Privilege – a slow dawning

[AmyParticipant]

That’s really different from both where I live and some of the churches I’ve been in.  I live in the western part of New York State.  New York City is known for being very liberal, but the rest of the state is not so much.  People outside my state tend to think that we’re ALL from NYC, as though that’s the only place anyone lives here.  I honestly can’t imagine thinking all Californians are from LA or all Floridians are from Miami, so I just don’t get it. Ha!

Anyway, around here, it’s expected that Christian = political conservative, but I can send my kid to public (free, non-religious) school without criticism.  However, since my daughter is homeschooled (my son goes to public school), I’m expected to use Christian materials & get criticized for using the local public school’s materials.

@AgnosticBeliever I agree that people confuse “privilege” and “easy.”  I think what should be understood is that it’s not really about individual people and playing oppression olympics.  It’s about systems that make it generally harder for people.  I saw a video of LeVar Burton talking about how he has had to teach his kids how to not get arrested if they’re pulled over.  My friend Ray tells stories about being stopped by police multiple times as a teen walking home after dark (but still well before town curfew) and having to prove he was just coming home from his friend’s house two streets over.  Those are not things I need to warn my own kids about.  That’s privilege–not that LeVar Burton has it hard and I don’t, or the other way around, but that there are things that could happen to him that will likely never happen to me which are directly correlated to race.

[Tim WBParticipant]

Another one:

 

I can walk around, by myself, at any time of the day or night, with very little risk of violence, arrest, or any other untoward event.

(I have only once been stopped by the police as they were running an operation, but they asked very few questions and moved on quickly.)

This is partly to do with my locality, but is primarily due to my gender, race, build, and perhaps attitude.

 

It is a privilege I would dearly love to share with everyone in my community – it must be terrible to be concerned for your safety just because you want to walk around outside. It is something I have trouble imagining, even though I have walked friends home, and walked with friends around strange cities.

[Tim WBParticipant]

And another which I hadn’t even considered – via Dianne Amderson:

It’s an element of privilege, that a person’s identity is something to be questioned and debated and discussed within frameworks of sin and hell and forgiveness. The Church labels itself as unsafe the very second it treats something that is vitally important to someone as a legitimate question, up for discussion.

http://diannaeanderson.net/blog/2013/6/my-life-is-not-a-question-mark-the-harm-of-harmless-questions

She speaks about treating women and GLBTIAQ people in this way as a conversation piece, even though they’re in the room. I objected to this the last time I saw Christians doing it – I’m not sure if I was clear, but it did make a difference – just by asking the person not to say “us” and “them”, and reminding those present that these are people who identify as Gay Christians.

[Author]

Posts