Privilege is based on how much the system and the wider culture favors you and the groups you belong to.

We all have something that puts us at an advantage, and we all have something that puts us at a disadvantage. It is not a mark against one’s character to have either one, it’s just the way the dice rolled. There’s no judgment to it, it just is what it is.

White privilege is based on how much the system and culture favor you solely because you are white. Wealth and class privilege share a Venn diagram there - but are not the same thing. To compare class privilege to white privilege is to compare apples to oranges .

A poor or middle class white man has gender privilege compared to a rich white woman, but he does not have economic privilege compared to her. In that case, the script is flipped. Both are at a disadvantage in one way or the other, but the two people are not equalized according to the way political and cultural power are granted. They do not receive equal treatment from society nor have equal value according to our wider system.

The educated have privilege compared to the uneducated. Natural born citizens have privilege compared to immigrants and naturalized citizens. Cis people have it compared to transgendered people, men to women, heterosexual to LGBTQ, etc. Even language and literacy are privileges people have compared to some others.

These are verifiable facts. Where there is inequality, there is privilege. Leveling the field means the privileged person, to some degree, will have to accept what feels like a “loss” (*not an actual loss).
*Sexism hurts men, racism hurts whites, poverty hurts the rich, and so on – so they are invested in equality too, or should be.

If a privileged person does not come to terms with this “loss,” he or she is implicitly supporting inequality. It’s that simple. 1%ers have to accept their privilege or there will never be equality – we understand this instinctively. It’s why pandering will never work, they have to admit there is a problem and that they benefit from it – even if it’s simply from a lucky hand dealt from a stacked deck. It's why we have no problem with wealthy progressives, it's not the money, it's the attitude and how they use their power.

POC instinctively understand the same dynamic in regards to race and color. It’s pure luck that some were born white in America, and that’s okay.

Inequality comes in many forms but racial inequality is the worst, and the most pressing form because a rich white person has wealth privilege compared to a middle class white person, just as he or she has white privilege by comparison to a black person. The wealthy white person has privilege compared to both of them. Because of that, it stands to reason that there be an alliance to gain political equality for poc and middle class/poor whites. If we are honest, that alliance requires acceptance and acknowledgment of white privilege. It is non-negotiable. You can reject that it exists, but then you undermine your fight against income inequality.

Together means together, on just terms, not white ones.

This is the most urgent and immediate obstacle between a just and equal society and the society we have now. White progressives have to grapple with racism. Not as much with race, per se, but racism.

note to Bernie folks – as far as I can tell, one of the reasons a lot of black people don’t trust Bernie and the revolution is because they have yet to be convinced that white progressives will stand up for them too – on their terms – with no pandering. It has to be authentic, much like we expect our leaders to be. A lot of black people gave up on a multi-racial alliance long ago. I have not. Hillary is focused on policy, incremental change from within the system, which works slowly, but it does work in targeted ways. As much as we see otherwise, she is perceived as a safer bet, even if she is problematic. People know she is problematic, but it is in her interest to pander to and appease black people because black votes matter and the poc community can come to be a real force, especially with black women on board.

On a final and personal note, I know that race isn’t real. That has been long established and black people are all too aware, there is no need to keep explaining it to us. (Not that everyone does but a lot of white people do)

What the “We are all one people” sentiment gets wrong is that it doesn’t stop bullets targeted at us. It does not pay the bills. It does nothing, NOTHING, to change racist policy and the racism that’s baked in the cake. Tackling racism has to come from two fronts, the cultural and political, what unity without race does is disregard the need for political change.

For what it’s worth, my personal belief is that “we are all one people, and race isn’t real” is the truth. I live by it daily, it informs my life on every level. But racism is part of my daily as well, it’s a real and present danger when I am navigating this thing called life. I do not have a choice but to deal with racism, it’s not something I get to ignore. I get it, identity is an illusion. But that illusion is not bullet proof and until people like me can stop dodging bullets, waxing poetic to understand illusions is a distraction from actual issues. I save that for “church.” My church. We of this global consciousness mindset are coming to understand race on a relational level, we are making headway on the cultural part of racism. But the political part demands equal attention. One hand washes the other.