Same experience of the white person in St. Lucia. Try riding public mini-bus there without passengers behind you touching your hair. This is just a human curiosity that is not limited to white people.
It’s not limited to hair, either… a woman in the gym just last week asked me why my ankles were “like that” 
… At least she didn’t touch me! But certainly no one wants top feel like a curiosity, no!
The use of the term “white privilege” to describe racial inequality is unfortunate in this sense. As described, some white people hardly feel privileged, nor do they really gain anything from racial discrimination against non-white people. The term “white privilege” implies that they have something unearned and undeserved that should be taken away, and it is not surprising that such rhetoric drives them away.
Of course, that does not mean that there is no racial inequality. But perhaps a better way of describing it would be “penalty against black [or non-white] people”, since that does not imply that disadvantaged white people have something that should be taken away. For example, police misconduct is more likely to affect black people than white people. Is it an undeserved “privilege” that white people encounter less police misconduct, or is it an undeserved “penalty” that black people encounter more police misconduct? Should the rhetoric be more along the lines of removing undeserved “penalties” against black and other non-white people (e.g. reducing police misconduct against black or other non-white people), or removing undeserved “privilege” that white people have (which in this case implies increasing police misconduct against white people, which is not generally desirable).
In the store today, I experienced what I suspect is privilege (perhaps white, also likely gender and age). I had shopped at the grocery store yesterday and got a large order. A couple of the pieces of fruit, though, were rotten inside when we tried to eat them at dinner. I went in today, and I had forgotten the receipt. They took my word for it and just gave me replacements at no charge.
I remember going into Target with a Latina friend and our toddlers, years ago. The kids were whiny so I opened one of our cart’s boxes of crackers to give them some. My friend went ballistic (“they’re going to arrest us!”) and I was shocked; my mother had done this many times, and of course my mother paid for the crackers (open) when she got to the check-out. But my friend’s experiences had shown her that if she would not get the benefit of the doubt.
Why do you assume that getting replacements at no charge was some how privilage. Maybe it was just store policy and good customer service.
Because my husband is black and I am not, it’s sometimes assumed that we are not together when we are out, so I see the difference in how we are treat-and the privilege that I have that he does not. More than once it’s been assumed that even though I paid for the tickets to say, the Monorail or a movie, that HE is trying to sneak in without paying. More than a few times, counter people have come over to me while ignoring my husband, and while I have never been followed in the store, it happens to him pretty regularly, especially if he has a bag already.
Once when I had a medical emergency he was stopped at the door from following me, and even after he said he was with me, they questioned whether he was actually my husband. My ex, who is white, was never once questioned, even when he was in his scruffy hippie phase. When H’s niece gave birth, he was questioned about his right to be visiting as “family” because her husband and HIS family were there-all white.
My Caucasian son and his same-age black cousin were often treated differently when they took the bus to get around town. In one memorable occasion, the cousin was thrown off the bus for having an expired transfer, while my son was told it was still valid for a few more minutes. They’d gotten the transfers from the same previous bus at the same exact time, and they were NOT expired.
Privilege is everywhere. I didn’t even scratch the surface of what I’ve seen.
^Only way to know is for a person of color to go into the same store with the same exact complaint and situation. It’s wrong to just assume that racism “would” occur in a given circumstance without actual testing. Just like it is wrong to assume that parent X is not reading to their child.
sseamom–did your son stand up for his cousin?
Well, sometimes I just do feel like other white people, specifically women, don’t question me or my motives in the way that my POC friends have observed happens to them. Do I know for sure that the particular store lady would be racist? I guess not.
It looks like the “privileges” described are those which should normally be extended to everyone, not taken away from those who have it currently. I.e. it is more like there is an unfair undeserved (and pointless/useless) “penalty” being applied to black people in these examples.
" And also, perhaps, there needs to be some understanding of how a lack of educational and economic privilege among some white people makes it difficult to accept that message and work for change."
Yes to this. Yes.
@gouf78 yes, he did. He pointed out that they’d gotten the transfers at the same time. When the driver refused to let the cousin on, my son got off the bus.
Re: the hair discussion. That’s interesting, I’ve actually heard of people touching hair when they are curious - in my family, a couple of my sisters have natural red hair. Apparently red hair is so rare around here that we have had people ask about it “what dye do you use?”, compliment, and yes, reach out to touch and pet it.
That was one of my first observations about Kansas - so many redheads!
I always found the bunches of little braids that some black girls, women, and men wear fascinating. Is that style called dreadlocks or am I mistaken?
@sseamom
Regarding " white privilege."
I think the examples in your post 225 are excellent examples for those of us who need actual specifics to really “get it.” Thanks.
“it is more like there is an unfair undeserved (and pointless/useless) “penalty” being applied to black people in these examples.”
That’s true. But it’s a privilege to live above those penalties.
Re: #234
Yes, but the point is, does it make more sense to emphasize it as a “privilege” or a “penalty”? Removing someone’s “privilege” causes people to be defensive about keeping what they have (particularly when they have very little of anything that can be seen as “privilege”), while removing someone “penalty” appeals more to people’s sense of fair play without threatening what they have. Especially when what is being stated as a “privilege” is really something that should be extended to everyone, rather than being taken away from those who have it.
Sometimes if I’m in between appointments, errands or exercise classes, I’ll pull over in a residential neighborhood near my destination and sit and read or close my eyes for a few minutes. Sometimes police have pulled up, but they immediately “read” me as a nice white suburban lady so I have no fear of any trouble. I don’t delude myself that a black women couldn’t get away with this, or that police wouldn’t be called a lot quicker.
My white girlfriend who has a black high school son - I somehow doubt she lets him play Pokemon Go and wander around neighborhoods with the same freedom I would have let my white son play it.
I think ucb raises a very good point about calling it white privilege vs black penalty. Privilege sounds like I’m getting away with something that I shouldn’t.
“while removing someone “penalty” appeals more to people’s sense of fair play without threatening what they have.”
I didn’t create this language, but if you just talk about a penalty, that frees everyone with privilege from having to think about it. Whiteness goes completely unexamined in this country. It’s imagined to be just neutral, the water that the fish don’t notice. But it isn’t neutral. It’s a thing. We have to see that it’s there and realize what it’s brought us.
After Trayvon Martin was shot I had my oldest, afroed son walk the neighborhood every couple of days in the daytime so people could see him, and come to recognize him.
A neighbor from the end of my cul-de-sac, a really nice man about 11 years my senior, who has lived in France and whose wife is equally wonderful (she is a teacher), would walk his dog on our street each evening as I was watering my flowers, and we’d always spoken to each other. He had not known my son.
About the second week of my son walking the neighborhood, that neighbor asked me if the young man walking past his house every once in a while was my son. When he expressed surprise that he had not known this child (he’d seen my others as they were moreso my satellites), had not seen him, I told him why my son was out walking. I told him of my deep concerns.
He was so saddened to hear this from me, and told me he perfectly understood. He said he hoped that none of our neighbors would ever respond to seeing my son in the manner that GZ had to Trayvon, but repeated that yes, he understood.
The only part of the privilege debate I can comment on, as I find it almost an issue of semantics, too academic and talking around all that we all know, is that in this country for too long only white people have had the privilege of being looked at, and received, as fully human. I would certainly extend such privilege to everyone.
I don’t like the term “privilege” either because it feels like something that can’t be wiped off or removed. I’m not sure I would choose “penalty”, and I can see what Hanna is saying about examining the situation from outside the fishbowl, as it were.
I went out yesterday afternoon to do some errands and decided to actually take note of how many Black people I saw in my whitebread suburb. I made 5 stops along about 3 miles of a commercial strip - JoAnn Fabrics, Home Depot, Lowe’s, the supermarket, Target. There were several Black cashiers and a customer here and there. This kind of separation is a big part of the problem, IMHO. For a lot of us, even if we live in a place with large minority populations, our exposure may be limited to very limited encounters, and the bad news coming out of minority neighborhoods. And vice versa in some way.
It wasn’t until I started teaching at the college where I am now that I was actually immersed in a fishbowl where I am in the minority. That’s a totally different experience from seeing one person at Home Depot. It requires making an effort to distinguish between people who otherwise seem alike.