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Arriya Uong

WR 37, Fall 2019

Professor Lynda Haas

14 November 2019

Two Sides of the Topic, White Privilege

The conversation of race and power has been going on in the United States since America

was first found. Racism is socially constructed into our society and many people don’t even

realize it. In addition, for most of the time in American history, one type of person was always

the leader and had the most power, white males. In 2016, Judge Aaron Perksy, a white male,

sentenced a white college student a lenient sentence for raping an unconscious girl (Cohen). Here

shows an example of how many white people, especially males get away with so much things.

Today, American society struggles with stereotypes and prejudices, these lead to people jumping

to conclusions and being negative towards a certain group of people. These stereotypes were

socially constructed into society, people learned these things from society. Furthermore, a type of

race and social power is white privilege. White privilege has been around since 1619, when

slaves were brought to America (Guasco). Well, what exactly is whtie privilege? White privilege

is “a benefit that comes with having an ‘accepted’ skin color, regardless of other factors like

class or sexual orientation or gender” (Mejia). After the civil rights act of 1964, discrimination

was still present in society and that’s why people started to think that white privilege was a

mental thing and the idea is subconsciously present and makes white people have this “lack of

awareness” of the power they have (Collins). It’s having advantages and opportunities because of

the color of one’s skin. Having white privilege is not having to go through the hardships that
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most people of color have to go through (Liggins).​ ​Most of America’s history and present day

America, white Americans have always been considered superior, they have better opportunities

and are more ideal. However, white privilege isn’t about a person’s economic status, it’s about

how because they are white they are given more advantages than someone who has a different

colored skin (Mejia). For example, segregation and discrimination against African Americans

before they were given civil rights. McIntosh and Lorde are both females born into the pre-civil

rights era and both lived dramatically different lives. McIntosh being a white feminist and

anti-racism activist and Lorde being an African American who was a writer, poet, feminist, and

civil rights activist. Peggy McIntosh focuses on unearned advantages she had when growing up.

Audre Lorde on the other hand focuses on a family trip that made her realize that America is

white and people of color don’t have the same rights as them. Although they are just life stories

written over 20 years ago, they contribute to the ongoing conversation of white privilege.

Furthermore, in her text, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack,” Peggy talks

about education and unearned advantages she and many other white Americans have. She talks

about how “knowledge is white and knowledge is male” (McIntosh). She lists unearned

advantages she has. Then she explains how her group makes themselves confident and

comfortable while oppressing other groups. Lorde in her text, “The Fourth of July,” expresses

her anger through her story of her family trip to Washington D.C. She expresses how she found

out that America was white and that African Americans don’t have the same opportunities or

rights as white people. She finds out what the American reality was at the time.

People don’t get to choose their skin color, they are born into their destiny and how the

world will treat them. People were born into slavery because of the dark color of their skin.
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Some people were born into poverty. Sixteen percent of white Americans born into poverty will

eventually end up in the top one-fifth before they are forty years old; while for African

Americans, that number is three (Mejia). It’s not just luck, White Americans have more

opportunities and are the ideal employees for companies and more. It’s easier for a white

American to climb their way up than an African American. The stereotypical African American

employee is lazy, not a hard worker, and might steal things. However, that isn’t true about each

and everyone of them, but society makes it seem that way, society makes African Americans

seem like bad people. McIntosh’s work is about equality and how white men have power, and

how colored people are treated differently, or have different experiences than whites. Plus, she

mentions how whites are different from others and how they treat other races. She quotes in her

essay that “a ‘white’ skin in the United States opens many doors for whites….” (McIntosh). To

help support this quote she lists a bunch of unearned advantages she has because of the color of

her skin. Having white skin has helped her all her life. Lorde on the other side, noticed that white

Americans have had more opportunities and assets. In her poem, she talks about how her sister,

even though she went to a white school, had fewer opportunities, she couldn’t even go on the

school trip because she was black (Lorde 240). Also, because of her and her family’s skin, they

were limited to what they could do and had less freedom than a person with light, white skin.

Even though her mom had a lighter tone of dark skin, she still didn’t have the same opportunities

(Lorde). Her family was born into segregation and the lack of freedom and opportunities. During

the time period of when she wrote her poem about, 1947, African Americans had no equal

opportunities. During 1947, there was African American segregation and discrimination, and

lynching. However, some black students did go to school with white students but very few,
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according to Lorde’s poem and how she states her sister was the only African American student

in her class (Lorde 240). This was when they had to sit in the back of the bus, when they had

different fountains, hotels, and couldn’t sit in bars and restaurants. She really was spreading how

bad times were back then when she was a child and tried to address it to modern people and how

things should change. She and Peggy McIntosh were born into this era of separation, yet they

have very different experiences.

White people are oblivious to the fact that white privilege is a thing. However, minority

groups see it because they are the ones being oppressed. McIntosh’s piece was written during

the 1980’s, which was a time when important leaders realized that they “must not choose

between quality and equality”, that schools should help boost their students’ knowledge, and

“that America could not afford to neglect its schools, nor any part of the rising generation“

(Ravitch). In her text she lets her main audience of fellow professors and scholars know that at

first she didn’t even realize that she oppressed others and that she didn’t know she had all of

these advantages. White privilege only stood out to her when she realized that male’s

oppressiveness was unconscious, then she realized that women of color have said that the white

females they work with can be oppressive too (McIntosh). At first she didn’t realize it because

she was unconscious of her advantages like men were to theirs. However to Lorde, she saw all

the advantages and privileges white people have and had. Expressing to her main audience of

fellow black communities, she showcases the anger she felt at the time. She expresses how mad

she was when she realized the reality of society at the time. Her main topic for this writing is

civil rights and how blacks were treated so differently back when she was growing up. She talks

about the things her and her family couldn’t do during that time because of the color of their
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skin. She felt like white people were oblivious to white advantages and wanted to show them that

it’s not right and not fair. She even expresses how she wrote a letter to the president because the

laws at the time were so cruel (Lorde 242). Back then, white people would just go on with their

days and not even realize how cruel they treated people of color. They wanted to segregate from

anybody who was different and not like them. They didn’t realize how much they were

oppressing African Americans. They didn’t realize how they prevented a whole community from

increasing and improving their knowledge. For example, in Thomas C. Holts piece, “Knowledge

is Power: The Black Struggle for Literacy,” he mentions “if blacks were to receive any education

at all, it had to be of a type that wouldn’t change anything fundamental in the southern labor and

social systems” (97). Holt talks about how if slaves were to receive an education, it wouldn’t be

one that they could grow from. Whites only gave the African Americans used books and didn’t

help them to build schools or gave them many teachers, and if they did provide teachers, the

teachers would say that the black students don’t have the ability to learn and belittle the African

American students (Holt 101). White people sometimes don’t even realize they have these

advantages and don’t even realize they are oppressing others.

White people have always had more opportunities and advantages than people of color.

In America 2009, African American low-waged job applicants get called at half the rate as a

white American with the same qualifications (Campos). In addition, white Americans who just

got out of prison have a better chance at getting a job than African Americans and Latinos who

have a clean record (Campos). This just shows how much more opportunity white Americans get

compared to minority groups. Companies and employers are mainly calling back white

Americans and aren’t giving much people of color opportunities for the jobs the provide. A
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reason for this is because if they gave more jobs to people of color the community of white

Americans can’t rise and have more “economic opportunities” (Collins). Another example of this

is looking at the current government officials who are high in the line. They’re all old white

males. Today, “Legislative bodies, corporate leaders and educators are still disproportionately

white and often make conscious choices...that keep this cycle on repeat” (Collins). Society has

been shaped like this for all of American history and it seems like the government and all the

white men in charge want to keep it that way. McIntosh mentions in her text the many

advantages she has because of the color of her skin. She lists unearned advantages such as

criticizing the government and not being judged because of her skin color, and if she was ever

pulled over it wouldn’t be because of her skin color (McIntosh). She started realizing these

opportunities and assets she believes her and many other white people don’t deserve or haven’t

earned. Sometimes African American people are pulled over for no reason and are searched for

no reason based off of all the videos on social media. Plus, if a person of color was to trash talk

the government people would think that they don’t belong and aren’t true Americans. Lorde on

the other hand experienced many events in her life that showed the many opportunities she didn’t

get to share with white people. Based on her text, she mentions how they weren’t allowed in

dining cars of the trains, how they couldn’t sleep in the same hotel of white people and had to go

to their own, and that they weren’t even allowed to eat at the same diners or restaurants as white

people (Lorde 240-242). These were some of the many rules back then during the Jim Crow era.

Even today, even though our population is so diverse, schools are still so segregated. Plus,

schools that contain mostly minority groups don’t have good resources and teachers to provide

the education needed to prepare students for college and life. This is because these schools don’t
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have the funding for these materials like white neighborhood schools whose community has the

money to donate and provide these materials. Not gaining the knowledge and education they

need, minority students will have a hard time trying to succeed in life, leading them to less likely

be accepted to good schools and get good jobs. Minority groups can’t really grow in society

because white males in power make it hard for them.

Even though Peggy McIntosh and Audre Lorde were born into the same era, they both

express the same idea of white privilege and white power. In their texts that were made twenty

plus years ago, they both contribute materials and ideas to the current conversation of white

privilege. White privilege has been around for pretty much all of United States history. That is

why it is subconsciously embedded into white people’s minds. Many white people don’t see it

and get rather very offensive when the topic of white privilege is talked about. White fragility is

when a little bit of racial stress becomes intolerable and white people start getting defensive and

feel guilty and try to self-pity themselves (Alder-Bell). It’s when white people try to defend

themselves and say they don’t have privileges, that they’re poor and have worked so hard to get

where they are today. However, they don’t realize that the color of their skin has opened up so

many doors for them and that because of their skin color they have twice, probably even more,

the amount of opportunities a person of color has. Today, people are struggling to grow in power

and white people, especially white men, make it so hard for people of color and women to rise in

society and become better and successful. White men are in charge and have always been in

charge. White privilege does exist and has always excited from the start of American history.

White people have more advantages and opportunities than minority groups and many don’t see
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how much they have oppressed other races and groups and have seen the damage they have done

and created.
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Works Cited

Alder-Bell, Sam. “America's White Fragility Complex: Why White People Get so Defensive

about Their Privilege.” ​Salon​, Salon.com, 18 Mar. 2015.

Campos, Paul F. “White Economic Privilege Is Alive and Well.” ​The New York Times,​ The New

York Times, 29 July 2017.

Cohen, Claire. “Judge Who Gave Stanford Sex Attacker Brock Turner 6 Month Jail Sentence Is

Recalled from the Bench.” ​The Telegraph,​ Telegraph Media Group, 6 June 2018.

Collins, Cory. “What Is White Privilege, Really?” ​Teaching Tolerance,​ 2018.

Guasco, Michael. “The Misguided Focus on 1619 as the Beginning of Slavery in the U.S.

Damages Our Understanding of American History.” ​Smithsonian.com​, Smithsonian

Institution, 13 Sept. 2017.

Liggins, Carl. “​Bold Expressions w/ Carl: White Privilege on Apple Podcasts.” ​Apple Podcasts​,

30 Apr. 2019.

Lorde, Audre. “Full Text of ‘the_fourth_of_july’ .” ​Internet Archive​, 13 Feb. 2016.

McIntosh, Peggy. “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” ​Peace and Freedom

Magazine,​ July 1989, pp. 10-12.

Mejia, Lisette. “We Must All Talk About White Privilege.” ​POPSUGAR News,​ 15 Mar. 2016.