Before continuing on with my discussion, I wanted to address something I wrote in my previous post. I wrote that if the reader disagreed with my modified definition of racism, their dissent didn't matter because it wasn't their perspective. To help understand what I meant like that, I want to talk about a Lego sculpture. Imagine a seemingly order less mass of Lego, but when you shine a light on it a certain way, you see the silhouette of a dragon. Standing a few feet from you, someone is looking at the same sculpture but because of where they are standing, a different light is casting a shadow of a butterfly. Same sculpture, two different perspectives that are both valid. The difference being not just where you are standing, but the light that is casting the shadow. I wanted to try and clarify that because in this post I want to try and tackle privilege, and clarifying what I meant, and how our background and education shape it, will hopefully help me get my point across.
If you would like a visual for the concept above, check this out:
Like the last post, let's talk about how privilege might be generally defined, and then modify it to how it can be used from a different context.
I remember when I first heard someone talk about privilege in a more social justice context, I thought that it was stupid. I wasn't rich, I didn't go to a private school, my family doesn't have a jet; my family worked for what we had, nothing was just handed to us. I had to wear knock-off shoes from Payless when growing up! (Aside: I don't have anything against Payless.) For me privilege = wealth. This is what makes privilege a tricky topic, it's easy to see ourselves as not benefiting from it, and seeing others who are more wealthy as the ones who are privileged. While money certainly plays a part in privilege (socio-economic privilege is a very real thing, and I would argue the foundation of the current chaotic election), it is only one of many ways that a person or group can get a leg up on others. Privilege can also be described as having unimpeded access towards a certain social objective, such as higher education or marriage.
Areas such as education, country or state of birth, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, gender identity, and race, are just the tip of the iceberg. How your parent's and grandparents fit into the above list affects your level of privilege as well. With the Lego sculpture, the light is each person's privilege, and it grows lighter or dimmer depending on the demographics of that person.
The two people are standing in different spots looking at the same sculpture, but there is a barrier making it difficult to see what the other is seeing. Behind one person, there is a strong bright light making the image easy to see, and the other has a dim light. To make matters worse, it's pretty clear the stronger light is making it harder for the person with the dim light to make out their image. In this scenario, it would be easy to go around the barrier and see that there is a different image. It would also be easy to understand that it is harder to see.
Unfortunately, getting to the other person's perspective is rarely easy, because it takes effort on our part to understand what they are seeing. What happens with privilege is that we don't have to understand because there are not any repercussions for ourselves. We express sympathy that the other person is struggling, but simply ignore the problem. We say they should just look harder, but don't admit that they shouldn't have to.
This is the difference between sympathy and empathy. Sympathy allows us to acknowledge a problem without addressing it, being able to move on without our lives being affected (which is the essence of privilege). Empathy requires effort and putting the other person first.
So how do we act when we're faced with our privilege? In the next post, I'm planning on talking about guilt and how focusing on it prevents us from truly helping others.
