In my humble opinion a big part of it is laziness. People are notoriously bad at deconstructing privilege. (Much like a discussion here yesterday on gender, where one poster didn't seem to recognize that the place of women in our culture has something to do with why fewer women artists and scientists over history have been famed). Privilege is hard for people to look at, where ever it is. It means recognizing that the old American tale of "hard won success" is often at least partly a lie. If you're born a straight white cis-gendered middle class male in this country, you start out further down the road than anyone else. It makes people distinctly uncomfortable to realize that, and it leaves them feeling uneasy, so they just look away and don't bother. It's really tough as a white person to say to yourself "I was born with advantages other people don't have, and they've impacted my life." Same thing with gender. We're all privileged in some ways and not-privileged in others. It's hard work to deconstruct that, and people are lazy.
Looking through the Gutman book, there is no national statistic I am able to find, just a breakdown of localities in 1880 (Richmond, Mobile..) which shows around 97/98%, but there is also a stat "In kin related household", which is slightly lower 95/96%. Which only probably means related nuclear families lived under the same roof. The 1870 census provides nothing. These numbers probably reflect the whole, but there is no comparative stat. It is a prolematic comparison nonetheless given the social conditions; and the saying "after the election of the USA’s first African-American President" is scurrilous. Scapegoating Black people would be a way to avoid looking in the mirror... Though I opened this discursive window (the family unit is a larger issue), this is a sound constructed analysis that any White social conservative has to face when discussing illegitimacy in the Black community.
It's entirely possible for an individual to effect change in their own life, but it's a lot harder and takes much longer to create societal change.
The problem with citing "privilege" is that it often excludes the current mechanisms that seek to further undermine groups of people; it's more of a constant battle of social forces, than it is a civil society constructing upon historical inequities.
Absolutely, but I do think an awareness of privilege is a starting point we cannot do without. I return to gender as an example, because it's an area I'm most familiar with. Yes, things have changed drastically for women in my lifetime, but as recently as last month, a government minister in the New Zealand cabinet suggested that it's right to pay women less because "They're sick several days a month." And this week in Houston, a jury decided that a woman who had been drugged into unconsciousness consented to rape. Without an understanding of the different "rules" that privilege sets up over women, those items have no context. With an understanding of privilege, one can see them along a continuum of things which need to change. As a friend of mine says about both race and gender "This shit doesnt happen in a vacuum."
again true........but not in the context in which I made my statement. thank you, come again. You are trying too hard to seem smarter than you really are.
That's a good point, especially in the context of law, institutions and overall in the "here and now". Whatever social climate or forces may happen over time is more of a theoretical take, than an actionable one. The action is the hard part; dealing with the "lazy" or those in opposition. What course of action does one take for any given issue? or how does one rectify privilege when as you suggest we are all privileged in some way? I raised the point of intersectionality in the last discussion I was in on gay marriage on this board. Very interesting theories coming from gender studies on how to understand oppression...but back to privilege. I think the laziness is part of the privilege, not having to deal with the issues of those less fortunate, even though your "privileged lifestyle" (or the appearance of it) is dependent on those people. The laziness seems to typify whats been called the White moderate, who may historically not support the right wing, but will flee to the suburbs all the same.
The ENTIRE "welfare queens" diatribe Reagan used was ENTIRELY AND SOLEY AIMED at blacks. It was replete with geographically and culturally specific markers, including urban areas, 'Cadillacs', and so forth. Claiming anything less is incredibly disingenuous. It has even been acknowledged as such by political pundits on both the right and left. It was intended to solidify the culture wars begun by Goldwater and continue Nixon's Southern strategy, i.e. raise white rural, working-class and Southern anti-black ire using coded language.
Absolutely. Intersectionality, btw is a big part of feminism now. What's called "second wave" feminism didnt pay enough attention to the needs of non-straight, non-white, non-middle class women, and feminism in general underwent a huge course correction to address that. As a white woman, a lot of the examples I might use relate to gender privilege, but the theory is the same with racial privilege. I think you'll find this one amusing. Big dustup in the atheist community. There was a woman who was asked to address at a conference why more women aren't part of the atheist movement, and she spoke saying that part of the problem is the sexual objectifying of women by men in that movement. Later in the evening, she left a group she'd been sitting with (around 4 am) saying she wanted to go to bed. Some guy follows her into the ELEVATOR and says he wants her to come back to his room "to talk." She posts a blog without naming him pointing out that this was not cool, and please guys dont do this anymore. You'd think she'd poured gasoline on the man and set him alight. Poor man, how *else* is he supposed to get laid but by propositioning a woman in an elevator at 4 am (who just got through speaking about not being objectified). The atheist community and it's contingent of Nice Guys (not to be confused with nice guys) is all up in arms about the poor man. Privilege. They are soaking in it.
O4,I wonder where Reagan got that Welfare Queen story? Corporations get twice as more money than the hundreds of thousands of "welfare queens".
How are you this fucking ignorant? Seriously. Man, you must be really young. Sooner or later, your bubble is going to get burst in a bad way if you, a black man, keep walking around with your head in the clouds and this know-nothing attitude about race. I almost pity this motherfucker.
It was later proven that he made it up. By the time it had taken legs and was running on its own. It was what conservative needed to point the finger than "them lazy negro" It didn't matter that it wasn't true.....might as well be true Sort of like the Willy Lynch letters....doesn't matter that its not true....might as well be true.
