General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: "Wednesday was the worst day of my life…" [View all]The Magistrate
(95,255 posts)Your line was this:
'Discrimination against People of Color does NOT collective privilege of "whites" make.'
A person exercising 'critical thinking skills' would proceed along some such line as this. You concede there is systematic discrimination against people of color, or in other words, that people of color are systematically disadvantaged. You then attempt to maintain that the systematic disadvantaging of one group does not result in any advantage for some other group. But clearly, if one group is subject to a disadvantage another group is not, the latter group enjoys some advantage over the former. Therefore, it is proper to speak of the latter group as being privileged over the former group, since they do enjoy an advantage over them.
The concept of 'white privilege' is not the idea that all whites enjoy good outcomes in life, any more than the concept of systematic racism is the idea that all people of color suffer bad outcomes in life. What it does mean is that, all else being equal, white people have somewhat better odds of a good outcome than colored people, in our society. A man whose point is six has a better chance of making it than a man whose point is three, and that is true even if he craps out on his first roll, and remains true even if the other fellow makes makes his point and collects despite the poorer odds.