What do you do when you’ve built a lucrative cottage
industry around a product but you’ve saturated the market and your product has
not lived up to its hype? Well, when
you’re a liberal and the product you’re selling is indignation over phony
racism, you repackage your phony racism as a new and improved product and you
call it, “White privilege.”
A handout
in a Wisconsin school’s “American Diversity” course defined white privilege as
follows:
In
critical race theory, white privilege is a set of advantages that are believed
to be enjoyed by white people beyond those commonly experienced by non-white
people in the same social, political, and economic spaces (nation, community,
workplace, income, etc.). Theorists differentiate it from racism or prejudice
because, they say, a person who may benefit from white privilege is not
necessarily racist or prejudiced and may be unaware of having any privileges
reserved only for whites.
“Critical race theory.”
Boy that sounds very intellectual, doesn’t it? You’re supposed to be impressed.
As charming as it is that “theorists” are attempting to
differentiate “white privilege” from plain old fashioned racism it’s clearly
just double-talk. If the theory is that whites
benefit from privilege strictly on
the basis of skin color alone (see the definition above), that’s racism –
period. So
why are we changing “racism” to “white privilege?” Maybe it’s because you can stop being racist but
you can never stop being white. Maybe it’s
because blacks can be racists, but they can’t have “white privilege.” Maybe it’s because the “racism” claim has
lost its luster thanks to the race hustlers who have gratuitously invoked it as
an excuse for each and every black failure, and enough whites have finally caught
on so as to weaken its effectiveness for extorting sympathy and public
money. Not ready to give up their golden
goose, the hustlers have re-packaged it as “white privilege,” secure in the
knowledge that the liberal sheep can be counted on to buy their revamped
product. As long as there’s money in it
and as long as liberals abound to act as enablers we can look forward to a new
variation of this same old game for as long as we live. So let’s talk about “white privilege,” shall
we?
If there’s one thing I don’t understand about the concept of
“white privilege” it’s the success of people of color in fields like sports or
entertainment. I love football, and it’s
been my observation that the vast majority of teams at the college level and in
the pros consist largely of black players despite the smaller number of blacks
in the general population. But how can
this be, I wonder, if whites are the ones with the privilege? These are high-paying gigs, after all, and
can set people up for a lifetime of great earning potential. Why don’t whites want these jobs if they are
entitled, via their privilege, to have them?
Ditto the same question for basketball.
And how did Will Smith and Oprah Winfrey become so rich and influential
in a world where only whites are entitled to such privilege? How did Dwayne Johnson overcome “white privilege”
to become the highest paid actor in the world in 2016?
These realities alone dispel the whole “white privilege”
theory as far as I’m concerned, because it represents concrete evidence that businesses
will embrace the people who can best help them succeed regardless of race or
gender. Therefore, if there are
other industries where blacks are underrepresented, there must logically be other explanations besides “white privilege.” Here are a few facts to consider when
reflecting on what some of those reasons might be:
·
Blacks graduate from high school at significantly
lower rates than white (75% vs. 88%) or Asian students (90%).1
·
According to the latest government census report,
46.9% of whites had an associate’s degree or more compared to just 32.4% of
blacks.2
·
In 2015 66% of black children lived in
single-parent households while just 25% of white children lived in
single-parent households.3
·
As of 2014 the teen birth rate for blacks was
34.9 per 1,000, or double that of whites (17.3 per 1,000).4
Is “white privilege” to blame for the high incidence of teen
pregnancy and fatherless households in the black community? Is “white privilege” to blame for the lower
graduation rate among black high school students? Consider the top reasons cited by blacks for
dropping out:
- Becoming a parent
- Being suspended or expelled even once
- Having several friends drop out
- Feeling academically unprepared for school
- Experiencing a significant mental health problem
- Homelessness, and moving to a new home.
From Black
Enterprise, September 2015
You have to stretch pretty hard to assign blame for this to “white
privilege.” Bad choices and poor
patterns of behavior are the reasons blacks fall behind academically, and this ultimately
manifests itself in lower college graduation rates and, of course, reduced
representation in areas of employment that require a higher level of
education. Employers in those fields
then have fewer positive experiences to draw upon when evaluating black job candidates
and they instinctively go with what’s familiar and what’s brought them the most
success in the past. Is that bias? Perhaps; but it’s not bias based on malice or
“privilege.” It’s bias based on experience,
history and observation. Most
importantly, the ONLY way to cure it is to change experience, history and
observation, and this is something only blacks have the power to do. Let me reiterate:
“White privilege” can only be cured by positive self-change in the
black community.
This is why, whenever I read the usual drivel on “white
privilege,” I think: “So what?” “Privilege,” if that’s the word the race
hustlers want to use, is around us all the time and it’s not reserved to race,
though if it was we would have to shift our focus to privilege among the Asian
race since they kick everyone’s butt when it comes to success as measured by
education and earnings. If we’re going
to obsess over “privilege” why aren’t we also talking about the privileges that
come from being taller, smarter, better looking, more talented, luckier, more
creative, healthier or happier, etc.?
And who is more “privileged,” the white child born to wealthy but abusive
parents or the black child born to poor but nurturing parents? These questions take our thinking where the
race hustlers don’t want us to go, because only race – or to be more specific,
whiteness – lends itself easily to the prospect of wealth transfer and that,
not equality, is the hustler’s ultimate objective.
I want to close with an appeal to those who’ve bought into
the message of “white privilege,” for they know not what they do. The peddlers of “white privilege” have only
two goals in mind:
1. To take something
from you;
2. To make you an
enabler for taking from others, including your children.
That’s it. And the
question is: Are you so desperate for a
cause that you’ll allow it? Will you be
an enabler to a scam that rewards the industry of victimhood when it threatens
the future of not just your own children but also the black children who are
being robbed of life’s critical lessons and the chance for self-driven success? No one in this world, white or black, is born
with an automatic pass for anything, as evidenced by those born to one form of
privilege or another who nevertheless end up experiencing poverty, hardship or
injustice, or those born without any privilege who nevertheless come to
experience great wealth or success. Life
is what you choose to make it. Let that
be the message you share in this life.
~CW
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