If you are good looking you can make it anywhere in this society regardless of race, creed or color.

I'm OK looking. So, nobody stares at me or treats me negatively simply due to my appearance. I'm no movie star, but I'm OK looking and that's a privilege I recognize. I had nothing to do with that, either. It's a matter of genetics.

And unattractiveness gets no racial or gender privilege.

I want to see a minority with a job and a functioning relationship tell any lifelong unattractive white male, they haven't suffered enough at the hands of society.

One has passed.

But one looks like the Irish side of the family and the other looked like the Mexican/Native side of the family.

Both get pulled over by the cops. One is belligerant and gets a ticket. The other is polite and spends a week in jail without being charged and no call to a lawyer.

Guess which brother was which example.

I know. I grew up in California.

I feel as if my heart is breaking for this country. I am crying because I can't see the end of this and it is criminal. We could have a wonderful world, but we sh*t on each other and on this planet. Ego is such a terrible destroyer.

Must've missed that.

You don't receive any special treatment, you are merely treated in ways any human being should expect to be treated.

If 85% of all Americans are treated in a certain way by cops, courts, employers, schools, retail store clerks, taxi drivers, that does not mean that they are a privileged class - it only means that the other 15% are underprivileged.

I guess it depends on where you are viewing the privilege-o-meter from. Anybody will resent those who were given advantages they themselves never had. But the word "privilege" in itself, has a sort of elitist connotation that many Americans would take issue with.

I did nothing to be white, male or straight, but I benefit from all of those. Others, who also have nothing to do with their race, gender, or sexuality, are treated less well. Unfair on its face. So yes, unearned privilege exists, and is unearned. It's simply wrong.

All I said was it ain't "privilege" if nine out of ten Americans have it. It's the norm. Right or wrong. Earned or unearned.

Yet if someone is "under" privileged, there is a privilege that is above them.

Because I think it carries a snobbish, elitist connotation that does not apply to the vast majority of Americans and which many people will resent.

"Privelege" is defined as "a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group of people." Well, it certainly isn't "special" if ninety percent of us have it.

I shudder to think what my life would be like if people could know with just a quick glance that I am an atheist.

Maybe we need to develop a Privilege Index that would result in a Privilege Quotient (PQ) so for me it might look something like this:

Male +15

White +20

Straight +10

Employed +5

Atheist -10

College degree +5

Height/weight proportional +5

Yeah, this is already getting too complicated...

Kinda.

People can be so defensive. It really blocks communication.

But it doesn't exist for all white liberal males.

You got to fit in and march to the drum of the controlling culture. If you don't fit in, if you don't march to the drum, if you resist, you are not immune from the punishments at the hands of your own culture. If you're different, if you're disabled, if you have a deformity, if you have a lifelong medical condition, if you're physically unattractive, if you've resisted the social status quo and paid for it by ending up alone all your life or impoverished, in a lot of cases you've been completely and utterly rejected by the predominant culture (and now, thanks to being a white, straight, male, maybe all cultures) and invisible all your life. And then you come to DU and people tell you to "shut up defending minorities you privileged white devil!" Excuse my language but, fuck that shit, MineralMan. There's people unselfishly here not even to defend and support their own beaten down demographic - but someone else's - and they're being told to go fuck themselves. Are friggin' kidding me?

People should keep that in mind when they attempt to corral all straight, white, liberal males into the box of white privilege.

There's straight white males here who have suffered their whole lives at the hands of their own culture (and multiple cultures) and then they look to the ranks of liberals and democrats as their only refuge for some understanding and connection (and maybe defense) only to be lectured by someone with two functioning legs, a powerful alliance behind them and a satisfying and healthy relationship about how they can never suffer as bad as them.

Talk about insensitive use of language and cultural invisibility!

White, straight, liberal males are lambasted as agents of "mansplaining" and "whitesplaining" by some of the more vocal groups, forgetting they are lecturing people (while adamantly objecting to ever being lectured themselves) whose presence in the ranks of democrats and liberals was often driven by a lot of suffering, personal growth and resistance to the status quo.

people need to know who it is they are talking to before they start brandishing the "privilege" card.

I'm not going to be told I'm privileged. Period. And, believe me, it's silly for someone to presume that I am based on the surface details of being white, straight and male.

It may be hard to accept but there are some white, straight, male liberals who are eminently qualified and experienced enough to speak, and even advise, on human suffering, sometimes, even more qualified than someone traditionally known as a minority.

So people should be very careful who they presume should shut up and listen.

"someone traditionally known as a minority". It is about institutionalized privilege and how it affects us all.

I had it thrown in my face about 10 yrs ago when I was getting out of my car at a gallery and a cop pulled up on the street and yelled "hey, can we talk". It rapidly became apparent that the cop had a bug up his ass, to put it politely. He yelled, harassed, kept pushing at me verbally while becoming more and more red faced and furious, the more I withdrew emotionally and repeated "I try to be a good role model driving, I am sorry I did something wrong". It was amazing. I was afraid to turn or walk away, even though he wasn't ticketing me, wasn't arresting me, wasn't doing anything except being very very very vocally furious. I was very angry afterwards, how dare he do that to me. A middle aged white woman. And bam. It hit me. I had been operating on so many levels of privilege that I hadn't even noticed.

Sexism, racism, ageism. There are many other types privilege and I will not deny them, even if they do not affect me, or I do not notice. They are real.

A person can be "white, straight, male" and still disadvantaged but he sure as shit has privilege going for him, even if he never knows it. This does not mean he can not suffer, can not be treated badly, but that privilege is still real.

But, as for being privileged…there are some cultural transgressions and conditions that cancel out white privilege.

Just because you've never been jailed or even harassed by police, doesn't mean you haven't lost, been denied or missed out immensely in other ways.

Goes clear back to Dubya and the big pile on agaist Affirmative Action. It was as if conservatives suddenly decided there was no more discrimination and Affirmative Action was obsolete. Oh, it was supposed to now be an 'insult' to be given a place at the table, for a job or college, if you got in per a quota.

If it wasn't serving a necessary purpose it wouldn't have been a threat to rich assholes who figure they can buy their way into anything money can buy. And yes, there in lies the rub. Some people are admitted into this society by their merit, not just their white ass pedigree and bank account.

customer agent that was not at least 6'.

so requires more work

Is it proving to be a good marketing device to convince straight, CIS, able-bodied whites to help the disadvantaged reach equality?

Or is it, as critics assert, simply derailing and personalizing conversations in a counterproductive way that alienates and insults those who might otherwise be allies?

Personally I think privilege is a reality... but has proven to be counterproductive framing.

Say what you might about the Brothers Koch, they certainly haven't let their white privilege go to waste.

If you've got it, flaunt it, yes?

rather than what the person has been through, and how they have treated others

and those who have experienced real tragedy will consider it callous at best, and outright racist at worst

Perhaps because he actually wants a productive dialog among people who are actually interested in helping to reduce racism?

Obama is very, very smart.

I am just making the point.