Privilege Defined
Today is not like any other day. Today I am seeing others, myself and my world in an entirely new way. I am sad, yet I am content.
I am white, middle-class and college-educated from the mid-west. Life seemed to have its challenges growing up. I was picked on for various reasons by other kids – younger, older and my same age. I was the youngest of four and my brothers made sure I knew that! My father was ill most my growing up years and died when I was 16. I “inherited” his four on the floor lime green Toyota Corolla hatchback. What a sweet ride!
I did well in school and graduated from college with a 4 year degree in business management. I was the first in my family to do so. I worked hard to get through school but never really struggled financially or academically. Classes were challenging but manageable. My mother wasn’t wealthy but certainly stable.
Privilege is a word that means, “a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group.” Not something I had ever considered or felt growing up or as a young adult.
Then I began hearing the phrase white privilege. This is defined as, “inherent advantages possessed by a white person on the basis of their race in a society characterized by racial inequality and injustice.” This made me defensive.
I was not from an affluent wealthy family. I was simply middle class. I was not privileged. I worked and earned my way through school and for my position in life. For many years I denied this concept and truly believed it did not apply to me. I now see that I was wrong, very wrong.
As a manager I receive various publications through email regarding business in general and women in the workplace. Recently a headline caught my eye. Proctor and Gamble was under fire for a video it produced geared to black women and their struggles. With the flood of recent protests and riots regarding Black Lives Matter and injustice in America, I was intrigued. Curious as to what P&G had put together, I clicked on the link and opened the page to the article explaining the controversy over the video.
As I watched the video, my heart began to ache, my stomach began to turn and I blinked back tears. I was seeing that white privilege isn’t simply about money or a college education. I realized that:
My privilege allows me to be able to drive on the streets and walk in the dark without the fear of being stopped or questioned by authority which could lead to not going home.
My privilege allows me to be free of racially based judgements.
My privilege allows me to be able to not fear for my children going out in the local community.
My privilege allowed me to raise children without having a hard conversation about how to be prepared to keep their own lives safe if stopped by authorities.
I now understand I am privileged and these are privileges I did not earn or purchase. They were simple given to me based on the color of my skin.
It sickens me.
It saddens me.
It makes me angry.
Not because I am privileged but because others are not. I have denied and not recognized this privilege for all my life, that is until now.
Grace. If ever needed, I need it today I need to give myself grace as I know my Creator does. Not grace to do nothing but the grace to move ahead and change…
Change my behavior.
Change my perspective.
Change my attitude.
I no longer need to be offended when I am confronted with having white privileged. Instead, I need to recognize my own privilege and recognize the pain of others who live without it. Then I am called to love and listen unconditionally.
But what is loving unconditionally? When the Bible speaks about love, it says God is love. There are over 100 verses about love. Why might that be? Could it be because it can be so difficult for us to love others?
Read these examples…
John 13:34 ESV: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”
1 John 4:20 ESV: ‘If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.’
Romans 12:10 ESV: “Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.”
1 John 4:7 ESV: “Beloed, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.
There are no qualifications around this love. Just do it. Love everyone even as we recognize that there will be pain and injustice in this world.
The Bible speaks to this as well…
John 16:33 ESV: “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”
The Bible goes also says we are to use what we have been through to help and support others:
2 Corinthians 1:4 ESV: “Who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”
Can I ever fully understand what it’s like to live in our country without white privilege? No. But I don’t have to understand. Instead what I can do is take heart, give love and take action.
JW