My initial reaction to this article was that of agreement. McIntosh describes white privilege vividly as the idea of an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions and more. In other words, a white person in the United States has on his or her back an invisible weightless knapsack granting favored status, acceptance, and more. It was interesting seeing a white woman’s perspective on the topic of privilege. As I was reading I was reflecting on moments in my life where I have whiteness white privilege and how it worked against me. I’ve seen white privilege illustrated at various time throughout my life. My personal favorite part of this article was the list of daily effects of White privilege that the author complied. It was interesting yet not relatable. To me, this list was eye opening. I understood the point she was trying to make with it. I cannot …show more content…
It offered a candid honest perspective on a taboo subject. Her studies in this field were rooted in findings of men’s unwillingness to acknowledge their over-privileged status. These denials, protected male privilege from being acknowledged or decreased. Calling out this unacknowledged male privilege her finding of white privilege might be a key to racism as well. The message that was being portrayed was that privilege is real and whites are taught not to recognize privilege. They simply go along with a system that is already biased in their favor, never noticing the privileges built into their daily lives and institutional structures. In terms of primary identities like race and gender, I do not think I am privileged. When looking at secondary identities like education and work experience I could be considered privileged in comparison to individuals of my same background. The freedoms of these specific privileges allow me access to higher education which opens more opportunity to various
In “Explaining White Privilege to a Broke White Person” by Gina Crosley-Corcoran. We learn about the authors struggle growing up poor. Crosley says that she was so poor growing up, it’s “the type of poor that people don’t want to believe still exists in the country.” Crosley grew up in northern-Illinois and she was truly impoverished growing up. At 12, Crosley was making cup noodles in a coffee maker with water she fetched from public bathrooms. She lived in a camper that had no running water or heat.
In Peggy McIntosh’s, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” she introduces the topic of privilege from the point of view of a women in a world designed to favor men. She sees that men acknowledge the fact that women are disadvantaged but are unable to admit that they themselves have higher power. This denial of power is what creates the gap between men and women and is a clear stepping stone to her primary point of white privilege. The problem does not lie in the existence of white privilege but more so in the validation that is given to it. To be oblivious to this privilege is what gives it power to aid the white population, while simultaneously crippling other minority groups. She goes on to state that realizing there is hierarchy is the first step to systematically taking it down. This however has to start by finding where the problem originates.
FIX IT -In this article is about the writer who is a poverty young white child who was not wasn't privileged as a kid. Gina Crosley grew up in the poor of poor and was taken back when she was reading an article we have read earlier by Mcintosh about how we all have white privilege. Crosley felt as if how someone who grew up with her certain circumstances had any White Privilege but after reading the Mcintosh article she understood. Crosley has said, ‘it's impossible to deny that being born with white skin in America affords people certain unearned privileges in life that people of another skin color simple are not afforded”. This is something that was an interesting fact to me that even a person who is less privileged than most can see the White Privilege they still have even at the lowest of the privilege scale.
Peggy McIntosh’s “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Backpack” addresses the issue of acknowledging whites’ unaware privileges, thus weakening the systems of advantage to reconstruct power systems in the society from 1989 to the present. For instance, men are unconscious about their privileges in a patriarchal society while women are oppressed in the society. White people are unaware of the privileges which they take for granted while non-white communities are discriminated against repeatedly. McIntosh identities her privileges from daily life, which she also relates the patterns of white privilege and assumptions that passed down.
1. To be quite honest, I am shocked by the article's hyperbolization of the concept of "white male privilege". Make no mistake about it, in general, certain groups absolutely do have it easier than others. However, we've all been dealt a hand, so to speak, and as a result everyone has a discrete set of privileges AND disadvantages.
Peggy McIntosh concludes white privilege is, “an invisible package of unearned assets which I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was meant to remain oblivious.” The writer came to this conclusion when observing male privilege initially in America. McIntosh discusses the lack of acknowledgement of men when it came to addressing their own advantages over women even if they could admit the position of disadvantage of women. This shed light on how white privilege is curtailed; In the United States, foundations of our society are interlaced with institutionalized privilege creates unethical levels of dominance; dominance of males over females, whites over people of color,
In regard to this article directly, America, being initially a British colony, will of course have a “white” history. Barack Obama, Colin Powell, and Condoleeza Rice are African American’s that held or currently hold high governmental positions. Living in a predominantly white town, going to a predominantly white school, I had no idea that white privilege even existed. Honestly though, I feel white privilege isn’t about who is a CEO or a multibillionaire. It’s about taxi cabs picking you up and job interviewers taking you seriously.
According to the authors, what practice(s) create white privilege is viewed in their own unique perspective but, it all fits up under one category of a specific race having the advantage to have their freedom to do what they like. Based on McIntosh view that “whites in Western societies adore recompenses that non-whites do not practice, as "an undistinguishable package of unjustified assets” (Rothenberg, 2016). White freedom represents together evident and not as much of evident submissive rewards that white people may possibly not identify they require, which differentiates it from explicit favoritism or preconception. In fact, they have been accepted as the better social status in addition to freedom to move, buy, work, play, and speak freely. It
There are two prominent writer/scholars who have taken the issue of white privilege to heart and have shared their expert analysis on the subject; these authors/writer-scholars are Peggy McIntosh, a white feminist, and Beverly Tatum, an African American Psychologist. McIntosh, in her article "Coming to See Correspondences," makes excellent observations about the privilege that she has experienced just by being a white female in America. The two most significant points made by McIntosh
McIntosh stresses on his identity as a white person, and more specifically as a white man, by drawing a very clear line between how white people and people of color think. He does this through announcing his identity multiple times (“As a white person” (pg.1), “my skin color”(pg.4), etc.) and multiple mentions of the idea of the “invisible knapsack of white privilege.” By calling this white privilege invisible, he is urging us to un-see it as invisible and recognize its presence – and as Ahem pointed out, assumes that the privilege is invisible in the first place when it is just actually invisible to those with the privilege. In addition, the power of whiteness comes from it being seen by non-white people, thus raising the question of what it means to push for people to “see” this privilege even more strongly. We can tie this back to his action of blaming it on the institution – in which invisibility is taught, instead of being an automatic quality of those who possess
The author of the "White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack," Peggy McIntosh, Ph.D., is an American feminist and anti-racist activist, the associate director of the Wellesley College Center for Research on Women, and a speaker, founder, and co-director of the National S.E.E.D. Project on Inclusive Curriculum (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity). The text appeared in 1988, as a part of Peggy McIntosh’s essay "White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences through Work in Women's Studies", and was written for High school students, college students, and beyond. She thinks that whites are carefully taught not to recognize white privileges, and as one who writes about having white privilege, she must ask: “what will I do to lessen or end it?” McIntosh wants to encourage white people to start recognizing situations in which they are privileged because of their skin color. That way would be more people to help lessen this problem, and make changes in our social system.
Peddy McIntosh highlighted various unearned white privileges in her autobiographical article “White Privilege, Color and Crime: A Personal Account.” She illustrated the white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that one white person could count on cashing in each day. White people have these privileges given to them by the society in which they live in. The same society taught them to be ignorant and unawareness of these privileges. This system of unearned privileges established by white individuals made people of color feel oppressed. In this system being white is a norm and dominant power. Caucasians, who benefit most from the white privilege system in the United States, are more likely to
Peggy McIntosh, chapter on “White Privilege, color, and crime,” encourages readers to think about the world in the framework of race, class, and gender on a “White privilege” perspective. McIntosh
Prior to beginning my readings on white racial identity, I did not pay much attention to my white race. If someone had asked me to describe my appearance I would have said short blond hair, blue eyes, average stature, etc. One of the last things I would have noted was the color of my skin. Growing up in overwhelmingly white communities, I never thought to use the color of my skin to differentiate myself from others. Over the course of this dialogue I have learned that my white racial identity is one of the most defining aspects of my appearance in this society. There is a certain level of privilege that I am afforded based solely on the color of my skin. According to Peggy McIntosh, “White privilege is like an invisible weightless
Yet, the most significant flaw in this essay can be seen through the author’s simplistic view of the scope of racial injustice. Remarkably, the author only refers to white privilege in terms of its impact on what she calls “the problems facing Black America.” She fails to acknowledge or perhaps has no insight that white privilege involves the preference for ‘whiteness’ over all persons of color. Every non-white group is impacted by individual and institutional racism. Every non-white group grows up with the knowledge that their white peers have certain automatic privileges. Every child of color has to learn to navigate through the floodwaters of racism