I recently participated in a brief email exchange about “privilege” and it made me think a broader discussion might prove worthwhile.
Does using the concept privilege as in “white privilege,” “male privilege,” and “class privilege” help of hinder how we understand, communicate about, and finally work to overcome racism, sexism, and classism?
A concept should give a name to important things and relations to draw attention to and facilitate clear communication about those things and relations. Activists seek to understand the world to change it. The concept privilege should point to phenomena that need activist attention in a way that helps us discuss those phenomena without confusion.
For privilege, the phenomena are from one constituency to another presumably oppressive differences in situation, access, possessions, options, etc.. We therefore want a concept that usefully directs us to such differences and helps us answer why they persist? What structures enforce them? Why people resist, support, or ignore those structures? If those who have better conditions should lose them? If those who have worse conditions should gain better? If the structures that enforce such differences should be replaced and, if so, with what? And how movement activists can most usefully work toward the sought ends by constructively addressing those who enjoy positive or who suffer negative conditions?
Okay, what differences do the phrases white privilege, male privilege, or class privilege highlight and how does calling those differences privileges enhance our efforts to address them in ways that further prospects for change?
For example, I wonder, overall, is it helpful to say, that not having to be ultra careful around cops or that not facing hurdles when trying to get a loan, etc., are white privileges, or that to not be raped or burdened with excessive household responsibilities, etc., are male privileges, or that to not worry about meeting bills or obeying bosses, etc., are class privileges?
What do these uses of privilege imply and provoke? What does a listener who hears a call out to give up their privilege think that means? Is it that they too should suffer the various limitations rather than that no one should? I presume no one means to communicate that, but do people nonetheless “hear” that? And do calls to shed white, male, or class privilege, seemingly a personal, individual step, sometimes crowd out calls to replace institutions that impose race, gender, and class oppression?
I assume the intent of using the word privilege is to instead highlight and give attention to the dynamics that cause even white people, males, and/or members of classes who feel themselves to be anti racist, feminist, and in favor of classlessness to nonetheless not perceive all the ways these oppressions manifest including even in their own behaviors or beliefs. Yet, despite that intent, does current usage have some harmful effects or does it always highlight what needs highlighting in a way that facilitates usefully addressing what needs attention?
Even to simply acknowledge differences to not abet them, is to instruct someone to give up their white, male, or class privilege the best way to get them to acknowledge that those who suffer racism, sexism, and classism are denied all sorts of things that those who do not suffer racism, sexism, and classism enjoy? And, in any event, what should the privileged give up to give up privilege? For that matter, does looking for and calling out privilege orient activists to see what needs seeing and do what needs doing?
Of course we all have baggage, but don’t most people already realize there are large unjust differences in circumstances—or perhaps know there are unjust differences but feel hopeless about personally affecting them—or perhaps know there are differences but say they are deserved?
It may be that I don’t know what the word privilege refers to, but do those told they have privilege know what they are being told? Is something good a privilege if one has it but others do not? Or if some constituency systematically has that thing but another constituency systematically does not? In either case, though, isn’t what most needs to be conveyed what some don’t have that all should have, why that is, and especially how to seek better?
If I have a job and you don’t. Is that me having a privilege? Why is it advisable to use the term white privilege, say, as a way to get white folks to see unwarranted oppressive differences when using the concept also gets some folks to feel they are being told they shouldn’t have these “privileges” which in fact everyone should have, or more so, that the problem is mainly personal attitudes not institutional pressures?
Should unionized workers not strike for still more income while they also try to advance all their co-workers, and even all other workers, and even ideally everyone suffering any oppressive denial because for the unionized workers to get more would leave them with still more privilege? I assume those who use the concept privilege don’t mean that, but does what they do mean get across—and does it focus on all that needs attention? If it does, excellent. But if it doesn’t, isn’t that a problem?
If we say, racism crushes possibilities so we should all fight it, including by our not being racist and especially not act to enforce racism and instead act to overcome it, why isn’t that better than that we seem to say, hey, whites, you need to give up your white privilege of feeling safe on the street so you can usefully understand racism, to then help get rid of it? Is the intended meaning clear given that much of the stuff we call privilege is stuff everyone should have, not stuff no one should have? Does calling out privilege work as a tactic to reduce oppression? Does it point to oppressive structures? Build solidarity?
Here are two simple consequences of using the concept privilege that I find potentially negative, and a third that is a bit more subtle, but I think also negative.
- In my experience, when activists use the concept “privilege” to talk about oppressive relations, the concept tends to focus them on various personal characteristics even to the exclusion of addressing institutional characteristics. This in turn tends to imply that progress is mainly a matter of personal characteristics, not institutional changes.
- Despite the good intentions of people who use the concept, it also seems to me that many who are told that they have male privilege, white privilege, or class privilege feel called out for having something that no one ought to have—and that because of that, regardless of their actions and beliefs, they are an active supporter of racism, sexism, or classism. More when they say no, I believe their assessment is not necessarily and probably not simply defensiveness, but instead a reasonable impression of what the words they hear and sometimes also the attending tone mean. Then, when additional content is provided to explain just what their privileges are and why they exist, which sometimes doesn’t even occur, people who are told to renounce things they think they and everyone should have as rights, feel that the idea of renouncing such things makes no sense. The entreaty to do so too often to disparages and intimidates, but does not communicate.
- Knowing that defensiveness is a possibility, and feeling a high priority to find and “call out” privilege, and to then also resist what seem to be defenses of privilege, it seems to me that too often people react to a person who disagrees with their views about something (for example, about the usefulness of the concept privilege) by assuming that the reason the person disagrees is not that the dissenter has honest concerns, but because he or she is defending privilege, or at least manifesting biases that derive from privilege. And of course, while that could be the case, it also might not be the case.
These three concerns of course say nothing about any particular person’s motives for using the concept privilege or their understanding of oppression. It doesn’t say everyone who looks for privilege intends to castigate or intimidate, or to ignore institutions, or to not hear sincere disagreements. But it does suggest these may be too frequent results built into using the concept privilege in current times.
Of course, we should realize that all people have better or worse circumstances in society, but does that mean we should go into a workplace, university, Church, household, or whatever, meet people, and seem to say hey, you there, give up your privilege (which people don’t even know they have, or even what it is), or does it mean we should instead clearly say, hey, we need a workplace, university, Church, household, or whatever where everyone has the following positive conditions and then move on to say that to achieve that we need to counter and replace sexist, racist, and classist institutions and beliefs.
It is commonly taught that white, coordinator class men have a stake in wanting to poo-pooh the concept privilege, whether the stake is psychological or material or both. And yes, that is one factor that could push an individual to feel the above concerns, and yes, such possibilities are important to be aware of and understand. For example, it is conceivable that right now I am poo-poohing the concept privilege simply to protect my white, male, or class privileges, or perhaps more benignly just out of ignorance or habit induced by those privileges. But it is also possible that I, and others, actually sincerely have these concerns.
A long-time leftist, for example, might honestly disagree about the value of the concept privilege, and so might a white working class guy, each not due to racist, sexist, or classist defensiveness, habits, or beliefs, but simply because they sincerely think that when someone tells another person that he or she is privileged and that he or she ought to renounce their privilege, it tends to have avoidable negative consequences. Shouldn’t we not jump to the conclusion that defensiveness is at work when someone disagrees with us? Shouldn’t we carefully consider the substance of the person’s words and not just assume their words are mere defensiveness and thus without substance?
Suppose a critic of the usefulness of the concept privilege doesn’t have a lifetime of practice that suggests there might be substantive reasons and not mainly defensiveness or a narrowness of perspective at work. Nonetheless, shouldn’t we carefully consider the person’s concerns and not dismiss them simply because the person is male, white, or coordinator?
Does looking for personal privilege and personal defense of privilege promote listening carefully or make us dismissive? Doesn’t to communicate and get positive results depend not only on the intended meaning of one’s words being worthy and applicable, but also on whether one gets across what one intends to convey to one’s conversational partner and, as well, to those hearing the exchange from outside?
If the debits I have mentioned do occur, even if only against the intentions of practitioners, shouldn’t we try to accomplish the valuable aims of people who use the concept privilege, but without suffering the debits of using the concept privilege?
In the email exchange that spurred essay, it was suggested that trying to find good, effective ways to communicate to people is of course valid and important. But an added suggestion was that in trying to find a better way to communicate about oppression, first you have to acknowledge that the concept privilege is useful, and to do that you have to acknowledge that our positionality informs how we think.
I assume this meant if you are going to try to do better than using the concept privilege, first you have to acknowledge that the aim of discerning oppressive differences and their sources, conceiving what to replace them with, and learning how to effectively challenge them is important. And yes, I agree. So I certainly emphasize that the roles we play and the societal situations we have to navigate not only help inform how we think but also help inform what our interests, habits, biases, and beliefs are. But then in light of that critical insight, shouldn’t I look at how the concept privilege is used and question if it is a good way to communicate?
People who centrally use the concept privilege have, I know, reported that it is revealing to note that you won’t find a lot of black, chicano, or female activists who disagree with the idea of positionality and how it deeply shapes the way we see and understand the world, but that you will find white men who do, which they consider pretty telling. In contrast, I would bet that very few white men on the left would disagree that the roles we play and positions we have in society not only inform how we think but also our interests, habits, biases, etc. And I would even bet that most people who don’t ordinarily think about such things would, on hearing a clear explanation, agree as well.
On the other hand, I would also agree that some white men, among others, don’t take the observation far enough to see various true things about race, gender, or class, including about their own views. And I would agree that that too is important to understand. But then I would suggest and I wonder if people who routinely and often use the concept privilege would agree, that that shortcoming is also true for some Black or Chicano men about gender, or for some white women about race, or for some white, female, Black, or Chicano people who are pursuing or occupying coordinator class positions about class?
For that matter, I wonder, more controversially, if people who often use the concept privilege and rightly believe the roles we fill and circumstances we encounter impact our views and beliefs, agree that the horrific circumstances and positions that women, Blacks, Chicanos, and workers often endure do not automatically guarantee them political wisdom about all things, and that nor does being white, male, coordinator, or capitalist, or even all together inevitably deny all wisdom.
Can we agree that these type results are critically important tendencies when looking at whole constituencies, but also that they are not inevitabilities even for the whole constituencies, much less for every individual in some constituency? Can we agree that to determine personal motives is generally too complex for quick and inflexible rule of thumb conclusions?
So, what makes up most of the things that people call “privileges”? Are they often as I suggest just rights denoted by a new overarching name that carries some additional too often unhelpful connotations? When I consult writings that describe or list privileges or when I hear about classroom, workplace, household, or organizing exchanges that involve calling out privilege, it seems to me that the things called privileges are often things we all ought to have and not things no one should have.
More, some people having them and others not having them seems, as I view such lists, mostly due to the pressures of institutions and not due to individuals actively pursuing their advantages and denying them to others. More, what makes up most of the tone and import of engagements about privilege also seems to quite often either begin at or gravitate toward implying or explicitly telling folks to, well, when it gets extreme, be silent because their being white, being male, being coordinator, or any one or all three prevents them from understanding conditions sufficiently to say anything worth listening to until they renounce their privilege (whatever that may mean).
To reply that not every advocate of using the concept privilege uses it to quiet people, or even that most advocates of using the concept privilege don’t desire that, is, I assume, true. But I am not concerned about the best use of this concept, nor even about its empirical claims, nor about people’s intentions in using it. I am concerned only about how the concept’s use plays out in practical situations. So the good intentions, good meanings, and even objectively good practices of many or even all who centrally use the concept privilege are beside the point if enough users of the concept even just sound like they are trying to convey to those who they say are privileged that they should be silent.
So are things called privileges mostly things we all should have, and thus things that might better be called rights, though to be sure many people do not have them because of systemic structures that we need to eliminate? Here, for example is a highly respected list of privileges I found. And I wonder, for the most part do these privileges identify circumstances that no one should have when anyone doesn’t have them, or do they identify rights that everyone should have?
- Having A Positive Relationship With The Police, Generally
- Being Favored By School Authorities
- Attending Segregated Schools Of Affluence
- Learning About My Race In School
- Finding Children’s Books That Overwhelmingly Represent My Race
- Soaking In Media Blatantly Biased Toward My Race
- Escaping Violent Stereotypes Associated With My Race
- Playing The Colorblind Card, Wiping The Slate Clean Of Centuries Of Racism
- Being Insulated From The Daily Toll Of Racism
- Living Ignorant Of The Dire State Of Racism Today
Most people who use the word privilege believe that sexism is in part about the idea of masculinity and unpacking the negative ideas of machismo and masculinity, but also bringing down gendered divisions of labour and sexism-producing institutional roles. I of course agree, but I nonetheless wonder about the efficacy of using the concept privilege as ubiquitously as it is now used. Is this because I am defending injustices, which I in fact agree must be overcome? Or is it because while its users tend to think that the practical use of the concept privilege helps win people over to the task to undo injustices, I worry that its practical use quite often does the opposite? Identifying privileges can positively help reveal mainly that some people are better off and in some sense gain from oppressive hierarchies of benefit, interrogate how this happens, indicate how we are all affected and to some degree we all even have assumptions and habits that enforce what we despise. But can all that be accomplished just as fully but without incurring the problems I have mentioned by simply using the concept “oppression” instead of privilege and by first highlighting structures and only then getting to, when useful, personal traits?
Renounce your privilege—well, okay, but how does an individual do that when the cause is systemic and the privileges are rights? To me it seems true but strategically irrelevant to say that this confusion isn’t any advocate’s intention. When told that they need to renounce their privilege, much less when told that until they do renounce their privilege their opinion is unworthy of attention, is it surprising people get a wrong impression of what is intended?
I know that some readers may feel at this point, about this essay, something like, Michael, don’t you agree it is worth considering how strategically useful it can be for white, male, or coordinator class activists to try to discredit the work of feminist, anti-racist, and classlessness activists by critiquing the discourse of privilege and its specific meaning and usage?
Yes, I do, but I wonder don’t you agree that to a priori assume defensiveness is the reason why some individual(s) question the attribution of privilege and to then dismiss their concerns is to do the thing I have suggested centrally using the concept privilege leads people to do—which is to conclude that someone who disagrees with them must be doing so not due to an honest assessment, but instead due to the influence of their privilege? Isn’t to suggest that questioning the concept privilege occurs because it is strategically useful to discredit the work of feminist and anti-racist activists the kind of unwarranted leap I am saying using the concept privilege tends to lead to?
I also anticipate that some who hear or read a piece like this will think there goes another old white guy saying ‘you know these women and black folks just don’t get sexism and racism.’ And then thinking to themselves that whether I like it or not, or whether it’s fair or not, strategically my stance too is not a good look. And perhaps even thinking, ‘hell, Michael, how about you give up your white, male, coordinator class privilege to give modern day anti racists, anti sexists, and anti classists the benefit of the doubt that they have been making a meaningful contribution to this work about their own oppression?’
Well, I certainly understand that sentiment, too. And I agree that if my words cause people to hear me as saying, ‘you know these women and black folks just don’t get sexism and racism,’ then, yes, I have to figure out how to change my words to better convey what I in fact mean. And of course I think that for women and Blacks and other oppressed constituencies to uncover the mainly institutional but also interpersonal circumstances and dynamics of their oppressions, and to envision what should exist instead, and to explore how we should reach what should exist are incomparably valuable things to do. But since I also think accomplishing all that is unintentionally undercut by using the concept privilege, while I agree that I should certainly seriously think on how my words could have caused anyone to read my contributions as an old white guy saying ‘you know these women and black folks just don’t get sexism and racism,’ at the same time, I would feel remiss if I didn’t suggest there is another possible cause for why someone might draw such a harsh conclusion from my words. That is, someone might see my words as saying something that they really don’t even get into the remotest ballpark of saying because to emphasize privilege, look for privilege, excavate privilege, and work to undo privilege has a tendency to too often abet and certainly not prevent a general tendency to assume that the reason a person disagrees about privilege is not that the dissenter honestly differs, but because the dissenter is defending privilege or manifesting biases that derive from privilege perhaps even in order to strategically discredit the work of feminists and anti-racist activists, and that therefore there is no need to consider said person’s concerns?
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