I'm not actually sure what's the problem here, there are serious cultural problems that come from Nigeria, as well as other countries where women's rights are but a dream and a thought, most relevant to this thread is their views on rape. You also omitted where I said they can be pretty cool.



Probably a problem in the land of the free, not here, native Irish or whatever get frisked a lot. Mostly it's just the small time teenage dealers who are predominately white males. Employment opportunities and salaries? True -for both genders. Blind CV studies have shown that both men and women are favored for certain positions. Housing? I honestly haven't a clue about, that's actually news to me. I would have assumed it's the opposite, to be honest. Sexual Harassment is pretty subjective, Adria Richards, for example got a man fired for making an innuendo joke with his friend about computers, a joke that she eavesdropped on and had nothing to do with her, but yes, it's a problem in the workforce (I'm... reasonably sure women get away it a bit more than men, but I don't know if there's a single source for estimated sexual harassment in the work force and the how many are punished per gender so it makes sense to concede that one a bit).
But for the sake of argument, I'll say I'm totally wrong, these are infallible male privileges. Does this mean that the fact that women are less likely to be homeless, commit suicide, not be pressured into dangerous jobs, have priority for custody and alimony are not privileges? These are all advantages that come with being a woman, and I'm not sure why what you see as male advantages are privileges and those would not be.

Actually women are way more likely to attempt suicide. Men just tend to do it in more effective ways (i.e. because they own guns, because guns are manly).

Is it possible, and this is even more controversial, but why not, that it could also mean that for whatever reason, more attempted suicides by women are cries for help/attention seeking behaviour than in men? But yes, guns are manly, and not advanced compensation machines.

the lady doth protest too much

Absolute rot. My impotence has nothing to do with my extensive gun collection.

Agreed.

What I was trying to explain is that these sorts of discrimination go all ways, but overall white men are discriminated against the least, as well as being the largest beneficiaries of these behaviors. That is quite apparent in our culture imo.

Whites in general are. The the short of it is, it's not bad in a lot of Ireland, but from my time in the states, there's a huge race problem still, it's just evolved a bit in the last few decades.

What the actual fuck? I just said it's an example of male privilege. Because people asked for examples. Do you know what the word means?


If women had tons of inherent advantages in other fields of life, you could certainly list that as an example of female privilege. The major point however is that the privilege is disproportionately in the favour of straight white males in almost every area of life.


It appears you really don't get what the term "privilege" means, because... I'm honestly at a loss as to why you'd say I'm "painting a group of people with a nasty brush". Saying that white males are privileged is not remotely the same thing as "white men suck" or "white men have no merit" or "white men are sexist racist pigs" or whatever imaginary boogeyman you think I'm talking about. I mean seriously, do describe this "nasty brush" to me. Go on, I'm waiting.


Oh, thanks. Obviously I never considered socio-economic reasons. Duh, me so silly. And it's not like discrimination based on race or gender or sexual orientation or even religion ever affected these socio-economic factors, right?
Also, it's important to note that the presence of other factors does not in any way disprove the existence of privilege. [Edit: also, wealth privilege does exist. No one denies that. It doesn't mean the other things don't exist.]


It's not my fault if you've chosen to interpret the statement "white male privilege exists" into some sort of gigantic strawman, and instead of educating yourself on the concept you've just flat out denied that it's even a thing. Hint: the presence of racial and sexual discrimination alone (whether it's illegal or not is not the point; the fact that it still happens regardless of legality is) is proof enough that there's such a thing as privilege.

Btw: as a straight white person, I am very much a privileged individual. I have absolutely no problem recognizing this hard fact and I wouldn't get defensive if someone told me so. Which is why I am at a loss whenever I see straight white men protest so loudly, as if it somehow demeaned them to be called privileged. It's like their manhood are attacked or something, WTF? If a LGBT person tells me "this [statement/movie/quote/person/whatever] here is homophobic and/or transphobic" and I initially didn't think it was, I'd ask myself if it's just my straight privilege talking. If a majority of LGBT people agreed with me I'd say "perhaps this individual is overreacting and this [thing] is really harmless or not offensive after all", but if they didn't, I'd certainly check my privilege and reconsider my opinion instead of being dismissive and saying "stop being so PC and whiny, it's not a big deal". Because, you know, I never had to deal with discrimination based on race or sexual orientation, so what the fuck do I know.

[Edit: Speaking of "stupid attitude", though, I can't claim that crown, I'll leave that to those who use "penis hating" in their rhetoric. Now that's a winner. ]

Arguing with Riffs about privilege seems a lot like arguing with an I.D.-creationist about evolution. "Only microevolution can be proven! There's no evidence for macroevolution!"

This is a good explanation of privilege. Sooooo many dudes confuse recognizing male privilege as some sort of weird attack or demand for an admission of guilt. That's not what it's about so put on your big boy pants, check your assumptions, and get over it.

I'm late to the party so the only other thing I'll add is that we need to spend more effort teaching boys and men what rape is and why it's wrong.

I think it could also be a control issue. Like, dudes who go out of their way not to be racist or sexist are personally insulted when someone makes a claim that they benefit from while male privilege.

Isn't it obvious the poor are all becoming (wage) slaves, especially here, whatever their cultural background.

This was written about America but it also applies here,



Say/hint anything about the increased competition from overseas (see uncontrolled mass immigration UK) and your obviously racist, very neat.

I await the name calling, references to movies, because I know many here aren't capable of rational debate on this growing public concern, and - Two wrongs don't make a right.





Someone commented the other day how the Irish were slaves in America before the Africans - the forgotten slaves.

http://www.historyjournal.ie/irish-slav ... trade.html

Apologies for deviating from the thread topic.

I honestly think the issue surrounding this could be summed up like this:

If A: being a straight white male gives me x number of privileges not given to others
and B: My life sucks, I struggle with all sorts of problems
Then C: Do I just suck at life given that I'm (supposedly) playing on easy settings and still getting owned?

From my analysis on the intersection between class, race and gender, this seems to be why poor white males seem to have the biggest chip on our shoulder. If you're told that you have it easy but you cant make a "success" of yourself, the internalisation of that guilt/shame construct can make you bitter and hostile. It's part of the legacy of calvinist protestantism in some parts of the world - the perception that if you can't "make it" there really must be something wrong with you.

So, part of my criticism of and defence against the "male privilege" argument comes down to "which men? Where?" - because it's a form of simplistic identity politics to imagine that a poor male is "privileged" over a wealthy female. Add race to that equation and it becomes a much more nuanced discussion than the shrill and hyperbolic click-bait media would have you think.

Regarding here people have a reason to feel let down, employers cherry picking from all over the world, especially when further education is free in some countries, many students here leave owing huge debt - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/26 ... 37000.html

From another thread


"doubtful that the Swedes will hire a non-Swede over a Swede" and it's the same in many other countries, like Thailand and the Philippines and I suspect Japan, China ...

Many countries safe guard their poor by not admitting, or limiting menial workers, yet England is different and if you question why your called names. And if you say well the English wont do these jobs you'd have to look into how the welfare state has evolved, how the unions were once too powerful (1970's) and how you need a liveable wage to afford accommodation, utility bills etc (hence welfare dependency), when many from overseas are prepared to live in sub-standard conditions and put up with abuse in the work place because at least they have a job and can send money home to help their family, and are literally too scared to complain about workloads/conditions.

Interestingly those who undercut workers here are now worried the same may happen to them as restrictions made in 2007 are lifted;



How do you think people can compete with this relatively recent development?

Fair enough. But fact is that there is that statistically white heterosexual men are better off than anyone else, even if some percentage of them isn't. It think the main purpose of using the term "privilege" is to demonstrate to white heterosexual men why they might have a blind spot for the existence and gravity of discrimination in our culture. Their "privilege" means that they normally don't have to deal with these things. It doesn't mean that every straight white man has the same oppurtunites in life. But if you give a healthy black gay woman and a healthy straight white man who are both the same age each 100000 bucks and an identical apartment in the same western city, the latter still has far better chances to lead a happy and successful life.

Well, I'm Australian rather than British (although only by one generation removed, so same difference really), but I see this stuff every day. Not as bad as the UK has it with the open borders requirement of the EU thankfully. I used to make jokes about how my Grandfathers would be rolling in their graves that it's easier for a German to work in the UK than their Grandchildren, despite fighting a war to keep them out. Re the student debt thing, I just had the NZ inland revenue attack me after not hearing from them from 12 years, saying they are calling in all outstanding student loans held by people who have not been "home" for over a decade. My current employer almost only hires Indian IT grads on shady permanent residency scams because they can get them cheap and they don't complain or join unions.

Anyway, the upshot of all this is that I sometimes honestly feel aggrieved being attacked as a "privileged straight white male" as if I were Wilbur from Mr. Ed or the Dad from "leave it to Beaver", with a house and a car and a stay at home wife. My privilege is what exactly? Massive debt? Diminished expectations? The idea of home ownership and supporting a family a thing of the past?

If I were to put on my big red socialist commentator hat, I would say that what we are seeing is a complete breakdown of the "old order" , and that while it's lifted some out of poverty and opened up the world up in ways that were unthinkable a couple of decades ago, it's not without it's winners and losers, And that for the most part, the biggest losers have been what I think a large part of the demographic of this site is made up of - well meaning, fairly well educated but not ruthlessly ambitious straight white men. A generation ago, the backbone of the unionised working class and the petit Bourgeois. These days, echoing Talking Heads - "This is not my beautiful house. This is not my beautiful wife. Where is my large Automobile?".

We seem to be so intent on beating each other up across fairly narrow gender and race issues that it's deflecting the real criticism from late-stage (vulture) capitalism and globalisation. A classic divide and rule" strategy as far as the "culture wars" stuff goes. Is it grotesque and uncondonable the instances of misogyny and rape culture anyone could point to? Of course. But I would hope that any decent human being would recognise this,and refuse to be a part of it. But, while they are our (broke) mothers, (Broke)wives, (broke) Daughters and (broke) sisters that are subjected to it, I tend to view it as a cultural phenomenon as part of a culture of cruelty and shallowness driven by the fact that everyone is broke and pissed off, and buying into a culture of "scoring points" off each other because everyone is so fundamentally angry and miserable.

Related: anyone want to invest in my flat-pack Guillotine company?

One last thought about the privilege thing after having read all the way back through this thread: "Does a fish know it's wet?"

What I mean by that question is this: everyone is trying to "level up" so to speak. That's the nature of a capitalist society - that we internalise a comparison with the guy above you. That you keep your fingers on the rung of the ladder above you and your foot on the head of the guy underneath you trying to climb over you. Issues about sexual harassment, stop-and-search, indigenous deaths in custody etc etc are things that happen to other people somewhere else.Not really "real" in terms of lived experience - and maybe that's the "privilege" , the ability to tune it out when we decide we've had enough of being all nice and sensitive. "We don't know we're wet", like the fish,because our (or at least what used to be our) demographic was the gauge of what is and is not taken seriously in our culture. That we can get our "good bloke badge" by being committed to these issues, up until the point when it becomes inconvenient, at which point we can tune out and go back to the mainstream if we chose.

If I recall correctly, this was the gist of Norman Mailer's "The white negro" essay way back in the 50's.

Are they really the biggest losers, or are they just the demographic that you pay the most attention to?

The Irish weren't largely considered "white" until relatively recently. In fact some older texts considered them part of some lost African people. In any case, throughout history, everyone enslaved everyone else.


I don't think rape is a very black and white matter, and certainly in terms of motivation. Andrea Dworkin was raped several times throughout her life, for example, so attractiveness certainly isn't a factor for everyone, so in some cases, sex is a tool to express domination, I suppose.

Nah. It's a common mistake to assume that "privilege" means "guarantee", but that's not what it's about. Having privileges in life does not mean your life will automatically easy. And lacking privilege in some areas is also not a guarantee that your life will be harder.

Having privilege in some areas means that you won't ever have to worry about these things. A straight white male in North America will almost never have to worry about racial discrimination, sexual harassment, or homophobia. That doesn't mean he can't be poor, or mistreated, or struggle in life in some other ways. But with racism, sexism and homophobia specifically he's privileged:
- If he drives poorly or carelessly, people won't say it's because of his gender.
- If he's promiscuous, he won't be slut-shamed. He might even receive praise or admiration from his peers.
- If he commits a crime, people won't say it's because he's white.
- If he has a hobby shared mostly by white males (e.g. metal, gaming, chess, whatever), his "hobby cred" won't be called into question because of his sex or race.
- If he gets a promotion, no one will say it's because he's sleeping with the boss.
- If he avoids prison, he is unlikely to ever be sexually assaulted.
- He gets to be "the default" in a variety of media ("straight white male" is pretty much the "default" protagonist in movies, TV, novels, video games, etc.) so he's obviously not bothered by the representation of his gender, race or sexual orientation.
- If he's a public figure, his physical attractiveness or lack thereof won't be a point of discussion and is likely to never be mentioned at all.
- If he's fat or physically unattractive, society won't be as harsh towards him as they would towards a fat and/or unattractive.
- People are unlikely to lock their car doors or clutch at their purse more tightly if he walks past them. (Even president Obama has stated that this happened to him in his youth, that's how widespread this racism is. No, it didn't prevent him from being president, that's not the point.)
- He doesn't have to worry about which public restroom or gym changeroom to use.

That doesn't mean he can't be unlucky, struggle financially or academically, be bullied or assaulted, and so on. No one ever said otherwise. And it doesn't mean that a black transwoman can't succeed in life, or that if she doesn't it's inherently because of her lack of privilege either. But you have to be wilfully blind to deny that she starts out with fewer advantages in life.
That doesn't mean we are saying his opinion on racism, sexism and homophobia are worthless either, just less informed and more... privileged. Those who whine about that are just projecting their insecurity.

Also, as I said, there is such a thing as "wealth privilege" too. Those who start from wealthy or well-off families have more advantages in life than those who don't. It doesn't mean poor people can't make it or that wealthy people can't suffer either. But how often do we see wealthy public figures be so oblivious to the plight of the poor? That's exactly what being blind to one's privilege is all about.

On another note, I think I'll split this tangent to a new thread, as this is quite the derail now I guess. [Edit: done. Original thread found here: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=101013]

I think with this whole white male privilege in the states it has become kind of unpopular. Being ethnic is kind of trendy and claiming heritage other than wasp heritage is in, people are more open about their pride in their native American lineagy and you've got proud Irish/Italian/German/Scottish American(although the Irish American are the most showwy of the lot, sorry about that ).

Where the white male still dominates is in industry and politics, white men are CEO's and top politicians because they are old and most likely grew up in a time when women were expected to stay home with the kids. Now Yahoo have a female CEO and even in my own software job we have plenty of women working there and not the stereotypical nerdy type, proper feminine women who just happen to be top quality software developers. Times are changing with this whole white privilege thing. Although in the famous words of Reginald D Hunter. The Irish don't do white privilege very well

Having lived abroad in some non-white countries, I'd sadly have to say white male privilege is a reality, probably not so much as it used to be, but I believe it's reinforced by pop culture quite a bit.

Male privilege has of course been a part of global society for aeons, with Asian and Islamic countries being much worse than European societies in this regard.

The worst symptom of "white privilege" exists mostly in the fashion/cosmetics industry, where black and asian women are sadly forcefed this fictional image of Britney Spears/Barbie doll "white beauty", and are told they can't be beautiful unless they get nose jobs and eyelid surgery to look white, as if Asian/African beauty is somehow "inferior" to the image of the white celebrity they have, which is really sad and makes me sick to my stomach....
Being married to an Asian myself, I think Asian women should be proud for looking Asian......

"Privilege" in "progressive" circles is used more for instrumental than descriptive purposes. "You don't get to reveal my victim-mentality or double standards because you're white/a male." It has lost any academic use it might have had thanks to the legions of septum-pierced "genderqueer" college students who repurposed it as a slur.

Even those who use it correctly obsess over it to a creepy degree, in a way that reminds me of the Christian original sin concept. I refuse to act like some conquered, ashamed creature because I was born a certain way.

No one told you you should be ashamed or submissive for being born a certain way. That line of thought comes from the fedora warriors, who've twisted the concept out of proportion. I think the term could use a revamping, though; it's used more in a derogatory light from what I see.

Reading this hit me like a ton of bricks. I've seen this shit happen at work, at class, everywhere. Just being consciously aware of the attitudes and actions that occur on a daily basis is disturbing now that I'm thinking about it.

No one should ever be ashamed of their heritage, and if anything, I think the whole white/male privilege thing ALSO negatively affects white males, just like it affects women or ethnic minorities.
This is why it's our responsibility as well to help fight against it!!

Nelson Mandela himself said that if we're to go forward, we need to stop carrying the burdens of our grandparents' generation!!
That's really the only way to end segregation and racism!!

Dude. Read Scorntyrant and Morrigan's posts again. It's not about shaming white men for being white men. At all.

Everyone thinks they're an expert at these recently canonized concepts (not that "privilege" is new, but this new "check your privilege" school of thought). However, I've seen it applied in the exact way he and I described.

Every logical conclusion of "privilege"-oriented social thinking involves making excuses for one person based on his/her melanin/junk/sexual preference, and not making the same excuses for another person based on his/her melanin/junk/sexual preference. Someone who claims to champion equality buying into that kind of thinking is a case of pure doublethink.

For the record I used to espouse views like that, but I eventually wised up and smelled the bullshit. It's turned into victim-pageantry.

Insulting an entire class of people with non-binary gender expressions not only hurts the argument you're trying to make, but also makes you look like a humongous asshole.

If you don't understand the difference between thinking everyone has an equal shot and WANTING everyone to have an equal shot...well, I really don't know what to tell you.

Stats on attempted suicide are very unreliable and tend to vary. Stats of on actual deaths by suicide... much more reliable.

You're missing the point I was making. The vehicles of women being searched way less often than males doesn't actual mean they are systematically "advantaged" or privileged" in any way. What I was saying is, you need to be careful how you apply data and interpret it. I'm not coming up with "fields of discrimination against men". I'm saying those so-called "fields" may necessitate more thoughts than simply looking at statistical data point blank.

And what you said above, more precisely, is that you couldn't understand how someone who stood up against an instance of discrimination would not conclude that there is such a thing as white men privileges. Of course there are actual examples of people being discriminated based on their skin color or gender. But I'm not seeing this so-called privilege where white men are magically above discrimination.



Others have already explained how it's a divisive term, not useful and can be seen as demeaning. It is a reductionist concept.



Well at this point, we're more talking about proving the existence of privileges rather than disproving a fantasy you pulled out of your ass.

And since you've informed yourself on socio-economic issues, I'm sure you'll agree that these are complex issues. A lot of stuff is interacting in any stat you can pull off. We can't go around and proclaim blacks are inherently more prone to criminal behaviour just because statistically, they have a large share in criminal sentences. That would be shortsighted and ignore a lot of issues. Similarly, you can't single out white men every time you get touchy feely.

And I agree with you that race and gender could traditionally affect these socio-economic factors. I think you understand that. But this isn't 1950. We're in 2013. Things are in place for people to succeed regardless of their gender or ethnic background and mentalities have thankfully changed. Yes, there will be times when someone will be discriminated against for being black, or a woman. There will also be, unsurprisingly, times where you're discriminated for being white or a man.

But I'm not seeing how someone with a certain family background, education, "startup conditions" would be systematically "privileged" over someone else simply because of his skin color or gender.



As a blanket statement, it does seem to be a gigantic strawman to me. Terribly ineffective to boot.



If you feel you've been given unfair advantages because of your skin or gender or sexual orientation, speak up.

If you feel someone is being discriminated upon, speak up as well.

More and more people are calling out specific instances of discrimination. That shit isn't flying out so well anymore, neither in court nor in society.

Grow a fucking spine and do likewise, instead of shifting the blame on a specific group of people or guilt-tripping.



But of course, if someone dares to question your "white man privilege" statement politely, you'll just call them cretins.



If you think you've never been discriminated because of your race, you live in your very own, delusional bubble. Even Spike Lee would tell you that.

Even though you like to call me a cretin, I'll tell you I understand a lot of what you are talking about. I don't deny discrimination exists, I've said so early in this thread. I just don't think it systematically ends up favoring the big bad white man in a manner that justifies coming up with this concept of privilege you speak of.

Being born is always a lose/lose scenario......

If you're born a minority, you're born with fewer privileges.

If you're born a majority, you're hated by all.

No matter what you're born as, someone is always going to automatically hate or discriminate against you for the body you're born with.

Suicide and total annihilation of all life on the planet is the only answer.

(True story: I attempted suicide at the age of 12 after watching Fern Gully.....)

This doesn't become true just because it's repeated again and again.

Riffs is looking at this in terms too literal and concrete. "White male privilege" doesn't connotate a "big bad white man." It doesn't mean bad anything, and most white guys aren't ashamed in the least to be white or male. Nor should they be.

However - If you can't see that being born white and male means that you have less chance of being discriminated against or disadvantaged, you are blind. Social and economic factors build upon that, and create more layers to the whole thing. These factors make a lot of difference, and a rich, well educated person of any other color or gender will be perfectly fine, but the fact is, history has favored the white man in Western culture at the very least.

Now we are forging a new path in which there is much less discrimination and things have become more complex, due largely to civil rights activism and the trend toward more intelligence. So in that respect yes, social and economic and other factors will make much more of a difference than before - and I doubt anyone is arguing that. But being born white and male generally means that, disregarding what happens to the person as they get older and begin to make choices, that person won't be harassed sexually, be profiled as a criminal, be looked at as weaker or less competent or anything else, nearly as much. It's not about individual cases, not about exceptions - these are facts of our culture.

It is true. Minorities, religious and ethnic, in any country have historically been oppressed, regardless of whether the white heterosexual, non-otherkin cisgender male boss hog super satan has been present of not. There's a lot of reasons why, but it can easily be summed up with "us versus them" mentality that has been so prevalent, even among animals like chimps.

Do many commenting realise what's happening in the UK? Because I think if some did they wouldn't sound so intransient to others posting about their concerns.

This was taken from the guardian;




How can it be that in simply expressing the truth in an official consensus someone should feel the need to ommit their name? what does that tell you about others mentality?

I assume everyone here is well aware of this line of thinking. At least one Pakistani pedo ring was deliberately poorly investigated due to the police fears of being labelled racists. Lucky bastards and their pedo privilege.

Try being white in Hawaii. (I'm asssuming that counts as North America as part of the U.S.) Or Atlanta, Baltimore, or any other place whites are the minority.

It's all relative and people are treated differently based on whatever environment or circumstance comes up.

Call the cops and report domestic violence next door. They'll come looking for a man and won't even consider a woman as the perp.

Women never get treated as a criminal. That's a huge advantage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ge7i60GuNRg

Hell, people were offering the girl to help steal the bike for her.

Men have it way easier than women in other places. Whites have it easier in some places.

Who has it worse is purely a matter of opinion. Maybe the most important thing to me is that people don't question my cred if I talk about hip hop. In that case, I would rather be black than white. Or maybe I've had rough times as a black male and the most important thing in my life is that the cops don't target me as a criminal. In that case I'd rather be a white woman.

Any chance you could provide a legitimate source for this accusation? All I've found is a Daily Mail article, which is about as credible a source as a self-proclaimed "Black Metal Scholar" with a Nickelback shirt.

Standing up against discrimination does not mean privilege does not exist as a social concept. A total non-sequitur.

But then again, it appears you still don't get it, since you write garbage like this:


(I never said that.)

(What fantasy?)

(I already gave tons and tons of examples, that are mysteriously ignored. I also repeatedly said privilege is not the same thing as guarantee, gave examples, etc.)

(...I don't think you know what the word strawman means, here. I'm saying you used a strawman, e.g. you distorted what others are saying into something they are not saying at all in order to dismiss it.)


Again missing the point. If I see someone being discriminated against by a white person, I wouldn't shrug and go "oh, look at this privileged asshole" and do nothing, what the fuck? This isn't remotely about blame-shifting or guilt-tripping, as I and others have been explaining over and over again.


I can tell that this really offended you huh? I'd feel bad for being rude and I might even have apologized if you hadn't a) called me a penis hater (and now you added "delusional" to that, nice) and b) persistently and repeatedly keep ignoring points being made and distort said points into things they're not and c) steadfastly cling to the notion that I'm blame-shifting and finger-pointing the "big bad white man". So no, you don't get to whine about name-calling when you engage in the same thing and in a far more obnoxious manner.


When I say discriminated, I mean in a negative sense. And I can assure you I've never been a victim of racism. If you mean that I've had positive discrimination because of my race (e.g. random people treating me decently where they may have been rude to a non-white person beforehand), then sure, that probably happened... and that would be an absolutely perfect example of my white privilege. So yay, glad we agree!


"Big bad white man". lol.... yeah, no, you still don't get it.


Sigh, obviously I meant in places that they're the majority, which is most of North America.

....Yeah, never.