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You're focusing on one tiny anecdote of my life and generalizing it to my entire existence. I never said being discriminated against for a job was an example o

You're focusing on one tiny anecdote of my life and generalizing it to my entire existence. I never said being discriminated against for a job was an example of incredible privilege - it's many of the other things that most white males never notice. When I get pulled over for speeding I don't have to worry about getting shot like black men do. Do you have any idea how fucking horrible it is to go through life worrying about legalized thugs with a proven history of racism regularly getting away with murdering you just because of the color of your skin? I don't because I'm white. That's privilege. If you think "driving while black" is a joke then your ignorance is making the world a worse place. Holy fucking shit I cannot stand the echo chamber that is tech sometimes. Get out of your bubble and try to experience the world outside of reading about it on HN. There are worse things than being denied a job because of bullshit HR policies.

native_samples 5y ago
More white men are shot by the police than black men in the USA, so unfortunately you do have to worry about that (a little bit, but not too much). https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-de... This means your example of white privilege is invalid. Do you have any other?
- BigBubbleButt 5y ago
  Those are raw numbers. What happens when you consider that there are more white people than black people in the United States? It reverses your claim. Your numbers show there are roughly twice as many white people shot, but there are roughly 4x as many white people as black - so being black makes you twice as likely to be shot by the police in the United States. This is so obvious I assume you're arguing in bad faith. The sign of privilege is being unaware of it, because you're not regularly confronted with adversity. What is the worst adversity you've faced in your life as a white male? Mine is maybe being denied a lucrative job. Boo fucking hoo for me.
  - native_samples 5y ago
    Look, the original article is about gender discrimination and you're displaying all the signs of the newly converted, so I'm not going to try too hard to argue with you about this. We all know there's many aspects of life where outcomes are disproportionate to racial/gender demographics, and that US police violence is one of them, with white women being given a famously light touch by police. In fact I once talked to a girl who openly boasted that she was always speeding and never got a ticket because she just started crying at the policeman (she was a very pretty girl so I could believe that this worked). However your original claim was wrong and deserved to be called out. You said: "When I get pulled over for speeding I don't have to worry about getting shot like black men do." which is an absolute statement. In fact, you do have to worry about getting shot. I knew perfectly well you'd make a statistical argument in return, and also that it would be irrelevant given the strength of your original claim. There is no "white privilege" that means US police won't shoot you. They will do so if they feel the need, or perhaps even if they don't. The primary determinator of that is nonetheless your own actions, like whether you're armed or on drugs at the time. But it also doesn't make sense to use this one isolated statistic in the context we're debating. After all, if you want to use getting shot by the police to define your hierarchy of privilege then the poorest European is vastly more privileged than the richest American will ever be, implying that Europeans should never be hired for jobs when an American could be hired instead. That wouldn't make sense. Now, none of the above will land home with you. But I want you to consider something else. When you try to justify racism and sexism against white men like you are doing above, you're not just slapping yourself in the face, you're slapping the rest of us too. You're justifying us being denied jobs, including those of us who don't even live in America, because this ridiculous self-harming ideology gets exported via American HR departments, management and cultural production to the rest of the world. That's how you end up with people marching in London saying "hands up don't shoot" even though British police are almost always unarmed and the UK doesn't have a problem with police shootings. By insisting that arbitrarily chosen differences in outcome with deep and complex socioeconomic causes are all reduced to "white man bad" you are deservedly opening yourself to harsh criticism, not merely because it's a racist and sexist viewpoint, but also because it directly harms the lives of those around you. By all means, stop applying for lucrative jobs if you feel so guilty about existing, but for goodness sake don't insist that those same harms befall the innocent.
username90 5y ago
Men are more overrepresented as targets by police violence than black people are. So you just brought up a strong example of female privilege, and more specifically white female privilege. But certainly not a white male privilege.

native_samples 5y ago

More white men are shot by the police than black men in the USA, so unfortunately you do have to worry about that (a little bit, but not too much). https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-de... This means your example of white privilege is invalid. Do you have any other?

BigBubbleButt 5y ago
Those are raw numbers. What happens when you consider that there are more white people than black people in the United States? It reverses your claim. Your numbers show there are roughly twice as many white people shot, but there are roughly 4x as many white people as black - so being black makes you twice as likely to be shot by the police in the United States. This is so obvious I assume you're arguing in bad faith. The sign of privilege is being unaware of it, because you're not regularly confronted with adversity. What is the worst adversity you've faced in your life as a white male? Mine is maybe being denied a lucrative job. Boo fucking hoo for me.
- native_samples 5y ago
  Look, the original article is about gender discrimination and you're displaying all the signs of the newly converted, so I'm not going to try too hard to argue with you about this. We all know there's many aspects of life where outcomes are disproportionate to racial/gender demographics, and that US police violence is one of them, with white women being given a famously light touch by police. In fact I once talked to a girl who openly boasted that she was always speeding and never got a ticket because she just started crying at the policeman (she was a very pretty girl so I could believe that this worked). However your original claim was wrong and deserved to be called out. You said: "When I get pulled over for speeding I don't have to worry about getting shot like black men do." which is an absolute statement. In fact, you do have to worry about getting shot. I knew perfectly well you'd make a statistical argument in return, and also that it would be irrelevant given the strength of your original claim. There is no "white privilege" that means US police won't shoot you. They will do so if they feel the need, or perhaps even if they don't. The primary determinator of that is nonetheless your own actions, like whether you're armed or on drugs at the time. But it also doesn't make sense to use this one isolated statistic in the context we're debating. After all, if you want to use getting shot by the police to define your hierarchy of privilege then the poorest European is vastly more privileged than the richest American will ever be, implying that Europeans should never be hired for jobs when an American could be hired instead. That wouldn't make sense. Now, none of the above will land home with you. But I want you to consider something else. When you try to justify racism and sexism against white men like you are doing above, you're not just slapping yourself in the face, you're slapping the rest of us too. You're justifying us being denied jobs, including those of us who don't even live in America, because this ridiculous self-harming ideology gets exported via American HR departments, management and cultural production to the rest of the world. That's how you end up with people marching in London saying "hands up don't shoot" even though British police are almost always unarmed and the UK doesn't have a problem with police shootings. By insisting that arbitrarily chosen differences in outcome with deep and complex socioeconomic causes are all reduced to "white man bad" you are deservedly opening yourself to harsh criticism, not merely because it's a racist and sexist viewpoint, but also because it directly harms the lives of those around you. By all means, stop applying for lucrative jobs if you feel so guilty about existing, but for goodness sake don't insist that those same harms befall the innocent.

username90 5y ago

Men are more overrepresented as targets by police violence than black people are. So you just brought up a strong example of female privilege, and more specifically white female privilege. But certainly not a white male privilege.