# Hard Work vs. Privilege **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 16, 2017, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322 "2017-01-16T17:23:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2017, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/181 "2017-01-18T23:11:04Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Do you still think he’s just “encouraging awareness of privilege issues” and not encouraging a form of protected-class discrimination? I don’t. Wait, what? You equate affirmative action with “a form of protected-class discrimination”? That is… well, an approach more notable for its ideological purity than its historical realism. > [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Comments like this one: > > > [@Kimstu](#): > > > > I can hear your knee jerking out the Morse code for “OMG TEH LIBRULZ WANT TO IMPOSE HIRING QUOTAS” from all the way over here. > > rather rankled me a while back in this thread Yeah, sorry about that, :o I didn’t realize at the time that you kind of **do** have a rather draconian approach to the definition of concepts like “hiring quotas” so the joke wasn’t quite as funny as I thought! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2017, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/182 "2017-01-18T23:29:17Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > […] if asked to summarize what actions she’s recommending, all I can find is some variations on “be more aware”. Well, recall that I did specify some concrete actions for **becoming** more aware, namely exposing oneself to the shared experiences of other groups through their communities, media, etc. Those oft-maligned “diversity goals” in hiring/admissions/etc. can be useful for helping that process along. I mean, honestly **HD** , it seems to me you’re kind of painting yourself into a corner here. You say you want to understand more about how to counteract the unjust social impacts of privilege differences, and you acknowledge (at least, I think you have) that not being aware of privilege can reinforce discrimination and prejudice, but when you’re told that actively seeking out diverse perspectives from different backgrounds tends to increase awareness of privilege, you seem to retreat into the claim that paying attention to backgrounds would be _ipso facto_ illegal because EEOC, or something. I’m just not sure you’re really thinking this through. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2017, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/183 "2017-01-18T23:32:35Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I can imagine that lots of people don’t get jobs for unfortunate reasons: their resume is unprofessional, they were late to their interview, they had a bad relationship with a former boss that gave a mean reference to the prospective employer. But if you’re a potential employer, you do have to make first cuts somewhere. Whether that’s with unprofessional resumes or people late to their interviews or people who get bad reviews from their previous employers, wouldn’t any of those “perpetuate privilege”? And if you’re not willing to cut people from your employment pool for things like that, what _should_ you cut them for? Is a prospective employer supposed to personally interview every applicant? That’s impractical in many cases. When you are dealing with entry-level positions, maybe it’s better to go random then to pick a criteria that says more about someone’s background than it does about their ability to do the job well. That rankles the English teacher in me, but honestly, I think it makes sense. Again, my field is more college admissions than hiring, and I already laid out examples there of how I think context has to shape evaluation. The resume issue has a parallel: these days it is increasingly the norm for upper-middle class and even middle class parents to hire a professional to guide their kids through the college application process. This results in a much slicker, focused application. Do you think it would be reasonable for a college to use the slickness of the applications–which include things like good looking resumes and perfect grammar in the essays–to do that first cull? They have the “too many resumes” problem in spades. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2017, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/184 "2017-01-18T23:41:42Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > You equate affirmative action with “a form of protected-class discrimination”? It depends on the form that affirmative action program takes, but certainly some of them amount to “discrimination” in my eyes. That shouldn’t really come as a great surprise. Various states have chosen to ban affirmative action, and there’s been a string of SCOTUS cases on the matter. It’s a touchy subject, to say the least. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2017, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/185 "2017-01-18T23:48:50Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I specifically responded a while ago. I never saw a reply. Let me try again: > > You said you wanted “individuals with power and influence” to "take this [meaning that in general minorities must work harder than white men to get to the same place] into account when making personnel decisions. I think [that’s actually _illegal_ for a lot of employers](https://www.eeoc.gov/employers/upload/poster_screen_reader_optimized.pdf). How is a well-meaning employer supposed to “take into account” without breaking the law? A few posters (such as **Kimstu** and **Miller** , IIRC) accurately characterized my intention with this and answered your question (i.e. no, it’s not illegal), which I noted in a post. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2017, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/186 "2017-01-18T23:57:56Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > A few posters (such as **Kimstu** and **Miller** , IIRC) accurately characterized my intention with this and answered your question (i.e. no, it’s not illegal), which I noted in a post. I think you are being vague and unclear, so let me ask you a simple yes/no question: Do you support affirmative action programs? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/187 "2017-01-19T00:08:12Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I think you are being vague and unclear, so let me ask you a simple yes/no question: > > Do you support affirmative action programs? Yes – I figured I was pretty clear on that when I talked about AA partially mitigating the negative effects of privilege. I don’t necessarily support every single one, but in principle I support AA. But this doesn’t have anything to do with what I think hiring managers (and college admissions professionals and the like) should do. These posts more or less did a good job of describing what I meant: > [@Kimstu](#): > > 😕 I think you must be missing the point. **iiandyiiii** was recommending that hiring decisions should include conscious awareness of privilege issues in order that “privilege _**(or the lack thereof)**_ would have _ **little or no effect** _ on one’s chance at a good job”. > > (Emphasis added.) IAN **iiandyiiii** and cannot speak for him, but ISTM that he was very clearly saying that being more privileged **OR** less privileged should not affect one’s job prospects. And the only way to prevent that from happening is to be consciously aware of how privilege works. > > You appear to have knee-jerked your way from that statement to the assumption that **iiandyiiii** was suggesting that employers should automatically prefer members of historically underprivileged groups in hiring decisions. That interpretation doesn’t really make sense in light of what he actually said. > [@Miller](#): > > If you understand the mechanism that underlie specific examples of privilege, you can design processes to specifically eliminate those aspects of privilege from consideration. For example, an oft cited example of privilege is that people who have “black” names have much more difficulty getting job interviews than people with “white” names. One way to eliminate this from the hiring process without favoring any particular group is to simply hide the applicant’s name until you’re ready to start calling people in for interviews. > [@Kimstu](#): > > Uh, yeah, looks pretty obvious to me. Namely, look at applicants as **individuals** , with **individual** backgrounds and combinations of inherent advantages and disadvantages, rather than making blanket assumptions about their abilities and achievements. > > In other words, don’t just reflexively assume _“Wow, most of the highly qualified applicants are white males, so white males are apparently smarter or better at this kind of work!”_ Group privilege may be affecting these outcomes, so take the trouble to spot the **individual** applicant(s) who really **are** the smartest and best. > > Likewise, don’t just reflexively assume _“Wow, a highly qualified black female applicant, she must be super determined and talented because she had so many obstacles to overcome being black and female!”_ Maybe this applicant comes from a wealthy family of experts in this field and had massive special advantages to help her follow in the family footsteps. Again, take the trouble to determine whether this **individual** applicant really **is** super determined and talented. > > That, IMHO, is how you use awareness of the realities of privilege to “lessen the effects of privilege on society”. Of course, as I said, I don’t speak for **iiandyiiii** , but that seems to me to be the sort of thing he was talking about. [ETA: and **Miller** ’s suggestion is another good example.] > :rolleyes: I can hear your knee jerking out the Morse code for _“OMG TEH LIBRULZ WANT TO IMPOSE HIRING QUOTAS”_ from all the way over here. > > What you seem to be missing, AFAICT, is **iiandyiiii** ’s clear statement of principle that **neither** privilege **nor** the lack of privilege should be a significant factor in hiring choices. The only way to lessen the effects of privilege is to start from a clear awareness of the realities of privilege and how it affects our lives. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/188 "2017-01-19T00:13:19Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Do you support affirmative action programs? Speaking for myself, it depends on the program. Different AA measures are employed and scrutinized in different ways in different situations. It’s a pretty complicated set of mechanisms, ranging all the way from applicant pool broadening efforts to specific placement goals to explicit hiring quotas (which BTW are not legal unless judicially imposed in consequence of a finding of persistent illegal discrimination). So I’d have to see what particular affirmative action program in what particular situation was being referenced in order to know whether or not I support it. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/189 "2017-01-19T00:19:12Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Yes Thank you! ETA: FWIW, in principle I oppose AA, but I don’t necessarily oppose every form it’s ever taken. There are some I find more offensive and some that bother me less. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/190 "2017-01-19T00:23:10Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Thank you! > > ETA: FWIW, in principle I oppose AA, but I don’t necessarily oppose every form it’s ever taken. There are some I find more offensive and some that bother me less. Do you understand that my position on AA is entirely separate from what I advocate for hiring/admissions managers in order to mitigate the negative effects of privilege? AA is government, not private action. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/191 "2017-01-19T00:34:31Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Do you understand that my position on AA is entirely separate from what I advocate for hiring/admissions managers in order to mitigate the negative effects of privilege? AA is government, not private action. It’s not entirely clear to me. For example, federal contractors are private companies that oftentimes have to comply with government regulations to stay in business. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/192 "2017-01-19T00:38:07Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > It’s not entirely clear to me. For example, federal contractors are private companies that oftentimes have to comply with government regulations to stay in business. I’m separating the policy of AA, which might include mandating certain things for employers and/or schools, from what I’m advocating that private individuals should do, morally, to help improve society and mitigate the negative effects of privilege and its lack. If every single employer, and every single admissions manager, did this, or nearly everyone, then there might be no need at all for AA policies any more – which is part of why I advocate for this behavior. A society with no need for AA is a better society, and I hope we get there someday, the sooner the better. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/193 "2017-01-19T00:49:42Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > There’s a lot wrong with that comic. > > A library card doesn’t cost anything. Maybe Paula can get one and read instead of watch TV? > > No, Paula won’t get into Harvard on "B"s. But it’s good enough to get into plenty of good schools. > > The writer’s from New Zealand. Why isn’t Paula’s sick father enjoying their free health care? > > Who gets student loans from some shady high fee lending club? Why doesn’t Paula use some Kiwi version of Sallie Mae or whoever issues legitimate student loans over there? > > And of course, the false dichotomy of Richard being handed a sweet job where he’s fast tracked while Paula works some dead end job where her boss is a total jerk. > > Does coming from a more affluent family afford Richard certain advantages? Of course. But from what I’ve seen first hand, you still have to do the work. I’ve seen plenty of rich kids fail out of college or struggle in jobs. And I’ve seen plenty of kids from not so rich backgrounds who are willing to work a lot harder because shit wasn’t handed to them. …while others have adequately answered your question, I just wanted to clear up a few “country related” questions. We do have “free health care” here. Two years ago my dad had a stroke. We didn’t realize it was a stroke at the time. He just stopped being able to see. “I can’t see the television!” he kept complaining. It wasn’t until I googled “sudden blindness” that we realized that something serious was happening and we bundled dad into the car and took him to hospital. We dropped him at the front doors and I went to park. In the minute it took me to do that the Triage nurse had assessed him as critical and he had been taken immediately through to emergency. My dad spent over a month in hospital. The first few days in Critical Care, under 24 hour monitoring by the most amazing medical crew. They eventually moved him to one of the wards. Then they moved him to Porirua Hospital so he could recover. When they bought him home we were given a huge amount of support. The district nurse dropped off a walker, some stuff for the shower and some other things, and committed to a monthly visit if we wanted it. We also got offers of regular “home help” if we needed it: but we turned those down. (For now.) All of that: zero dollars out of pocket. But dad needs a lot of help now. His memory isn’t so good any more. He has had a few falls, a few accidents. He’s spent a few weeks back in hospital. Our family have had to make some serious changes to how we do things now. We’ve had to make sacrifices. So “free health care” doesn’t fix everything. And this is our dad. Our family. Our whanau. We look after him. The frame with the loans? Those aren’t student loans. All students under a certain income threshold/criteria are eligible for a “student allowance.” All those that aren’t eligible are eligible for an interest-free student loan. Those loans highlight the differences in getting credit: a real problem for low income families, who get into trouble for any sort of reason, look to the banks but the banks turn them down, so they have to resort to high interest finance companies. That frame of Paula looking after her dad? Heartbreaking. Paula’s story? That is my story. I’m Samoan/Maori. I worked in hospitality. Hardest job in my life. Going to work when the sun was up and then coming home while the sun was rising the next day was normal. My greatest achievement was being Functions Manager for the Royal Visit of the Queen, being in charge of the front of house team for her State Lunch. But I’ll never forget the feeling I had a couple of weeks later. We had a meeting with a client who was running a conference in a few weeks time: and I bought along one of my supervisors just to sit in. (The supervisor just happened to be white.) This client never once looked me in the eye. Everytime they had a question they asked my assistant, who would reply with either a “yes” or a “no” or a “you should ask the boss!” while pointing at me. It was one of the most painfully awkward meetings I have ever had. My assistant felt so terrible he even apologized to me afterwards. (“What are you apologizing for? You didn’t do anything wrong!!!”) I am constantly reminded of “my place.” Like when I’m in a room and I’m the only brown face and someone will say something remarkably racist and everyone will laugh, and then someone will look at me and say “well not you mate, you are one of the good ones.” I’ve had to overcome a lot to get to where I am today. I own my own business and its been running for six years now and it is doing well. I think about privilege a lot. I am in an industry that dramatically skews white male. I am using my position as a business owner to open up opportunities to minorities and to women. I am using my privilege to help “level the playing field”. I don’t have quota’s. But I have started consciously started thinking about my decision making. I’ve made a lot of small, but significant changes to how I do things. I’ve got a long way to go. But recognizing the privilege that I have was the very first step I took. Breaking down the barriers to the industry is what I am investigating now. Its a work in process. One that may take the rest of my life. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/194 "2017-01-19T00:56:01Z")
Thanks for sharing, **Banquet Bear**. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/195 "2017-01-19T01:00:01Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I’m separating the policy of AA, which might include mandating certain things for employers and/or schools, from what I’m advocating that private individuals should do, morally, to help improve society and mitigate the negative effects of privilege and its lack. > > If every single employer, and every single admissions manager, did this, or nearly everyone, then there might be no need at all for AA policies any more – which is part of why I advocate for this behavior. A society with no need for AA is a better society, and I hope we get there someday, the sooner the better. Gotcha. Thanks for clarifying. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/196 "2017-01-19T01:02:13Z")
> [@bump](#): > > I mean, someone who is brought up in a middle-class house, gets out of college with no debt, and goes on to make $250k a year has still accomplished something, even if he started from a higher position. To use the running race analogy, if a kid starts on the 30 meter mark and still crosses the finish line in under seven seconds, he’s done something remarkable, even if he didn’t have to run the entire race, or have a beartrap on his foot or whatever. I don’t think they are analogous at all. A kid running a race doesn’t get a boost from his parents every time he goes around the track. But your typical middle class college kid does get regular “boosts”, especially a kid that gets out of college without any debt. Who let the kid live at home during the summer so he could pocket his minimum wage earners at Starbucks? His parents. Who pays for his cell phone bill and car insurance, and reminds him to fill out their FAFSA form every year? His parents. Who pays for his tuition? Even if the kid is on scholarship, he likely has his parents to thank for putting him in the position where he can get one. Not all parents are willing to wake up at 5:00AM every morning so their kid can get to sports practice, or pay $$$ for Princeton Review. If I see a kid running a race and he has his own pit crew helping him along, I’m not going to hate on him for finishing first. But I don’t want to hear that kid bragging about how he did it all on his own. I want to hear him express a little gratitude for the pit crew so that everyone might appreciate the value of teamwork. [Radiolab just did a fascinating episode on poverty myths](http://www.radiolab.org/story/radiolab-presents-media-busted-americas-poverty-myths/). The show starts off by discussing how one of the most famous “self-made” men in American history–Ben Franklin–was kind of asshole for tooting his own horn so much. Not because it is a lie _per se_, but because not everyone–like his sister–had the same advantages he had. In all his self-tooting, he never acknowledged those advantages, leaving people with the false impression about the keys to success. (One key to success: abandon your sick and dying parents. They’ll just drag you down. Besides, your sister will take care of them.) ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/197 "2017-01-19T15:29:33Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Of course it’s a good thing! No one in this thread has said anything that remotely could be construed as advocating begrudging anyone this. Your conclusion is exactly the thinking that rankles me with it’s apparent detachment from logic. > > If LHOD pretended his wonderful vocabulary and literacy was a product of his own intellect and character–and had nothing to do with having a mother who had the time, energy, and desire to read to him–that is when he would likely earn himself a raised eyebrow. That is when someone might remind him of that his privileged upbringing should be accounted for before he judges those less well read as inherently lazy and stupid. And that is when someone might point out how book drives and reading programs aimed at kids help level the playing field between kids in literate and non-literate homes. I think a lot of it is a semantic issue; for me anyway, the notion of “privilege” implies something unearned, and to some degree unwarranted. The word connotes some sort of idea of beyond-the-norm advantage or experience that someone gets through some sort of extraordinary means- wealth, luck, geographic positioning, etc… Note that the operative components here are beyond the norm and extraordinary means. On the flip side, there are things whose presence doesn’t connote privilege- they’re just normal, everyday things. Their absence in someone else also doesn’t connote privilege in those who do have it either. These are things that might be considered “rights”- things like clean water, clean air, shelter, education, etc… The insidious thing about this new usage of the word is that it’s all relative, rather than being something applied to a society at large, and I’m not at all convinced that describing the other 300 some-odd million people in the US as “privileged” because we have reasonably clean drinking water, while people in Flint, MI don’t, is a good idea. That’s not a situation of privilege/lack of privilege; it’s more of a criminal situation and a denial of a basic human right. Similarly, describing children whose parents read to them as “privileged” is kind of insidious as well; it implies that this isn’t, or shouldn’t be considered the normal, unprivileged behavior, which I think may be a mistake. Wouldn’t we, as a society rather normalize that behavior as normal and unpriivleged, and work on bringing everyone up to that standard, instead of describing it as privileged, and implying it’s special and not normal? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/198 "2017-01-19T15:43:36Z")
> [@bump](#): > > I think a lot of it is a semantic issue; for me anyway, the notion of “privilege” implies something unearned, and to some degree unwarranted. Unearned? I think so. Unwarranted? Absolutely not part of the connotation. > [@](#): > > The insidious thing about this new usage of the word is that it’s all relative, rather than being something applied to a society at large, and I’m not at all convinced that describing the other 300 some-odd million people in the US as “privileged” because we have reasonably clean drinking water, while people in Flint, MI don’t, is a good idea. That’s not a situation of privilege/lack of privilege; it’s more of a criminal situation and a denial of a basic human right. This isn’t an either/or thing. Yes, it could be useful to describe ourselves as privileged in our access to clean water. It’d be a useful concept if someone were like, “The families in Flint are a bunch of whiners; why don’t they just use bottled water?” Because I’ve got cheap clean running water, I don’t really have to think through the logistical implications of using bottled water for everything from tooth-brushing to boiling pasta. That’s a way in which I’m relatively privileged compared to the folks in Flint. It’s not unwarranted. It’s not a bad thing. I’ve never heard anyone suggest “privilege” is a bad thing, except for people who reject the concept. It’s as if I objected to wasabi because it’s so overwhelmingly minty and is served in buckets. My objections aren’t based on what wasabi actually is. I might still think it’s yucky, but my reasons make no sense. Objections to the concept of privilege based on things that aren’t part of the concept of privilege are flawed objections. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/199 "2017-01-19T16:16:17Z")
> [@bump](#): > > On the flip side, there are things whose presence doesn’t connote privilege- they’re just normal, everyday things. Their absence in someone else also doesn’t connote privilege in those who do have it either. These are things that might be considered “rights”- things like clean water, clean air, shelter, education, etc… Here’s the deal, though. Over [50%](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/majority-of-us-public-school-students-are-in-poverty/2015/01/15/df7171d0-9ce9-11e4-a7ee-526210d665b4_story.html?utm_term=.f7d47e43f265) of American school children live in poverty. That number was [38%](https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10_044.asp) in 2000. I don’t know how you were raised, but if it was middle-middle class, that was the normal, everyday thing for you, it’s the normal, everyday thing for you now, but it’s not the normal everyday thing for \*most \*kids. And when we pretend that living a middle-middle class is a privilege that most kids have, it is a distorted view of “normal.” ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2017, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322/200 "2017-01-19T16:43:45Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > [Radiolab just did a fascinating episode on poverty myths](http://www.radiolab.org/story/radiolab-presents-media-busted-americas-poverty-myths/). Thanks for this! I just listened to this episode on my morning commute and now have a new podcast (On the Media) to check out. I enjoyed this episode, though I did disagree with some characterizations. I’m always interested in new and interesting podcasts. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hard-work-vs-privilege/777322.md?page=11)