8 ms·

It's not directly related to this article, but on the click through (primer link) there's an idea that really resonated with me: If you're western/male/white/s

It's not directly related to this article, but on the click through (primer link) there's an idea that really resonated with me: If you're western/male/white/straight you're playing life on 'very easy' mode. This probably betrays my 'gamified' lifestyle, and maybe it trivializes the issue somewhat, but its a much more compelling argument to me than using the term 'privilege' which is loaded with baggage (hey! I worked hard to get where I am. I'm not some privileged kid who's parent spent big to send me to a good college...) It's really an idea that connects to my demographic, rather than disconnecting them, which is what a lot of this discourse does. So you're a great hacker? sweet. You did that on EASY mode. That guy over there, he's transgender, he's playing on hard and he's where you are despite that. Those hackers girls in the corner? They're playing on nightmare difficulty. Just a little bit of gentle respect for that goes a long way. It's a really great metaphor to explain these ideas to people I know. Just my $0.02

KuraFire 14y ago
Yes, it is a good metaphor. Credit goes to John Scalzi (linked in the original Primer): http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/ http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-th...
nostrademons 14y ago
It would be a great metaphor if it were extended out to all the handicaps people face. That straight white male programmer who has struggled with mental illness since adolescence? He's on nightmare difficulty too. The guy who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth but lost his father as a child? Hasn't been too easy for him either. The girl who grew up with loving parents from a poor neighborhood and didn't see her first computer until college? Well, she's got some huge handicaps, but some pretty solid roots too. I've been privileged in many ways, and I've also struggled in many ways. I'd like to think that I played the hand I got as well as I could, and extended a hand out to those who didn't quite have the same privileges whenever possible. I wouldn't really expect otherwise from anyone else.
- Alex3917 14y ago
  "It would be a great metaphor if it were extended out to all the handicaps people face." This. People often forget that 32.8% of Americans are disabled, including 27.1% of adults age 18 - 64. (According to the CDC.)
  - ced 14y ago
    I was curious about that figure - here's the breakdown: Percent of adults with hearing trouble: 16.2% Percent of adults with vision trouble: 9.4% Percent of adults unable (or very difficult) to walk a quarter mile: 7.3% Percent of adults with any physical functioning difficulty: 15.6% The hearing disability is described as: Overall, 16% of adults aged 18 years and over experienced some hearing difficulty without a hearing aid (defined as ‘‘a little trouble hearing,’’ ‘‘moderate trouble,’’ ‘‘a lot of trouble,’’ or ‘‘deaf’’). Men were more likely to have experienced hearing trouble than women. The report is interesting. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/disable.htm http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/disable.htm
    - nostrademons 14y ago
      Also, within any given year 26% of the U.S. population will suffer from mental illness, and 46% will suffer from it during their lifetime: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/statistics/1ANYDIS_ADULT.shtml http://www.nimh.nih.gov/statistics/1ANYDIS_ADULT.shtml Within any given year 15% of families are below the poverty line, and 58% will fall below it at some point in their life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States Normal is kinda abnormal.
- rayiner 14y ago
  The distinction is that this particular "handicap" applies to 51% of the whole population. It's not unreasonable to consider it more important than the other ones.
  - nostrademons 14y ago
    So, I don't think it's unreasonable to try and lower barriers for women who choose to go into tech. (I don't think it's unreasonable to try and lower barriers for anyone who chooses to go into tech, but like you say, targeting women affects 51% of the population, so it has a pretty high return on investment.) I think it's worth supporting our female colleagues, and celebrating what they achieve. (FWIW, a friend of mine has a blog that does precisely that: http://techladyallstars.com/ http://techladyallstars.com/) I object to framing the debate as a "handicap", because I've found that whenever you start identifying something as a handicap it tends to become one. (Edit: shit, just reread the thread and I did that. Poor word choice on my part.) My own experience is race; my father was sure that the reason that he kept getting passed over for promotions was because he was non-white, and as a result, he ignored all the other possible reasons that were under his control. I've been very careful not to identify myself in racial terms since, because I don't want to give those stereotypes power over me. I read Kathy's account of being oblivious to all the little microaggressions going on around her. I explicitly made a different choice: I knew from the beginning that there may be people who see me as "just a programmer" or "not leadership material" or "socially awkward nerd" or "undateable" because physically I look Asian. And so I figured I'd work on the parts that I could change, and everything else is somebody else's problem. They're entitled to whatever preconceptions they have; if that's a problem, I can go find other people to interact with. I really like that Kathy came here to clarify that she was sharing her personal experience, just as Laura shared hers, and now I'm sharing mine. Isn't the meta-problem here that we don't see each other as individuals, and that it's all the "1%" and the "99%" and the "51%" and the "49%"? And I think that if there're specific policies that make it easier for 51% of the population, that's a good thing. But that doesn't make it a handicap, nor should they be a protected group exempt from the same standards we apply to anyone else, nor should we forget that there are all sorts of other axes that we can categorize people by, and some of them have it a lot easier than others.
tisme 14y ago
The truth is that there is a story behind everybody, and there is good fortune and misery to be found at every level. Don't presume to know about an individual or their circumstances until you get to know them well and be prepared to be surprised.
johngalt 14y ago
Almost anyone in America is playing on 'easy mode'. The people playing on 'nightmare mode' predominately live in third world countries.
ANTSANTS 14y ago
The conclusions of this analogy are fairly offensive if you only consider race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality in the equation. Who has it worse: A middle class white woman of that grew up with loving parents that supported her fascination with computers who now has to deal with an environment that seems strangely tolerant, by 21st century standards, of misogynistic behavior, or a straight white man who grew up poor with abusive parents and was bullied in school for his entire childhood (hell, maybe he even has some sort of mental or physical handicap!), but managed to focus his free time on learning about computers anyways, and does not today deal with racial or sexual discrimination in his workplace? That's an extreme example, but I've heard enough startlingly ignorant retorts along the lines of "you don't understand, it doesn't matter how bad you had it, women always have it worse," or "how dare you spend most of your free time learning in front of a computer!" to know that I'm happier keeping the "privilege" debate out of mind. I also think it's ridiculous to claim that a trans person is playing on "hard mode," while a "hacker girl" is playing on "nightmare mode." I don't think "possibly deals with some misogynistic behavior in her workplace and possibly feels discouraged by the lack of women in her field" is anywhere near as bad as having to deal with the scorn of a very large portion of society, possibly being disowned by one's parents (and very likely some kind of disappointment or other negative behavior from them otherwise, even if they try to be accepting), being avoided even by people who mean no harm (especially if you can't pass), or the constant mixture of shame, self-denial, and wistfulness you feel if you decided to accept living as the gender you didn't want to be. Ok, I think I've scraped enough off the tip of that iceberg. Regardless, I think it's ultimately about as pointless to try to rank people by the amount of "privilege" they "enjoy" as it is to have a discussion about which fictional character would beat who in a fight. Why would you try to take someone's achievements away from them for the sake of an argument or a cause? That's just rude. I can't wait for us to reach the "end game" where everyone has learned to be professional and only judge people by the results they bring to the table, but while I hope there is a path to it that does not focus on wracking every white, male, and/or straight person with guilt and witch hunting everyone who dares express the slightest hint of a contrary opinion, maybe I'm just a dreamer who doesn't know anything and the only way to change culture is to declare thermonuclear war on the loudest mouths and wait for everyone else to fall in line out of fear.
- 14y ago
randomdata 14y ago
I can easily imagine that my career was influenced by my location/gender/race/sexual orientation, but my "hacker skills", for better or worse, were gained in solitude. There would have be no direct social repercussions for girls my age to do as I did, because in reality nobody ever needed to know. It was something even I kept hidden until I started to become confident in what I was doing, and additionally, wasn't really exposed to anyone else like me until many years later. All of these discussions seem to centre around the idea of women being discriminated in hacker groups. I won't dispute it happens, but that seems orthogonal to learning the skills in the first place. Maybe it is just my privilege talking, but it is really difficult to imagine social pressures applying so strongly when alone where secrets can be kept. Having to keep those secrets is a travesty in and of itself, but quite different to what you were speaking to.
dmm 14y ago
> If you're western/male/white/straight you're playing life on 'very easy' mode. When I read this, my interpretation is "Your achievements don't count because you are a white man." Is that what you were trying to express?
- SwellJoe 14y ago
  Perhaps Louis CK can explain it in a way that makes it make more sense to you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG4f9zR5yzY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG4f9zR5yzY It's not about denigrating anyone's achievements. It's about understanding that some things make your life easier. Being born straight, white, and male, in the United States (or other first world countries) provides a tremendous amount of benefit to you. To deny that benefit is to deny reality. It doesn't mean when you do something good it doesn't count...it just means that you probably would have had a harder time had you been born non-white, non-male, non-straight. No one is saying you're bad for being white, male, or straight, or that what you accomplish does not count. Denying you receive privileges for being a straight white male can be offensive or upsetting to those who don't experience life with those privileges. It's a complicated issue, of course, and there are plenty of straight white males who have to overcome significant hurdles; but given the same circumstances, the straight white male has an easier time getting ahead in business (especially tech and science), being treated with respect, not being treated like a child (women are frequently treated like children by well-meaning men), and not being treated like an outsider. You're not being blamed for being born lucky. You're just being asked to acknowledge it.
  - dmm 14y ago
    I think the historical narrative that Louis CK has presented in the clip is wrong. Sure at any point in the past 500 years you could probably point out a group of white men that are far better off than the majority of society but those people would always be outliers. Imagine all the men born in German and Great Britain eighteen years before WWI. Just as they were graduating secondary school they would have been drafted and forced to kill each other in some of the most horrible battle conditions in recorded history. Does lying in a waterlogged trench, dying slowly over three days of a gut wound sound like a privilege? Men currently account for 92% of occupational deaths in the US. Imagine what it was like a century ago, before occupational safety standards. A coal miner in 1910 had the privilege of being able to vote and to wear pants but his wife had the privilege of not being crushed to death in a poorly supported tunnel or dying of black lung. Men have far higher rates of mental illness and drug addiction. Men are more likely to attempt suicide and more likely to succeed. Men who are victims of rape or domestic abuse are often ridiculed. At least one study showed 40% of domestic abuse victims are men. The majority of US rape victims are men. Unemployment rates are currently higher among men. Imagine you're a woman and you really like small children and want to work in a career with them. That's perfectly acceptable. A man doing the same thing is constantly viewed with suspicion and often faces false accusations. You say men have the advantage of being treated with respect but I think that is highly dependent on the circumstances. I will readily admit that the greatest factors that have affected my life are random. We all play the birth lottery but I don't see your ranking of various characteristics as justified or useful. To me it just seems like a way to dismiss people and their achievements because of things beyond their control.
mpolun 14y ago
The thing about privilege though, is that it's not about difficulty in life. Someone can have a very difficult life and be very privileged in many ways. Consider someone that is a straight, white, male, but that grew up in crippling poverty. They have a very difficult situation, but they still have privilege -- the privilege of not seeing the tribulations involved in being a woman or person of color. That's what's privilege is about, not seeing things. As an example, my girlfriend recently was telling me about when she had a job that started at 4am, she constantly was harassed by taxi drivers (since she had to take a taxi for a short ride from the train). This is something I just never see because I'm a man. They don't harass me, and they don't harass anyone I'm with so I just never see it. I therefore have a form of privilege. That's why the term privilege exists and is unrelated to easyness/hardness of life.
Crake 14y ago
This metaphor is overly simplistic to the point of absurdity. I wish people would stop profligately promoting this nonsense.
jbellis 14y ago
Reminds me of http://www.jonathanrauch.com/jrauch_articles/height_discrimination_short_guys_finish_last/ http://www.jonathanrauch.com/jrauch_articles/height_discrimi... Conclusion: "For centuries, short men have shrugged their shoulders and carried on. They, at least, still see themselves, and are seen by others, as variegated individuals, not as a monotonal social group. That may be the best approach to all such human characteristics."
Tichy 14y ago
I wish he would provide any citations for that claim. Wonder if he is aware that men die on average ten years earlier than women? Or that the human population is descendant from twice as many women as men, meaning men are much less likely to reproduce? (http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/20/is-there-anything-good-about-men-and-other-tricky-questions/ http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/20/is-there-anyt... ) I think the latter is a pretty damning point, given that reproducing is pretty important to the human condition. So perhaps there are more video games that cater to male needs, but that doesn't help much with the stuff that matters, like having children. I am not even sure what exactly he refers to by easy mode. What was the easy mode I got that women don't get?
- dmorgan 14y ago
  >I think the latter is a pretty damning point, given that reproducing is pretty important to the human condition. Not according to 21th century hip ideology. You're insulting all LGBT guys by saying that.
  - Tichy 14y ago
    Why am I insulting LGBT guys/gals? Everybody is free to choose, but it is still a fact that reproduction (or rather, having kids) is important for a lot of people. Even some LGBT people try to adopt children afaik. Also without reproduction nobody would be here.
    - dmorgan 14y ago
      >Also without reproduction nobody would be here. I know that, I was being sarcastic towards the attitude that sees things that formed the bases of society since ever was one, like reproduction, are viewed as "optional" or "sexist" nowadays, because we should be "above that". Of course we only get to have the privilege of saving that (and still have a human population on the planet) due to overpopulation in other parts of the world, and we still get declining and aging population our own countries for that. That's also why we get to have our LGBT privilege. In the large scheme of things, a mostly LGBT society would mean a dead society, because of no reproduction.
dmorgan 14y ago
This pedophile over there? He's playing in VERY HARD mode, and yet he made it to a congressman. See where the analogy breaks down? Playing "hard mode" doesn't mean you're also doing something worthwhile.
yummyfajitas 14y ago
If you're western/male/white/straight you're playing life on 'very easy' mode. But what does this actually mean? Explain it like I'm 5. Do I need to earn more EXP to level up my computer programming ability? Do my enemies automatically gain +10% disruption resistance? In video games the meaning of "nightmare difficulty" is quite concrete. Not so much in this conversation.
- c3o 14y ago
  Here's one specific list: http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html
  - yummyfajitas 14y ago
    I've seen that list before. I've suffered from nearly all those things while living in a foreign country. It's really not a big deal unless you choose to make it one. A large number of those problems are of the form "I prefer people of my race, but there aren't very many of them. Oh noes." If you have narrow preferences of any sort, racial or otherwise, your life will be harder. Big surprise. Should I feel doubly awesome because people thought I was a smart hotshot dev even while I suffered from these horrible problems?
  - Evbn 14y ago
    That's a very bad example that misses the point, one that builds confidence that "privilege" is PC BS, as yummyfayitas points shows. The discussion of "privilege" , like so many things, is corruotd and drowned out by extremists, so its salient points get lost.

KuraFire 14y ago

Yes, it is a good metaphor. Credit goes to John Scalzi (linked in the original Primer): http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/ http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-th...

nostrademons 14y ago

It would be a great metaphor if it were extended out to all the handicaps people face. That straight white male programmer who has struggled with mental illness since adolescence? He's on nightmare difficulty too. The guy who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth but lost his father as a child? Hasn't been too easy for him either. The girl who grew up with loving parents from a poor neighborhood and didn't see her first computer until college? Well, she's got some huge handicaps, but some pretty solid roots too. I've been privileged in many ways, and I've also struggled in many ways. I'd like to think that I played the hand I got as well as I could, and extended a hand out to those who didn't quite have the same privileges whenever possible. I wouldn't really expect otherwise from anyone else.

Alex3917 14y ago
"It would be a great metaphor if it were extended out to all the handicaps people face." This. People often forget that 32.8% of Americans are disabled, including 27.1% of adults age 18 - 64. (According to the CDC.)
- ced 14y ago
  I was curious about that figure - here's the breakdown: Percent of adults with hearing trouble: 16.2% Percent of adults with vision trouble: 9.4% Percent of adults unable (or very difficult) to walk a quarter mile: 7.3% Percent of adults with any physical functioning difficulty: 15.6% The hearing disability is described as: Overall, 16% of adults aged 18 years and over experienced some hearing difficulty without a hearing aid (defined as ‘‘a little trouble hearing,’’ ‘‘moderate trouble,’’ ‘‘a lot of trouble,’’ or ‘‘deaf’’). Men were more likely to have experienced hearing trouble than women. The report is interesting. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/disable.htm http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/disable.htm
  - nostrademons 14y ago
    Also, within any given year 26% of the U.S. population will suffer from mental illness, and 46% will suffer from it during their lifetime: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/statistics/1ANYDIS_ADULT.shtml http://www.nimh.nih.gov/statistics/1ANYDIS_ADULT.shtml Within any given year 15% of families are below the poverty line, and 58% will fall below it at some point in their life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States Normal is kinda abnormal.
rayiner 14y ago
The distinction is that this particular "handicap" applies to 51% of the whole population. It's not unreasonable to consider it more important than the other ones.
- nostrademons 14y ago
  So, I don't think it's unreasonable to try and lower barriers for women who choose to go into tech. (I don't think it's unreasonable to try and lower barriers for anyone who chooses to go into tech, but like you say, targeting women affects 51% of the population, so it has a pretty high return on investment.) I think it's worth supporting our female colleagues, and celebrating what they achieve. (FWIW, a friend of mine has a blog that does precisely that: http://techladyallstars.com/ http://techladyallstars.com/) I object to framing the debate as a "handicap", because I've found that whenever you start identifying something as a handicap it tends to become one. (Edit: shit, just reread the thread and I did that. Poor word choice on my part.) My own experience is race; my father was sure that the reason that he kept getting passed over for promotions was because he was non-white, and as a result, he ignored all the other possible reasons that were under his control. I've been very careful not to identify myself in racial terms since, because I don't want to give those stereotypes power over me. I read Kathy's account of being oblivious to all the little microaggressions going on around her. I explicitly made a different choice: I knew from the beginning that there may be people who see me as "just a programmer" or "not leadership material" or "socially awkward nerd" or "undateable" because physically I look Asian. And so I figured I'd work on the parts that I could change, and everything else is somebody else's problem. They're entitled to whatever preconceptions they have; if that's a problem, I can go find other people to interact with. I really like that Kathy came here to clarify that she was sharing her personal experience, just as Laura shared hers, and now I'm sharing mine. Isn't the meta-problem here that we don't see each other as individuals, and that it's all the "1%" and the "99%" and the "51%" and the "49%"? And I think that if there're specific policies that make it easier for 51% of the population, that's a good thing. But that doesn't make it a handicap, nor should they be a protected group exempt from the same standards we apply to anyone else, nor should we forget that there are all sorts of other axes that we can categorize people by, and some of them have it a lot easier than others.

tisme 14y ago

The truth is that there is a story behind everybody, and there is good fortune and misery to be found at every level. Don't presume to know about an individual or their circumstances until you get to know them well and be prepared to be surprised.

johngalt 14y ago

Almost anyone in America is playing on 'easy mode'. The people playing on 'nightmare mode' predominately live in third world countries.

ANTSANTS 14y ago

The conclusions of this analogy are fairly offensive if you only consider race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality in the equation. Who has it worse: A middle class white woman of that grew up with loving parents that supported her fascination with computers who now has to deal with an environment that seems strangely tolerant, by 21st century standards, of misogynistic behavior, or a straight white man who grew up poor with abusive parents and was bullied in school for his entire childhood (hell, maybe he even has some sort of mental or physical handicap!), but managed to focus his free time on learning about computers anyways, and does not today deal with racial or sexual discrimination in his workplace? That's an extreme example, but I've heard enough startlingly ignorant retorts along the lines of "you don't understand, it doesn't matter how bad you had it, women always have it worse," or "how dare you spend most of your free time learning in front of a computer!" to know that I'm happier keeping the "privilege" debate out of mind. I also think it's ridiculous to claim that a trans person is playing on "hard mode," while a "hacker girl" is playing on "nightmare mode." I don't think "possibly deals with some misogynistic behavior in her workplace and possibly feels discouraged by the lack of women in her field" is anywhere near as bad as having to deal with the scorn of a very large portion of society, possibly being disowned by one's parents (and very likely some kind of disappointment or other negative behavior from them otherwise, even if they try to be accepting), being avoided even by people who mean no harm (especially if you can't pass), or the constant mixture of shame, self-denial, and wistfulness you feel if you decided to accept living as the gender you didn't want to be. Ok, I think I've scraped enough off the tip of that iceberg. Regardless, I think it's ultimately about as pointless to try to rank people by the amount of "privilege" they "enjoy" as it is to have a discussion about which fictional character would beat who in a fight. Why would you try to take someone's achievements away from them for the sake of an argument or a cause? That's just rude. I can't wait for us to reach the "end game" where everyone has learned to be professional and only judge people by the results they bring to the table, but while I hope there is a path to it that does not focus on wracking every white, male, and/or straight person with guilt and witch hunting everyone who dares express the slightest hint of a contrary opinion, maybe I'm just a dreamer who doesn't know anything and the only way to change culture is to declare thermonuclear war on the loudest mouths and wait for everyone else to fall in line out of fear.

14y ago

randomdata 14y ago

I can easily imagine that my career was influenced by my location/gender/race/sexual orientation, but my "hacker skills", for better or worse, were gained in solitude. There would have be no direct social repercussions for girls my age to do as I did, because in reality nobody ever needed to know. It was something even I kept hidden until I started to become confident in what I was doing, and additionally, wasn't really exposed to anyone else like me until many years later. All of these discussions seem to centre around the idea of women being discriminated in hacker groups. I won't dispute it happens, but that seems orthogonal to learning the skills in the first place. Maybe it is just my privilege talking, but it is really difficult to imagine social pressures applying so strongly when alone where secrets can be kept. Having to keep those secrets is a travesty in and of itself, but quite different to what you were speaking to.

dmm 14y ago

> If you're western/male/white/straight you're playing life on 'very easy' mode. When I read this, my interpretation is "Your achievements don't count because you are a white man." Is that what you were trying to express?

SwellJoe 14y ago
Perhaps Louis CK can explain it in a way that makes it make more sense to you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG4f9zR5yzY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG4f9zR5yzY It's not about denigrating anyone's achievements. It's about understanding that some things make your life easier. Being born straight, white, and male, in the United States (or other first world countries) provides a tremendous amount of benefit to you. To deny that benefit is to deny reality. It doesn't mean when you do something good it doesn't count...it just means that you probably would have had a harder time had you been born non-white, non-male, non-straight. No one is saying you're bad for being white, male, or straight, or that what you accomplish does not count. Denying you receive privileges for being a straight white male can be offensive or upsetting to those who don't experience life with those privileges. It's a complicated issue, of course, and there are plenty of straight white males who have to overcome significant hurdles; but given the same circumstances, the straight white male has an easier time getting ahead in business (especially tech and science), being treated with respect, not being treated like a child (women are frequently treated like children by well-meaning men), and not being treated like an outsider. You're not being blamed for being born lucky. You're just being asked to acknowledge it.
- dmm 14y ago
  I think the historical narrative that Louis CK has presented in the clip is wrong. Sure at any point in the past 500 years you could probably point out a group of white men that are far better off than the majority of society but those people would always be outliers. Imagine all the men born in German and Great Britain eighteen years before WWI. Just as they were graduating secondary school they would have been drafted and forced to kill each other in some of the most horrible battle conditions in recorded history. Does lying in a waterlogged trench, dying slowly over three days of a gut wound sound like a privilege? Men currently account for 92% of occupational deaths in the US. Imagine what it was like a century ago, before occupational safety standards. A coal miner in 1910 had the privilege of being able to vote and to wear pants but his wife had the privilege of not being crushed to death in a poorly supported tunnel or dying of black lung. Men have far higher rates of mental illness and drug addiction. Men are more likely to attempt suicide and more likely to succeed. Men who are victims of rape or domestic abuse are often ridiculed. At least one study showed 40% of domestic abuse victims are men. The majority of US rape victims are men. Unemployment rates are currently higher among men. Imagine you're a woman and you really like small children and want to work in a career with them. That's perfectly acceptable. A man doing the same thing is constantly viewed with suspicion and often faces false accusations. You say men have the advantage of being treated with respect but I think that is highly dependent on the circumstances. I will readily admit that the greatest factors that have affected my life are random. We all play the birth lottery but I don't see your ranking of various characteristics as justified or useful. To me it just seems like a way to dismiss people and their achievements because of things beyond their control.

mpolun 14y ago

The thing about privilege though, is that it's not about difficulty in life. Someone can have a very difficult life and be very privileged in many ways. Consider someone that is a straight, white, male, but that grew up in crippling poverty. They have a very difficult situation, but they still have privilege -- the privilege of not seeing the tribulations involved in being a woman or person of color. That's what's privilege is about, not seeing things. As an example, my girlfriend recently was telling me about when she had a job that started at 4am, she constantly was harassed by taxi drivers (since she had to take a taxi for a short ride from the train). This is something I just never see because I'm a man. They don't harass me, and they don't harass anyone I'm with so I just never see it. I therefore have a form of privilege. That's why the term privilege exists and is unrelated to easyness/hardness of life.

Crake 14y ago

This metaphor is overly simplistic to the point of absurdity. I wish people would stop profligately promoting this nonsense.

jbellis 14y ago

Reminds me of http://www.jonathanrauch.com/jrauch_articles/height_discrimination_short_guys_finish_last/ http://www.jonathanrauch.com/jrauch_articles/height_discrimi... Conclusion: "For centuries, short men have shrugged their shoulders and carried on. They, at least, still see themselves, and are seen by others, as variegated individuals, not as a monotonal social group. That may be the best approach to all such human characteristics."

Tichy 14y ago

I wish he would provide any citations for that claim. Wonder if he is aware that men die on average ten years earlier than women? Or that the human population is descendant from twice as many women as men, meaning men are much less likely to reproduce? (http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/20/is-there-anything-good-about-men-and-other-tricky-questions/ http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/20/is-there-anyt... ) I think the latter is a pretty damning point, given that reproducing is pretty important to the human condition. So perhaps there are more video games that cater to male needs, but that doesn't help much with the stuff that matters, like having children. I am not even sure what exactly he refers to by easy mode. What was the easy mode I got that women don't get?

dmorgan 14y ago
>I think the latter is a pretty damning point, given that reproducing is pretty important to the human condition. Not according to 21th century hip ideology. You're insulting all LGBT guys by saying that.
- Tichy 14y ago
  Why am I insulting LGBT guys/gals? Everybody is free to choose, but it is still a fact that reproduction (or rather, having kids) is important for a lot of people. Even some LGBT people try to adopt children afaik. Also without reproduction nobody would be here.
  - dmorgan 14y ago
    >Also without reproduction nobody would be here. I know that, I was being sarcastic towards the attitude that sees things that formed the bases of society since ever was one, like reproduction, are viewed as "optional" or "sexist" nowadays, because we should be "above that". Of course we only get to have the privilege of saving that (and still have a human population on the planet) due to overpopulation in other parts of the world, and we still get declining and aging population our own countries for that. That's also why we get to have our LGBT privilege. In the large scheme of things, a mostly LGBT society would mean a dead society, because of no reproduction.

dmorgan 14y ago

This pedophile over there? He's playing in VERY HARD mode, and yet he made it to a congressman. See where the analogy breaks down? Playing "hard mode" doesn't mean you're also doing something worthwhile.

yummyfajitas 14y ago

If you're western/male/white/straight you're playing life on 'very easy' mode. But what does this actually mean? Explain it like I'm 5. Do I need to earn more EXP to level up my computer programming ability? Do my enemies automatically gain +10% disruption resistance? In video games the meaning of "nightmare difficulty" is quite concrete. Not so much in this conversation.

c3o 14y ago
Here's one specific list: http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html
- yummyfajitas 14y ago
  I've seen that list before. I've suffered from nearly all those things while living in a foreign country. It's really not a big deal unless you choose to make it one. A large number of those problems are of the form "I prefer people of my race, but there aren't very many of them. Oh noes." If you have narrow preferences of any sort, racial or otherwise, your life will be harder. Big surprise. Should I feel doubly awesome because people thought I was a smart hotshot dev even while I suffered from these horrible problems?
- Evbn 14y ago
  That's a very bad example that misses the point, one that builds confidence that "privilege" is PC BS, as yummyfayitas points shows. The discussion of "privilege" , like so many things, is corruotd and drowned out by extremists, so its salient points get lost.