What privilege do I have for being white?

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It's being approached by a police officer and asked why you are there regardless of your concern.

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It's being pulled over for a traffic violation that you have actually committed.

Translation: white suspects are never innocent.

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It's writing a check for groceries and not being asked for your ID.

That's "looking old" privilege.

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It's successfully hailing a taxi after sunset.

That's "being sober" privilege - closely followed by "female" privilege.

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It's having the taxi driver go into your neighborhood to drop you off in front of your home.

Assuming you have one.

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It's being articulate, educated, and well-spoken without people being surprised because of your race.

Unless you're Irish, Scots, etc or from a non-anglo country.

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It's being able to use foul language without people blaming your race.

See previous answer.

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It's getting a job or a promotion, and no one assuming that it had nothing to do with your qualifications.

Except you've literally just blamed it on skin colour - as has Bob in accounting.

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It's browsing in a department store without being followed by a security guard.

Because white people are never suspects.

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It's never being expected to act or speak as a representative of all white people everywhere.

Because invoking the collective identity of one's race is never, ever, EVER used to one's benefit.

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Because my hypothetical avatar of the average white person is suitable for every single one of you and that's somehow not racist.



In other words, the notion of "White Privilege" is de facto racism but I follow an ideology that pretends that's somehow impossible.

Like Fnord said, it's more of a BS you don't have to deal with deal than a get free stuff kind of deal. Regardless, it's an overused and misused concept often deployed as a thought terminating cliche, which is why I don't use it even though I don't think it's completely wrong.

Which hasn't stopped you from doing so right here.



The notion that you cannot be racist against whites is <drumroll> racism.



Everyone has the ability to not worry about things.



Likewise, everyone has the capacity for fear, or lack thereof.



As a white person who has been pulled over for literally no reason beyond the spurious one given by the officer, I beg to differ.



Pardon?



Why do you believe non-whites "automatically look suspicious"? That's rather offensive.

Whereas I find it to be reprehensible. Any notion that starts with the premise "all people of x colour have the following advantages" is inherently racist and dehumanising.

Human beings are individuals, not subjective archetypes.

Being a minority in any situation is a disadvantage, if you have 10 people and they're all the same except 1 then that person will probably face some form of prejudice and discrimination so I think there is just a certain level of evolutionary biology involved in it. As the sole white kid in a black classes most of my life I can assuredly tell you that black people can be very racist, is there any scenario when not being the majority is an advantage in some measure?

To say there is this epidemic of cops shooting black people is just patently false; people in Europe really have no clue about race, cops, gun, pretty much anything America except for the propaganda they absorb from our sensationalist news media. Perhaps the question should be asked as to why there is much policing in black neighborhoods, it's not because of racism but rather the violence and organized crime which cops can not be blamed for. Blacks are like 13% of population and commit like 50% of the murders and you could narrow to young men mostly and then you can kind of understand why a middle aged white lady might not be treated the same as opposed to someone that looks like a gangbanger with sagging pants, there is a serious serious problem in Black America and it doesn't all start with the cops or white people.

There are still many subtle reminders in this society that it is, overall, better to be "white" than to be any other race. But these "reminders" are getting ever more "subtler" as time proceeds.

It does not mean that everything is "black and white" (pardon the pun). Many black people live higher-quality lives than many white people. Many white people are victimized for being white. Many people of many races are victimized for being a member of a particular race.

Experience belies statistics at times, it should be noted.

One example of being "privileged" to be white

If I have to go to the bathroom badly in NYC, I can walk into any bar, and they'll (grudgingly) allow me to use the bathroom. If you're a black person, they'll probably make you order something (yes, this has happened--in the same bar, but at different times!)

Overall, though, I really don't feel "privileged" because I am a white person. Everything I've gotten has been the result of hard work on my part, rather than as a product of my "race."

Overall, I am in agreement with "Blasphemous Dog"--except for the part about being a misanthrope.

Black people do have it worse in this country, but that's no one individual's fault. If we let go of all the negative stereotypes we'd all be a lot better off. There's no reason "white guilt" should even be a thing. Slavery is a horrible reality of American history, but if I were black, I'd sure as hell rather be a decendant of a slave, living here in America than in Africa fighting a monkey for a banana.

Because police never ask innocent white people what they are doing, right? By the way, they are allowed to ask you why you are there, just like anyone else can. If you don't want to tell them, don't tell them. That's an extremely petty thing to even be upset about, let alone to use as an example of white privilege, which it clearly is not.

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It's being pulled over for a traffic violation that you have actually committed.

Once again, this happens to everyone. Cops don't just see that it's a white guy when they walk up to the car and say, "Oh, I'm sorry sir, I didn't see you were white. My mistake. You have a nice day." Come on, what world do you live in?

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It's writing a check for groceries and not being asked for your ID.

Seriously? Asking black people for ID at the grocery store is what racists do now? I mean, I knew that racists were losing ground, but I didn't realize they were reduced to such a pitiful means of expressing their racism. It's almost sad.

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It's successfully hailing a taxi after sunset.

Maybe it's just because black people aren't as visible as white people after the sun goes down. I guess that is a white privilege.

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It's having the taxi driver go into your neighborhood to drop you off in front of your home.

Yes, this is a big problem in black communities; taxi drivers, just refusing to take black people all the way home, and forcing them to walk a few blocks. Sickening racism. Totally not ever because that particular neighborhood is more dangerous than others.

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It's being articulate, educated, and well-spoken without people being surprised because of your race.

Once again, it could happen to anybody, and when it does happen it doesn't immediately mean their reason for being surprised is the person's skin color. But whenever it's a black person, people make assumptions that any rude treatment is based on racism. That's stupid.

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It's being able to use foul language without people blaming your race.

Wow, I'm so privileged.

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It's getting a job or a promotion, and no one assuming that it had nothing to do with your qualifications.

You realize the only reason people would think this is because of affirmative action, right? So now you're actually proving my point, about how treating black people as if they are helpless victims that don't have "privilege" leads to people assuming they can't or don't accomplish things on their own. Instead, they need help from "privileged" whites.

The assumption comes from the idea that black people don't have enough "privilege" to accomplish such things, so if anyone is to blame for such an assumption besides the people themselves, it's the ones going around preaching about white privilege.

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It's browsing in a department store without being followed by a security guard.

Because that only ever happens to black people, right? What if most of the shoplifting is done by black people at a particular store? It seems likely, considering that black people are more likely to be in poverty. Does it make sense to follow 50% whites and 50% blacks anyway, just so people don't get upset?

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It's never being expected to act or speak as a representative of all white people everywhere.

This is another example that proves my point. White people assume that groups like BLM represent the sentiment of all black people, a group that talks endlessly about supposed white privilege and white supremacy in America. I say it's condescending to agree with a group just because they say they represent black people, but the left has no problem with doing it.

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So I'm so privileged, I have the privilege of not knowing how privileged I am. I guess you beat me; no matter what I say, it's simply based on my ignorance of my own privilege. Nice.

However, I don't view life through the lens of privilege. I think it's a sure way to keep yourself down. If someone else has something I don't have, I don't whine about it, and I certainly don't blame it on their "NT privilege", "rich privilege" etc. as if their having something somehow means they are better than me. Instead, I focus on what I can have, and work for it. I think others should do the same.


Yeah, well I already explained why the term "white privilege" isn't accurate. It implies a specific advantage or right given to a particular group of people. Nothing you listed fits that definition, because either it happens to white people to, or it is something so petty and generalized that it couldn't even be considered a privilege, let alone a white privilege.

Why are you so convinced that the reason you're begrudgingly allowed to use the facilities is your skin-tone? There are numerous factors that inform such decisions, e.g. clothing, speech, grooming or mannerisms.

As I have previously stated here, this is the relative chance of being:

- (1) stopped and searched by the police in Baltimore and
- (2) the police actually finding contraband during the search...


As demonstrated above, African Americans are stopped at a much greater frequency than Caucasians by the police, even though there is a lower chance of finding contraband among African Americans (and thus less evidence that the search was based on probable cause)...

So while the term "White Privilege" is an annoying buzzword worthy of an F in statistics, discrimination against African Americans by the police in the US has nonetheless been thoroughly documented...

This is also evident by the fact that African-Americans are more likely to be arrested and convicted for using drugs... despite the fact that the prevalence of illegal drug use among African-Americans is fairly similar to the prevalence among White Americans...

People don't actually seem to take that question seriously, usually it just get scoffed at even if said white person is genuinely asking and trying to understand the concept. At least from what I've observed granted some people are just immediately angered at the phrase and decide before even looking into what it means that it's saying white people can do whatever they want and people of minorities cant...so could be a bit of defensiveness on both sides. Only way stuff like this will be resolved in society is if people are willing to listen to each other even if they're not exactly on the same page and disagree/see it differently.

Also there is a lot to do with class when it comes to privilege its not all just about race. For instance you can't really say a homeless white person from a poor family and broken home has more 'privilege' than say a middle class black person with a successful career who was born into a middle class family. I think financial class has a lot to do with privilege, yet that seems quite under-addressed.

Alternatively, it demonstrates that cops are better at profiling white criminals than black criminals, hence their greater success rate. We cannot isolate the statistics from all other pertinent data. Are there common markers among white offenders that make them easier for cops to recognise?

That's the same thing as discrimination.

Part of it is location, Baltimore is pretty widely known for crime and it's rough ghetto which the cops have taken a proactive approach towards and who mostly lives in the ghetto? I imagine yeah cops probably have a high hit percentage on whites stopped in these areas because I imagine many are there to buy drugs to begin with. That is essentially how it worked in my hometown, yeah some white kids from the suburbs aren't cruising the ghetto looking for a place to get milkshakes. Things aren't so simplistic as 'X racial disparity is evidence of racism', I think that is a very black and white way of thinking no pun intended.

Hardly. If I'm better able to recognise when someone from my hometown is undergoing stress than someone from (e.g.) Anchorage, that's a matter of familiarity and experience, not discrimination.

If the police are disproportionally targeting a specific group without legal justification, then they are discriminating... In this case, it doesn't matter *why* they are doing it...

It's called the 4th Amendment... look it up...

EDIT: And the 5th and 14th Amendment, while we are at it...

EDIT (another one): BTW, here was how the Baltimore Police Department would profile potential criminals:



Source: https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/883366/download (see page 67)