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Understanding Privilege And Oppression

Page history last edited by Ariel 7 years, 10 months ago

 

Privilege

Unearned advantages that are attached to certain identities, as Peggy McIntosh has written; it is hard to recognize privilege because many privileges are basic human rights. However, people who are deprived of them often see privileges more clearly.

 

"Understand that having privilege doesn’t mean you didn’t work hard, doesn’t mean you don’t struggle through things as well, and it isn’t an accusation; privilege means there are certain things you don’t have to confront because of an identity you were born with."

-Hafsa Mansoor, "The Complexities of Being An Ally," Occasional Planet. May 19, 2016. 

 

At a 2016 conference, Fred Moten pointed out that privilege and private have the same Latin root: “privus,” which means simply, “individual.” Someone has privilege to the extent that they also have privacy. This explains why white people have difficulty believing that white supremacy exists or that they benefit from it. Whiteness is a totalizing assumption of individualism and privacy. (Quoted in Johanna Hedva, In Defence of De-Persons, GUTS: Canadian Feminist Magazine, May 10, 2016)

 

 

 

White Privilege

White privilege is when those who are light-skinned, primarily European descendants, gain invisibility from mainstream critique as well as institutional benefits from being white, or having light skin. This privilege is tightly linked to colonialism.

 

  • List of White Privilegesexcerpted from Peggy McIntosh's “White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming To See Correspondences through Work in Women’s Studies”, Working Paper 189, Wellesley College Center for Research on Women. 
  •  History of How White Privilege Originatedexcerpted from Allan G. Johnson, The Forest and The Trees: Sociology as Life, Practice, and Promise, rev. ed., pp. 173-182

 

 

Male Privilege

Male privilege is when masculine traits (traits associated with men) are valued over feminine characteristics that are often associated with women.

 

Class Privilege 

Class privilege is having access to substantial standards of living, or an accumulation of wealth that allows for luxuries and access to essential aspects of life such as education, clean water, healthy food, housing, medical care, and employment opportunities.

 

Heterosexual Privilege

Heterosexual privilege is being able to express your sexual orientation, such as kissing, holding hands, going on a date, getting married, having a family, in public without being subjected to misgendering, harassment, and violence.

 

Able-Bodied Privilege

Able Bodied privilege is being able to maneuver through the world, easily, and effortlessly such as climbing stairs, getting on public transportation, driving, getting ready for work, walking on the sidewalk, and being able to take care of yourself without additional equipment or caretakers. 

 

Age Privilege

Age privilege is being young and considered "beautiful," represented in media, or worthy of attention, as the increase in age tends to be a decrease in sexual desirability or value. Age privilege is often closely linked with male privilege. 

 

Cisgender & Cissexual Privilege

Cisgender Privilege occurs when a society bestows unearned advantages on those whose gender identity is aligned with their sex assignment; that is, their self-identification as masculine or feminine matches their reproductive organs. People who are trans* or genderqueer or non-binary do not have cisgender privilege. Sometimes such people define themselves as gender failures, as in this excerpt from a performance by Rae Spoon and Ivan Coyote:

 

 

Religious Privilege

When the religion you believe in is held as the national religion, regarded as the superior religion, or is a part of mainstream culture and government. 

 

Oppression

Oppression is when systems and institutions such as laws, medicine, education, social norms, media, and language implement policies and ways of thinking that limit and prevent certain communities of people, based on identity, from having the same opportunities that the dominant group has access to. 

 

"However, only oppressed people experience all that [stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination] and institutionalized violence and systemic erasure. This is about a cultural value that is systemic in that it exists within the very fabric of our society. By virtue of not having access to these privileges, the lives of oppressed people are limited. Dominant or privileged groups benefit in unconscious ways, from the disempowerment of subordinated or targeted groups. One group having the opportunity to define the world is a lot of power."

-Melissa Fabello, "Why Reverse Oppression Simply Cannot Exist," Everyday Feminism, January 26, 2015.

 

 

*People in positions of privilege can be subjected to prejudice, and stereotypes however, reverse racism, sexism, classism, ableism, ageism, cissexism, and cissgenderism cannot exist because there is not a systemic power in support of that discrimination. 

 

Racism

When institutions and systems create policies, laws and ways of thinking that discriminate against people who are non white, based on the color of their skin, their ancestral heritage, and racial identity. 

 

Sexism

When systemic oppression operates to devalue, stereotype, dehumanize, and discriminate against someone based on their sex that is not male. Women, non binary, intersex, transgender people, and so forth can all be subjected to sexism.

 

Classism

When society produces a hierarchy within an economic system, where a small group of people own most of the wealth, and can use that wealth to gain power, access to necessities, luxuries, at the expense of the majority that are of lower class status. Lower class individuals are often rendered invisible when it comes to policy reforms and institutions that make decisions about who has access to which supplies and how much. 

 

Heterosexism

The assumption that everyone is heterosexual until proven otherwise is heteronormativity. Heterosexism is only representing and valuing relationships that are between men and women, and invalidating, discriminating, or acting violently towards groups of people who are not heterosexual. 

 

Ableism 

When society structures are aimed at healthy, able, young, bodied individuals and ignoring how the creation of certain structures could be altered to be more accessible for people who are differently abled. Also, discriminating against disabled persons with the notion that they are deficit, a burden, and incapable of work or achievements. 

 

Ageism 

When institutions and systems implement process that actively discriminate, isolate, and ignore people who are not considered "young," "attractive," and "teachable." This could take the form of a lack of media representation of an older generation of people, and policies that deny individuals considered "seniors," from making decisions about their life. 

 

Cissexism / Cisgenderism

When your sex assignment at birth and gender coincide with how you view yourself. Cisgenderism is the assumption that everyone feels this way, and anyone who strays from this must have a "psychological disorder," that the medical institution often declares. Institutions and systems fail to recognize ways that cissexism and cisgenderism ignore the experiences of transsexual and transgender individuals. 

 

 

"If our first response to being asked to use more inclusive language is to complain about how we "can't say anything anymore," or how we've become too "politically correct," or sensitive, we're suggesting that it remains the responsibility of the oppressed to accept the oppressive labels and behavior, rather than to resist it."

-Michal Jones, "Being 'Too Sensitive' Isn't the Problem - Oppression is," Everyday Feminism, April 12, 2015. 

 

 

References

Collins, Patricia Hill. “Social Inequality, Power, and Politics: Intersectionality and American Pragmatism in Dialogue.” The Journal of Speculative Philosophy. Vol. 26, No. 2, pp. 442-457.

 

Davis, Angela Y. Women, Race & Class. New York: Vintage, 1983. Print 

 

hooks, bell. Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center. Cambridge, MA: South End 1984. Print 

 

 Johnson, Allan G. “Where White Privilege Came From.” The Forest And The Trees: Sociology as Life, Practice, and Promise, rev. ed., pp. 173-182. Print

 

Kendall, Frances E. "Understanding White Privilege: Creating Pathways to Authentic Relationships Across Race." Routledge 2006

 

Lorde, Audre. Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches.Trumansburg, NY: Crossing, 1984. Print

 

McIntosh, Peggy. “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” White Privilege and Male Privilege: A personal Account of Coming To See Correspondences through Work in Women’s Studies. pp 189. Working Paper. 1988. Print

 

Wise, Tim. “Whine Merchants: Privilege, Inequality, And The Persistent Myth of White Victimhood.” Tim Wise. Word Press, 13 May 2013. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.

 

 

Comments (4)

Elizabeth Kissling said

at 2:20 pm on May 26, 2016

Can we rely less on Melissa Fabello and Everyday Feminism? If this site is meant to be a resource for students and scholars, we should cite sources that students can cite in course assignments and papers.

Ariel said

at 9:34 pm on May 29, 2016

those are just the quotes. The information is from referenced from sources on my bibliography

Elizabeth Kissling said

at 8:47 pm on May 31, 2016

OK. Then add sources for other information, please. You can add a list at the end, like I did on the main WIKI page.

Elizabeth Kissling said

at 12:21 pm on Jun 1, 2016

Please double-check Kendall source - Understanding White Privilege was published in 2006 and 2012; PDF at link says 2002 and is attributed to FrancIs Kendall. The book was written by FrancEs E. Kendall. I changed spelling in text but if PDF cannot be verified we need to remove link.

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