INVISIBLE WHITE PRIVILEGE VS MAKING WHITENESS VISIBLE

ON THE HISTORY OF
THE CONCEPT OF
"WHITE PRIVILEGE" 



While working for equality between men and women, PEGGY McINTOSH, a white woman, came to see that men were

willing to openly admit that women are disadvantaged in society
(women making 69 cents to every man's dollar)

but were unwilling to admit that men were advantaged compared to women in society
(men making a dollar when women are only making 69 cents)


You may have noticed that the same thing was said twice, using different words.  "Women are disadvantaged" and "men have advantages" (privilege) ought to mean the same thing to people who all those who tell themselves that they believe in equality.

But men only object to the latter - "men have advantages"

Peggy McIntosh realized how very important this irrational stance was.

"[Men would] say they will work to improve women's status, in the society, the university, or the curriculum, but they can't or won't support the idea of lessening men's privilege. Denials which amount to taboos surround the subject of advantages which men gain from women's disadvantages. These denials protect male privilege from being fully acknowledged, lessened or ended." If a person admits that someone else is disadvantaged, it is like they are only admitting that something unfair is being done to women by some anonymous *they*.  But if you say I belong to a group that has advantages, that means I have more than my fair share of something, that means I may have to give up something in order for equality to arrive.  Pretend we live in a world where men actually make $1.00 an hour while women make .69 cents an hour.  If we were to make wages equal between men and women in this fictional world, by waving a magic wand in a single moment, then men and women would both make .85 cents an hour.  The reason men will admit disadvantage to women but not the advantages of being male is because m en have no intention of giving up anything (.15 cents an hour) or saying they don't deserve exactly what they've gotten. They have no intention of admitting they are unfairly getting promotions, etc simply because they have a penis.   For you to acknowledge an advantage rather than another's disadvantage is to admit that you have things that don't belong to you. This would mean that everything you bought with that extra .15 cents an hour (1.00 - 0.85)  is essentially stolen . In real world dollars, if a man earned $100,000 year when he only should have made $85,000 a year -- everything he bought with that extra $15,000 a year is stolen.  Whiteness functions in the same way. White people will admit disadvantage of race but will become fuzzy headed when talking about their own advantages.  And McIntosh began to realize this, after she was confronted by a woman of color.

 This belief is common and why many white people cannot separate "racism" from "hate-ism"
But white supremacy and white racism work just fine with or without hate. 

McIntosh began to realize that she did not like to see racism as systemic but individual, just as men had done with sexism, misogyny. She, like many white people, would admit black people are disadvantaged but not that white people have advantages or "privilege" 

* * * * *

Based on an interview in "Mirrors Of Privilege: Making Whiteness Visible" McIntosh said a black or brown woman asked her why she had stocked some library she was in charge of with all white female/ white feminist books.  As I recall, McIntosh denied it at first. But then she asked herself if she had indeed done this. McIntosh said she prayed and asked God to show her what benefits she had as a white person.

She wound up constructing a list, wrote it over several days, even waking up in the middle of the night to write things down and eventually turned it into an academic article or paper in 1989, called some variation of  "WHITE PRIVILEGE: UNPACKING THE INVISIBLE KNAPSACK

1. I can if I wish arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure of renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
4. I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.
5. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
6. When I am told about our national heritage or about "civilization" I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
7. I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.
8. If I want to, I can be pretty sure of finding a publisher for this piece on white privilege.
9. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods that fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser’s shop and find someone who can cut my hair.
10. Whether I use checks, credit cards or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.
11. I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like them.
12. I can swear, or dress in second-hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
13. I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial.
14. I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.
15. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.
16. I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color who constitute the world's majority without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
17. I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.
18. I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to "the person in chargw" I will be facing a person of my race.
19. If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven't been singled out because of my race
20. I can easily buy posters, postcards, picture books, greeting cards, dolls, toys, and children's magazines featuring people of my race.
21. I can go home from most meetings of organizations I belong to feeling somewhat tied in, rather than isolated, out-of-place, outnumbered, unheard, held at a distance, or feared.
22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having co-workers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
23. I can choose public accommodations without fearing that people of my race cannot get in or will be mistreated in the places I have chosen.
24. I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help, my race will not work against me.
25. If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether it has racial overtones.
26. I can choose blemish cover or bandages in "flesh" color and have them more less match my skin.

http://nationalseedproject.org/white-privilege-unpacking-the-invisible-knapsack

A Clip From: MIRRORS OF PRIVILEGE: MAKING WHITENESS VISIBLE

White Privilege, Racism, White Denial & The Cost of Inequality 
The first three minutes of this video where Tim Wise speaks on his own privilege that interested me here because I truly believe it is white people who will have to explain white privilege and white racism to white people who don't want to know about their own advantages.