Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Not Bob

I think you mostly get the concept; you just don't like the terminology that the kids are using these days. We straight white guys in the soft alcoholism of middle age are used to thinking about "privilege" as some special and unique gift for certain individuals. So we bristle at the idea that the grandson of an Irish stone cutter who came to the US via Ellis Island, and the son of a blue collar Union guy, is "privileged" in the same way that a Princeton legacy admitted WASP whose name has Roman numerals is "privileged."

But we are. In all sorts of ways, big and small. Senior government officials getting pulled over for driving while black. White lawyers assuming black female lawyers at a deposition are the court reporters. A black female cop came onto my crowded subway (shhh!) the other day, and bumped two or three of us as she walked by. I got an "excuse me, sir" but she didn't say anything to the black guy in a suit standing next to me. Silly example, but there you go.

Apparently, NB, I'm actively perpetuating the bad system. Though it's unspecified, I'm somehow availing myself of benefits at cost to another. (Nevermind concrete steps I've actually taken against it.)

This is what I meant when I said "loaded" term. I'm guilty of availing myself of benefits at cost to another. I'll leave you, or someone else, to explain what they were, and how that was an intentional bad act on my part, and I guess your part, and also the part of everyone else who happens to fit into the "privileged" category.