I'll admit white privilege is something that I think about from time to time. Yes, only time to time. In a country as messed up as the US is about race, I only spend a little bit of my energy considering how to help change the system and myself. To exacerbate matters, my professional career has been focused in movements that merely give lip service to issues of race in this country. So you can imagine the surprise/delight/fear I felt when I found this article on Alternet this morning.
The author's points are so right on. I have been guilty of many of these things myself. He/She analyzes 10 misunderstandings white liberals have about race and white privelege.
1. White supremacy? You mean white men in white sheets?
This one is fairly self explanatory. It is much easier for us to point out some terrible thing some overt racist said or did then to work to dismantle our institutions that are inherently racist.
2. I'm not racist, but ...
The author writes and I agree, "The liberal establishment -- everyone from the Democratic Party to Daily Kos -- fails the anti-racism test by merely paying lip service to racial oppression while maintaining a predominantly white constituency."
3. Colorblind as a bat.
4. Kumbaya, multiculturalism!
While they are certainly different, number 3 & 4 speak to me on a similar level. They go hand and hand in every learning environment I've ever been in. People use to say in my graduate level policy classes "I don't see race, so what's the point in talking about it?" Then we'd saunter on down to the international food fair and oooh and ahhh over the "strange" dishes the international students made.
The author writes "Stanley Fish calls it boutique multiculturalism. But it's just food. Or earrings. Or music. It reduces culture to benign, apolitical trinkets." So right on.
5. It's not a "[insert racial group here]" issue as much as it is a "human" issue.
To me, this one is very self explanatory.
6. One of my best friends is [insert nonwhite group here]!
"But how does a white person having sex with a nonwhite person -- or having a nonwhite "best friend" for that matter -- necessarily make her less racist? Strom Thurmond managed the contradiction fairly well."
7. How could I have white privilege? I'm poor/female/gay/Polish/disabled!
This is something that most every progressive political group struggles with. I love that the author points out the hypocrisy of the gay rights and feminists movements. In my experience, they may be the worst. They are quick to categorize people as other and simply pretend to be inclusive.
8. The white savior complex.
"It's the difference between social service and social justice, where the former works to alleviate hardship, while the latter aims to eradicate the root causes of that hardship."
9. "Good" people of color
The author's Obama example is perfect.
10. All that guilt.
I've got a lot of that.
3 comments:
This is an important article. I struggle with this quite a bit as well. I work in a social service field, but try to infuse social justice, but feel my head slam against a brick wall a lot.
Just this morning I talked to a woman who had her children taken away (she is black, this may go without saying). She went to rehab, got clean and got her children back. Since 1999 she has been clean and a productive member of society.
Her son is in prison and impregnated a 15 year old girl who is on the run. She is trying to get custody of this child before child welfare sends the baby to the abyss called foster care, permanency and adoption. She is being told because of her past issues she cannot gain custody.
Child welfare has rules you see. I got into this business for reunification and specifically because of the dismantling of the black family by the clearly white supremacist institution that is child protection.
I go to my supervisor who is a dark skinned dominican and she tells me "well, they have their rules. She has no chance." Are we not supposed to fight these rules and systems? This is stage 4 racism, the end, being propagated under the guise of "child protection."
Shall I quit in protest? No, I have retirement benefits, I have a 401K for Christ sake. I need to pay my loans. At least getting the white kids back to their mommies is easier.
Ugh, that's such a heart breaking story. I think it takes people like you working to help people who are in need now and others who are working to change the system. It's too simplistic to me to assume that you should just quit. Then no one would get help. Or maybe it would force the system to change if everyone in your situation quit. Hard to say.
That is what I tell myself. And I know it is true to a certain extent...but I think the reverse is also true, that as long as we continue to accept what is given...we will always be on the defensive. We must learn to straddle both change and crisis.
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