General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: I keep hearing people talk about privilege. What is it? [View all]AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)Originally, it was meant to be a metaphorical teaching tool, to make people think about the point of view of the disadvantaged. However, though, in more recent years, it has taken on a more literal meaning, and has, unfortunately, in tandem, sometimes used as an attack against people who disagree with the more extreme fringe elements of the SJ movement, usually referring to ethnic issues("white privilege" , though not always. Radical feminists such as Diana Boston have also abused the term to attack their own opponents, including fellow feminists, amongst other things.
(For example, with racism/other ethno-cultural based prejudices in particular, although a slight majority of the outright bigoted infighting in general on places like Tumblr, etc. appears to have been the fault of a few Individuals of Color, sad to say, there's been also a few white feminists guilty of their own bigotry, as well. There's a really decent lady from South Texas on YouTube who goes by Divinity33372 who was cruelly attacked by Diana Boston and some of her fans just for being sex-positive; some of these attacks even included ethnic slurs which I won't repeat here. This incident did not invoke the use of "privilege" as far as I can recall, but it was merely to illustrate that no one section is immune from these problems.)