4 ms·

you will get some replies with the depth of "it would be worse if you were not white." I think there is only the smallest amount of truth there. Here are things

you will get some replies with the depth of "it would be worse if you were not white." I think there is only the smallest amount of truth there. Here are things that have happened to me, a poor white kid from california (and this is just off the top of my head): I could never join a sports team in school or other extra curricular, that shit's expensive. I had to steal food to get enough to eat. I've been pulled over multiple times, nearly every case because my car was shitty and the cop was shaking me down. I've been stopped by cops for walking through a hospital parking lot to go visit a friend. I've had a cop pull a gun out at me and order me to the ground. I was 14. I was told at a young age to follow cop orders exactly and be non threatening else I may get shot. My mom didn't come to a complete stop at a side street stop sign. Pulled over and the entire car tossed. The cop told my mom she likely stole it and they will find out what she did. A white buddy got the shit beat out of him by a cop. His crime was being poor and skating. I've seen a lot of nice cars going to a car race and then there was my buddy and I in a shitty car. We got pulled over and harassed. I was constantly excluded from most of my peer group because I was poor. I had to work multiple jobs to put myself through college -- little financial aid there. I spent over a decade scraping by because I didn't have a single role model on how to grow my career (or even really start one). Living in a low socio-economic area makes it hard to earn enough to get out. I was the first and only person in my family to go to college. I've been ghosted on interviews, called racist names, and hell, my wife had rocks thrown at her as a kid because she was one of like 5 white kids at her inner city school. Classism is elephant in the room nobody seemingly will acknowledge. But, hey, I'm white, so it can't be that bad, right? /s

rednerrus 6y ago
As someone who grew up poor and white, this was similar to my experience.
epgui 6y ago
Nobody can take these experiences away from you or discount the difficulties you went through. But saying that you don't have white privilege because you grew up poor is not quite right either. The thing with privilege is that there's more than one kind, and they all add up (and most likely they interact as different factors, so they're more than additive). * If you're non-white in the US, you're underprivileged. * If you're poor, you're underprivileged. * If you have a disability, you're underprivileged. * If you have a health problem, you're underprivileged. * If you're an immigrant, you're underprivileged. * If you're a minority group, you're underprivileged. There's no neat division between totally privileged and totally underprivileged people: it's a multifaceted and highly textured aspect of human experience, and all of the above statements are true. If it helps, don't think of it as privilege "adding" anything to your life. Think instead of the opposite: being underprivileged subtracts from the opportunities you're given.
- ZephyrBlu 6y ago
  Do you believe that being black or white has a larger impact than being poor or rich? If so, why? If not, why do people focus so much on race instead of wealth?
  - mjevans 6y ago
    Race was, probably still IS, one of many cast-ist and class-ist factors used to disenfranchise groups outside of the rich elite, and probably to some extent within them. It would be far healthier to recognize discrimination is anyone not exactly like the person discriminating; which includes ALL the factors. Not just race. (Though that was historically the easiest to notice filter in many terrible and egregious ways that were more obviously systemic.)
  - ingleswood 6y ago
    Do you believe that being black or white has no impact? If not, then racism and white privilege are real things that exist. The presence of other forms of discrimination and oppression does not change this.
  - epgui 6y ago
    I wouldn't dare put a number on it: I frankly don't know what the ratio would be, or if there even was just one ratio. I stand by what I said, and my main point was that this is a highly textured aspect of human experience. It's hard to reduce that to a > or a <. And also I think in the United States, the impact of wealth is quite high compared to other places. I think one's perspective on this would likely depend on where they grew up.

rednerrus 6y ago

As someone who grew up poor and white, this was similar to my experience.

epgui 6y ago

Nobody can take these experiences away from you or discount the difficulties you went through. But saying that you don't have white privilege because you grew up poor is not quite right either. The thing with privilege is that there's more than one kind, and they all add up (and most likely they interact as different factors, so they're more than additive). * If you're non-white in the US, you're underprivileged. * If you're poor, you're underprivileged. * If you have a disability, you're underprivileged. * If you have a health problem, you're underprivileged. * If you're an immigrant, you're underprivileged. * If you're a minority group, you're underprivileged. There's no neat division between totally privileged and totally underprivileged people: it's a multifaceted and highly textured aspect of human experience, and all of the above statements are true. If it helps, don't think of it as privilege "adding" anything to your life. Think instead of the opposite: being underprivileged subtracts from the opportunities you're given.

ZephyrBlu 6y ago
Do you believe that being black or white has a larger impact than being poor or rich? If so, why? If not, why do people focus so much on race instead of wealth?
- mjevans 6y ago
  Race was, probably still IS, one of many cast-ist and class-ist factors used to disenfranchise groups outside of the rich elite, and probably to some extent within them. It would be far healthier to recognize discrimination is anyone not exactly like the person discriminating; which includes ALL the factors. Not just race. (Though that was historically the easiest to notice filter in many terrible and egregious ways that were more obviously systemic.)
- ingleswood 6y ago
  Do you believe that being black or white has no impact? If not, then racism and white privilege are real things that exist. The presence of other forms of discrimination and oppression does not change this.
- epgui 6y ago
  I wouldn't dare put a number on it: I frankly don't know what the ratio would be, or if there even was just one ratio. I stand by what I said, and my main point was that this is a highly textured aspect of human experience. It's hard to reduce that to a > or a <. And also I think in the United States, the impact of wealth is quite high compared to other places. I think one's perspective on this would likely depend on where they grew up.