The Best Explanation of White Privilege?

[xbuzzerx]

I gave up on page four and skipped to the end when a thought took up residence in my brain and waved for attention:

Most of this discussion revolves around whether there's such a thing as zero.

Really!

I don't feel that the discussion of "whether or not there is a zero", or zero sum, is strictly the grounds of disagreement, no. Whether we say whites are +1 and blacks are -1, or whether we say whites are 0 and blacks are -3, in a comparative statement it would still remain true that whites are privileged over blacks in our society.

Bankside's position ultimately says, whites are at zero and if anyone is under zero it's due to racism, and whites aren't privileged at all because everyone should be at zero. I don't actually disagree with the ultimate picture he's taking aim at with that statement, but his disavowal of any privilege to the group that is at zero while most everyone else is under zero is the source of our disagreement. Whether we define baseline as being 0 or 5 or -200, the group that is there with every other group being under them is experiencing a relative privilege, whether or not members of that group would turn around and say "but everyone should be here."

An example I know that we touched upon down in CE&P regarding some of the shooters lately... take the Colorado Batman theater shooter, a white grad student. The entire discussion became about his "mental health." What would that public discussion have been if he'd been a) Arab or b) black? I think we all know the discussion would have had an extremely different theme.

 

[pat grimshaw]

Are we talking Queen Latifah? or Nat King Cole? Duke Ellington and Earl Nelson?

Here's another: De' Marquise Elkins.
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/03/22/us/georgia-baby-killed/index.html

 

[refujiunderground]

Here's another: De' Marquise Elkins.
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/03/22/us/georgia-baby-killed/index.html

wtf does his name have to do with anything?

black suspect, white victim=guilty until proven innocent.

white suspect, black victim=innocent until proven guilty.

what's even sadder is how the police were able to find two black kids to charge without having ANY evidence other than they were not in school that day. that's what's disturbing about the whole thing. that could be ANY black teenager for that matter.

also white victim gets nationwide media attention.

black victim gets up on the patch news or in the back of the newspaper.

in america, a white life matters more than a black life and this is the proof. i'm surprised at how most people are assuming that they're guilty despite the questionable tactics that the police had in finding them in the first place. how many kids were NOT in school that day where they were able to pick out those two? no weapon found? i'm curious to see how the police did it's investigation to pick out two black kids and say that they're the prime suspects. racism still alive in america.