Why are Americans so fixated on "privilege" and "entitlement?"

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@lance_strongarm

Not really a meaningful difference to me. Whatever.

Wow.

Eating a pile of doggie poo is easier than eating a planet.

Eating a pile of doggie poo is easy.

These two sentences? No meaningful difference.

[lance_strongarm]

@Frylock

You do understand how arguments work, right? You can’t just snip out a couple of premises and treat them as though they are the entire argument.

What you said wiped out the rest of your argument, which was a tautology anyway.

“Your experience is inaccurate because it doesn’t match mine” would be a bad argument for me to make, for exactly the reason you say. But it’s not the argument I made. I did not say or imply that your experience not matching mine is sufficient for me to reject it.

Sure reads that way to me.

[even_sven]

@lance_strongarm

I have personal examples - people talking to me - but I can’t prove those, can I? You have to trust me, and I doubt you’ll extend that courtesy.

I realize that trying to provide other examples will end up in a morass of “but that’s not what I wanted you to prove” back and forth. It’s not worth playing that game. I withdraw.

So, no. On an Internet where you can find amputee brony clown porn, satellite images of nearly every inch of the planet, and 3,849,492 recipes for vegan meatloaf-- not to mention 15 years of SDMB posts to trawl through-- you can’t find an actual cite for what you claim to be the standard usage of a common phrase?

[Frylock]

@lance_strongarm

Sure reads that way to me.

I am sorry, Lance, I do not know what to say to this. If it reads that way to you, the fact is, you are having trouble reading correctly. That is inflammatory to say, I know, but if you’re saying what’s literally true about how it reads to you, then you really and actually are having trouble reading accurately.

Believe it or not I am willing to spend as much time as it takes to explain to you why this is, but I don’t want to begin doing so if you’d rather I didn’t. (I am turning in for the night anyway.)

[Miller]

@lance_strongarm

I have personal examples - people talking to me - but I can’t prove those, can I? You have to trust me, and I doubt you’ll extend that courtesy.

The problem here is, you have a demonstrated inability to understand what other people are actually saying to you. My cite is, well, pretty much everything you’ve posted in this thread. So, no, your personal recollections on this matter really aren’t trustworthy, because you’re very likely misunderstanding the people you’ve interacted with in real life in the same way you’ve consistently misunderstood people posting to this thread.

[tomndebb]

@lance_strongarm

Not really a meaningful difference to me. Whatever.

Of course, not. Your do not appear to have any interest in actually learning the genuine meaning.

However, I will say that Lance probably has part of his claim right.

There are two groups of people who use the phrase “white privilege”:

[ul]
[li]There are the people who use it in the way that it was originally coined, to indicate that, in general, all other things being equal, a white person in our society will get a better break than a black person.[/li]
[li]And there are people, generally the same people who believe that “Political Correctness” is an actual Liberal Conspiracy to harm society, who think that “white privilege” means a false belief by blacks and liberals that white people always have it easy (even though that has no part in the actual meaning).[/li][/ul]

It is a silly belief, of course, given that we have an actual history of the phrase’s history and meaning, but there are certainly people who incorrectly hold that belief.

[amanset]

@even_sven

amputee brony clown porn

I’ll be in my bunk.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@tomndebb

However, I will say that Lance probably has part of his claim right.

There are two groups of people who use the phrase “white privilege”:

[ul]
[li]There are the people who use it in the way that it was originally coined, to indicate that, in general, all other things being equal, a white person in our society will get a better break than a black person.[/li]
[li]And there are people, generally the same people who believe that “Political Correctness” is an actual Liberal Conspiracy to harm society, who think that “white privilege” means a false belief by blacks and liberals that white people always have it easy (even though that has no part in the actual meaning).[/li][/ul]

It is a silly belief, of course, given that we have an actual history of the phrase’s history and meaning, but there are certainly people who incorrectly hold that belief.

You know I’m pretty far to the descriptivist end of the spectrum, but even I’m willing to call this second usage incorrect, inasmuch as it’s used almost exclusively to describe a view that nobody holds. It’s similar to a dude I knew in college to, when pressed to define capitalism (we were in a seminar and his comments were about as incoherent as Lance’s), said, “Greed.” At a certain point, one’s definition for a term becomes so absurd that it’s not useful to anyone.

So yeah, I agree: there are some people that use the word “white privilege” that way, and since its use is entirely to illustrate their poor understanding of other people’s beliefs, it’s fair to call it an incorrect usage of the word.

[tomndebb]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

. . . it’s fair to call it an incorrect usage of the word.

At no time did I (or would I) suggest that there is anything “correct” about that usage. I simply note that Lance probably has heard it used that way–since he probably hangs out with people who support his views and reinforce his ignorance with theirs.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@tomndebb

At no time did I (or would I) suggest that there is anything “correct” about that usage.

Thus my saying, “I agree.”

[Ruby_Slippers]

It would appear that Americans (or at least Dopers) are more fixated on defining “privilege” than discussing the concept. I started reading this thread looking forward to a discussion of the concepts of privilege and entitlement – and to be sure, there was some discussion at the outset – but this thread has deteriorated into a spitting contest. I know I’m not making much of a contribution here, but I couldn’t even read all the way through the last page of back-and-forth and have no wish to get caught up in it. But I do wish someone would bring this trainwreck back to the original topic.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Ruby_Slippers

It would appear that Americans (or at least Dopers) are more fixated on defining “privilege” than discussing the concept. I started reading this thread looking forward to a discussion of the concepts of privilege and entitlement – and to be sure, there was some discussion at the outset – but this thread has deteriorated into a spitting contest. I know I’m not making much of a contribution here, but I couldn’t even read all the way through the last page of back-and-forth and have no wish to get caught up in it. But I do wish someone would bring this trainwreck back to the original topic.

You’re right, and I’m kind of embarrassed for my part in that. My apologies.

[lance_strongarm]

When discussing this issue, I once had a poster here literally tell me he knew me better than I know myself. Of course, he had never even met me, but he was serious. That’s the kind of preposterous thinking that I’m wary of, and is obviously still happening.

[Miller]

@lance_strongarm

When discussing this issue, I once had a poster here literally tell me he knew me better than I know myself. Of course, he had never even met me, but he was serious. That’s the kind of preposterous thinking that I’m wary of, and is obviously still happening.

Could you find that post? I’m curious if your recollection of it matches with reality.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Miller

Could you find that post? I’m curious if your recollection of it matches with reality.

If I may suggest, ruby is probably right–this thread is in danger of turning into (or having already turned into) the lance strongarm show, which really doesn’t need to be renewed. This thread is all about the lance strongarm show, and might be a good place to continue discussion of his peculiar use of language.

[Frylock]

Here’s a great article on the topic of this thread: Why White People Freak Out When They’re Called Out About Race

A couple of quotations:

In large part, white fragility—the defensiveness, the fear of conflict—is rooted in this good/bad binary. If you call someone out, they think to themselves, “What you just said was that I am a bad person, and that is intolerable to me.” It’s a deep challenge to the core of our identity as good, moral people.

In my workshops, one of the things I like to ask white people is, “What are the rules for how people of color should give us feedback about our racism? What are the rules, where did you get them, and whom do they serve?” Usually those questions alone make the point.

When I’m doing a workshop, I’ll often ask the people of color in the room, somewhat facetiously, “How often have you given white people feedback about our inevitable and often unconscious racist patterns and had that go well for you?” And they laugh.

Because it just doesn’t go well. And so one time I asked, “What would your daily life be like if you could just simply give us feedback, have us receive it graciously, reflect on it and work to change the behavior? What would your life be like?”

And this one man of color looked at me and said, “It would be revolutionary.”

[Bone]

For some reason I decided to read the article. It sounded like a bunch of preachy bullshit that relied on some sweeping generalizations. If the statements made become offensive by switching the race oriented terms then, unless talking about a specific event, they hold no informative value whatsoever.