To ask when you’ve experienced white privilege

[Whitepriv]

Sadly I know I have. In East London at a high rise, was checking into an Airbnb and couldn’t find the lockbox despite instruction so was looking extremely dodgy, looking under lots of the block of flats windowsills. There’s a young black man hanging out a few metres from me smoking a cig.

Police come by and ask me if I could do with any help and if I’m okay. I tell them that I’m fine but thank you. In less than a minute, I see the same police moving on the young black man for hanging around outside the flats, with a ‘you can’t loiter here’. Sad 😞

No never

Assuming @2010Aussie is white, s/he wins. Reaching adulthood and still being completely oblivious to the fact that white people are treated more favourably to people from BAME backgounds. Coming on a thread like this to post a two word denial without feeling the need to explain. There it is.

Yes, I'm white and live in the UK, I will experience it every single day.
I am trying to educate myself on how other people are treated, I thought it was bad enough being a woman.
I was wrong.

Most white privilege is unseen by receivers and even givers. Trust me when I say (almost) all white people experience and benefit from white privilege everyday. Recalling only one incident just shows how ingrained it is that it can be (so) missed

Always, by virtue of being born English.

You know that some black people are English and some English people are black, right?

@bankofnook I was open mouthed reading your post. Absolutely astonishing and appalling.

I think the whole point about white privilege is that if you’re white, you barely notice it (I’m white) I think this is me.

But, as people have mentioned class, having grown up in a poor working class area, I have gradually noticed differences between me and people born into upper middle class households and continue in this lifestyle in adulthood, and the privilege of their upbringing, and not just in wealth but in assumption about what their lives will be like, and ignorance of people not living that life.

I don’t know what assumptions people might make when they see me, but as soon as I open my mouth and they hear my RP accent it is like class supersedes race - it, together with self effacing politeness always gets me excellent service.

@wigornian

It doesn’t surprise me - I think that’s ‘the good immigrant’ narrative in action!

I'm white, my whole life is white privilege even though I'm poor and on disability benefits, my privilege means that my disabilities are properly recognised and that even though I might not have rich privilege I still have more privilege than a black person in my position.

The thing with white privilege is that it's the "norm" and most of the time we don't even notice it. It's only when you think about how life is for people who aren't white that you realise how much that we think is normal is based on us being white.

My boyfriend when I was 21 was black, he was driving my car at the time (a brand new BMW) the police stopped him and said they had the checked the car and it wasn't registered to him, I leant over to explain that it was my car and that he was insured to drive it and had my permission, they just looked at me and said "oh don't worry, we aren't interested in you love" and then said that they had received reports about a man of his description (?) in the area causing trouble. They took him out of the car to question him. Was clear that they were just suspicious of a young black man driving an expensive car. Was the first time it really hit me.

I've also recently lost the keys to my car (again an expensive BMW) and been looking in the car and searching around it, the police helped me look for the keys and didn't even bother taking my details. I imagine if I was a black man they would have been much more suspicious of someone peering through the car window in the middle of the night and checked my details.

The amount of times I've walked into a room where DH (black) is having a discussion with a service-offerer (doctor, etc.) to see them suddenly straighten up and tone of voice change to more professional.

At first I dismissed it as slightly odd but a "one-off", but it's an oddly repeatable pattern. It's like the reaction your child has when they've been being naughty and you walk in unexpectedly.

Yep. Job interviews. Well pretty much anything, how would I know really.

You're right, Fosler, you are a minority and I hope racist fucks like you remain to be a minority.

@Fosler oh come on. Your situation is sad but the point beingade is that black people start out at a disadvantage. Surely you've noticed this in trivial ways if you have any black friends. I mean I can't imagine how fucking irritating it would be if people assumed I had "rhythm" just because of my skin colour.

In my career. I'm in the media and from an ordinary lower middle class family with no contacts or connections in the industry. I went to state school and did not go to oxford or Cambridge. I'm in my late 30s and consider myself lucky to have got where I have, which is a role that could nevertheless probably have been given as a second or third job to someone with the "right" education and connections.
If I was BAME I'd doubt I'd have ever made it to where I am.

We once arrived to get on an Air Ethiopia flight at Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on our way to the Middle East. We were at the back of a huge queue for about 2 minutes before some officials came up to us and ushered us to the front of the queue and put us in First Class. We were the only white people there...including the Airline and airport staff. I'll never forget it. I was about 12 years old.

I reject the concept entirely. An absence of opression is not a privilige. It is everyone's right.

I've seen several theorists now saying similar - that it would be better to frame it as 'spared (racial) injustice' or similar, both because it reframes things like not dealing with racist state violence as a right everyone should have, but there are some studies that have shown strong evidence that education and focus on White privilege does little to make White people more sympathetic or caring towards the issues and realities of BAME people, but does make them significantly less sympathetic towards the systemic oppression White people may face due to poverty or other issues.

Also yes to everyone saying every single day. That's the reality.

@Fosler

What jobs aren’t you allowed to apply for due to being white?

You can’t have multiple marriages in the UK, that’s illegal.

@Stripesgalore The privilege is that OP was looking under window sills, what could be viewed as 'suspicious behaviour', yet was not viewed with suspicion, infact the police offered her help but the innocent black man having a smoke WAS viewed with suspicion and told to move on.

I suppose all the time, but I've never seen it like you have.

Well my Mum is white and maternal outcomes are better in white women so I was born into it and it kind of went from there. My Mum didn't die in childbirth, I grew up with security because my grandparents weren't denied mortgages/certain jobs/housing opportunities which in turn helped my parents have a better start. My family don't carry historical trauma. I was never singled out as different, knew I could go to a policeman if I got lost, my teachers didn't have unconscious bias towards me and my potential, I wasn't expected to act more mature for my age as black girls can be, I spent most of my childhood never having to even consider my skin colour, so that's some privilege and I'm barely at primary school yet.
I've had white privilege before I was even born and every day since.