It is unavoidable. I can no more stop exercising my white privilege while walking in a public park than an African American bird watcher in that same park can stop someone from calling 911 on him because they think he looks suspicious. I don’t think it’s useful to look at every situation, particularly odd events like a presidential inauguration involving famous people, and draw broad conclusions about privilege. When Michael Jackson visited the White House in 1984 he wore a ridiculous military style sequined jacket and dude could get away with it because he was Michael Jackson. Did people make fun of him? Sure, in the same way people poked fun at Bernie with all those memes. But I wouldn’t look at Jackson’s first or second visit to the White House and come to the conclusion that white privilege was baloney because a black guy got away with dressing like an oddball twice. Likewise, I’m not going to look at Bernie at this one event and conclude that he’s somehow benefiting from white privilege. And I’m sure not going to get angry and encourage my students to get angry either.
I don’t think anyone in this thread is supporting people being angry at Bernie Sanders over what he wore to the inauguration.
I can, however, look at Bernie Sanders at this one event, or any other event, and know that he benefits from white privilege (in general). Because I can see that he appears to be white. Again, that doesn’t mean he has done anything wrong. It’s just what white privilege is.
What would’ve been really scandalous is if Bernie had worn a good Republican cloth coat.*
*like Pat Nixon.
Which isn’t actually a useful or insightful observation.
I was on the fence at first, mostly because of the hysterical tone of the teacher’s statements. It sounds like she has many bees in her bonnet and I also wonder how much she influenced her students to take offense.
After reading more nuanced opinions, I understand that yes, some people have the privilege of not having to worry about how they dress. Not a conscious decision on Mr. Sanders’s part to snub his nose at the importance of the event; just an old grumpy cat “doing his thing”. Be he’s a grumpy cat that has one less thing to worry about.
It’s subtle and not a great example of white privilege, simply because it is so subtle. Very easy to wonder if it’s something about BS and his persona and therefore dismiss it. It belongs on the minor side of the white privilege scale but I believe it’s still a manifestation of it.
Of course it’s unavoidable, I never said otherwise. All I’m saying is this old man wearing a parka when it’s cold out thing is not white privilege. It’s simply a old man trying to stay warm.
Of course you can, he’s white in America. What doesn’t follow is that this particular incident is therefore white privilege. Sometimes an old man in a parka is just cold, not privileged.
There’s not really such a thing as an incident “being” white privilege or not “being” white privilege.
The point is that perceptions of any incident are always filtered through various forms of societal privilege, although it can be very hard to say whether or how much or in what way privilege is affecting perception in any given case.
Certainly, nobody at all AFAICT is trying to claim that Bernie Sanders was thinking “Hmm, what should I wear to the inauguration? I know, I’ll wear this rather informal-looking parka and mittens because as an old white guy, I can get away with that!”
No, he wore the parka and mittens to keep warm, obvs, doubtless with no deliberate intent to “get away with” anything. But that doesn’t mean that other people’s perceptions of him are therefore automatically completely uninfluenced by privilege. A white man in America doesn’t magically stop having white privilege because the weather is cold.
Of course there are things that are not white privilege. It’s everything if that is the primary way you view things. In this case, people have linked to photos of many people at the event, wearing all kinds of clothing, including a white woman and a black woman wearing weather appropriate coats. the only reason old Bernie is getting the attention is how he looks like a grumpy old man because, you know, he is a grumpy old man. The white privilege stuff came later.
I don’t know how you can help what names other people see you as. That would be their problem with perception. Everything a white man does in cold weather doesn’t magically become white privilege. This is, once again, a think horses not zebras thing. You have a perfectly good reason to wear a parka in the winter when you are an old man. You don’t have to twist things until they break in order to fit into your worldview that every single thing a white person does is suspect. The whole cigar is just a cigar thing.
As I just said, I don’t think anybody at all is suggesting that Sanders’ choice to wear a parka was in any way an attempt to assert his white privilege or for any other “suspect” reason:
When people say that the perception of Sanders’ clothing choices is affected by societal white privilege, they’re not trying to accuse Sanders of deliberately trying to assert his privileged status in any way, or of choosing his clothing based on his awareness of his privilege. That’s a total red herring you’ve got there.
That’s the whole point. If you are a person with societal privilege, then perceptions of your behavior are inevitably filtered through that. In a society that’s still pervasively influenced by systemic racism, for example, there’s no such thing as truly “color-blind” perception of people.
You as a privileged person can’t erase the fact that your privilege affects people’s perceptions of you, no matter how good your intentions are. Acknowledging that fact is in no way blaming a privileged person for their privilege, or accusing them of engaging in “suspect” behavior.
Once again, nobody’s blaming or accusing Sanders in this situation. I don’t know how to reassure you of that any more clearly.
It is not a fact that Sanders was using white privilege, aware of it or not, in this instance. The fact that many other people, including a black woman, were dressed appropriately for the weather other than Sanders tells me this has nothing to do with white privilege. It’s about people keeping warm in cold weather.
This nearly 300 post thread was started by an article by a woman who thinks this is not only white privilege but white supremacy. I happen to think she’s whackadoodle. If this is an example of white privilege/supremacy then we can all relax, the problem is not as bad as we feared.
To say that some incident is manifesting white privilege, and even to point out the structural connection between white privilege and white supremacy, as the author of the article did, is not the same thing as to accuse somebody of deliberately exploiting white privilege, which the author of the article did not.
Reasonable people can certainly disagree, as I’ve said, on how much (all the way down to “essentially not at all”, if that’s how you see it) and in what way(s) perceptions of Sanders’ clothing were affected by the ubiquitous “background radiation” of white privilege.
But to declare categorically that white privilege simply has nothing to do with the situation is to fundamentally misunderstand the concept.
No, I understand the concept just fine, thank you. The fact that I disagree with you does not make me wrong. Just because you want to force everything that happens in the world, deliberate or not, into a single point of view does not mean people have to agree with you and they are too stupid or ignorant to understand a concept. I love it when people tell me I don’t understand something because I don’t agree with them. There should be a name for that argument. Maybe I’ll use Kimstuism until someone that’s not as stupid or ignorant as I am tells me the real name.
No need to thank me, but your posts are not conveying the impression that you understand the concept. For example:
No, the fact that other people (including some non-white people) besides Sanders also wore some comparatively informal outerwear does not prove that perceptions of Sanders have “nothing to do with white privilege”. White privilege isn’t something that people can turn on or off at will, and it’s not something that magically disappears whenever some white and some non-white people are doing similar things.
People who understand the concept of white privilege generally are aware that white privilege and a sincere desire to keep warm in cold weather aren’t mutually exclusive phenomena. The existence of one doesn’t automatically disprove the existence of the other.
Well. I’m not blindboyard but at least you got the quotes right.
Again, I understand the concept quite well and I would appreciate it if you could argue an actual point instead of saying, over and over again, that I don’t understand the concept.
I don’t care about perceptions. Perceptions are not automatically truths. And, again, just because some people view every situation in the world thru a very small lens, does not make their view correct. You are the one talking about magic, not me. I am talking about real life, not a magic life filtered thru the view that every single thing a white person does is white privilege.
Yet again, your insistence that the mere presence of a white man in any situation means white privilege is wrong. The fact that an old man wore a parka does not automatically prove white white privilege.
For the final time: white privilege exists, white privilege is a serious problem, Bernie Sanders wearing a parka is not white privilege unless you view every single thing a white person does as white privilege.
I’m sincerely sorry you are burdened with this view in your everyday life but it is a burden you can ease by taking a more nuanced approach to your opinions ang not trying to force them all into one basket. Good luck.
Oh how stupid of me, sorry, I have flagged myself for misquoting!
ISTM that you’re under the impression that somebody’s trying to argue that Sanders’ wearing of a parka somehow in itself proves the existence of white privilege. It doesn’t, and AFAICT nobody is trying to argue that it does.
Of course every single thing a white person does is perceived through the existence of white privilege. That doesn’t mean, and nobody is claiming that it does mean, that every single thing (or any single thing) that a white person does is direct proof of the existence of white privilege.
Again, the issue seems to be that you’re using the phrase “is white privilege” to mean “is proof that white privilege exists”.
Here’s the problem. This quote is not true unless you personally make it true. I can’t help you with your perception, but like I said, widen your horizons and don’t shove everything in your world into one viewpoint. A tunnel vision view of the world severely limits you participation in it,
That said, I think I’m done with this. I’ve explained my point of view quite plainly many times. The fact that you just want to come up with different versions of how stupid or ignorant I am because I don’t agree with you doesn’t bode well for a good conversation.
Thanks to everyone else though. Great thread.
And you still don’t get it.
Thanks for your very well thought out and cleverly presented comment. I guess my only option is to put your level of thought into my reply and say “No, you.” Man. I love posts with no content!