Justice Entails Ending ‘White Privilege’
(I wrote the following as an invited opinion editorial which appeared in the 13 April 2003 issue of the Free Lance-Star, Fredriksburg, VA.)
The debate about racism in America today revolves around achieving diversity. But focusing on diversity means questions of history and power go unasked and unanswered. Without an unflinching understanding of the history of racism in America, and the enduring imbalances of power and wealth, status and privilege, further progress toward racial justice is unlikely.
Racial oppression is a set of strategies for social exploitation. The institutions of slavery and Jim Crow apartheid were established in order to secure benefits for white people at the expense of African slaves and their American-born descendants. One way to think about the benefits of exploitation is in terms of racialized social privilege — patterns of social privilege and benefit, including exemptions from harm and burden, which accrue to racial groups at the expense of others. The shorthand term for these patterns in American society is “white privilege”.
Economic benefits are at the core of white privilege. The captive pool of labor provided by chattel slavery, from which both Northern industrialists and Southern planters benefited, is one of the founding sources of the American economy. African Americans still struggle today with the economic legacy of an unjust history. Some 35 years after the civil rights movement destroyed the most obvious, _formal_ structures of racial oppression, the _substantive_ legacy of those structures endures.
According to the latest Survey of Consumer Finances, non-white Americans own 10 or 11 cents of wealth for every 100 cents of wealth owned by white Americans. And, even more troubling, the wealth gap between whites and non-whites expanded 21% from 1998 to 2001. The racial injustices of American history do not fully explain wealth disparities, but they are impossible to understand without reference to historical advantages and disadvantages.
Poor and working class whites object to the idea of white privilege, pointing out that not every white person is wealthy or powerful. But other benefits accrue to white people, including one which W.E.B. DuBois called the “psychological wages of whiteness”. Membership in the privileged group, even for whites on the bottom economic rung, confers a social status and recognition which is denied to all but the most powerful members of oppressed groups.
Even today, as Glen Loury suggests in his recent book, The Anatomy of Racial Inequality, African Americans suffer from a racial social stigma unknown to even the poorest white Americans, who share in many of the privileges of being white, no matter their economic disadvantage.
And so the other pattern of racially-dispensed benefit and harm is political. Slavery and Jim Crow were accompanied and supported by a political ideology which stigmatized African Americans and other non-whites by suggesting that only white people were fully human and that white people are the norm by which others are to be judged. These assaults on the dignity and self-respect of African Americans cause long-lived, public, even generational harms which are not easily or quickly overcome.
Most of the central, large features of the history of racial oppression in America are not disputed. What is disputed is whether, or to what extent, 400 years of oppression continues to harm African Americans and their life chances unjustly; and, conversely, whether that history of oppression continues to benefit white Americans unjustly. No one establishes systems of oppression unless they intend to benefit thereby. There is no reason to believe, a mere 35 years after dismantling the formal props of an oppressive system, that social institutions and power structures no longer dispense benefits and harms racially.
When we examine the way benefits and harms are apportioned in the U.S. — including wealth and income, equality of treatment in court and from police, access to colleges, universities, and even the political symbolism of state flags — what we see are exercises and expressions of white privilege. As a group, white people have more wealth, more income, more political representation and access, more power, more status, and more social reinforcers of their human dignity and self-respect.
We white people have and enjoy these privileges unjustly, as a result of an unjust and still largely unaddressed history. The promise of American democracy will remain unfulfilled until the legacy of American racism is addressed and overcome.
May 10th, 2003 at 10:17 am
White Privilege, it does exist, but it is only subscribed to by the ignorant or the racist. Another premise for this form of social discrimination is that the “privilege” is only extended by fellow anglos or the ignorant. Also, the writer did not make clear in what arena’s this benefit is extended. Certainly it is not in the arenas of sports where there is a stereotype that “whites” are inferior athletes to their darker counterparts. Stereotypes abound everywhere for all types of skin tones, and stereotypes have their roots in generalized truths. However, stereotypes are not universal truths and have negative implications on our society as a whole. Thats why I find it hard to believe intellectuals would propagate the stereotype of white privilege. I certainly didn’t experience the “privilege” as a “white” school boy in a predominantly “african-American” school system in Mobile, Al. In conclusion I agree with Playthell Benjamin who doesn’t believe in race. Like him I believe that it is only a social construction. Hopefully one day we will reach a point where we no longer classify a person by any “race” but human.
May 14th, 2003 at 4:04 am
“In conclusion I agree with Playthell Benjamin who doesn’t believe in race. Like him I believe that it is only a social construction.”
That’s not what the genes say:
http://www.ancestrybydna.com
May 28th, 2003 at 3:02 am
There is less than 1% difference in the genes of any person of any race. Consider that no persons genes are exactly the same as any other persons genes there is not much difference between any of us. I digress, concerning this article I have to reluctantly agree with some of what is said. I believe that their is still some underlying benefit of being one skin color or another in some instances in life but I feel it applies to most every race of people, even if it applies mostly to whites. For example in the case of a high school graduate looking to attend a college or university an average black male is eligible for 26% more scholarships than if that same male was white. Including the fact that the extra 26% is exclusive to a population that represents roughly 12% to 30% (depending on wether the scholarships are exclusive to African Americans or all minorities) of the whole there is a much better chance of getting financing for college as a minority. And as for the section of this article that states “Membership in the privileged group, even for whites on the bottom economic rung, confers a social status and recognition which is denied to all but the most powerful members of oppressed groups.”. This is absurd and almost borderline on conspiracy theorism. It’s not plausible that this is true or that it can be proven or concluded from any type of research. I also resent the use of the term “oppressed groups” to characterize non-whites as though they are oppressed by the white people.
May 29th, 2003 at 4:01 pm
i do not “disagree” with this article, but i would like to point out another side to the racial privilage. i grew up in north georgia, where whites were the majority race in my highschool, although not a drastic majority. Anyway, when i graduated, i moved to miami, Florida, where i am now the minority. i can count my “white” friends on one hand. i married into a hispanic family, and have a half hispanic baby. i have found that in this part of america, and im sure there are other areas, i am the minority, and am subject to being w/o “privilage”. i consider myself lucky to be employed at all in this city, as most employers favor bilingual employees. many jobs, it is a requirement. (hello, this is america, we speak english here)… anyway, i also have to deal constantly w/phrases like “oh, you wouldn’t understand, you’re white” or “you wouldn’t understand, you’re not latin” oh, and my favorite is “what are you?” (I’m a FREAKING HUMAN BEING) what’s even more fun, is when my friends (and they are friends, they mean no ill will towards me in doing this) start having the conversation of “well the diffence b/t hispanics and americans is…” and “latin families are like this and american families are like that” and to them there is no harm, but to ME they are putting up a wall that should NOT exist. they are saying “you are different from all of us” they are setting me apart and it is very much a form of racism. not in the form of hatred, im sure, but all the same, racism. and there is a certain “hispanic-privilage” here in miami. and the funny thing is whether you be hispanic, black, asian, whatever, as long as you are’t typical white american of european decent, then you have a privilage HERE.
just wanted to show that racism and privilage is not something strictly b/t black and white where blacks are the underprivilaged and whites are the racist. it does exist, i know, i grew up in the deep south. i just wanted to throw a different light on the subject.
May 30th, 2003 at 3:57 am
I probably should point this out. Compare these two excerpts from the article:
“Economic benefits are at the core of white privilege.”
“Even today, as Glen Loury suggests in his recent book, The Anatomy of Racial Inequality, African Americans suffer from a racial social stigma unknown to even the poorest white Americans, who share in many of the privileges of being white, no matter their economic disadvantage.”
So whites are privileged with economic benefits no matter their economic disadvantage? Nice doublethink.
May 30th, 2003 at 9:45 am
So whites are privileged with economic benefits no matter their economic disadvantage? Nice doublethink.
I don’t know why I bother treating you, Rurik, as if you are a good actor, but I’ll do it at least once more, here.
You suggest that I’ve asserted a contradiction, but you’re simply wrong. There are at least two readings of the excerpts which are not inconsistent. First, the meaning I intended, is simply to say, as I do, that while economic advantage is at the core of white privilege, that privilege also has other components, includnig political and other benefits. Some of those other components are orthogonal to economic aspects of privilege, including the social stigma which still attaches to being African American. (To say nothing of the plain fact that I was pointing out Glenn Loury’s notion of social stigma, which African Americans suffer no matter their economic position. There’s just no non-tendentious reading in which that’s a contradiction.)
There’s another reading, which I cannot warrant with facts, but which may also be true, and which is certainly possible and consistent. One might conclude from what I wrote that at every economic level (that is, at every class level), non-whites are relatively disadvantaged vis-a-vis whites; so, for example, among the super rich, there are disproportionately fewer non-whites (or even African Americans) than whites, and that the same goes for the middle and working classes.
But then you are not only not a charitable reader of my work, you’re not even reading it in good faith.
July 7th, 2003 at 2:37 am
I am somewhat put off by this article. I am doing research on reverse discrimination, I have found out so much. The “White” Majority upper class are often the main reason well deserving Majority students don’t recieve enough funding for college. I go to college in Georgia, almost all of my friends are minorites, they are on my side with this point. It is more difficult for a Majority student in a private college to get a scholarship than it is for an Minority. I would know and they would to because it is somthing we are dealing with now. I graduated Valedictorian of my high school, and I have a 4.o GPA in college. In no way do I feel like I am “enjoying any of my privleges unjustly”. If what this article said was true then after applying for over 30 I would have recieved a scholarship by now, compared to my closest friends who have applied for less than a third of what I have and recieved plenty. Please be open minded and do more research to prove your point, it is when everyone begins to think the same as you that reverse-discrimination becomes a problem. It is only fair when both sides have an argument to balance the scale.