Sunday, July 26, 2015

Inventing White Privilege

Wow. I just read something at Huffpo that can only be described as sheer idiocy, lies and hate of the lowest caliber. It’s written by someone calling himself “Rev. Dr. John C. Dorhauer,” the President of the United Church of Chirst. The UCC has been bleeding members for decades and is down below one million members, most of whom are recovering circus clowns with antisemitic impulses. Let us call our letter writer Dr. Turdburglar, shall we?

The best way to handle this will be to present you with Dr. Turdburglar’s letter in brown... because what he writes is crap. My response will be in italics... in black because I'm probably a racist. Take a couple pain killers, because this is going to get ugly.


Dear White Men,

You are persons of privilege.

You didn't earn it. More than likely aren't yet prepared to either admit to it or lose it. This letter, written by one of you, is offered to invite you on a journey of insight, honesty, hard truth and just living.


Whoa! Hold the phone, turdboy. First of all, you don’t know me. So you don’t get to judge me. Secondly, to judge an entire group of people by race is called racism. Third, casting your sins on others is called “projection,” and that’s a psychological issue. Fourth, if you want hard truth, let’s start with the fact that your theology is twisted and sick. Your views are antisemitic. The race views you espouse in this letter are lies or so reckless as to count as lies. Enough truth for you?

Privilege can be hard to see, mostly because of what doesn't happen to us when we have it.

Right. It blinds us to the truth, like that other whites who aren’t sucking off the teat of a fake church aren’t living in privilege.

One of the four reasons James Cone offers in his landmark essay "Theology's Great Sin: Silence in the Face of White Supremacy" for why men of privilege remain silent in the face of so much racial injustice is: "They don't have to speak."

Landmark essay? Too bad nobody but the likes of you has read it. In terms of silence in the face of white supremacy, let me site you to the massive amount of civil rights legislation, juries that convict racists, and the sheer numbers of whites who condemn white racists. I don’t think silence is the word.

We aren't getting arrested at four times our population rate.

That’s because whites aren’t committing crimes at four times our population rate.

We aren't being followed when walking through a department store wearing a sweat shirt with a hood.

Actually, yes, we are because that’s suspicious behavior which brings the watchful eye of those who suffer when people in hoodies rob them.

Real estate agencies didn't write codes, rules and laws that kept us out of the high rent districts and middle class neighborhoods.

Oh, you want to go back a hundred years? Don’t you have anything newer? As an aside, we also don't have to deal with “well-meaning” lefties pushing out all available housing by foisting rent control on us.

Property values don't go down when more than 10 percent of our neighborhood is saturated with people of our race.

Yep, because whites don’t tend to move into declining neighborhoods because they can afford to move to rising neighborhoods.

Our children aren't sitting in classrooms with teachers who are likely not to have even a minor degree in the courses they are teaching.

So true. Why? Because schools in white areas don’t lower standards so they can hire teachers of a certain race. White parents also tend to be much more proactive about making sure their kids are getting good teachers or they yank their kids out of school. Interestingly, blacks who flee the public schools in crappy inner city neighborhoods where the parents don’t care about education tend to place their kids in schools that are as good (if not sometimes better) than average white schools. Why? Teacher quality is about parent involvement and cronyism, see e.g. Atlanta.

Young white men are not being gunned down by black police officers in epidemic numbers.

Interestingly, neither are blacks. According to the liberal New York Times, there are not enough statistics for you to make this claim in any way because such statistics have not been kept by race. IN OTHER WORDS, you made that up... liar. Also, despite calling this an epidemic, I’m pretty sure the left tries to turn every police shooting of a black person into a nationwide crime, yet we only hear of about one per month tops. That’s hardly an epidemic.

Our churches aren't being burned to the ground, nor or our church members in danger of being gunned down in prayer meetings.

Neither are black churches. Nice job exploiting the Charleston shooting though... that must have made you so happy. Too bad more whites died in movie theaters in the past two years than blacks in churches.

We are not saying to ourselves as part of a white man's code of conduct that when a police car drives by us without pulling us over even though we are exceeding the speed limit something like: "Well, once again I didn't get pulled over because I'm white."

Nope. We say, ‘Whew. Good thing I wasn’t breaking the law.’ Because when we are, we get pulled over.

We are not saying to ourselves when our child didn't get her college application rejected with a questionable GPA something like: "Well, thank God she's white and that her mother graduated from that school 25 years ago."

You’ve wrongly rammed two issues together here Turdburglar. First, kids of people who went to a college and donate are getting privileges that the rest of us po’ honkeys aren’t. So stop mixing that. On the other part, white kids with questionable GPAs get denied... because they don’t get affirmative action bonus points and they aren’t athletes.

We are not saying to ourselves when the prosecutor reduces our son's charges from aggravated assault to loitering and sets him free with a small fine and time served: "Wow, that white prosecutor made sure my white son got a break that the black man who got convicted of that crime last week didn't get."

True, we never say that because race has nothing to do with it. Prior records do that and our white sons don’t have prior records, unless they are white trash in which event they say something like, ‘That f**ing proscuter is bias and always hate me jus ‘cuz I sells meth.'

The journey to seeing and understanding the pernicious consequences of privilege includes the harder work of seeing what isn't there to be seen.

You mean like the truth that everything you’ve just written is a pile of steaming crap?

I have started practicing this as a discipline.

I see no evidence of that. Perhaps you should try harder? Perhaps do some research? Maybe stop sniffing your own junk and come see that the rest of us aren’t you.

When I walk into a convenience store to get a receipt for my gas and the young woman at the counter greets me with a smile and a kind word, I tell myself "She felt comfortable doing that because I'm white."

Nope, she does that because it’s her job... it’s called ‘customer service.’ And if you think she does it because she feels comfortable with you... because you’re white... then you’re creepy as sh*t, weirdo. Oh, and the rest of us get our receipts at the pump, we don't use that as a pretext to see if the old “I'm white” line will work on the unsuspecting convenience store clerkette.

When I see a highway patrolman pass me by while I'm exceeding the speed limit or, as actually happened two weeks ago, I get pulled over for that and let off without a ticket, I say to myself: "That happened because I'm white."

No, it happened because they don’t ticket people in Prisuses for driving 2 mph over the limit. Try racing down the street at 50 over and see if you can escape the ticket then. What’s more, I’ll bet you never once raised the issue of race with the cop did you? No, I doubt it. Instead, you acted very meek and waved around your ‘I’m a preacher’ credentials. Try it again in a hoodie, while packing heat after chugging a ‘fifty and see if the cop lets you off when he sees your five priors and you can’t produce insurance. That’s the more authentic experience for the people, white or black, who scream bias.

When I drive through the many border checkpoints we have set up here in the Southwest along the Mexican border, and as I roll down my window and make my stop at the guard gate, and as the border patrol agent simply glances at my face before waging me on with a perfunctory "have a good day," I say to myself: "That is the result of my being white."

LOLOLOLOL! Idiot. Of course the border patrol agent waves you through because they are looking for MEXICANS... and you don’t look Mexican, idiot. I’ll bet they don’t pull you over either when they are looking for Asians, do they? Or escaped tigers from the zoo. Moron.

I don't know in the end if any of those were in fact true statements. That isn't the point of this exercise. The point is to create a consciousness from which I can no longer let myself escape.

Whoooooa! First, no, none of those are facts. They are all untrue. Secondly, your admission is truly a travesty. That tells me that you are intent on creating an escapist fantasy without any knowledge of what is true and what is false. That’s called fiction. And the fact you would pimp fiction as fact and then use it to justify a political solution tells me that you are one sick turd, Turdburglar.

I want to be clear about something. This solves nothing. I can notice, and still be happy and content with the privilege I am afforded.

Of course you can because this entire argument has been a fraud. But what if it wasn’t? Well, then your current statement is about as immoral as one can get. It is the equivalent of ‘I know people are suffering for the privileges I enjoy, but hey, I do like those privileges.’

That’s it. I can’t take anymore. This guy is a fraud.

Thoughts?

34 comments:

Critch said...

Where was all that white privilege when I was busting my butt for a nickel a palter in a sawmill, where was it when I was bumping hay for a dime a bale in a 100F weather? Boy howdy, it sure felt good to be white in those days...

AndrewPrice said...

Critch, Exactly. I've never experienced that either. My dad was Air Force enlisted - $78 a month. His family was coal miners. We grew up in a trailer park. But my dad wanted better for us, so he struggled through night school to get a college degree (got two eventually), moved to where the jobs are on several occasions, and did whatever he could to work his way up the mobility ladder.

I got zero help for being white getting into college or law school, whereas many blacks with far lower scores got into schools that turned me down. I got my jobs by busting my hump to work my resume and then earn the respect of my employers. I've been hassled by the cops on several occasion just because it was late at night and they were bored or because they just didn't like something about me.

I've never received a penny's help from the government. Because of self-employment, I pay tax rates that would even make a liberal cringe.

Nothing was ever handed to me or my family and no one ever gave us any break because we were white.

This guy is a turd.

Rustbelt said...

I'm going to second Critch, given my prolonged experiences in the quick service food and beverage industry when I've needed to get by.
(The only evidence I saw of white privilege in that setting involved landscapers- grown men ranging from high school dropout to middle age potbelly who cut grass for a living- folding their arms and looking down on the cashier taking their order.)

In happier news, professional a**hat Colin Cowherd's days at ESPN are over. The ultra-smug, super lefty, superiority-complexed, poor man's Skip Bayliss- who has said plenty of stuff over the years that he could have (should have) been canned for- finally went too far over statements made about Dominicans and ESPN at last pulled the rug out from under his feet.
With Olberman and Coward now history, I'd like to think this to be a coming trend for ESPN. But since since cleaning of a**hats would remove approximately 90% of their onscreen talent, I don't see it happening anytime soon.

Rustbelt said...

Update: Just did a search and saw that Coward was already heading to greener pastures at Fox. (This controversy just hastened his ESPN departure.) Well, Fox Sports and FS1 are already a mess and pathetic ESPN wannabe. I'm honestly not surprised. The good news here is that since so few people watch Fox Sports to begin with, Coward shouldn't be heard from again very much anymore- if ever at all.

AndrewPrice said...

Rustbelt, Surely you just don't see all the privilege your being a honkey has afforded you. I'm sure it's there if you look hard enough... maybe it fell behind the fridge? ;-)

You know what this letter reminds me of? In the 1980s, Eddie Murphy did a skit for SNL in which he dressed up as a white guy and went around the city. He found that once the last black got off the bus, it turned into a party and the whites were given champagne. A bank manager then tried to hand him cash and told him he never needed to pay it back. The point was to really skewer the image that guys like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton were presenting of how whites supposedly treat each other infinitely better than they treat blacks. Guys like Turdburglar seem to have take that bit of parody as fact.

I saw that about Coward. He deserved to be fired years ago. Frankly, I'm amazed this was enough.

Rustbelt said...

Actually, Andrew, I think I left it in the walk-in with the box-cutter and mop! :-)

But maybe I need to wake up about it and come to realize the same sort of smugness enjoyed by all those landscapers with the gold teeth and hedge funds and property to ride on and luxurious tanned looks and and untraceable, crinkled dollar bills that they throw at the cashier (instead of burning it with their many, many cigarettes).*

(*-If you ask me, you learn more about people when serving food to them than at any other point because they have absolutely no facade on at the time.)

Rustbelt said...

I need to see that skit. Back in the days when satire truly was satire. And Murphy has never disappointed when he's truly in his element.

AndrewPrice said...

Rustbelt, I've looked and I can't find the SNL video sadly. :(

Yep, you should get on the white train and get your free money and easy-life (TM) guaranteed. //shakes head

How people treat waiters is certainly an indication of whether or not they are decent human beings.

Unknown said...

Andrew......This crap is one of the reasons I like a lot of Dave Chapelle's work. There was one called "When Keeping it Real Gets Real" or something along those lines. Dealt with a black woman "keeping it real" as she's getting arrested and thrown in jail by being an asshat. Her version of keeping it real.

And if you got through his obvious parody of whites, he was actually pretty funny. Gave whites an insight into some black humor. Watch the Charlie Murphy interviews. Some of the best work he did.

Bob

Unknown said...

Ans as far as the b.s. writer Turdburglar, what is his solution to white privilege? Does he want whites to have different laws than blacks? Does he want whites to be obsequious to every black? Does he want whites to give up their hard earned money and just give it to any blacks they come across?

No. What he wants is to try and rationalize a massive transfer of wealth through government force from those that have (whites he believes) to those that don't (blacks he believes). Completely ignoring ANY black who succeeded in our imperfect capitalist system.

The unfortunate thing for him, is that whites came over and settled this land 400 some years ago. Most, if not all whites never owned black people as help, nor sent blacks out to fight the indigenous people. Yeah, our culture believed that private property was the basis for wealth accumulation and the existing culture didn't. Should we have just recognized that and said, oh....they don't see land as being owned by anyone, and then turned around and went back to Europe?

It's people like Turdburglar that were part of every fascist movement throughout history. It all comes down to kill the ones we don't agree with. Your approach to this asshat and all the SJW's and their ilk, is spot on. Humiliate them...shame them....shun them from normal society and let them stew in their little miserable world of self-hate and like-minded small thinking idiots that were forcibly institutionalized in the not so distant past. "You Sir are insane and here is how we handle insanity in the society you live in."

Thanks for the early Monday morning rant. I feel much better now.

Bob

AndrewPrice said...

Thanks Bob! Turdburglar deserves nothing but contempt for this unhappy horseshit.

In terms of what they want, you were right in your first thought. They want more than a distribution of wealth. Liberation Theology (and something called Critical Studies) claim that laws are a tool of oppression invented by those in power (i.e. whites) to keep those out of power (i.e. blacks) down. They want a total re-write of the laws to essentially give them power.

The only examples I've seen of what they are willing to say they want specifically involve redistribution of wealth, eliminating property crimes, proportional voting for minorities so they are guaranteed a certain number of legislators, and laws forcing companies to put them the Boards of directors.

BevfromNYC said...

I am not going to apologize for working hard for no money, taking my lumps, picking myself up and moving on and taking care of my independent self. I will not apologize for making good choices and receiving good parenting. My parents expected me to be valuable to society.

Yes, I was an upper-middle class white child whose parents work their fingers to the bone to give me the opportunity to do anything I wanted to do in life like their immigrant and natural-born working-class parents before them.. There is no one in my entire life that has been held back because they were of a certain race, gender, or social status. That doesn't mean that they were not discriminated against in their lives ever. It means they succeeded because they pushed passed all the failures and crap flung at them and found a way.

AndrewPrice said...

Well said Bev! In fact, you said something truly insightful of the key difference... "my parents expected me to be valuable to society."

That is a key difference between those who succeed and those who fail. Those who succeed are raised with the idea of contributing to society. Consequently, they develop the skills, manners and mentality that leads them to become successful and find their way into society to achieve their goals.

Those who fail and end up at the bottom most often view it the other way around... they start with a belief that society will provide for them. I've seen this in low class blacks, whites and Hispanics. And the result is that they fail to develop the skills need to succeed. For example, they don't understand the reason to obtain education, to engage in self-help, or why it's important to cater to people like bosses or clients.

Because of that, they fail. Then they get pissed off because they believed that everything they see on TV (what all those stupid middle class people own) was an entitlement and they don't understand why they didn't get theirs. And since all their friends, who are just like them also "got screwed" they engage in conspiracy theories to explain their failure... racism! foreigners! etc.!

AndrewPrice said...

BTW, Bev, let me add that it doesn't matter to me if you were the daughter of the richest man on the planet (though if you are then can I "borrow" a million dollars? :D), because I don't begrudge anyone anything unless they stole it or extorted it through something like government cronies.

Every person is their own person, whether rich or poor or somewhere in between, and the only moral and sensical way to judge people is on their own merits as a human being. Are they a good person.

Once you get beyond that and start judging people based on race or income or where they started in life, you are only talking about prejudice.

BevfromNYC said...

BTW, Bev, let me add that it doesn't matter to me if you were the daughter of the richest man on the planet (though if you are then can I "borrow" a million dollars? :D), Uh, okay, sadly or gladly I am not. Though I have actually wanted to try being a millionaire. It think I could be as least as good as Donald Trump. And I think the government owes me the opportunity to try, don't you? 8-D

But to your other part - There are just as many of us who blow opportunities as take advantage of them. It's not just about "the money". Look at all of the athletes and famous/almost famous entertainers who are paid astronomical amounts of money who end up bankrupt and on the skids because of really bad choices.

To me the test of one's true character is how you dig yourself out of the hole, not how you get there.

Koshcat said...

I think the skit you are referring to was a Dave Chappelle.

I like this quote:

•There’s a lot of racism going on. Who’s more racist, black people or white people? It’s black people! You know why? Because we hate black people too! Everything white people don’t like about black people, black people really don’t like about black people. [Chris Rock: Bring the Pain, 1996]

tryanmax said...

Watch where you step on the Internet. Little piles of these "awareness raising" turds are everywhere. They'll tell you that it's not about making whites feel guilty, and if you do, you don't "get it" and your guilt is offensive. Of course, if you don't feel guilty, you're an insensitive, privileged racist, so...

But as has already been pointed out, it's all about reparations in some form. Raising awareness hits an early wall since most people aren't blatant ash holes and only so many people are so self-doubting as to wonder whether they lock their doors b/c, deep down, they hate anyone who looks different.

Anyone else who wants to "do something" beyond reading Maya Angelou's crappy poetry is immediately directed to contribute to and campaign for a lefty politician.

tryanmax said...

On a related note, what this "privilege" stuff is about is another attempt to define whiteness as something materially different than blackness. The racial grievance types have successfully branded success and the things that lead to it as "white" behavior and have delegitimized that behavior as unrelated to success. In other words, you didn't get ahead b/c you studied, worked hard, and obeyed the rules. You got ahead because nobody randomly arrested you while/for doing those things.

Kit said...

On this topic, "Black Lives Matter co-founder threatens to "shut down" GOP Convention." LINK

tryanmax said...

White Like Me

Koshcat said...

I was wrong. Tryanmax found it and now that I see it I remember the skit. Chappell had one after blacks received reparations. Hilarious.

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, Thanks for finding that! :)

On feeling guilt, I feel zero guilt and I don't care if they call me racists because I know better and I see their charges as politicized in any event. But you are absolutely correct, that is their game!

AndrewPrice said...

Bev, I agree with your test of character.

AndrewPrice said...

Koshcat, At one point, Chris Rock made some devastating critiques of pretty much everyone. Lately, he's kind of lost his touch, but he used to be hilarious in his observations.

Anthony said...

Andrew said:


That is a key difference between those who succeed and those who fail. Those who succeed are raised with the idea of contributing to society. Consequently, they develop the skills, manners and mentality that leads them to become successful and find their way into society to achieve their goals.

Those who fail and end up at the bottom most often view it the other way around... they start with a belief that society will provide for them. I've seen this in low class blacks, whites and Hispanics. And the result is that they fail to develop the skills need to succeed. For example, they don't understand the reason to obtain education, to engage in self-help, or why it's important to cater to people like bosses or clients.

Because of that, they fail. Then they get pissed off because they believed that everything they see on TV (what all those stupid middle class people own) was an entitlement and they don't understand why they didn't get theirs. And since all their friends, who are just like them also "got screwed" they engage in conspiracy theories to explain their failure... racism! foreigners! etc.!
------------
I haven't personally run into many people who think a degree should have magically translated into money, but I have met many blacks who have severely underestimated the importance of networking.

Working hard and being competent or even good at your job isn't enough, you need to be what the people who sit in judgement of you want you to be. They will not elevate people they are uncomfortable with to their ranks. Being what bosses want is easier for some than others though how easy it is varies depending on what the expectations of the bosses are (some bosses are looking for someone who can do the job well, some are looking for friends, some are looking for surrogate kids, some are looking for people similar to themselves, which in some cases means race is one of their criteria, etc).

------------------
I'd also say that it can't be argued that too many blacks are picking the wrong majors (not enough blacks in the hard sciences, too many in humanities).

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, Speaking of white behavior, an NFL legend just got in trouble for advising the young players to "act white. Do what the white players do." Then he pointed out that white players don't get arrested, don't do drugs, and don't get into the kids of trouble that are so routine. He said he was going for effect, and obviously he overstated the race issue, but the interesting thing was the reaction.

AndrewPrice said...

Kit, The left always tries to shut down the GOP convention. It never really works. They tend to do a better job of shutting down the Democratic convention.

AndrewPrice said...

Anthony, This ==> Working hard and being competent or even good at your job isn't enough, you need to be what the people who sit in judgement of you want you to be.

... is the number one lesson smart people need to learn the hard way. I've met so many of these. They are very bright, very talented and they believe in the idea of meritocracy, and they can't believe they got dumped for someone with far less talent. What they don't realize at first is that the comfort factor will always trump talent. So you need to play the game of making the boss like you. And obviously, it applies down the line as well.

In terms of picking the wrong majors, that is a problem with both blacks and women. They actually get degrees in greater numbers than white males, but the degrees many of them get are worthless.

In terms of undervaluing education, I've seen this consistently among the low class/poor of every race. In fact, it's become a machismo thing to oppose being educated as if that somehow emasculates you. I have repeatedly seen low class whites talk about how education makes you a not "real American" or not real "workin' man." Among low class blacks, I have see the refrain that education is "acting white."

As an aside, I've seen a couple documentaries that are just infuriating on how blacks in the worst inner cities view education... parents who literally don't know if their kids are in school or care, parents who tell their kids that education won't matter because racism will stop them from succeeding, etc.

AndrewPrice said...

BTW, if you ever get the chance, check out this documentary: Hard Times at Douglass High.

It's shocking. It's supposed to be an attack on NCLB, but what it shows instead is a high school that is in total collapse because the parents don't care.

Kit said...

"The left always tries to shut down the GOP convention. It never really works. They tend to do a better job of shutting down the Democratic convention."

Like in '68?

Kit said...

"In terms of undervaluing education, I've seen this consistently among the low class/poor of every race. In fact, it's become a machismo thing to oppose being educated as if that somehow emasculates you. I have repeatedly seen low class whites talk about how education makes you a not "real American" or not real "workin' man." Among low class blacks, I have see the refrain that education is "acting white.""

In Dr. Theodore Dalrymple's magnificent book, Life at the Bottom, he discusses how low-income (white) kids who try to do well in school get beat up by other low-income (white) kids for "bein' clever."

Here is a passage:
------------------------------------------
I wish I could say that some irony was intended, but the cult of stupidity has become in England what the cult of celebrity is in the United States. To call someone clever has never been an unequivocal compliment in England, but it takes a special kind of perversity for students at the secondary school situated 400 yards from my hospital to say to one of their colleagues, who took an overdose because of the constant bullying to which she was subject: You’re stupid because you’re clever.
What did they mean by this apparent paradox? They meant that anyone who tried hard at school and performed well was wasting his time, when he could have been engaged in the real business of life, such as playing truant in the park or wandering down town. Furthermore, there was menace in their words: If you don’t mend your ways and join us, they were saying, we’ll beat you up.
This was no idle threat: I often meet people in their 20s and 30s in my hospital practice who gave up at school under such duress and subsequently realise that they have missed an opportunity which, had it been taken, would have changed the whole course of their lives much for the better. And those who attend the few schools in the city that maintain very high academic standards risk a beating if they venture to where the poor white stupids live. In the last year I have treated two boys in the emergency room after such a beating, and two others who have taken overdoses for fear of receiving one at the hands of their neighbors.
------------------------------------------

This being Dalrymple, don't expect to hear about happy endings for students who persisted.

The book is available at Amazon.com, I highly recommend it.
LINK

Critch said...

I'm in our capitol, Jefferson City. I noticed that the hotel is very quiet and the bar is empty at 8PM,,,turns out that the hotel is full of young law students taking their bar exams tomorrow here at the hotel...you can hear them sweating.

tryanmax said...

Andrew, I heard about that NFL guy. I haven't heard about the backlash, but I can imagine. The thing is, he's basically saying what the left keeps denying: that it's not about race but behavior. The fact that an inordinate number of blacks choose to act foolish doesn't change that. As for the surveys that supposedly show how blacks and whites commit crime in equal numbers but whites get away with it, beyond calling shenanigans (it's always a survey, never a research study), the answer is simple: don't break the law. "But he did it, too!" doesn't work on the playground, and it doesn't work in the real world. There's no crying that the field isn't level when you're already out of bounds.

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, That's exactly right. It is about behavior, not race. And screaming that the other guy did it too just isn't relevant.

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