This might be a touchy subject but I'm feeling adventurous

Do you believe in white privilege?
If so, why?
If you don't believe in it, why not?

Is being a white person really like having your life automatically set on easy mode? I'm curious what you guys think.

 

It’s kind of the opposite now, people give advantages to people of different ethnicities just to meet diversity requirements set by the higher ups.

 

White privilege is still very much a thing, I don't know if I should be horrified, embarrassed or grateful that my life has been as easy as it has been so far..... I don't think I get special treatment for being white, but there are a lot of nasty things I don't have to deal with directly because of it, so for that reason I definitely think I'm privileged

 

you're white?

 

As a white male in a first world country that has a decent job and is at least average looking

I could say I had a hard life

 

Yeah, it’s a thing.

Not that people of other ethnicities can’t get as far as white skinned folk, but they have to work a lot harder to get there.

 

How about affirmative action?

 

White privilege is a thing. I’ve posted irl examples before, like when I wanted to go into shoppers drugmart and my bf told me to go in alone. The reason he didn’t wanna come in was because he was wearing a backpack and didn’t want to be followed by staff/security. It’s awkward as hell and I’ve seen it happen to him, but it’s never happened to me before. I’ve also overheard a guy tell his friend that he was impressed at how cultured Nisgaa people are compared to other First Nations people. No one ever says they’re surprised about how cultured Irish people are (insert joke here) but seriously, being surprised that someone is “cultured” based on their race is so fucked up. And you can’t look at him and know he’s Nisgaa, so say that guy is an employer and a First Nations person applies for a job. Is he going to have a bias? Obviously yes, he is. He thinks First Nations people in general are below other people. And that’s not a rare occurance, lots of people think that way and we’ve all heard it first hand. Go back to when we were teenagers and remember how many jokes there were about First Nations people that were derogatory, degrading, damaging and just plain racist. We’ve all heard a friend make a listerine joke. We have all been taught by each other to think differently of First Nations people, and it started when we were young. I’ve never had someone say something derogatory to me based on my ethnicity (sure have about my gender tho but that’s another can of worms) but my bf has had people say derogatory things to him about his ethnicity. When he was a CHILD some crazy ass white dad went wild at an assembly and shouted that he didn’t want the First Nations kids at his kids school. I’m willing to bet all of my money that all the white people itt have never, as children, heard someone say they shouldn’t be at school because of their skin colour. I could go on but I think you get the point.

 

White privilege is not something white people notice, so it becomes easy to say is doesn't exist. What it is is an almost complete absence of having to deal with negative racial biases that other races do have to deal with. I get my resume thrown out because I am not qualified for the job, not because my last name is Tailfeathers.

 

As far as I know

 

weird i thought you were asian

 

Aww. The thread title made me think that we were going to be able to touch people in this thread.

 

I get that a lot

 

White privilege is not a real thing.
It is a made up excuse

 

So you think baby boomers aren’t racist?

 

I think wars would make some one racist. Think of the racist words that the U.S. military use for enemy soldiers, such as Japs (World War II) and "crispy critters" for victims that they burned to death, Charlies during the Vietnamese War and posing with dead civilians and enemy soldiers in Iraq.

 

No. What an odd question.

 

it's very well documented that dehumanizing the enemy is a psychological trick to bypass that natural human tendency to not kill each other.
"Surveys of WWII infantrymen carried out by U.S. Army Brig. Gen. S.L.A. Marshall found that only 15 to 20 percent had fired their weapons in combat, even when ordered to do so. Marshall concluded that most soldiers avoid firing at the enemy because they fear killing as well as being killed. "The average and healthy individual," Marshall contended in his postwar book Men Against Fire, "has such an inner and usually unrealized resistance towards killing a fellow man that he will not of his own volition take life if it is possible to turn away from that responsibility…At the vital point he becomes a conscientious objector."

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/why-soldiers-get-a-kick-out-of-killing/

 

Not so much now, but soldiers had it really, really rough, in the past. Worse than now. I mean, if they attack the enemy, then there's a pretty high percentage that they will be killed and if they don't attack the enemy, then they will be branded a coward or a deserter, depending upon what actions they take, and risk a high percentage of getting killed that way. And the common soldier usually don't get medical help and if they don't die immediately, they will be suffering in agony on the battlefield until they do. Henry Dunant saw this, first hand, and created the Red Cross, to help those on the battlefield get medical treatment.

 

It definitely exists. I notice when I shop alone or with my mom I never get followed, and if I try things on I'm allowed to bring my purse/shopping bags into the change room. When I'm with my friends (who are women of colour) the same staff who let me in with my bags now tells us that there's a "no bags" rule.

I'll even point it out to the staff like, "My purse wasn't an issue when I tried on clothes last week," and instead of responding they just stay silent like they didn't hear me.

The "no bags" issue is such a teeny tiny annoyance I only experience when I'm with my friends. I can only imagine the more serious discrimination that they have to go through on a daily basis.

I also have a friend who is racially ambiguous, and she's mentioned that she's treated better when she dyes her hair blonde (because she passes as white), and worse when she leaves it as her natural dark colour.