If anyone is curious when “listen more, speak less” is applicable, I think this is a great object lesson. If this misunderstanding of the concept of privilege is unintentional, it’s truly remarkable.
The “check your privilege” can be used as a worthless aggression, of course–but so can just about anything else. It’s most useful to remind the audience that their problem-free experiences in a particular arena may not be universal, and the fact that they haven’t experienced problems in a certain arena may be due to factors outside of their control, not due to any particular virtue on their part.
Thus someone raised by two middle-class college-educated parents whose college was paid for might say that anyone in the US can get a good-paying job if they just put in the work. It’s appropriate to tell them to check their privilege: their own college experience doesn’t qualify them to speak so universally.
Of course, often people told to check their privilege respond exactly as UA has responded, with a series of super-aggressive non sequiturs. It’s reasonable to ask, then, if “check your privilege” is a smart tactical move.
Privilege can come in many different forms. For instance, take a kid from the inner city, parents addicted to drugs, lives in housing projects. And for the sake of this hypothetical, assume that this kid knows that the life he’s living sucks, and he’s determined to do something about it. So he works very hard indeed at getting out of that life, by the only means he knows he has available: He pins his hopes on becoming a professional basketball player. He spends 14 hours a day working on this goal, practicing playing, developing his skills, keeping himself in shape, and so on. Maybe he even works on networking, making sure that he’s visible to top talent scouts and so on. And he still doesn’t succeed, because basketball is a really lousy path out of poverty, which depends not only on the hard work that he’s put in, but on natural talent and a fair bit of luck that he unfortunately lacks, and most people, even most people who work hard at it, won’t be able to become pro basketball players.
That kid failed because of a lack of privilege. What privilege did he lack? The privilege of even knowing that there were other paths available to him. If he had put the same amount of hard work into his education, he probably would have succeeded, but coming from the environment he did, he didn’t even realize that success through education was possible.
In spite of the positive benefits of education being broadcast every day on TV?
I wonder if there’s also an issue of expectations? Just because anyone can make it to the top doesn’t mean that everyone should try. Sure you’re good at basketball, but are you really that good? Becoming a star basketball player who also earns squillions is almost as unlikely as winning the lottery (i.e. monstrously unlikely). If you lower your expectations, just maybe you’ll exceed them, and you’ll lay a more promising future for your children.
I think it’s about helping people become aware of how their assumptions about how the world works are shaped by their background. I teach English to poor kids. I cannot tell you how many teachers cannot get their head around the idea that getting a $12 trade paperback is a significant barrier for a lot of kids–that $12 is real money, that the logistics of getting to a bookstore are complicated when everyone works shifts and takes public transportation, that ordering on-line isn’t feasible when everyone uses cash. They point out, rightly, that a kid that’s really dedicated can figure all those things out. It’s true. But people don’t always rise to every occasion, and putting up those barriers mean you lose some of the poor kids. They weren’t less willing or dedicated than any number of the privileged kids, but they end up with less education.
I literally see examples of this sort of thing every single day. But if people think they got where they got entirely through hard work, then they think the opportunities they were given were sufficient for anyone. They don’t want to make systemic change because it undercuts their own accomplishments.
We can work to dismantle the systems that perpetuate the privilege, and while some, like implicit bias, may be stubborn, others are quite fixable if people are willing to try.
We can also be humble, and count our blessings. One of the issues with the concept of privilege is that a shocking number of people are unwilling to admit they had any advantages, and that anyone less successful than they must be that way through a failure of character.
And a lack of education does? Your whole argument rests on the notion that so-called “privilege” is a “bad” thing. It is not. It’s good for people who have it and it’s good for people who don’t to try to get it - if not for themselves, then at least for their children. What is truly remarkable in this discourse is the lack of reality perception from people who appear to be blind to how the world actually works on some very fundamental levels.
I think this is a reasonably good summation, though it may not address every part of privilege.
Individuals with power and influence can do a lot to address privilege – for example, take into account that, in general, a black person, or woman, (etc.) must work harder, other things being equal, than a white man, to get to the same place. There are exceptions to this – professional sports, for example. But in most offices and workplaces in the US, I think this rule holds. If they take this into account when making personnel decisions, they are doing a little bit to lessen the effects of privilege on society. If everyone in charge of hiring did this, then privilege (or the lack thereof) would have little or no effect on one’s chance at a good job.
I want people to understand privilege, recognize the privileges that they themselves might benefit from (and almost everyone in almost every category benefits from some sort of privilege some of the time), and act with compassion and thoughtfulness with regards to others, especially for things like hiring, job advancement, education, and the like. Privilege, in terms of race, gender, sexual orientation, and other such immutable characteristics, doesn’t have to exist – if everyone recognized it and acted with compassion and decency with regards to it, it wouldn’t be such a big thing in our society, IMO.
Here’s [Vox.com] a testimonial from an entrepreneur who worked his ass off to become a millionaire, but acknowledges that the task was made much easier by his many privileges.
The point is not that privilege is bad, but that by recognizing it, we can take steps to help ameliorate the various lacks that the, to use an old term, “underprivileged” face. Of course hard work is important, but luck, of which privilege is a part, is also a contributor to outcomes.
Good point WRT one of the few real examples among other contrived scenarios proposed here ostensibly showing “privilege” in a bad light. How convenient it is to overlook the multitudes of people with none to start who worked to gain privilege all on their own. They are the ones who took the presidency away from HRC and also tend to take a very dim view of people and politicians feeling compelled to legislate privilege away or somehow otherwise level a playing field that by it’s very existence defines it to not be fair or level.
There will always be people trying to take what others have. Those too lazy to turn to actual crime will simply cry foul when things don’t go their way and they can’t have what they want and expect the gubmit to take up the slack.
At the end of the day it is nobody’s fault and there is nothing to change.
Just the same as how his house had food, but he still had to chew it.
The girl had it easier, actually, having less food to chew through every day, right?
To be honest, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen such an ad. But, were there ads that extolled the virtues of school, they’d be between ads that extol the virtues of mcdonalds, starbucks, ford, chevy, and viagra, so I don’t know if there is much of a point to be made there.
So, if he raises his expectations to be able to get out of poverty, and is going the only route he can find for himself, your advice to him is to lower his expectations?
It is not a matter of making it to the top. It is a matter of not being crushed at the bottom.
I think the biggest disconnect is in how we perceive the world.
Those in survival mode see privilege as a way to increase their offspring’s chances of survival in a world where the needs of life are scarce, and therefore, will defend them as they defend their own child’s life. If there aren’t enough resources to keep everyone alive, there is obviously going to be someone who is unhappy about the situation, and no one could ever agree on an equitable way of dividing things.
Those in prosperity mode are those who realize that we are in an era of plenty, where there is no scarcity of resources to fulfill the needs of the people. They can see that a small sacrifice of wants on their part can fulfill the needs of those less fortunate.
I am in the latter catagory, and I think that it is a more rational way of seeing the world. As a species, and even as a society, we have spent the vast majority of the time in survival mode, and we are just now learning to operate differently.
The needs of the many may outweigh the needs of the few, but the wants of the many do not outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.
If you have ever caught yourself saying or thinking “That’s easy for you to say”, then you likely know how it feels to be lectured to by someone with more privilege.
A rich guy can certainly give good advice to a poor guy. But once the rich guy starts moralizing on a soap box (“You just aren’t working hard enough!”), he demonstrates his privileged position.
Which is why diverse perspectives are needed when attempting to solve social problems. It doesn’t make sense to have a bunch of rich guys drafting social welfare policies, for instance, because their privileged position is going to be a major hurdle to them understanding the people they are supposed to serve.
Interpersonally, the whole concept of “privilege” helps one to understand why people feel and behave the way they do. For instance, you can take an uncharitable view of minority group’s sensitivity to certain things (“These people just want to be offended”). Or, you can realize that it is 100% normal to be sensitive to certain things when one is in a stigmitized minority group, and you can realize that your lack of sensitivity doesn’t indicate your moral superiority, but rather your privilege. Like, you might be able to laugh at a joke made about your group since you aren’t constantly reminded of your group’s inferior status, whereas another person may be more prone to butthurt because they aren’t in such a privileged position. Recognizing privilege actually helps both sides of the equation be more compassionate, IMHO. I know that it makes me less inclined to hate someone when I realize their lack of empathy is due to lack of understanding and first-hand experience rather than maliciousness or willful ignorance.
Three problems with the notion of privilege.
First it prevents people from being seen as individuals. The son of a pain pill addicted waitress in Appalachia has white privilege and male privilege while the Obama’s daughters have neither, but in no sense is he more privileged. So when people speak of privilege as someone whole classes of people have it invalidates the individual experience. People deserve to be treated as individuals and you can not know someone just by looking at the groups they belong to. Ben Carson was the son of an illiterate housekeeper but she valued education and instilled that into her son who grew up into a world famous surgeon. Micheal Reagan was the son of two Hollywood stars one of which became President. As a child he was sexually molested by a babysitter. Was he more or less privileged than Carson?
Secondly it focusing on diminishing achievement rather than uplifting the poor. In a discussion of income inequality I read someone say that if Bill Gates father had been in prison instead of a bank executive no one would no his name. That is true but it misses the point. He took what he was given and went farther with it than anyone had a right to expect. Kobe Bryant’s father was a professional basketball player but lots of professional basketball players have had lots of sons and so far there is only one Kobe Bryant. By saying the privilege is something some people have and others don’t the issue is framed as taking away the privilege from one person instead of helping the other person. If you took away every bit of money that is inherited in this country you would make it harder for some people to get ahead but you wouldn’t be helping the poor at all. The problem is not that some people are privileged and some people are poor it is that some people are poor. Taking away every bit of privilege would not help the poor.
Lastly, talk of privilege discourages the very people who need encouragement the most. It makes all the sense in the world to practice basketball if you want to get good. However, no one in their right mind practices playing Bingo. That is because Bingo is all luck. If we tell poor people that luck which is just another word for privilege is the only way to get ahead then why would anyone work hard? They either have privilege or they don’t, if you tell people the game is rigged then the rational answer is to refuse to play. This is dangerous because although there is no sure way to success, not working hard and relying of luck is a sure way to failure.
Just to be clear–have you actually read the posts in this thread talking about multiple types of privilege, and how comparing people with different sorts of privilege is a fool’s errand, how you can’t just place them on some sort of privilege continuum? Because this part of your post sounds like you’ve not read those. If you have, and you disagree with them, please elaborate.
This is simply not true. Studying what leads to an achievement is not “diminishing” it, unless you’ve held it to fantasy standards.
If someone says, “Look at me, I can fly, I’m a superhero!” and you say, “Dude, you’re flying an airplane,” you’re not diminishing their achievement, except inasmuch as you’re acknowledging reality. If, however, they say, “I learned how to be a pilot, and now I fly planes,” they’re fine.
Same thing here. If someone is claiming their accomplishments have no outside support, maybe it’s diminishing them to point out the support they have. But you can still claim your accomplishment if you acknowledge the very real support you needed to make the accomplishment.
This is also wrong. Life is neither Bingo nor basketball. Instead, it’s a game of basketball where some players are randomly given cement shoes to wear while they play. If someone thinks they suck at basketball, but it turns out they got the cement shoes, pointing this out allows them to advocate for new tournament rules in which nobody gets the cement shoes. Surely showing them that it’s not their own personal fault that basketball is so hard for them, when it’s not their own personal fault, has got to be encouraging.
That doesn’t mean you tell them not to practice. That doesn’t mean you tell them not to play. It’s just, you also tell them that advocating for a fairer set of rules is something they can do.
One thing I’ve learned from this thread, though: in college, I thought my professors were exaggerating Hegel’s position for effect, thinking nobody could be so extreme in their beliefs about the individual will. Maybe they were right after all.
It is much harder to win if you are sitting on 8 high.
And there are a continuum of hands in between.
If you are dealt a huge hand, do you actually feel proud of yourself for winning?
If you start with a smaller hand, but manage to make it win, doesn’t that actually make you feel better?
Why is that? Is it because you had to overcome greater obstacles and adversity in order to achieve your goal?
/analogy
Do you at least acknowledge that different people start the race at different points along the path? That some are born where they can just reach out to cross the finish line, and others have a marathon just to reach what would be considered acceptable.
ETA: was kinda specific with the “you’s” in there, didn’t mean to be, especially as I mostly agree with LHOD, and was just exapnding upon.
Just consider all the “you”'s as “You all’s”, please.
I’m pretty sure the suggestion to “take this into account when making personnel decisions” is a violation of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act in many circumstances. And where it isn’t an actual violation, it used to be thought of by most people as a rather despicable act.