<p>Wow this thread is really making my age show. Most of you do not understand the concepts of priviledge as they are understood among the more diverse of today’s youth. Its simply about innate advantages. The more people understand the concept the easier the lives of the downtrodden will become. Like ANYTHING it can go overboard and be turned into hyperbolic and essentially meaningless statements but people calling “check your privilege” over stupid things doesn’t negate the concept of privilege. Also, no one actually says check your privilege. It is usually one of those things that goes unsaid and unseen accept for the person made to feel inferior (or more insidously denied something unfairly).</p>
<p>I do understand that children raised by parents who were financially, emotionally and physically ready to begin a family are better prepared for the challenges of life than children who were born to parents who enjoy the act of procreation, but don’t give too much thought to the result.</p>
<p>Don’t see how that has anything to do with race though.</p>
<p>I don’t seem to understand how to quote unless its just copypast.
I do understand that children raised by parents who were financially, emotionally and physically ready to begin a family are better prepared for the challenges of life than children who were born to parents who enjoy the act of procreation, but don’t give too much thought to the result.</p>
<p>Don’t see how that has anything to do with race though. </p>
<p>Growing up in a stable family is certainly something can be considered a privilege that gives you an advantage over someone whose parents made poor decisions, abandoned you, or abused you. This is not to say you should feel anything in particular due to this fact. You aren’t required to analyze this to death and look for ways defend your privilege or justify it or erase it. Its not something to feel bad about. It just is. It just exists. As you can imagine a lot of things can involve privilege and most them are minute and meaningless in the large scale of things. Certainly some are much more observable and oppresive than others, such as race.</p>
<p>The word itself just helps build a common language for the phenomenon which gives more power to it.</p>
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<p>"Women’s colleges are invaluable in empowering women to own their individual agency as human beings, but they can also harbor microcosms of political and feminist intensity. The confrontational atmosphere engendered by that can sometimes, I’m sure, be quite irksome. It can also be extremely amusing at times. It’s all in how you approach it. "</p>
<p>Yes. Sometimes it’s irksome and sometimes it’s amusing. Luckily D has us to snark with her privately over it all!</p>
<p>I’m surprised at the length of this discussion, given that nobody in my family has ever even heard the term “check your privilege.” I asked the lacrosse team carpool (HS kids) and got the same thing - never heard it. Nor has S1 at Big State U.</p>
<p>My daughter is working on a HS project where her group has to teach a classroom of sophomores about distribution of resources around the world. The myths that distribution of privilege is based on either hard work or intelligence are what will be addressed; the randomness of birth dictates how 98% of the world will live. Refuting that with anecdotes of the 2% does not disprove the statistical reality.</p>
<p>Since we seem to be collecting stories of hardships here, I work with a man who was taken from his family by the Khmer Rouge when he was 8 years old. He worked as a slave, barefoot, for 5 years until he was liberated by the Vietnamese Army. </p>
<p>One of my daughters NICU nurses in 1982 was Hmong. Amazing woman, terrible stories.
<a href=“Honor And Pride Of Family -- Boat People Are Richer Than Anyone Dreamed | The Seattle Times”>Honor And Pride Of Family -- Boat People Are Richer Than Anyone Dreamed | The Seattle Times;
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<p>And yet, if he stood up in his college class in America and said people need to prioritize education, stay in school and get a college degree, he would probably be shouted down to “check his privilege!” because he is Asian, and everyone knows that Asians are privileged when it comes to succeeding in education. And if he was offended, he would be told, “its nothing personal, it just “is,” don’t get offended, but start thinking about how hard it is for everyone else other than you Asians to make it to college, you clueless idiot!”</p>
<p>Your chip is showing.</p>
<p>I know. I admit it.</p>
<p>It’s so interesting some commenters here like Bay are conflating not being allowed to express an opinion with being allowed a complete pass from others commenting or criticizing that opinion and the person who made it.</p>
<p>Ironic considering denying the latter would actually be denying the same right of free expression to anyone who disagrees or is critical of some parts to express his/her response. Very interesting as the article’s author’s supporters are using the same distortion of “rights of free expression” to make the very same flawed argument. </p>
<p>More ironically, it only confirms one of the critics’ point that one aspect of privilege is the privileged one’s words are much more likely to be automatically be taken at his/her word by default and any criticism harshly denounced and critics…especially less privileged subjected to much more scrutinizing questions or dismissed out of hand. Very evenhanded…right. </p>
<p>And yes, while women are not considered privileged in the context of gender, they may be depending on other situational contexts. </p>
<p>In the context of SES status, a wealthy woman would be more privileged in the SES context than someone who is from a lower SES strata…whether female or not.</p>
<p>By the same token, a woman who is White or who could “pass”* as such has more privilege in the racial sense than someone who is non-White…whether female or not. </p>
<p>Incidentally, this very lack of awareness among those with more privilege in the racial and SES contexts in the Feminist movement leadership of the '70s were some of the key factors in why the movement later fractured. </p>
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<p>“Check your privilege” is a phrase most folks only hear for the first time in undergrad…and that could vary depending on the campus culture.</p>
<p>It is also not limited to Women’s colleges as this phrase has been commonly used at my co-epublic colleges like some groups of students in the 4-year CUNY colleges or at Berkeley. </p>
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<li>This has its own sordid history…especially in the Jim Crow South and White supremacists where there was some paranoia about interacting with or <em>shudders</em> marrying someone who may not be “racially pure”. One only needs to look at what happened with White supremacist Craig Cobb and his town takeover plans when it was publicly revealed he was 14% Black via DNA test. Incidentally, with that percentage Cobb would definitely been considered Black under the racial purity laws of the Jim Crow era.<br></li>
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Didnt you say this, and the article was “hot news” in the NY area? </p>
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<p>I am not “conflating” anything. I am perfectly fine with discussions about privilege, and I am perfectly fine with someone responding to an apparently “clueless” comment with, “have you considered that it might be harder for non-white males to achieve what you are proposing?” Why do you have such a problem with eliminating the phrase from your vocabulary, cobrat, when people tell you it is offensive?</p>
<p>Isn’t the answer obvious? It “tweaks” Preston Weatherby IV (or his Jewish doppelganger, Fortgang) and that’s enough reason for cobrat to want to use it.</p>
<p>“is also not limited to Women’s colleges as this phrase has been commonly used at my co-epublic colleges like some groups of students in the 4-year CUNY colleges or at Berkeley.”</p>
<p>So you “know” it’s commonly used at the CUNY colleges and at Berkeley, neither of which you ever personally attended? Wait … don’t tell me … let me guess. You have cousins and friends and neighbors who all conveniently attended such schools AND made it a point to tell you that the phrase was used there. </p>
<p>Check your cousins.</p>
<p>"In the context of SES status, a wealthy woman would be more privileged in the SES context than someone who is from a lower SES strata…whether female or not.</p>
<p>By the same token, a woman who is White or who could “pass”* as such has more privilege in the racial sense than someone who is non-White…whether female or not."</p>
<p>Why do you persist in telling us the obvious? Yes, wealthy women are more privileged socioeconomically than poor people. So? There’s no way to correct that other than redistributing income so everyone has the same, and that’s kind of a bad idea.</p>
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<p>I did visit Berkeley and yes, knew many who attended Berkeley from the time they were radical.</p>
<p>As for CUNY, I am a NYC local so it shouldn’t be surprising that I not only know plenty of alums and current students, but also been on the campuses countless times.</p>
<p>Heck, two of the 4-year campuses are within a 10-20 minute bus/subway ride from where I grew up. </p>
<p>Incidentally, my most recent visit was a few days ago to attend a lecture on one of the 4-year campuses. </p>
<p>I’ve visited plenty of colleges in my day, but I don’t pretend that therefore I know tons and tons of people who miraculously talk to me about every topic I ever read about CC. </p>
<p>Gee, DePaul, Loyola, U of Chicago and Northwestern are all within close range of me but I don’t pretend that I “know” them except for Northwestern which I obviously do know. </p>
<p>“One observation, though, has left me feeling wryly amused: It’s much worse (apparently) to be dismissed as “privileged” than to allow racist statements to stand. Understand that I AM NOT saying anyone in this thread has made racist statements. NO ONE HAS to my knowledge. I’m merely thinking back on some past threads in which posters charged blacks with genetically predisposed inferior intelligence, criminality, hyper-sexuality, and a general moral paucity, and remembering how such porters went largely unchallenged by the majority of participants in the thread. Certainly, there wasn’t the level of outrage expressed in this one over the admonition to “check your privilege”, leading me to the reinforced perception that it’s much worse to be accused of being racist (sexist, other-ist) than to actually be any of those things”</p>
<p>I don’t recall specifically which threads or posters you might be talking about, but back in the day of that “other cc forum”, some people would say outrageous things. Sometimes they were trolls, sometimes they were idiots. I suspect people didn’t challenge them all the time because they didn’t even want to bother to engage that person. Sometimes I either don’t even take the time to read certain posters comments, or figure they’re so rude that I’m not going to even bother arguing with someone making inflammatory, ridiculous statements. </p>
<p>I wouldn’t say that it is worse to be “accused of being racist than to actually be any of those things,” but it’s really just different examples of racism. If you assume that because of someone’s skin color (including Caucasians), therefore that person must be A, B, C, that’s racism. Perhaps to some whites who feel that they are not racist in any way, to be accused of such merely because they are white, it might be more offensive than being accused of the things in the threads that you’re speaking of.</p>
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<p>If people understand they have inherent advantages over others it generally improves communication and compassion.</p>