Is it productive to repeatedly remind white people of how privileged they are?

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

258. Your brilliance leaves me speechless! Thank you so much!

The people of color here on DU have been talking amongst ourselves for a long time now and many of us--the very few of us who are left on DU--had been contemplating leaving the forum for awhile. One reason why I won't leave is because I feel that my voice is needed. I feel that I must continue to speak out. I now the same is true of other DU people of color who I have had very long and painful conversations with.

The fallacy that liberals cannot be racists must be addressed. Denying that white privilege exists gets us nowhere. It doesn't mean that white men or white women are being attacked. It simply means acknowleging that skin color matters and still matters, and accepting that people are thought of as being lesser than because of it. That is racism. Racism leads to prejudice and *institutionalized* discrimination. If people come to this thread and deny the very root of the problem, the problem itself never get resolved.

I invite everyone to get to know Tim Wise. He is a white male scholar who writes and lectures about race and racism in American society who has written quite a lot on white skin privilege. This is a white man--not a black person--discussing white privilege who is unafraid to acknowledge this truth because he knows that until we do, racism will never be eradicated...

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http://www.timwise.org/f-a-q-s/

F.A.Q.s
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS – AND THEIR ANSWERS

This page serves to provide answers to questions I am often asked, but which I may not have directly addressed in an essay or other blog post; or, alternately, to questions that I have addressed elsewhere, but which are so commonly asked that placing answers in a FAQ page makes sense.

1. How do you define racism?

As with other “isms” (like capitalism, communism, etc.), racism is both an ideology and a system. As such, I define it in two ways.

As an ideology, racism is the belief that population groups, defined as distinct “races,” generally possess traits, characteristics or abilities, which distinguish them as either superior or inferior to other groups in certain ways. In short, racism is the belief that a particular race is (or certain races are) superior or inferior to another race or races.

As a system, racism is an institutional arrangement, maintained by policies, practices and procedures — both formal and informal — in which some persons typically have more or less opportunity than others, and in which such persons receive better or worse treatment than others, because of their respective racial identities. Additionally, institutional racism involves denying persons opportunities, rewards, or various benefits on the basis of race, to which those individuals are otherwise entitled. In short, racism is a system of inequality, based on race.

2. How is racism different from white supremacy?

White supremacy is the operationalized form of racism in the United States and throughout the Western world. Racism is like the generic product name, while white supremacy is the leading brand, with far and away the greatest market share.

3. Do you think all whites are racist?

I believe that all people (white or of color) raised in a society where racism has been (and still is) so prevalent, will have internalized various elements of racist thinking: certain beliefs, stereotypes, assumptions, and judgments about others and themselves. So in countries where beliefs in European/white superiority and domination have been historically embedded, it is likely that everyone in such places will have ingested some of that conditioning. I think all whites — as the dominant group in the U.S. — have been conditioned to accept white predominance in the social, political and economic system, and to believe that white predominance is a preferable arrangement for the society in which they live, the neighborhoods in which they live, the places where they work, etc.

However, this doesn’t mean that all whites, having been conditioned in that way, are committed to the maintenance of white supremacy. One can challenge one’s conditioning. One can be counter-conditioned and taught to believe in equality, and to commit oneself to its achievement. These things take work — and they can never completely eradicate all of the conditioning to which one has been subjected — but they are possible.

In other words, we can be racist by conditioning, antiracist by choice. That racism is part of who we are does not mean that it’s all of who we are, or that it must be the controlling or dominant part of who we are. By the same token, just because we choose to be antiracist, does not mean that we no longer carry around some of the racism with which we were raised, or to which we were and are exposed.

4. Do you think people of color can be racist against whites?

At the ideological level, anyone can be racist because anyone can endorse the kinds of thinking that qualifies as racism, as defined above. At the systemic level, people of color can be racist in theory, but typically not in practice, and certainly not very effectively. Although a person of color in an authority position can discriminate against a white person, this kind of thing rarely happens because, a) such persons are still statistically rare relative to whites in authority, b) in virtually all cases, there are authorities above those people of color who are white, and who would not stand for such actions, and c) even in cases where a person of color sits atop a power structure (as with President Obama), he is not truly free to do anything to oppress or marginalize white people (even were he so inclined), given his own need to attract white support in order to win election or pass any of his policy agenda. Ultimately, there are no institutional structures in the U.S. in which people of color exercise final and controlling authority: not in the school systems, labor market, justice system, housing markets, financial markets, or media. As such, the ability of black and brown folks to oppress white people simply does not exist.

5. What do you mean by white privilege?

White privilege refers to any advantage, opportunity, benefit, head start, or general protection from negative societal mistreatment, which persons deemed white will typically enjoy, but which others will generally not enjoy. These benefits can be material (such as greater opportunity in the labor market, or greater net worth, due to a history in which whites had the ability to accumulate wealth to a greater extent than persons of color), social (such as presumptions of competence, creditworthiness, law-abidingness, intelligence, etc.) or psychological (such as not having to worry about triggering negative stereotypes, rarely having to feel out of place, not having to worry about racial profiling, etc.).

Operationally, white privilege is simply the flipside of discrimination against people of color. The concept is rooted in the common-sense observation that there can be no down without an up, so that if people of color are the targets of discrimination, in housing, employment, the justice system, or elsewhere, then whites, by definition, are being elevated above those persons of color. Whites are receiving a benefit, vis-a-vis those persons of color: more opportunity because those persons of color are receiving less. Although I believe all persons are harmed in the long run by racism and racial inequity — and thus, white privilege comes at an immense social cost — it still exists as a daily reality throughout the social, political and economic structure of the United States.

The fact that white privilege exists and that all whites have access to various aspects of it, does not, however, mean that all whites are wealthy, or that in competitions for jobs and other opportunities, whites will always win. The fact of general advantage doesn’t require unanimity of outcomes favoring whites. In certain situations, other factors will effect the distribution of opportunities: among these, socioeconomic status, sex, gender, sexual orientation, religious identity, age, or physical disability. There are, after all, also such things as class privilege, male privilege, straight privilege, Christian privilege, and able-bodied privilege. And these other forms of privilege exist — and generally provide greater opportunity to their respective group members — even though there are rich people who lead miserable lives despite their money, and there are men, heterosexuals, Christians, and able bodied folks who are poor. On balance, it pays to be a member of any of those dominant groups. And the same is true with whiteness.

More at the link:

http://www.timwise.org/f-a-q-s/

More on Tim Wise:

http://www.timwise.org/about/

Tim Wise readings:

http://www.timwise.org/books-and-dvds/

Videos:

5 Things Whites Can Do to Improve Race Relations: http://www.timwise.org/2013/08/tim-wise-on-cnn-wdon-lemon-81013-5-things-whites-can-do-to-improve-race-relations/

Stop and Frisk: http://www.timwise.org/2013/08/stop-and-frisk-the-high-school-senior-whereiamgoing-org-powerful-video/

Trayvon Martin: http://www.timwise.org/2013/07/tim-wise-on-lyrical-rhapsody-wginnie-love-and-samaria-graham-trayvon-martin-george-zimmerman-and-race-in-america-71713/