White Privilege Primer

For the 1000^th time, and for the people in the back, white privilege is not a tangible benefit you get for being white.  It’s not extra money deposited in your bank account for being white.  White privilege is not a coupon code you get for whitewater rafting trips and pumpkin spice lattes; it’s not a trophy you get to hit Black people with when you don’t like them in spaces where you don’t think we belong.  White privilege means never having to know the pain of being something other than the norm.  White people have been the norm since the architects of history erased Black accomplishment and rewrote white people as the heroes. You have what no Black person, no person of color can ever hope to have in this lifetime; you have the benefit of the doubt.  The world will always see you, your opinion, your voice, and your beliefs as more valid than mine because of your whiteness.  That is white privilege.

Society has never hated your whiteness.  You were not born into a society whose foundations were predicated on the assumption that you were less than human.  The fact that you have never had to contemplate what it feels like to have skin that is universally despised, the fact that people with your skin color are seen as universally right, just, beautiful, and smart, the fact that you have never once been seen as a threat because of the color of your skin is the very definition of white privilege. You've never had to manipulate your identity to compensate for the fact that you are seen as less than right out of you mother's womb. Unless you have been raised in a society where you, where who you are as a person, is hated for superficial and false reasons, unless you are powerless to change that perception, you will never understand what the pain of not being white in a society that worships whiteness feels like.  

White people, you have never lived in a world where your whiteness has been viewed as inherently inferior so you have that advantage over Black people.  That is a privilege.  You have lived your entire life in a world where God was created in your image, that’s not anything close to what I can say so you have that advantage over me.  You exist in a world where you’ve been told that every invention of everything good was from someone who looked like you.  That’s not true by the way.  White people stole Black/Africans knowledge, wisdom, wealth, art, and secrets and claimed them as their own. Your anger at that statement, is racism. That feeling of anger boiling up in you is your subconscious mind insisting that Black people are inferior and incapable of creating anything worth stealing.  I wish I could say that I grew up in a world that accurately told the tales of the great accomplishments of my people, but white men have written history so they are always the victors and Black people are always pawns. 

I wish I could know what it feels like to live in a world where Black people were Gods, where Black people performed magic and understood the heavens and the seas, where we were the architects of civilization and art and science and mathematics, and we lived in harmony together.  I can’t live in that society, however.  I was born into a society that falsely believes that people who look like me have never contributed anything to the world stage.  You have no idea what that feels like because you were white and born into this world created by white men just for you to feel like you were superior to everyone else. 

So, your argument is going to be, “I don’t hate Black people, I’ve never seen Black people as inferior so you’re not talking about me.” There are multiple levels of error with that sentiment.  First and foremost, you are unaware of your subconscious beliefs.  You can’t live in a society that broadcasts Black faces as criminals as the first new story every night and not have that negatively color your perception of Black people.  You lock your door when you see a Black person in a neighborhood.  You wait for the next elevator because you fear a Black person is going to rape and rob you.  You shake your head in disgust when you see a Black woman in Walmart with loud kids and you don’t even care if white kids are loud.  That’s your inherent bias.  You might SAY I’m not racist.  That doesn’t mean that every single belief system you have isn’t based on racist beliefs. 

Now, back to your regularly scheduled deprogramming.  You’ve never turned on a television and been stressed out because every single show on TV is about people who look nothing like you, don’t have anything to do with your reality, or make the people who look like you a fucking criminal or a clown.  If you want to find a TV or movie where people who look like you are the heroes, all you have to do is flip a few channels, you’ll find it.  Me, I have to wait for February.  I have to subscribe to a streaming service. You don’t know what that feels like, so you have that advantage over me.  You say that’s not a big deal, that no one cares about that sort of thing. I say that if you turned on the TV and every show, every movie, every person you saw was Black, every storyline was about the greatness of Black people, every Black character saved the day, you would lose your fucking mind.  Every fucking channel is White Entertainment Network.  Every fucking channel has white programming executives creating content based on their personal racist perceptions.  Every Black show, every Black movie has white people behind it inserting their privilege and racist perceptions.  Every fucking month is white history month because your false history, the history where white people are the heroes and saviors of everything, is all that’s taught in schools. 

You are privileged.  You’ve never looked for a book about a topic and discovered that not one single person who looked like you had authored one.  You’ve never even had to think about something like that, right?  That’s a privilege because that is my experience every time I go on Amazon.  Well, there are no published books, because surely, the publishing community rejected all the authors who looked like me because they didn’t think Black people have a valid voice on the subject, whatever the subject may be.  You’ve never had to experience anything like that in your life.  That’s privilege.

“Well, that’s dumb!  Information is information, it doesn’t matter what color the person is who wrote the book!  You’re the racist for caring about what color the author is.” If the shoe were on the other foot, if you were looking for a book on making stained glass or the history of the organ in the Roman Catholic church, you’d be put off if the only authors on said subjects were Black.  If every book you were interested in had a Black author, you’d say that they weren’t as smart, they didn’t do their research well, that they couldn’t be as smart as a white scholar on the subject.  That’s your racism whether you want to admit it or not. 

 What you’re feeling right now as you form your empty arguments against me is racism.  You need to prove that racism isn’t real, that you don’t have any privilege, and that Black people are making it all up.  That need that you feel to put me in my place, that anger you feel when you think about Black people saying that things are unfair and that you benefit and that you perpetuate racism, is racism.  It’s your belief that we don’t have a right to express any complaints, that if we are unhappy and/or poor, it’s our own damn fault because you’re just lazy and dumb, your core belief is that we are inherently inferior, it’s what you’ve been told your entire life in ways you’ve never considered or contemplated. 

You don’t want us to talk about racism because it makes you mad to think that there are justified reasons we are angry, you want to believe that our anger is unjustified because you don’t think racism isn’t real.  I don’t know how else to explain it to you.  That’s racist.  You being mad at me discussing racism because you don’t like me saying that the system is rigged in your favor is the definition of racism.  It’s denying my pain because it doesn’t make you comfortable.  And unfortunately for you, I won’t do any fucking more.   I’m not going to let you get away with your irrational, immature rant, telling Black people to go back to Africa in one breath and screaming that you aren’t racist in the next, and have you walk away thinking that your opinion invalidates racism. 

Sit with it.  Digest it.  Understand that you acknowledging that you have white privilege, acknowledging that you can’t have the same or even similar painful experiences that Black people have since birth if the first step to you letting go of the fallacy of white supremacy. I know you think that you can’t give up anything, if you concede and admit that racism is real, you think that Black people are going to rise up and enslave whites.  Hell, you were born into a world that was created to make you appear as if you are perfect.  And you’ve grown up believing that.  Calm down, I’m not saying you don’t have insecurities and fears or that you’ve necessarily had an easy life vis-à-vis your whiteness.  I’m saying your life has been better than people with Black skin because we have been told that we don’t belong here.  You’ve been told that you created everything in the world we live in. 

If I had a choice, I would rather be the be living in a world where Blackness was seen as beautiful.  I would like you to invite you to shut the fuck up because you are screaming right now that you think Black people are beautiful.  Society doesn’t.  Society sees Black skin as ugly.  Society sees Black noses as ugly.  Society sees Black people as criminal, lazy, stupid, and ugly. You don’t even see Black people as beautiful, you see us as arousing.  Two different things. You pretending that society doesn’t see Black people as inferior because you individually see Black people as sexually arousing does not negate racism, it is an example of your racism.  Please stop being obtuse and insisting that racism doesn’t exist because you think your personal experience and perception of race invalidates the heinous and debilitating institution of racism. 

Wanting to fuck Black people is not an indication that you aren’t racist.  Wanting to be submissive to Black people is not an indication that you aren’t racist. I’m sorry, but wanting to be sexually degraded, humiliated, and tortured by Black people is not an indication that you aren’t racist. Are you getting it yet?  Even if you swear your sexual desires are not driven by race in any way shape or form, color doesn’t matter, kumbaya, the whole nine, that doesn’t mean that you are self-aware or introspective enough to identify your racism. 

Racism is far more complex and nuanced than white people who aren’t active and avid anti-racists have ever thought of.  Unless you have dedicated your life to understanding and fighting racism, you are incapable of speaking on racism because you know nothing, you know less than nothing about racism.  The clichés you repeat, the ones ingrained in you, those aren’t going to work anymore. You are going to be really pissed off in the next few years because I have new for you, your reign of having the last word, of silencing anyone who doesn’t agree with you, the days of having your opinion being considered more valid than everyone else’s is over. 

I’ve got more bad news for you, white people.  Denying that you have privilege . . . denying that white privilege exists . . . that’s racist.  Denying that white privilege exists is essentially saying that the playing field is level and that everyone has the same opportunity and that Black people are making complaints because we are ungrateful, we are exaggerating, that things are fair and just and if there is any evidence to the contrary, it’s all Black people’s fault for being criminal and dumb.  That’s not true.  I know it’s what you believe, but it’s not true.  The truth is, that when Black people are given even the smallest opportunity, even when it comes saddled with racism and obstacles that white people don’t have, we excel at whatever we do.  If Black people had access to the same opportunities as you, in a world that hates us, we would excel in every possible way.  You have yet to give us credit for that.  We have survived and succeeded when you have had every advantage.  That’s testament to our greatness. 

Denying that you have white privilege is the blatant denial of the fact that every system in this country is built to make white people right and people of color wrong.  You don’t want to think about the fact that the justice system is rigged to incarcerate Black people and let white people get away with murder because of the presumption that Black people are more criminal.  We aren’t.  We are more oppressed.  We are more disadvantaged.  We are denied more opportunities than whites.  If you were denied the same opportunities as Blacks consistently, for generations, I would dare say that white people would not have been able to survive. 

I had a white man tell me recently that white privilege wasn’t a thing because . . . follow me with this one . . . white people are the ones creating false identities as Black people, white people are actively choosing and pretending to be Black so white privilege can’t be a thing.  The basis of his belief is that if so many white people are assuming Black identities, he reasoned, then white privilege can’t be a thing because no white person would want to be Black, no white person would want to assume a Black identity, because whiteness would be better, thus white privilege is a made up concept and Black people are just bitching about white privilege. Still with me? This highly educated white man has convinced himself that white privilege is completely baseless because white people have arrogantly assumed that they could navigate the world and speak to the world as a Black person.  He didn’t see that as white delusional thinking.  He saw that as proof that Black people were insufferable whiners who complained about racism where there isn’t any. 

I confess, I lost it.  The more he made his ridiculous and insane assertions, the angrier and more frustrated I got.  I ended up yelling at him to shut the fuck up and I hung up on him because his assertions were so fucking stupid and he kept asserting that he had definitive proof that racism doesn’t exist because it’s white people who are pretending to be Black.  In the end he condescendingly said that I was unable to handle candid conversations because I refused to even acknowledge what he was saying was valid.  That is white privilege.  I’ve never in my life had the ego or audacity to tell someone else that their experience of life wasn’t as bad as they said it was because my opinion is different.  White men are so used to being told they’re always right that they think they can negate 400 years of racism with the actions of a handful of clearly insane white people. 

This white man never once considered that Blackness is more than color, blackness is an experience.  Blackness is having grandparents who survived Jim Crow and oppressive racism shape your sensibilities and your fears about being Black in a world that doesn’t value you; Blackness is not wearing brown makeup.  Blackness is knowing that your life isn’t as valid as white people’s, Blackness is not a posting #BlackLivesMatter in a Twitter post.  This guy created an absurd truth based on his concept of what it means to be Black in his mind.  In his white mind, Blackness is highly coveted.  He thinks Blackness is the ability of Black men to fuck white women with a big dick.  He has no concept of the pain of being Black.  There is nothing painful about being Black to him because he’s white, privileged, arrogant, and obtuse.  More importantly, he never considered that Blackness is a tragedy. 

The tragic flaw with his delusional thinking is those sad and pathetic white people pretended to be Black, they didn’t actually grow up in a environment where they were called redbone, or high yella, or Sambo, or house nigga by other Black people. They never experienced being called the many creatie racist epithets that white people love to throw around when they are feeling cocky and safe.   They never experienced that sort of pain, thus, their fake personas are not an indication that racism isn’t bad or that white supremacy doesn’t exist.  These imposters didn’t grow up in a society where every magazine, every movie, every TV show, fuck, every myth, fairy tale, and magical creature was Black and they felt different and flawed for being born.  This guy failed to grasp that Blackness was more than just the skin color he jerks off to watching interracial porn. 

Racism can’t be reversed.  I know you want to yell and scream that it can be.  You want to believe that someone calling you a cracker in the 7^th grade is the same as calling a Black person a nigger.  It’s not.  Your failure to recognize the historical context of racism, your failure to empathize and understand that being white in a world literally created to falsely identify whites as superior, is racist.  I can’t, I didn’t grow up in a world where my Blackness was revered as sacred, holy, righteous, and pure so I can’t, we can’t have the same experience of racism.  You are always going to be the beneficiary of the fallacy of white supremacy; the system was designed for me to never have power over you.  I will never know what it means to know that my identity, irrespective of anything that I’ve personally done, is worshipped around the world as being the creators and originators of the world as we know it.  African accomplishment and achievement has been erased from history.  African heroes have been written out of world history.   African consciousness has been grafted with the greed, materialism, and the petty insecurity of white consciousness so that we have no access to our greatness as a people.  White people will never ever know what that feels like and that is the ultimate white privilege.