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Discrimination and racial bias
Summary on the Pathology of “White Privilege”
Summary on the Pathology of “White Privilege”
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Growing up I attended schools where white was the minority. One day towards the end of my sophomore year in high school, we were reviewing for the state exam we had to take in a few weeks. Our teacher excused himself from the room and one of the school security guards came in to watch us while we worked. We were working silently on our questions that were focused on the Holocaust. Suddenly someone behind me asked loud enough for everyone to hear “Samantha was your grandfather a Nazi?” I was completely blindsided. I had never really spoken to this person before. I calmly explained to him that my family was in the United States when the war started. All of a sudden, someone else asked “So did your family own slaves?” After I explained that this too was false, I found some people looking at me with skepticism, the security guard being one of them. These were questions that I had grown accustomed to over the years. I was used to some of my …show more content…
While walking through the halls with a classmate I had gotten to know very well, she asked me if I was going on the trip and if I would like to room with her. I told her that I was not attending because my family could not afford it this year. “What do you mean you can’t afford it? You’re white.” I knew that coming from a home with two working parents left me more privileged than many of the students in my school. Did she mean that because I came from a higher income home that I should be able to afford this trip? Or did she mean that I should be able to afford this trip because I was white? After straight out telling her my family is not rich she said “Well I guess not, otherwise you’d be in a fancy private school and not here with kids like us.” After that whenever someone asked me about the trip, I said I wasn’t going because I didn’t want to spend the trip with kids I didn’t like. This was more accepting than the
The incident actually occurred in my home in a banal everyday interaction with a plumber who was fixing our shower. Firstly, the plumber who was Caucasian continually bombarded his younger, Latino assistant with racial insults mostly to the tune of "you stupid Mexican". When he realized that we were staring at his comments he explained that his assistant "gets it from his mother's side". This young man was in fact the plumber's son! He then went onto talking about how America is today, and how being a fellow American, I should understand that. Of course I immediately responded with: "I'm not American," to which he countered: "Oh! I thought you were white!.....I mean American."
High school is meant to be the time of your life, but for most seniors just like me it can be some of the most emotional and crazy time. The things in my past make me who I am today, and the things I do now are the first footsteps into the future. I’ve learned a lot about myself in these past four years, and I still have so much learning to do. This is my high school story; the good, bad, and the ugly.
Because I am white, no one wonders if I am associated with terrorists or feels nervous and pulls their belongings closer if I am alone in an elevator with them. Going to school I always had a sense of safety. Having brought white privilege to my conscious awareness, it raised feelings of guilt and shame, because I was ignorant to my oppressiveness for so long. These feelings empowered me to identify various ways in which I can challenge the concept of white privilege in myself and others. On an individual level this can be done by increasing awareness of privilege, reducing feelings of guilt, accepting one’s own role in perpetuating racism. Do not assume that all differences are the same, acknowledge and validate everyone’s experience, avoid assumptions, listen with compassion, and create safety and room for everyone. Additional ways to challenge white privilege consist of exploring resources produced by or about other races, developing relationships with people across racial lines, positioning oneself in a context where they are the numerical minority, and/or exploring the field of whiteness
Dilemma 1: Clash of racial realities; where racial perceptions of people of color differ markedly from those of whites. White Americans believe that minorities are doing better, that discrimination is declining, and that racism is not a significant factor anymore however, minorities, on the other hand, perceive whites as racially insensitive, believing they are superior, and treat them poorly because of their race. Dilemma 2: the invisibility of unintentional expressions of bias; research continues to confirm the existence of unconscious racial biases in well-intentioned whites and that nearly everyone born in America inherits the racial biases of the society. According to this finding, microaggressions would occur when whites would pretend not to notice differences, thereby justifying that "color" was not involved at all, in any of the actions taken. Dilemma 3: perceived minimal harm of racial microaggressions; where/when people of color are told to stop overreacting and to just let it go and so they are encouraged to not waste any time or effort on them. Dilemma 4: the catch-22 of responding to microaggressions; the immediate reaction of the victim is potentially placed in a series of questions. These questions are more often than not, reactions/victims of color who experience "an
You come from a middle class white family, you went to a school whose demographic was mainly white, you live in a white neighborhood, the majority of your friends are white, you decided to continue your education at a college that has a heavily white student body. Notice any similarities? Every aspect of your life has been white. In the past we have had conversations about race, and your opinions always seemed to be unsettling and never really showed any empathy to the struggles minorities face. I never could figure out why you thought this way until I heard the term white privilege in my English class. Once I acknowledged the fact that unknowingly my race has given me advantages that people of color do not have, I am more aware about the racial
I wanted to wear brand clothes/shoes they did, I wanted to do my hair like them, and make good grades like them. I wanted to fit in. My cultural identify took a back seat. But it was not long before I felt black and white did not mix. I must have heard too many comments asking to speak Haitian or I do not look Haitian, but more than that, I am black, so I always had to answer question about my hair or why my nose is big, and that I talked white. This feeling carried on to high school because the questions never went away and the distance between me and them grew larger. There was not much action my family could take for those moments in my life, but shared their encounters or conversations to show me I was not alone in dealing with people of other background. I surrounded myself with less white people and more people of color and today, not much has
The social location we grew up in is not what we wanted for our children this was decided when we got We receive privilege’s that others do not, because of race, social class, education, and gender, even age and the way we present ourselves. Also as a white, married, middle-class, mother, in my thirties, I get respect from a stranger, whether it be at the store, restaurant, or out at a movie theater. I 'm approachable, or non-threating look. My husband also gets these perks, and even more than me because he is a man.
In the article, I Won’t Make Their Lies My Truth by Otterbein senior, Kris Crews, she talks about her experiences growing up black in predominately white schools. When I was reading this article, I found a quote that really resonated with me, “For the longest time, I excused the people who made these comments and made me feel this way. I told myself that they weren’t personally at fault; maybe they had never been taught how to interact with people from different backgrounds and didn’t understand what’s offensive and what’s not. I let them off the hook because I figured their parents had raised them this way, and children are supposed to abide by what their parents teach them” (Crews, 2016). If we go back to the article, What Do You Say When
Have you ever been turned away or discriminated by another being? Patricia Williams was and she wrote about it in “The Death of the Profane: The Rhetoric of Race and Rights”. Williams was discriminated by an employee at a Benetton in New York because of her skin color. She was told the store was closed at 1:00pm while there were still others in the store. Williams created a poster about her rage and posted outside Benetton when it was truly closed. She attempted to write a story but her race, rage, and the stores name was edited out of her paper. Williams convinced them to put her race back into her story, she then spoke at a convention and talked about her experience at Benetton and the struggles of getting her story published. Williams is
I am an Asian with yellow skin very differ with Staples's skin color, but I still was discrimination by some people surrounding me. I remember the first year I lived in America, I was in Middle School, eighth grade; I never forget the day I get in a school bus, everybody: Black, White, Asian, they placed their backpacks on empty seats, because they did not want me to sit with them. I went through all seats and looked around; I was lucky, there was only one back seat left for me in a corner, but when I stepped close to having a sit, a white young girl said, “This seat is taken.” All of them laughed very l...
I am a 22 years old, white female. I know that women have had a great deal of persecution in their struggle for equality and happily, I can say that they did great. I was raised that I was equal to men in every way and thus have always been treated that way. I am proud to be a woman and feel lucky to be born into this life. My race is white and therefore I have never been persecuted for the color of my skin. Even as I write I am figuring out features about myself. For example, I just realized my father raised me in a very neutral way. He is not a prejudice man and I have never heard him make a racist joke, although he makes jokes constantly and is very funny.
I reside here in the United States of America. Currently, I am in Montgomery, Alabama, at a predominately white institute. I sit in a room full of white faces. I find myself intrigued, yet out of place as on the first day, my teacher transforms what I thought to be a typical literature class into a discussion of black women’s rights. I look around observing my peers’ faces as I begin to feel uneasy as the professors indulges into the lecture. I question myself as to why do I feel uncomfortable, as if my professor has revealed secret, government information. Why is it that being taught of black significance seem to compel an uproar within me, yet all of my life I have learned of astonishing white individuals while black excellence was only to be explored within the shortest month of the year? I find it so peculiar how my politics of location has caused me to be reluctant of speaking of black history or anything black in the presence of non-colored individuals.
Although my journey to the University of California, Los Angeles has required many hours of arduous work, it is irresponsible to neglect the fact that my skin color has given me an advantage on my journey towards higher education. My whiteness has, in some ways, allowed me to attend a private college-preparatory school, pay for testing such as the ACT and SAT, apply to colleges, and eventually pay college tuition. Although the dedication my parents have put into creating financial stability for my family is clear, recognizing the lack of obstacles and discrimination they dealt with, as opposed to the daily oppression of many minority groups, is necessary. Lipsitz argues that “Whiteness is everywhere in American culture, but it is very hard to see… ‘white power secures its dominance by seeming not to be anything in particular.’ As the unmarked category against which difference is constructed, whiteness never has to speak its name, never has to acknowledge its role as an organizing principle in social and cultural relations” (Lipsitz 369). Although subtle, my journey to UCLA, and specifically my high school experience, was influenced by whiteness and white privilege. Private schools are often only afforded to white people, who, by majority, make much higher income than people of color. This
I think I have been feeling self-conscious about living in my White culture, not because I am making up issues that are not there, but because I feel guilty about how much of my existence is informed by racism. I was thinking if I came from a more liberal space – if my parents, siblings, family, friends didn’t microaggress – then that would lessen how much I participated with and benefitted from this country’s systematic racism, maybe it would help me come to terms with the fact that I could never have been Eric Garner or Trayvon Martin or Sandra Bland. Cops trust me inevitably. I can do most things without suspicion. But I am realizing that this is not, and will never, be true – no matter who I am friends with. I guess I have to fully come to terms with the fact that my White Culture will always be informed by racism that I an inherently racist, and that this guilt I am feeling is a part of my privilege. I have the privilege to feel guilty about all the things I have, about how my society values my life over POC, while for POC, it is always evident even from when they are young. To POC microaggressions and systemic racism are always a force in their lives; they always know it is there. I have to privilege not only to feel bad about not experiencing these things, but also to not have to even see them. I do not know what to do with this guilt; I just know I have finally realized where it is
I did not understand at the time but people had been saying phrases such as “Go back to where you came from terrorist”. These phrases were overheard by teachers in the school who later notified my parents through a translator. With these incidents and others that followed I was feeling hopeless and constantly looking for someone to give me a hand. About one year had passed in this school before I moved to another town. At this neighborhood, I thought to myself that things would change for the better, but however, the situation worsened. In this new neighborhood I would not only be harassed verbally for my ethnic background but often other kids would vandalize the town house my family lived and pick fights with me because I was an easy target for