I am a white male, and I'm not ashamed of that.
In today's culture, there are a lot of conversations about race and culture, and these conversations are loaded with buzzwords and laced with politically-correct landmines. There is often this feeling that if you say the wrong word or do the wrong thing there will be severe backlash. In this article, I am going to unpack just one of those buzzwords and see if we can figure out what to do with it. That word is privilege.
I have had several conversations about privilege with some pretty educated people to figure out just what it is, and then what to do with it. This conversation can be uncomfortable, so I encourage you to come to me with any questions you may have, and I would love feedback on this article, whether that's comments, texts, emails, handwritten letters or something sent by carrier pigeon. Just let me know.
Here we go. First off, there are a bunch of definitions of privilege, and before we can unpack how to respond to privilege, we need to know what it is.
Google defines privilege as "a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group of people." Whereas Webster says it is, "a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor."
While these definitions show a part of what privilege is, my favorite definition of privilege is just this: Privilege is the unique access to resources and opportunities.
I think this broad definition gets to the core of what privilege is, and this is the definition that I will be using when I use the word privilege.
Now comes the more fun part of unpacking what that means. So, who has privilege?
The answer is everyone. If privilege is simply access to resources and opportunities, we all have that in some capacity.
The difference is in the extent of that access. We do not all have the same access to resources and opportunities, and in our American culture, race, gender, class and many other things contribute to this.
So then, is privilege bad? Not inherently. Having access to resources and opportunities is not a bad thing, but it is complicated because of the way it is used. Historically, privilege has been used in some very bad ways. It has been used in some good ways too, like Abraham Lincoln leveraging his position of President to end slavery, but it has been used more for oppression rather than reconciliation.
But it does not have to be used that way. Privilege can be used in some really positive ways. The best way to use our privilege, wherever that comes from, is to help provide others with access to resources and opportunities.
For example, on the George Fox campus, I am an RA. This position has a certain level of prestige associated with it, and it very much provides me with access to opportunities and resources that the average student does not have. In that sense, I am privileged on campus here.
So to leverage that positively, I believe that I need to be willing to share the resources and opportunities that I have. This can look a number of different ways, but just a small way is that I have a master key for my dorm, and so I can let people into their rooms when they get locked out.
This is me using my privilege – access to resources and opportunities to help others have more access to resources and opportunities, or in this case, their room. I could alternatively use my master key to only let myself into my room and, if I wanted to, other people's rooms when I needed something from them.
Whereas that is a small and trivial example, the principle stays the same when you look at issues with race and culture. Wherever you believe that privilege comes from, not everyone has the same access to resources and opportunities. You can leverage your privilege to help others have better access to resources and opportunities.
So yes, I am privileged, and that is okay. But it is okay because I know that I can use that privilege to help others benefit from the position that I have been put in.
