DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.

 

Rebekah Christie

I'd like to think of myself as a spinning, colorful vortex. I'm multi-dimensional, full of life, and never fail to look beyond the surface. There's a reason I'm a Gender Studies major and minor in Africana Studies. I'm a first generation college student, number 6 of 8 siblings, driven, and passionate about my role as a black woman in this world. I see everything, solve everything, and speak in a creative framework. If  I was broken down into atoms, you'd see a million mini-creative projects.

 

Within all the work I do, including my studies, I try to implement as much creativity and self-expression as I possibly can. It is my first language. I believe we were given talents for a reason, to share and utilize them. I feel committed to extracting the confidence it takes to change the world using our skills and talents. Whether it's through sharing my artwork, facilitating a self-love workshop, or mentoring a young man or woman. We all have something to offer and it's our job to use what we have.

 

Privilege is a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor. It's important to point out that having privilege is not a bad thing. There is nothing wrong and nothing to feel guilty about. But, when privilege is given context, it takes on a life of its own. In addition to context, there are different variations of privilege: the most commonly discussed are, male, whitecisgender, and class privilegeHowever, one cannot fully grasp the other variations without a strong foundational understanding of privilege alone and in context. I will use two quotes which combat the existence of privilege to help conceptualize it. And lastly I'm speaking of privilege from an intersectional framework. This means regardless of your race or class you've experienced some form of privilege, even if you're in a marginalized group.

 

David Gaider, a Canadian writer and game designer, has said “privilege is when you think something is not a problem because it’s not a problem to you personally.”  It was tweeted by @femfreq and shared from Kim Katrin Crosby. When we're not aware of something, we're not at fault for not knowing. The world is too vast to know all the problems it faces, especially if it isn’t a direct concern to us individually. However, it is with this realization that 

there are some things we're not aware of that should encourage us to seek beyond what we know. It is a privilege to be able to choose to not see the problems of the world, as a problem of your own. In this instance, I'm referring to white privilege. White  privileges are the subtle, sometimes invisible ways in which white people benefit from being white. Gaider is saying a person does not have to think or worry about a particular situation when it does not concern them. 

 

Gaider's quote is free from a reference to a particular race, class, or gender, because you can in fact be both privileged and oppressed. A white feminist may be concerned about the pay gap for women but she does not acknowledge that a woman of color makes even less than her. The intersectional failure is that although she's oppressed as a woman, her race (white) allows her a privilege to be paid more than a woman of color. Her non-acknowledgement of her privilege is an extension of her personal problem. This is not oppression Olympics. But like Sian Ferguson, from Every Day Feminism, has said: "The aspects of our identities that are privileged can also affect the aspects that are oppressed. Yes, privilege and oppression intersect — but they don’t negate one another."

 

Peggy McIntosh, a women's studies scholar and writer of, "White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences Through Work in Women’s Studies," has described the response people have to her article. She says, "In order to understand the way privilege works, you have to be able to see patterns and systems in social life, but you also have to care about individual experiences. I think one’s own individual experience is sacred. Testifying to it is very important—but so is seeing that it is set within a framework outside of one’s personal experience that is much bigger, and has repetitive statistical patterns in it." When one acknowledges their privilege, it doesn't take it away, but it gives opportunity to be an ally.  

 

Let’s put it this way: being told to "check your privilege" doesn't take it away, literally or figuratively. However, the very act of denying that it exists demonstrates the intuitive response to defend its existence.  Acknowledge it, understand its core power structure, and then become a better ally.

 

 

"When you're accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression."

 

Ferguson, S. (n.d.). Privilege 101: A Quick and Dirty Guide. Retrieved December 6, 2016, from http://everydayfeminism.com/2014/09/what-is-privilege/  

Howerton, K. (2014, May 13). White Privilege Doesn’t Mean What You Think it Means. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kristen-howerton/white-privilege-doesnt-me_b_5296914.html  

McIntosh, P. (1988). White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences Through Work in Women’s Studies. Diversity. Retrieved December 8, 2016, from http://www.collegeart.org/pdf/diversity/white-privilege-and-male-privilege.pdf 

Rothman, J. (2014, May 12). THE ORIGINS OF “PRIVILEGE”. Page Turner. Retrieved December 8, 12, from http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-origins-of-privilege 

 

DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.