Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Privilege

Privilege is a very difficult word to define. Some people may feel that it means whoever is privileged has an oppurtunity over others; whereas, some people may feel that being privileged is simply being able to live their daily lives without having obstacles preventing them from living it. I feel that there are many things in my life that make me privileged. For example, I do not have to worry about paying for my own rent while being in college because my parents are able and willing to support me while I am still in school. I am able to attend the University of Oklahoma which is certainly not a low out of state tuition and get a good education.

People who don't believe that white privelege exists are naive because as sad as it is, it does exist in today's society. I am able to walk into a job interview or apply for a university without people questioning me because I am white and most of them are white. They don'y feel threatened because they don't feel that I am dangerous because we are the same. Or at least that is what their thought process is do to labels of other races and even their own.

http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/freelance/whiteprivilege.htm

But are we really the same? I could have a background of drug addictions, of theft, or any other crime (which I don't by the way) but they wouldn't even know it because they assume "She's white, she must be harmless." Just because I am white, doesn't mean that I am the person that they are looking for. Just because someone is African-American doesn't mean that they aren't the person that they are looking for. They very well could be. Just because they are African-American, doesn't mean that they didn't have the same education or have't experienced the same success that I have. There are many successful African-Americans. There are many unsuccessful whites and vice-versa.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wQwq7Fvs2s

The video we watched in class made an interesting point when he said that a high percentage of African-Americans or Hispanics get pulled over for a car search, but whites are the ones who have a higher percentage of actually having something. Unfortunately, there are people who put labels on other races for whatever reasons and can't break away from the idea that not every person in a race is the same. Just because a white guy gets caught with drugs, doesn't mean that all white people do drugs. Just because an African-American (Kobe Bryant) was accused of raping a woman, doesn't mean that all African-American males rape women. These kind of situations cause stereotypes which initially hurt people's views towards a race even though people shouldn't be as naive.

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