4 ms·

It could be less privilege and more a long cultural history of intellectual activity and thus, being raised in an environment that encourages these kind of ende

• sago 12y ago
  When 'privilege' is used in these topics, it is often rather broadly defined to mean any feature of the accident of your birth that is beneficial compared to others who lack it. So yes, a long history of intellectual achievement is a privilege in that sense: the prevalence of expectation (you can do this), of value (it is worth doing this), of role-models (so and so, who is similar to you, did this), mentorship (so and so, who your uncle knows, knows people who do this), and so on. So yes, a long history of achieving X in a group tends to act as a privilege for children born in to that group, because there is a well-worn and understood path to going in that direction. I get why people hate the word 'privilege' so much, but that is basically the hegemonic term of art.
  • proveanegative 12y ago
    >'privilege' is used in these topics, it is often rather broadly defined to mean any feature of the accident of your birth that is beneficial compared to others who lack it. Is that meaningfully different from "luck"?
    • sago 12y ago
      From an individual's point of view, no. But when privilege is correlated with a particular group, then it isn't helpful to see it as random. It self perpetuates. But an individual can be lucky to be born into a rich family, but the rich family probably isn't lucky to be rich: it tends to retain its status over generations. Not in terms of absolute dollar value, but its social status.