Just because you like being in relationships with women does not mean that you are not a misogynist. There are plenty of racists who are friends with people who have a different skin tone than them and there are plenty of misogynists in relationships with women.

You have absolutely no idea when a woman is being ’stupid’ or ‘blindly following the herd’ without forming her own opinions. Just because someone shares a viewpoint with a group of people doesn’t mean that they haven’t made an educated decision about that opinion.

I’ve seen “privilege” thrown around quite a bit and, quite often, it’s used as an insult or a judgment. I cannot quote exactly because my memory is pretty shitty, but I’ve seen comments going through my tweet stream or on blog posts that say things similar to “This is so full of privilege” and “You’re so cis-privileged” and, I think, even calling someone a “cis-privileged fuck” or “asshole” or something like that.

So, I can understand why C&B would get up in arms about the word “privilege” when it HAS been given the undertones of being a bad thing. His blog post definitely went overboard with it, but I understand the thought behind it. If calling someone “privileged” is not an insult, than people should stop using it that way. Maybe, instead, point out that people who refuse to acknowledge the fact that privilege exists are “privilege-ignorant” or “feel entitled”?

Wait… what? You don’t even know me.

So because I’m friends with Eliot, owned property, don’t stand by feminist propaganda, and agree with, what I understood as, a declaration that if people as a whole would stop buying into privilege, it would cease to exist, I hate women? You guys sure are funny.

I don’t hate women. I’m firmly bisexual. I love women.

I hate stupid women. I hate women who blindly follow the herd, rather than forming their own opinions. And would you look at that? I hate stupid men who blindly follow the herd without forming their own opinions, too. So I guess that makes me an equal opportunity hater. ~smiles sweetly~

For one thing, there is a sick notion of achievement and of having to justify everything you have by “having worked hard for it”. Call it the capitalist worker’s ideology if you will. It gets everyone riled up, because having something you have not worked hard for is somehow bad and immoral.
But more importantly, this kind of chided child reaction does nothing whatsoever to further your understanding. You (and me) being privileged in the sense I have tried to describe above, that is in the sociological, not in the moral sense, does not mean that you:
- don’t deserve what you have.
- should make yourself unprivileged somehow (you can’t anyway).
- should pay dues for your privilege.
or
- are a bad person because of it.

I think you (and me, too) should react to our understanding and observation of privilege by not supporting it. Not by turning down opportunities our privilege grants us (they would most likely only go to others who are privileged) but by consciously trying to look beyond the taken-for-granted believes and biases that ground privilege.
Don’t be the guy from Dangerous Lily’s story.
It’s as simple as that.

“I find it interesting that no one touched on how he labeled his neighborhood as ‘Spanish’ to show he’s in the same boat…but also to show how ’shitty’ it was. Uh…hello! Privilege!!”

Uh, no. Hello, indeed, the same assumptions that Hubman, myself and a whole bunch of people are frustrated with.

My neighborhood is largely Spanish, which means I don’t enjoy the ‘privilege’ of living in a community of the same demographic I am (one of the major ‘privileges’ the author of that stupid ‘white knapsack’ essay started off with.)

It’s also a shitty neighborhood, which has nothing to do with the Spanish aspect but the fact that my neighbors are largely very poor and underprivileged – one of the reasons I live there, because it’s the only sort of neighborhood I can currently afford.

Megan made the same sort of typical, offensive, judgmental assumption that is rife throughout discussions of privilege. It’s why the notion is bullshit; because it always boils down to one stranger passing judgment on another.

I live in a place where white people are a minority. Which doesn’t change the fact that all those great government jobs go to the minority. Etc etc.

But my life? My life is a little different. I smile at everyone I come across on the street. (Unless I’m in a really bad mood. Which happens.) I smile at everyone because every single person I come across is an awesome human being. I have conversations with every kind of person without labeling beyond “human.”

I truly thing, B, that you have quite a bit of rage. And that’s OK. Rage can get shit done. But what rage will NOT do is bring disparate groups together. It simply creates more disparate groups.

I’m not seeing how this discussion, though it is interesting to read, provides anything positive to the issue you feel you are addressing.

I never call my shit privilege. I call it luck. And with that, I can say I have been truly lucky in many ways… Truly unlucky in many other ways. I roll with it. Move on. Learn. Grow. Would I be the same person if I lived in a third-world ghetto? I hope I would be a similar person. A person who still sees others as worthy human beings.

So much of this discussion is vitriolic and insulting.

Regardless… You pose interesting questions that are definitely worth some thought. But as someone who sometimes says “fuck you” I would advise that you diminish your argument by resorting to that kind of mindless vehemence. Study up on rhetoric and debate strategy. You will become much more powerful. As it is, you destroyed your own position.

“I find it interesting that no one touched on how he labeled his neighborhood as ‘Spanish’ to show he’s in the same boat…but also to show how ’shitty’ it was. Uh…hello! Privilege!!”

are you even paying attention to the responses to your comments? multiple people have been saying that we AREN’T blaming you two, personally, for having privilege. it’s not a personal attack. multiple people have also said that what is “expected” from you is mere recognition of the fact that privilege exists and to treat others with sensitivity and consideration.

and yet you keep harping on the same arguments as if nobody said anything.

I think what these dudes are failing to realize — and you’ve pointed this out, Brit — is that this isn’t about them. It’s about being respectful to other people who may not have the same forms of privilege. I mean, how hard is that to understand? I don’t get it.

My point, moreso, was that privilege DOES exist, and it is not “bullshit,” as C&B so eloquently put it, and that I am not, in fact, a “fucking idiot” for believing in the concept.

But of course, there are many different ways that someone can be privileged. To sit and compare them just makes this a “my dick is bigger than yours” contest, of who is more privileged than whom, who worked harder than whom, etc, when that’s totally irrelevant.