5 ms·
> Explore, yes, by all means, just not near politically fraught international borders, even if you are a white man from America, with all the privilege in the w
by camus2 10y ago
> Explore, yes, by all means, just not near politically fraught international borders, even if you are a white man from America, with all the privilege in the world to marshal
I'm not an English native, can someone explain me what would be the meaning of the verb to marshal in that sentence, in the context of using of the word "privilege". I don't want to misinterpret the last point.
- rangibaby 10y agoIt means he has a lot of privilege.
- charlieflowers 10y agoIn that context, it means "to muster up." To gather and apply.
- mistermumble 10y agoIf one wanted to overthink this, one could say there is a "calculus of privilege" that depends upon context. In many contexts (geographical and social contexts), being white, male and America adds up to maximum privilege. But in other contexts, white and male usually add up to a positive -- but being American can subtract (which is why backpackers are returning to the habit of sewing the Canadian flag patch on their gear, even if they are from the US). In the era of Trump, the attribute of being American has turned negative, in many places. I suppose the bottom line is that if you are placing yourself in different contexts, don't assume that that calculus of privilege works the same way on the Russian border as it does in Virginia or Indiana. And if you are a Sikh in the United States, that calculus, which was at best neutral, has now turned sharply negative, sad to say.
- microtherion 10y agoOr, in a brief video illustration of said "calculus of privilege": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY_FRc__ZVQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY_FRc__ZVQ
- chatmasta 10y ago> In the era of Trump, the attribute of being American has turned negative, in many places. This is a wild generalization that in the past nine months of traveling, I have not experienced once. In fact you may be surprised to hear I found more Trump supporters in Morocco, of all places, than I did detractors. Regardless, even if someone hates trump, for most people it does not also follow that they hate all Americans. I would lose immediate respect for someone sewing the flag of another country on their backpack; it's so presumptuous, arrogant, and self absorbed.
- jsjohnst 10y agoDon't mistake personal anecdata for fact. I've personally seen it happen recently to friends (and experienced it in the past the last time we had a president many outside the US hated). Not saying it's universally a constant (otherwise I'd fall in the same trap you did), but it definitely happens.
- Frondo 10y agoYour post also seems like a wild generalization, to be honest. I spent some time living abroad in the Bush years, in a variety of places where Westerners almost never go. (I hate the beaten path...if I can see photos of it on Flickr, I don't need to go there myself. That should help you figure out where all I've been ;) ) Based on the anti-American sentiment I saw there, then, anti-American sentiment in many parts of the world would not at all surprise me now. And I didn't sew any flag on my backpack, but I sure didn't tell people I was an American; I speak another language well enough (and with an indistinct accent) that I usually told people I was from a non-Western country entirely. If for nothing else, the haggling. Just passing as a non-Westerner got my prices in North Africa cut by 90% every. single. time. Hah, maybe they just liked your money!
- pbnjay 10y agouse, collect, gather up, stockpile. "a white man from America" has a lot of privilege in the world, but even putting it all together could not help this guy.
- gydfi 10y agoClearly privilege is contextual and it doesn't help here. Another reason why "privilege" the way it has been used recently is a silly concept.
- beisner 10y agoMarshal generally means something along the lines of "to wield". So in this case the author is saying that even though as a white American male he possesses many societal privileges (and may attempt to take advantage of them), they aren't enough to overcome the political barriers outlined.
- ThrustVectoring 10y agoIt's a somewhat older word that basically means "to gather" or "to collect". A good surviving use of it is in a "marshalling yard", where a series of railway switches get used to sort and organize freight trains.
- selimthegrim 10y agoOr indeed, in programming too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshalling_(computer_science) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshalling_(computer_science)
- kybernetyk 10y agoIt's a leftists jab at "dumb white males who believe they can get away with anything". Media is full with this crap nowadays. They even manage to put it in completely unrelated stories (like this one).
- BjoernKW 10y agoThe word's original meaning comes from a military context. Both its literal and its figurative meaning here is synonymous to 'to muster'. It can be interpreted as both 'to summon up' and 'to draw upon'.