Can we discuss white , male priveledge,?

I think the term privilege is a problem.

Women are disadvantaged by the power men have over us. Poc are disadvantaged by racism white people have. Woc are doublet disadvantaged.

We live in a developed country where there is more than enough money for everyone to live comfortably, if it was used fairly. The idea that people are privileged because they don’t suffer racism or misogyny is fucking rediclious. Not being a victim of either should be the bare fucking minimum any of us have rights to-world over it should be, there’s more than enough to go around- but especially in a developed country.

White men being blind to the realities women or poc live with isn’t privilege, it’s ignorance, misogyny and racism.

I often find that the concept of white privilege gets used to silence women- ‘ Karen’s’for example is just misogyny- the idea that as a white woman I should be great full I only have a very high likelihood of being raped, very high likelihood of never seeing my rapist prosecuted, very high chance of domestic violence and being murdered by a man, rather than the very very high likelihood woc face, is fucking rediclous. I often find the concept of privilege is used to silence women in this way, to shut us down and to divide women who could be standing together. I’ve heard white feminists accused of using fgm, as fgm mostly happen to woc, yet it happens solely to people who have a vagina doesn’t it? Moc calling out white feminist for that or for higher rates of sexual violence woc face appear to miss that glaringly obvious point.

Imho for a world that has v more than enough for everyone there are only a small % who have real privilege. Us scrambling over the term means no one addresses that. How women are disadvantaged by men is based on the power they hold over us. From my limited white stand point poc seem to be disadvantaged by our racism and the harm that causes. White men aren’t privileged for not being subjected to either- that makes it sounds like they get extra for being white and a man, they get basic rights not extra, we get much much less. Making them privileged for this makes it sound like we are the norm, what we get is ok. Imho that serves to benefit the truly privileged minority at the top of the pyramid, while leaving us blind to that.

Agreed - the ‘whiteness’ of the girl victims in the sex gang scandals - Rotherham et al - worked very much against them.

Their whiteness was used by the rapists to target the girls as easy prey and by the police to dismiss them as irrelevant/asking for it - plus the police didn’t want to be seen as racist

Some of those girls also gave evidence to joutnalists, in police statements, and the courts that they'd been racially abused by the gangs.

I think being white means there are aspects of your life that are not made worse by your skin colour.

Does it? I think when people think of someone white and poor and uneducated, their whiteness is very much part of the package. There's a tendency to see them as thugs or white trash.

Agreed - the ‘whiteness’ of the girl victims in the sex gang scandals - Rotherham et al - worked very much against them.

Their whiteness was used by the rapists to target the girls as easy prey and by the police to dismiss them as irrelevant/asking for it - plus the police didn’t want to be seen as racist.

Slight tangent - but this hurts black people too - part of the reason social workers didn’t intervene in the tragic Victoria Climbie case is because they didn’t want to be seen as racist / interfering in a different ‘culture’. Perhaps if poor Victoria was white - without the fears of racist/ cultural insensitivities - the authorities would have intervened.

Focusing on white privilege - will exacerbate this and reduce safeguarding for ALL children.

I think being white means there are aspects of your life that are not made worse by your skin colour.

Does it? I think when people think of someone white and poor and uneducated, their whiteness is very much part of the package. There's a tendency to see them as thugs or white trash. They aren't related in any way to the advantages of being well off and white.

As for women and men and the differences there, that's a totally different kind of differentiation that's largely rooted in reproductive role. It's mechanisms are not as the same as the mechanisms of money and political influence.

Critical Theory is pretty useless, it imagines by giving an effect a name, it makes it solvable without identifying the mechanisms of the difference.

It’s very difficult to know without an explanation of what the problems are.

There’s nothing intrinsically humiliating about being poor. It puts you at the bottom in terms of material resources and in many situations in terms of power and influence, but it doesn’t mean you have less value as a human being.

People often read poor white people or poor men not kowtowing to the middle classes as entitlement, when it’s just about seeing yourself as possessing human dignity.

Because your concern is about how people from a range of backgrounds can fairly arrive in positions of wealth, which is very much a right wing concern.

@Stripesnomore
I think you are coming from a very right wing place Plan.

Can you elaborate on this? I am firmly left wing/liberal so I am scratching my head over how my viewpoint can be “right wing”

I think white male privilege is a big thing. All of my ds's friends come from loving naice families, attend very good schools, thrived and did well at GCSE.
Some of the mixed race boys, with a white parent and a black parent, have already experienced difficulties, and as a group they have already discussed white privilege in lessons.

I think privilege contains a strong element of entitlement, along with opportunity to act out that entitlement.

Men don't have to buy lessons in e.g. how to be sexist or misogynist. Patriarchy delivers these lessons for free, affordable for any man - rich or poor.

I think this helps to explain why white male privilege still applies to poor white boys and men - many of them feel entitled to be better off than any man of another race or better off than any woman and they act accordingly e.g. violence and insults can be given without spending money.

For many white men of all income levels, being the poorest white man in a group of white men seems to them less humiliating and less shameful than being the poorest man in a multi-racial group of men and women.

I'm trying to show why poverty is not a privilege-free zone. I'm not accusing all poor white men of being violent racists or misogynists.

Missed

Apols Andy, misses that

HecatesCatsInXmasHats

"There needs to be an acknowledgment of sex there too though doesn't there Andy?"

Exactly, which is why I called it the "white, establishment patriarchy". The patriarchy does not include women, the Bullingdon Club is only for men from a certain social background.

What always gets me about this issue is that here in Europe we are predominantly white, some countries to a very large percentage are white. Maybe the UK is even different, perhaps France (i.e. the old colonial powers). But in my country what 'privilege' is there if it is shared with almost the entire country?

Moreover, 'privilege' now really only is used to shut people up. Have privilege? Shut up. You have no say.

Oppression olympics, intersectionality, it is all the same with the sole goal of pushing one's opinion based on nothing more than a hierarchy created to silence others.

Hecate, I am saying that referring to the problem of the disparities between men and women as groups as privilege causes a conflation with class and wealth which don’t make the issues clear.

I think you are coming from a very right wing place Plan. I don’t mean that as a criticism - just a statement of fact. That isn’t the context I am considering privilege in.

Making it fairer for some people to end up much wealthier than others isn’t what I’m concerned with.

What I am saying is that wealth and access to power are what constitutes privilege. Thus everyone who has wealth and a good job is privileged

I understand that, but are you therefore saying male privilege does not exist in any other context? Because where I grew up I could see it in communities that I wouldn't describe as wealthy.

What I am saying is that wealth and access to power are what constitutes privilege. Thus everyone who has wealth and a good job is privileged.

But I think, in this context, that privilege must be unearned. So if someone has wealth and a good job through their efforts- say they are female, a minority and started life in a slum and destitute but worked their way to wealth and a good job. That is not privilege in action. That is overcoming lack of privilege. So, it then follows, that not everyone with wealth and a good job is privileged, some are self made people who had no privileges that got them to wealth and a good job easier than another person.

Exactly! And divide and rule, used as a diversion tactic and means of control, is as old as the hills.

Children generally do better in education if:

• Their families value and encourage academic achievement
• Their teachers view them as agreeable and non- disruptive

So girls and some ethnic groups may actually be advantaged in the area of school achievement and exam results.

Which goes to show that "privilege" is often contextual.

All women experience problems as a consequence of male as the default.

What I am saying is that wealth and access to power are what constitutes privilege. Thus everyone who has wealth and a good job is privileged.

It doesn’t change the fact that wealthy upper class people are by definition privileged and working class people are not.

Of course it doesn't, but are you saying that women from low socioeconomic backgrounds aren't also affected by male as the default?

Witness the rise of people like Lawrence Fox

I am not sure scapegoating all white men is going to get anyone not-white, not-male anywhere

We are blaming boomers for society’s woes

We are blaming men

We are blaming white people

This will just push white boys into the arms of right wing/ misogynist /racist groups IMO