# What exactly is "white male culture"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 22, 2019, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475 "2019-07-22T21:17:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/21 "2019-07-23T16:18:21Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > If the cited study shows anything it’s that there was an opiate abuse problem across all populations. The prevailing course of treatment (reflected disproportionately in the black population) has traditionally been incarceration. Given the cited study, it’s at least interesting to observe that while illegal opiate abuse rose dramatically in the white population, the reaction was to declare a ‘national crisis’ with funding for treatment. I’d like to think that this was because of the lessons learned from previous mistakes. I really would like to think that and there may well be something in it. But I’m afraid rose colored glasses are not my style. Opiate abuse (legally obtained drugs) resulted in an increase in the white population becoming addicted and something was done (or is being done) about it yes? He conflated this epidemic with the black population becoming addicted to crack cocaine and why didn’t the populace do anything about it then? Must be white culture!! I then posited that maybe the difference was the legality of the two and not the race of the individuals. ---
**Author:** ![Airbeck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/airbeck/32/6574_2.png) [@Airbeck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airbeck)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/22 "2019-07-23T16:41:49Z")
> [@Kearsen1](#): > > Opiate abuse (legally obtained drugs) resulted in an increase in the white population becoming addicted and something was done (or is being done) about it yes? > > He conflated this epidemic with the black population becoming addicted to crack cocaine and why didn’t the populace do anything about it then? Must be white culture!! > > I then posited that maybe the difference was the legality > of the two and not the race of the individuals. White people acquire opiates illegally too. Were you not aware of this? People buy pills on the black market all the time. You can’t really think all white opiate abusers got their drugs via a prescription from a doctor, can you? ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/23 "2019-07-23T16:53:56Z")
> [@Kearsen1](#): > > Opiate abuse (legally obtained drugs) resulted in an increase in the white population becoming addicted and something was done (or is being done) about it yes? > > He conflated this epidemic with the black population becoming addicted to crack cocaine and why didn’t the populace do anything about it then? Must be white culture!! > > I then posited that maybe the difference was the legality > of the two and not the race of the individuals. I can’t make you read the study I cited, but perhaps I can ask you to consider examining [Figure 2](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6072374/figure/F2/) and [Figure 3](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6072374/figure/F3/). ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/24 "2019-07-23T17:29:11Z")
> [@Airbeck](#): > > White people acquire opiates illegally too. Were you not aware of this? People buy pills on the black market all the time. You can’t really think all white opiate abusers got their drugs via a prescription from a doctor, can you? The opiates in question are legal drugs, crack cocaine is not … ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/25 "2019-07-23T17:32:32Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > I can’t make you read the study I cited, but perhaps I can ask you to consider examining [Figure 2](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6072374/figure/F2/) and [Figure 3](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6072374/figure/F3/). Ok, I looked at the figures. The legal opiates are equally affecting both groups. How does that affect whether or not white culture stepped in to try and help this legal phenomenon , whereas they did not for an illegally obtained drug? And yes, I am aware that pills get sold but this addiction crisis isn’t solely beholden to illegal drugs. Maybe someone could study whether the majority of addicts on opiates (the legal ones) were obtained legally or not? Or were you or others positing that if the crack crisis had affected white people, that the government would have stepped in? ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/26 "2019-07-23T17:37:03Z")
> [@Kearsen1](#): > > The opiates in question are legal drugs, crack cocaine is not … > [@Kearsen1](#): > > Ok, I looked at the figures. The legal opiates are equally affecting both groups. Again, the cited study contradicts your claims. White population is addicted in great numbers, per 100,000, to illegal substances. The same illegal substances that are abused by the black population. It is clearly a larger epidemic in the white population for the cited period of study. ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/27 "2019-07-23T17:46:20Z")
> [@Kearsen1](#): > > How does that affect whether or not white culture stepped in to try and help this legal phenomenon , whereas they did not for an illegally obtained drug? > > And yes, I am aware that pills get sold but this addiction crisis isn’t solely beholden to illegal drugs. Maybe someone could study whether the majority of addicts on opiates (the legal ones) were obtained legally or not? Treatment is not determined on whether or not you obtained the substance legally. Perhaps those stats are being tracked but treatment is not granted/denied on that basis, AFAIK. Perhaps you have data to the contrary? Point is, when it became a recognized epidemic in the white population, a national emergency was declared and treatment options made available in a way that was not offered to the black population in the past. > [@Kearsen1](#): > > Or were you or others positing that if the crack crisis had affected white people, that the government would have stepped in? Hard to be certain. But it appears to be pointing in that direction. Of course, it’s unfair to completely dismiss the lessons learned in the recent past with respect to rates of incarceration for drug possession/use. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/28 "2019-07-23T17:50:15Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > Again, the cited study contradicts your claims. White population is addicted in great numbers, per 100,000, to illegal substances. The same illegal substances that are abused by the black population. It is clearly a larger epidemic in the white population for the cited period of study. But it doesn’t matter the rate of illegal anything. His thesis was that white culture kept America from stepping in to help the crack riddled black population, but somehow when it’s legal opioids, white culture did step up! because it greatly affected the white population. That is and was the basis for my entire argument. For which you have disproved nothing. In fact, you’ve helped it. My counter argument was that it was possibly about legality vs illegality. Or maybe we (as a people) just got better and did better recognizing a need. ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/29 "2019-07-23T18:00:32Z")
I think there is little argument that as a society we are somewhat better at how we handle drug related (non-violent) offenders. That said, it’s naive of you to suggest that illegal drug abuse is ‘besides the point’ in this conversation. I think it is entirely the point. As is the sudden rise in rates of abuse in the white population. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/30 "2019-07-23T19:35:13Z")
I would like to also add that one reason the opioid epidemic hit the white community harder had to do with racial bias in prescribing. Doctors were generally freer with opiate prescriptions if the patient was white. Another facet of white privilege, white people in pain is a problem that must be fixed, black people in pain is status quo. And probably a lot of unconscious bias based on the stereotype of a drug addict as a person of color. [https://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(18)30790-7/fulltext#/article/S1072-7515(18)30790-7/fulltext](https://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(18)30790-7/fulltext#/article/S1072-7515(18)30790-7/fulltext) Also, there were a lot of heroin dealers from small towns in Western Mexico that ran black tar operation in mid-major cities ( Salt Lake, Columbus, Charlotte ). They refused to sell to black people as a matter of policy. This was covered extensively in the book **Dreamland-A True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic** by _Sam Quinones_ ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/31 "2019-07-23T21:07:09Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > It’s not about “white male culture” as a specific cultural heritage _per se_, it’s about a **culturally conditioned expectation of white male dominance**. To put it another way, white male culture was American culture in the 1950s. White males could assume dominance over women and minorities, all of whom knew their place. In fact I’d call it White Male Christian Culture, because before the war Jews should know their place also. I didn’t get much of this living in a Jewish majority neighborhood, but it was there. Why some people are so nostalgic for the '50s. I still see it, even in California, where older white residents of my neighborhood are a bit uncomfortable with those people moving in, even if those people are buying million dollar houses. It’s not blatant around here, but it is there. I think those who live in less diverse areas suffer from this more. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/32 "2019-07-23T21:45:11Z")
> [@Kearsen1](#): > > The opiates in question are legal drugs, crack cocaine is not … Fentanyl is what is killing people and that is an illegal opiate obtained from china. Also Rx pills are illegal when bought on the black market. As was mentioned upthread, physicians are more willing to give opiates to white patients than black patients, and this is yet another form of white privilege (along with things like easier times getting loans, nicer police interactions, not all being painted as terrorists when one commits a crime, more callbacks for job interviews). Status and privilege are finite and relative. For one to win, another must lose. Lots of white people don’t want to give up that relative status and privilege. Throw the privilege of being christian or male on top of it, and people are very defensive. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/33 "2019-07-23T21:55:13Z")
If you find yourself saying “well, actually…” quite a bit, you may be a white male. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/34 "2019-07-23T22:11:53Z")
> [@Settimo](#): > > [article on a Pew survey](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/03/21/pew-survey-whites-fearful-minority-country-will-weaken-american-culture/3217218002/)–a survey on white attitudes toward population inversion, and some discussion; it’s from USA Today, but has some substance Here’s the study for anyone not interested in retreads: [Public Sees America's Future in Decline on Many Fronts | Pew Research Center](https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2019/03/21/public-sees-an-america-in-decline-on-many-fronts/) I too am a bit puzzled by what “weaken American customs and values” even means. More taco trucks? Phone trees that ask you Para español, oprima dos? Welfare all the way down? Brown people marrying our daughters? People working harder than (general you) you for less money, and an impending sense of irrelevance? Pew didn’t dig. I do like some American customs and values. Like getting my groceries bagged for me. And stores being open at odd hours. And pie. Maybe these are under threat and I didn’t even know it. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2019, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/35 "2019-07-23T22:12:35Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > If you find yourself saying “well, actually…” quite a bit, you may be a white male. [puts down the jar of mayonnaise and craft microbrew] [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/A1zLzWtULig/maxresdefault.jpg "If Black People Said The Stuff White People Say") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1zLzWtULig) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2019, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/36 "2019-07-24T00:02:44Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > So what will replace it? Do you really see some sort of perfectly equal world where everyones views and ways are accepted as equal? Will the world magically become “perfectly equal” if we (all of us, not just white males) learn to let go of our culturally conditioned expectation of white male dominance? No, of course not. Will the world be somewhat **better** if we learn to let go of our culturally conditioned expectation of white male dominance? Yup. If we truly support the principles of democracy and equality, we should not be constantly making mental reservations and keeping our collective thumb on the scales of society to add the rider _“as long as white males still remain first among equals”_. Your question is very telling, because it highlights a fundamental assumption made by a lot of people who ostensibly support the principles of democracy and equality. Deep down, they assume that the real choice is not between equality and inequality, but between inequality that favors one group and inequality that favors another. The only way they can picture a world in which white males are no longer the default/dominant members of society is to imagine white males being replaced by a different group (maybe nonwhite males, maybe females in general) as the default/dominant members of society. But that says a lot more about them than it does about the actual views or intentions of the people speaking out against our culturally conditioned expectation of white male dominance. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2019, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/37 "2019-07-24T00:44:49Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Status and privilege are finite and relative. For one to win, another must lose. In the case of the various criminal justice system disparities, no one wins except the prison-industrial complex and those few racists who enjoy the superiority despite the extra cost to society. Everyone else is paying more money in taxes and having a less productive workforce. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2019, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/38 "2019-07-24T00:49:08Z")
Eddie Murphy actually did a pretty good take on [white male privilege](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_LeJfn_qW0)way back in 1984. As a white male I’ll tell you, it’s gonna be hard to give all that up. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2019, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/39 "2019-07-24T01:26:26Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > To put it another way, white male culture was American culture in the 1950s. White males could assume dominance over women and minorities, all of whom knew their place. In fact I’d call it White Male Christian Culture, because before the war Jews should know their place also. I didn’t get much of this living in a Jewish majority neighborhood, but it was there. > Why some people are so nostalgic for the '50s. > > I still see it, even in California, where older white residents of my neighborhood are a bit uncomfortable with those people moving in, even if those people are buying million dollar houses. It’s not blatant around here, but it is there. > I think those who live in less diverse areas suffer from this more. I’ve seen this claimed in these threads without any support, but in my entire life when someone talks about how the 50s were pretty good, I have never heard a single person mention or allude to the fact that “blacks knew their place” or “we kept the Jews down” or any similar sentiment. What I generally heard was the fact that any able bodied man could get a job and support a whole family in a middle class lifestyle, saving for kids’ college, owning a house that was paid for on a 5 year mortgage, and having enough money for the extras in the community. There was no need to pay for cable, internet, and cell phone bills. Vacations usually meant going to a nearby lake or state park and the constant pressure to “keep up with the Joneses” wasn’t nearly as prevalent. At its nadir, nostalgia for the 50s peaked in the 1980s as captured in Back to the Future. The high crime rate in the 1980s made people look back to the 50s as a better time. Recall that nothing in the movie showed how good the 50s were because of blacks. I’m not saying that nobody at all wishes for that time for racist reasons, but I’ve just never heard it and it seems as if there were many other positives that without any support, the accusation shouldn’t be made that people primarily look to the 50s for these reasons. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2019, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475/40 "2019-07-24T04:31:41Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > What I generally heard was the fact that any able bodied man could get a job and support a whole family in a middle class lifestyle, saving for kids’ college, owning a house that was paid for on a 5 year mortgage, and having enough money for the extras in the community. There was no need to pay for cable, internet, and cell phone bills. Vacations usually meant going to a nearby lake or state park and the constant pressure to “keep up with the Joneses” wasn’t nearly as prevalent. :dubious: This is a very one-sided picture of 1950s life, heavily distorted by nostalgia. During the 1950s themselves, a major cultural theme in the American middle class was concern about the “rat race” and social pressure to advance in wealth and status. [The 1955 classic novel _The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit_](https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2019/04/09/the-man-in-the-gray-flannel-suit-by-sloan-wilson/) expresses this: > [@](#): > > Almost all the houses were occupied by couples with young children, and few people considered Greentree Avenue a permanent stop—the place was just a crossroads where families waited until they could afford to move on to something better. […] The biggest parties of all were moving-out parties, given by those who finally were able to buy a bigger house. Of course there were a few men in the area who had given up hope of rising in the world, and a few who had moved from worse surroundings and considered Greentree Avenue a desirable end of the road, but they and their families suffered a kind of social ostracism. On Greentree Avenue, contentment was an object of contempt. “Keeping up with the Joneses” is a phrase that long pre-dates the 1950s and in fact, according to Google Ngram viewer, its use actually [peaked in the late 1950s](https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=keeping+up+with+the+Joneses&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Ckeeping%20up%20with%20the%20Joneses%3B%2Cc0). So you are dead wrong about the notion of conspicuous consumption and social/economic advancement not being as much of a thing in the 1950s. If middle-class Americans back then didn’t have to pay cable, internet and cell phone bills, they had to pay maids’ wages, club dues, and other expenses; and the cost of items like washing machines, televisions, telephone service, etc., was higher back then (in inflation-adjusted dollars) than their counterparts today. > [@UltraVires](#): > > At its nadir, nostalgia for the 50s peaked in the 1980s as captured in Back to the Future. The high crime rate in the 1980s made people look back to the 50s as a better time. Recall that nothing in the movie showed how good the 50s were because of blacks. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the movie that you point to as the apex of '50s nostalgia among white people hardly shows any black people at all. And its sequel even uses black people as [an indicator of social and economic decay](http://talkinaboutshitnstuff.blogspot.com/2011/10/back-to-future-ii-racist-scene.html): > [@](#): > > Remember in Back to the Future II when Marty thinks he’s back to the normal 1985 but when he goes to sneak back into his house he finds a black family living in it? […] The neighborhood is all trashed with burnt out cars and houses that have been foreclosed ‘n shit and, of course, this is where a black family lives. Also when the father comes running in to investigate he says, “freeze sucka!” and the kids have a Thriller poster on the wall. I guess the whole town was turned into a ghetto but to make sure the audience understands they chose to introduce that fact to us with a black family. Of course most people who express this kind of blinkered nostalgia for an imaginary 1950s don’t consciously think that what they want is a more racist and sexist time. What they mostly want in that regard is the unchallenged privilege of not having to think about racism and sexism, or openly examine the extent of their own racist and sexist biases, or the ways in which they benefit by not being the targets of racism and/or sexism in a traditionally racist and sexist culture. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-white-male-culture/837475.md?page=3)