Do you consider the phrase "White Male Privilege" to be Harassment?

originally posted by: Byrd

originally posted by: MrInquisitive

There is such a thing as white privilege in this country, but to accuse every white male in the country as being responsible for it and continuing it is wrong, and just as bad as any other racial stereotyping.

You appear to have fallen for the ATS version of "white male privilege" instead of what it actually is. The term comes from P McIntosh (1989) and the original paper can be found here

Here's the basics:
The author's statement where she defines "white male privilege" I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was “meant” to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools and blank checks.

I can if I wish arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure of renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.
I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
When I am told about our national heritage or about “civilization,” I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.
If I want to, I can be pretty sure of finding a publisher for this piece on white privilege.
I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods that fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser’s shop and find someone who can cut my hair.
Whether I use checks, credit cards or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.
I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like them.
I can swear, or dress in second-hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial.
I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.
I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.
I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color who constitute the world’s majority without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.
I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to “the person in charge,” I will be facing a person of my race.
If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven’t been singled out because of my race.
I can easily buy posters, postcards, picture books, greeting cards, dolls, toys, and children’s magazines featuring people of my race.
I can go home from most meetings of organizations I belong to feeling somewhat tied in, rather than isolated, out-of-place, outnumbered, unheard, held at a distance, or feared.
I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having co-workers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
I can choose public accommodations without fearing that people of my race cannot get in or will be mistreated in the places I have chosen.
I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help, my race will not work against me.
If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether it has racial overtones.
I can choose blemish cover or bandages in “flesh” color and have them more less match my skin.

So it's more about how the culture is set up and not an indictment of anything in particular. The idea of her essay was that if we know and understand these points and see how they affect others, that we can make sure they have the same kind of expectations that an Average White Guy has.

Some of it (like bandages and makeup) have been addressed... and the world didn't fall apart.

ATS seems to conflate it with Men's Rights Activism and similar philosophies. It's not what they think it is. And yes, I'm aware of my own privilege thanks to this. It's not a burden or rime, but it is something for sociesty to work on.

I understand what you mean by white privilege, and understand that it, too, exists and that I can't help but be a recipient of it, but I and my male colleagues have actually been accused of the ATS form of white privilege several times in my life. Once as a grad student, by a woman with less education and life experience than ourselves and no knowledge of our work environment, when the real issue was male professorial privilege, and once by a speaker who came at the behest of my employer at the time. This speaker, in addition, represented a trans and queer organization, so she/they/it made it clear that it was white, cis-male entitlement that we were responsible for and made it very clear that just by us being who we are that we are helping to perpetuate this social ill, and that we should take responsibility for this. Needless to say this caused an uproar after the meeting, and not just by the white cis-males either.

And at this place of work we saw how most all of the hiring became of trans and queer folk while there were no black or Asian and very few hispanic folk hired -- and certainly no more white cis-males. So I have to agree with ATS folk that I don't usually align myself with that there is a social agenda that aimed at marginalizing white cis-males.

BTW, I hate the term "cis-male", but am using it here for contextual reasons.

a reply to: Byrd

Im a woman, and left a job because a woman was put in charge. After a lfetime career, I would MUCH rather work for a man.

Do you consider the phrase "White Male Privilege" to be Harassment?

Harassment? No.
I consider it to be an ignorant woke phrase and 'white male privilege' doesn't exist.

a reply to: MrInquisitive


you referenced the Byrd source of the term 'white privilege' ... is 'white privilege' linked in any way withe the Boer War hostilities in South Africa ?

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originally posted by: CoyoteAngels
a reply to: Byrd

Im a woman, and left a job because a woman was put in charge. After a lfetime career, I would MUCH rather work for a man.

This is an old post, but I agree! I've never had a female boss, by choice!

I've been a female boss, but I'd never work for a female boss.

The phrase “white privilege” is not the only verbal sleight of hand used to make achievement differences vanish. Even racial or ethnic groups that arrived in the United States destitute during the nineteenth century, and were forced to live in a desperate poverty and squalor almost inconceivable today, have had their later rise from such dire conditions verbally erased by calling their eventual achievement of prosperity a “privilege.” The histories of Irish, Jewish, Chinese and Japanese immigrants in America are classic examples of this process—and of their achievements being verbally air-brushed out of history by simply calling them “privilege.” Even middle-class blacks today have likewise been characterized by some as “privileged,” even though their ancestors arrived as slaves.
-Thomas Sowell

a reply to: shooterbrody
As a former LEO I disagree. Maybe just my department but I didn't know any that treated anyone different based on color, race or ethnicity. However, criminals were arrested and prosecuted equally.

Do stupid stuff and win a trip to jail.

I don’t live in NY or Cali. I never hear it.