference to divine dispensations, natural advantages, gifts of fortune, genetic endowments, social relations, etc.
 2. A privileged position; the possession of an advantage white persons enjoy over non–white persons.
 3. a. The special right or immunity attaching to white persons as a social relation; prerogative.
 b. display of white privilege, a social expression of a white person or persons demanding to be treated as a member or members of the socially privileged class.
 4. a. To invest white persons with a privilege or privileges; to grant to white persons a particular right or immunity; to benefit or favor specially white persons; to invest white persons with special honorable distinctions.
 b. To avail oneself of a privilege owing to one as a white person.
 5. To authorize or license of white person or persons what is forbidden or wrong for non–whites; to justify, excuse.
 6. To give to white persons special freedom or immunity from some liability or burden to which non–white persons are subject; to exempt.
I started WhitePrivilege.com in order to make the structures of white privilege—its causes and effects—less socially invisible, primarily by pointing out instances in U.S. society where it is or seems to be at work. I needed, therefore, a good working definition of the social phenomenon I was looking for. I hit upon the long, detailed definition—which has been used in antiracism education in many educational contexts, including a wide–range of colleges and universities and even PBS—one day, rather suddenly, while talking to a friend of mine, the philosopher Bijan Parsia, who’s spent a good deal of time working on the philosophical theory of oppression. “White privilege is after all,” Bijan said, “a form of social privilege per se.”

If that’s true, one good way to define racialized social privilege is by reference to social privilege generally. In other words, you can figure out what white privilege is in part by figuring out what any social privilege is. So I walked over to my copy of the Oxford English Dictionary, looked up the word “privilege”, and after reading it through a few times, I realized that if I rewrote the definition of privilege to refer to white people, rather than people in general, I would have the basis of a working definition. And so that’s what I did, with a few modifications and changes as seemed appropriate.

In that sense, the definition is like a working hypothesis, subject to change and adjustment as we accumulate and study more and more facts. I have from time to time tried to make the defintion less verbally complex (because I initially didn’t realize that the OED’s language is a bit stilted for everyday use) but its main conceptual claims have remained stable.

Why is it important to define “white privilege” so carefully? Because, in part, many people want to deny that it exists at all, especially in response to other people’s assertions that it is at work in some particular situation, that it exists unjustly and so should be dismantled. This pattern of assertion and denial is itself racialized: for the most part, people of color say white people enjoy white privilege, while white people for the most part deny not only that they have it, but that such a thing even exists. I have been assured countless times by white people that there is no such thing as white privilege and that the very idea is nonsensical.

(For example, among the objections to the idea of white privilege, there is one which deserves some consideration here. Given the fact of a systematically unjust society, such as is the case in the U.S., the differential possession of basic human and political rights becomes a privilege. Yes, every person by virtue of being a person has the right to enjoy and possess certain rights. But, in fact, over the long course of U.S. history only white people have enjoyed and possessed the rights which they loudly proclaimed were fundamentally human rights. I think it is fitting and accurate, in such an unjust situation, to call the racially differential possession and enjoyment of human rights a privilege arising out of particular social relations.)

In studying historical examples and theories of oppression, it becomes clear that social (in)visibility is an important strategy. Early feminists make this point over and over. If men and women equally believe, for example, that women are by their very nature subordinate to men, then gender oppression seems natural, inevitable, timeless. If you can design structures of oppression which are invisibile, which seem natural, they will be more effective than structures which are visible. If you can convince everyone, but especially members of the oppressed group itself, that the way things are is natural or inevitable or unavoidable, people will be less likely to challenge the way things are.

If that idea is correct, then we should expect the very idea of racialized social privilege—that is, social privilege which attaches to a group or groups which are identified racially (whether one understands ‘races’ culturally or scientifically)—to be invisible socially. We should expect that members of the dominant group, the one which has the privilege, to deny that it exists or that it could exist. Which is precisely what we white folks do (for the most part) when faced with claims by people of color that we enjoy social privilege by virtue of the social fact that we are taken to be white.

To sum up, (1) white privilege should be defined carefully because it is contested; (2) that contestation is itself racialized, (3) which is what we should expect, since (4) socially invisible structures of oppression are more effective and enduring than socially visible ones.

We define it in order to make it a problem for white people, to show that it is an unjust, historical creation. Whatever has been made by human hands can be unmade by others.

[Real American]

What about black privilege and Latino privilege?

[Trauma-san]

Do you expect anybody to read all that? You're getting worse than me at rambling on and on about something nobody cares about. 

[M Dogg™]

What about black privilege and Latino privilege?

If you want me to list the all the different white privileges, I am more than willing. And as for black and Latino privilege, yeah we have the privilege of cheap housing when we get arrested thank's to profilling, we get extra security in our neighborhoods thanks to all them police watching over us, we get to watch the great white people on TV, at games we have all of our stars on the court and we see the whites in the stands watching. I mean, we have lots of privileges. Honestly, these are not lawful privileges, these are the privileges given by society, the ones that no one says out loud, but are done in favor of the white race. As I said, I can list them. And Trauma, I didn't write that, I got that from whitepriliege.com. I think you should check it out.

[Trauma-san]

Man, you're such a whiner, you're always looking to blame your problems on someone else, and in today's society, that's just pathetic.  Everyone has obstacles in front of them, rise above.  Besides, you're doing pretty good, you're in school, you have goals, nothing's being denied to you that wasn't denied to me, so just drop the crap already. 

[M Dogg™]

Man, you're such a whiner, you're always looking to blame your problems on someone else, and in today's society, that's just pathetic.  Everyone has obstacles in front of them, rise above.  Besides, you're doing pretty good, you're in school, you have goals, nothing's being denied to you that wasn't denied to me, so just drop the crap already. 

  Actually, after seeing all the shit that was talked in the Nas topic in another thread, I figured I start with square one with everybody. I think we all need to clear up every single racial thought, prejudgements, everything, just clear it all out. Instead of fearing what we'll hear, I think it's time to finally get everything out, have a good, educated talk about our feelings on race, and see how each side looks at race and the what is out there. I think you are one of the main people I was thinking about, but I don't know how far we'll get, but I do want to try. In fact, one thing I've always wanted to have is just a straight up thread with just us two, clearing everything out. I mean everything we disagree on, and why and the hell are you so mad. I mean you are just an angry bitter person. I wish to get past all that and understand you, and CWalker, and everyone.

[7even]

What about affirmative action, for instance? All this bitching about white people making other people's life hell in society is getting on my nerves. If a white boy gets a job when you don't, many won't even consider the possibility that he's better. Some people are so fast with pulling the race card and blaming others instead of trying to improve themselves, which leads to a vicious circle.

[*Jamal*]

What about affirmative action, for instance? All this bitching about white people making other people's life hell in society is getting on my nerves. If a white boy gets a job when you don't, many won't even consider the possibility that he's better. Some people are so fast with pulling the race card and blaming others instead of trying to improve themselves, which leads to a vicious circle.

Actually in Germany there have been many instances of Germans getting the job over the foreigners, even if the foreigner was more qualified for the job. This was in the 80s/90s... I don't know about now.

[Don Seer]

when i stayed in germany on a school trip the indian kids would get treated funny by germans... and when we wandering around the city centre a ginger kid got harassed by an old man with a walking stick just for being a red head.. LOL!

the only black person we saw while over there was a complete nutter and kept shouting "mc hammer" at us.. and yeah he did have parachute pants on.. no lie..

[*Jamal*]

Personally, I don't care about any of these "privileges" people talk about. I don't think a person's race holds him/her back from being successful in America. However, I do believe that a child part of a poor family that lives in a poor neighborhood, has a huge impact on that child's potential of being "successful" in the future. There is a small percentage of these people (those who grow up in poor economic neighborhoods - "ghettos") that make it, and big props to them. It's not just minorities because a white person who grows up in these conditions has just as much (or little) of a chance at making it as the black or hispanic kid.

[*Jamal*]

when i stayed in germany on a school trip the indian kids would get treated funny by germans... and when we wandering around the city centre a ginger kid got harassed by an old man with a walking stick just for being a red head.. LOL!

the only black person we saw while over there was a complete nutter and kept shouting "mc hammer" at us.. and yeah he did have parachute pants on.. no lie..

I believe you because once I saw across the street yelling at two little kids, saying "Foreigners out of our country". These kids were like 8 years old, walking home from school, and just happened to walk past this lady. Fucked up shit. I heard/saw "Foreigners out" all the time while there.

[7even]

You have to consider we have an enormous number of immigrants/foreigners. To be honest I doubt English people would behave differently if they had 10% turks in their country.

America is a tottally different story for obvious reasons.

[*Jamal*]

You have to consider we have an enormous number of immigrants/foreigners. To be honest I doubt English people would behave differently if they had 10% turks in their country.

America is tottally different story for obvious reasons.

Yeah I know, racism and anti-immigrant feelings exist everywhere, but my point was that in Germany people were actually denied jobs because of their race. German employers were willing to offer a less-qualified German the job over a foreigner who was more qualified.

In America, racism obviously does exist as well, but even with this great diversity, people being denied jobs because of their race is not that common. Soon after 9/11, this kinda changed for Middle Eastern people, but I'm assuming this was an issue in Europe as well.

[7even]

You have to consider we have an enormous number of immigrants/foreigners. To be honest I doubt English people would behave differently if they had 10% turks in their country.

America is tottally different story for obvious reasons.

Yeah I know, racism and anti-immigrant feelings exist everywhere, but my point was that in Germany people were actually denied jobs because of their race. German employers were willing to offer a less-qualified German the job over a foreigner who was more qualified.

Well there's of course absolutely nothing you can say to defend this. 
Good thing my sister-in-law has made it as a doctor here.

[Don Seer]

actually 7even england is very different.. due to the massive amount of countries we've had colonies in etc we have especially strong west indies / carribean and (east) indian connections