Learning about white privilege is anti-white, studies prove

[Threlizdun]

I'm a bit curious about actually obtaining their full data set, as well as the studies on white privilege they provided to the subjects. Variables such as the class composition of the respondents appears to be missing, which could offer considerable insight into the manner in which the respondents held familiarity with class inequality and the struggles it presents.

The findings of the study strike me as odd, which makes me really curious about the materials being shared with the respondents. I know of few classes that will teach about white privilege without also touching on class inequality and the systemic barriers provided by it, as well as its relation to racial and sexual inequalities.

The specifics of the situations provided to the respondents as examples also are important to consider. We know that the example provided to them is identical aside from Kevin being identified as black in one example and white in another, but the situations Kevin finds himself in for the example remains unclear to the reader. The difference of Kevin's race actually could drastically alter the manner in which he experiences the situation offers.

This is an interesting study, but the number of variables not included within the report gives me pause as someone who has conducted social research. If the findings indicate that teaching of white privilege without also including discussion of class inequality reduce empathy for the white poor, then obviously such a lack of an intersectional analysis needs to be addressed. This does not in any way indicate, as many in this thread have been suggesting, that white privilege is fake and some conspiratorial ploy to reduce sympathy for white people, or that the evidence for it should be discarded and lessons on it discontinued from classes concerning racial identity and inequality.

Prejudice and incompetence doesn't need to be a conspiracy. White privilege is a story you tell about facts to frame them in a narrative, it is not a fact in and of itself, and it involves selecting certain facts and ignoring others to present that narrative. If the result is lower sympathy for white people, that makes it a bad narrative. "fake" or "real" doesn't enter into it.

It's not the first study to draw similar conclusions. A while back there was a study with homeless people that noted if the subject was white, sympathy was reduced, and that took place in a radically different environment with different things being studied.

The existence of white privilege is supported be the enormous statistical advantage white people in America are offered in wide swaths of life. Incarceration rates, hiring rates, loan approval, housing, police violence, social trust, adoption, treatment by medical officials, etc. The advantages white Americans accrue as a consequence of their race when all other variables are accounted for can't be ignored.

Studies like these are interesting, but there are some problems with trying to quantify sympathy like we do more concrete subjects such as hiring rates, loan approval rates, and the like. These are further complicated by the existence of priming. Subjects like to be compliant to researchers and offer them the answers they think they would like to hear. In matters of race, people generally want to be seen as non-racist. Studies looking into attitudes towards questions such as "would you be okay with your child marrying someone of another race" or "would you be play voting for a candidate of another race", will overwhelmingly see yes responses as the subjects understand a no response will be seen as racist. Yet when the same people are given implicit bias tests, which function by flashing images of different people and things on the screen and have the subjects make associations with them, subjects are more likely to make negative associations with images of black people and take longer to select positive associations for them if they do so.

A subject who is given material on white privilege before a test will have been primed to consciously try to make their choices appear non-racist. An over correction of their responses and behavior to do so is to be expected. If you gave them this information and then tested them months afterwards, would the results be the same? When the respondents went out into the world, did they feel more sympathetic to poor black people they passed in the street than poor white people?

Sympathy is an immensely hard matter to accurately pin down and quantity. With the general lack of information provided on how this test was conducted and what other variables were accounted for, making such sweeping conclusions as "teaching people about white privilege will make them less empathetic to poor white people" does not seem appropriate.

[Ostroeuropa]

Prejudice and incompetence doesn't need to be a conspiracy. White privilege is a story you tell about facts to frame them in a narrative, it is not a fact in and of itself, and it involves selecting certain facts and ignoring others to present that narrative. If the result is lower sympathy for white people, that makes it a bad narrative. "fake" or "real" doesn't enter into it.

It's not the first study to draw similar conclusions. A while back there was a study with homeless people that noted if the subject was white, sympathy was reduced, and that took place in a radically different environment with different things being studied.

The existence of white privilege is supported be the enormous statistical advantage white people in America are offered in wide swaths of life. Incarceration rates, hiring rates, loan approval, housing, police violence, social trust, adoption, treatment by medical officials, etc. The advantages white Americans accrue as a consequence of their race when all other variables are accounted for can't be ignored.

Studies like these are interesting, but there are some problems with trying to quantify sympathy like we do more concrete subjects such as hiring rates, loan approval rates, and the like. These are further complicated by the existence of priming. Subjects like to be compliant to researchers and offer them the answers they think they would like to hear. In matters of race, people generally want to be seen as non-racist. Studies looking into attitudes towards questions such as "would you be okay with your child marrying someone of another race" or "would you be play voting for a candidate of another race", will overwhelmingly see yes responses as the subjects understand a no response will be seen as racist. Yet when the same people are given implicit bias tests, which function by flashing images of different people and things on the screen and have the subjects make associations with them, subjects are more likely to make negative associations with images of black people and take longer to select positive associations for them if they do so.

A subject who is given material on white privilege before a test will have been primed to consciously try to make their choices appear non-racist. An over correction of their responses and behavior to do so is to be expected. If you gave them this information and then tested them months afterwards, would the results be the same? When the respondents went out into the world, did they feel more sympathetic to poor black people they passed in the street than poor white people?

Sympathy is an immensely hard matter to accurately pin down and quantity. With the general lack of information provided on how this test was conducted and what other variables were accounted for, making such sweeping conclusions as "teaching people about white privilege will make them less empathetic to poor white people" does not seem appropriate.

No threl. The difference between black people and white people in those fields is well studied and well founded.

Calling those differences "White privilege"? That's narrative, that's storytelling. You can just as well call them black disadvantage and say Whites are at the level everyone should be, or some other narrative, such as both whites and blacks being disadvantaged by the presence of racism in society, but one moreso than the other, and so on. The framing of the issue as white privilege not factual, it is a political narrative, and that political narrative appears to lower empathy for the group they are discussing without actually helping anybody.

Your priming point is a good one and a reason for further study, however, i'd argue that the prevalence of white privilege in the political narrative produces a situation of constant priming, especially in the modern era of social media and social media witchhunts, which produce an environment of constant observation akin to a testing environment after having been primed.

[Aclion]

Privilege theory has only ever been a means to delegitimize and dehumanize opponents to the lefts kooky religion, so i'm not surprised.

[Arayas]

White privilege is an excuse anti-white racists use to dimish the achievments of white people.
Literally everyone except whites have institutionalized preferences towards them to help them succeed and yet white hating racists want to talk about a magical white supremacist conspiracy that they blame all their problems on.

[Nova Cyberia]

Privilege theory has only ever been a means to delegitimize and dehumanize opponents to the lefts kooky religion, so i'm not surprised.

Because the left only knows how to build up one group by denigrating another.

Formerly men had an enormous amount of "privilege" over women in the US. However, thanks to decades of progressive theology the pendulum has swung far in the other direction. Women now outnumber men at American colleges and universities, and women are treated far better than men by courts.

The only way they know how to build up one group is at the expense of another.

[Ostroeuropa]

Privilege theory has only ever been a means to delegitimize and dehumanize opponents to the lefts kooky religion, so i'm not surprised.

Because the left only knows how to build up one group by denigrating another.

Formerly men had an enormous amount of "privilege" over men. However, thanks to decades of progressive theology the pendulum has swung far in the other direction. Women now outnumber men at American colleges and universities, and women are treated far better than men by courts.

The only way they know how to build up one group is at the expense of another.

I am a person on the left and I've been bitching about these topics for years. It's a very particular ideological strain on the left that acts this way.

[Nova Cyberia]

Because the left only knows how to build up one group by denigrating another.

Formerly men had an enormous amount of "privilege" over men. However, thanks to decades of progressive theology the pendulum has swung far in the other direction. Women now outnumber men at American colleges and universities, and women are treated far better than men by courts.

The only way they know how to build up one group is at the expense of another.

I am a person on the left and I've been bitching about these topics for years. It's a very particular ideological strain on the left that acts this way.

You're an anamoly, unfortunately. You can tell by how the other leftists here treat you with such disdain.

[Skarten]

Because the left only knows how to build up one group by denigrating another.

Formerly men had an enormous amount of "privilege" over men. However, thanks to decades of progressive theology the pendulum has swung far in the other direction. Women now outnumber men at American colleges and universities, and women are treated far better than men by courts.

The only way they know how to build up one group is at the expense of another.

I am a person on the left and I've been bitching about these topics for years. It's a very particular ideological strain on the left that acts this way.

Well, then i fear you're quite alone. Center, perhaps, but you can see that we've reached a point where opinions such as yours are considered center/right wing.

[TURTLESHROOM II]

YOU DON'T SAY?!

It's almost like teaching whites to hate themselves for the sins of some centuries-old ancestor, and telling non-whites that whites are the reason they deal with racism and hardship BREEDS HATRED AGAINST WHITES!

WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT THAT TEACHING HATRED MAKES HATERS?!

[Valrifell]

I am a person on the left and I've been bitching about these topics for years. It's a very particular ideological strain on the left that acts this way.

You're an anamoly, unfortunately. You can tell by how the other leftists here treat you with such disdain.

It's because it's his only trick, to the extent he's willing to sabotage literally any other self-proclaimed policy he might have.

[Des-Bal]

I heard it was traced moreso to westward colonization, where prior to that people were "English" "Irish" "Slavic" and so on. Chinese Christian families began adopting white children in one of the colonies states in the US, and the whites absolutely flipped their shit and developed a collective identity of those kids being "Theirs" because they were "White", banding together, seizing the kids, and driving the Chinese out of town. Then the media went ballistic about it and was like CHINESE STEALIN KIDS and so on, and from then on realized they could pitch "Whites" as a united group.

That might be more of a genesis for "White as One People" concept rather than "Whiteness" itself though. I kind of assumed that "Black" was the designation for slave, but people didn't refer to "White" for a while yet, instead referring to "Anglo-saxon" and so on.

There were many keystone moments for white solidarity overcoming differing nationalities but the idea that grew out of and actually required that there was already an "us" to white people. What I'm referring to is how important it was to get people who were too poor to own slaves and were often not quite free themselves to support the institution of slavery. The way slavery usually worked was you had a bunch of slaves a bunch of guys controlling them on a sugar plantation or a mine or something and that was that. In America though you had slave owners, their slaves, their guys, and then a bunch of poor farmers, fishermen, etc. who didn't benefit from your arrangement and may even suffer from less work to go around. They could even stand to benefit if there was a slave rebellion that toppled the people who had everything. Black slaves didn't know the land, couldn't read, had no contacts or roots, and stuck out like sore thumbs- the white poor were not so encumbered. The slightest bit of mingling between the two groups could topple american slavery or at least precipitate a fuck-off huge massacre. Getting the poor starving masses to help you oppress the poor starving masses is a hell of a trick and they pulled it off by tying white skin to access to social privileges and reinforcing that whiteness as the reason they were above the inferior black and indian population.

To bring this all the way back around highlighting our differences, suggesting our experiences are unique and can't be related to, and elevating the importance of race in our day to day lives are all tools in the arsenal of racists throughout history. Slavery, ethnic cleansing, genocide, this is how you pull it off.

[Hirota]

Right now, I'm the only one to vote I don't believe the evidence...But that is because I am wary of two studies from the same source showing similar results - at least that is how I read the article.

Until these results are replicated elsewhere (something difficult to do in these softer sciences) I'll remain skeptical that any breakthrough or meaningful discovery has been made.

I mean personally I can believe it but I'd be wary of proclaiming victory just yet.

Also, I'm uncomfortable with their solution. Intersectionality is not the answer because of how it gets abused.

Prior studies showed that exposure to white homeless people reduced peoples inclination to support higher taxes and welfare, while exposure to black homeless people didn't affect it, which is what I previously used to draw this conclusion, but that was more suggestive and not as explicit as this one.

Fair enough, but if you really seek to change people's minds rather than laud over them, then your evidence has to be comprehensive, and with what I've seen here (when I put my most cynical hat on) seems lacking.

[Liriena]

And I still do

If constant reference to white privilege without inclusion of class privilege lowers empathy for white people and makes people less empathetic toward them than other races, how is that not racism?

For example, reference to black criminality without important context would be systemic media racism, yes?

Go ahead, what's your reasoning. Previously you could argue that just because an article references white privilege and doesn't mention class doesn't make it de-facto anti-white, we now know that is not the case.

You are acting as if the results of a very specific experiment on white privilege were reflective of a direct motivation on the part of everyone or most people who produce and circulate work related to the concept of white privilege.

[Liriena]

YOU DON'T SAY?!

It's almost like teaching whites to hate themselves for the sins of some centuries-old ancestor, and telling non-whites that whites are the reason they deal with racism and hardship BREEDS HATRED AGAINST WHITES!

WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT THAT TEACHING HATRED MAKES HATERS?!

That all caps and overuse of emojis aesthetic [kisses fingers italianly]

[Liriena]

Because the left only knows how to build up one group by denigrating another.

The right-wing projection machine is at it again.

[Nova Cyberia]

Because the left only knows how to build up one group by denigrating another.

The right-wing projection machine is at it again.

literally just a "nou"

[Liriena]

Whites have worked and have fought long and hard for what they have

More like white and non-white workers got exploited for centuries so that the terminally mediocre white bourgeoise could pretend to have an innate, nature or god-given mandate to dominate the world at "lesser" peoples' expense.

[Liriena]

The right-wing projection machine is at it again.

literally just a "nou"

It's "no u".

[Nova Cyberia]

literally just a "nou"

It's "no u".

Any other worthless arguments you'd like to make?

[Proctopeo]

The right-wing projection machine is at it again.

literally just a "nou"

Almost as if something hit too closer to home. But what do I know? /shrug

Anyway, more on the topic, I'm inclined towards the position that "privilege" as it's commonly presented, discussed, and treated is largely a poor, ideologically motivated analysis of reality, though not quite into the realm of "absolute nonsense". As in, there may be a strong valid point somewhere within - but it's never properly approached or addressed, so it's hard to know for sure.

This is especially evident as those that constantly espouse "privilege theory" are inconsistent on where far-east Asians fall, with their level of privilege switching around like a metronome for speedcore. Now, granted, this isn't everybody who flings "privilege" around like an overly aggressive baseball pitcher, but it's far more than enough to bring doubt onto the whole thing.


I didn't intend to make this into a rant :U

[Liriena]

literally just a "nou"

Almost as if something hit too closer to home. But what do I know? /shrug

Anyway, more on the topic, I'm inclined towards the position that "privilege" as it's commonly presented, discussed, and treated is largely a poor, ideologically motivated analysis of reality, though not quite into the realm of "absolute nonsense". As in, there may be a strong valid point somewhere within - but it's never properly approached or addressed, so it's hard to know for sure.

This is especially evident as those that constantly espouse "privilege theory" are inconsistent on where far-east Asians fall, with their level of privilege switching around like a metronome for speedcore. Now, granted, this isn't everybody who flings "privilege" around like an overly aggressive baseball pitcher, but it's far more than enough to bring doubt onto the whole thing.


I didn't intend to make this into a rant :U

On the issue of "far-east Asians", that's a bit of its own can of worms, insofar as the "model minority" stereotype doesn't hold up once you start to dig into the actual specific ethnic groups contained within that category. But even then, the relatively advantageous position of that community as a whole on a socioeconomic level doesn't necessarily dispute "privilege theory", as you call it, any more than the existence of poor or homeless white people does, unless we are talking about a "privilege theory" that ignores issues like class struggle or historical context... which would be weird if that same theory happened to measure privilege exclusively on the basis of socioeconomic status.

Does "white privilege" get abused? Probably. Specially online. Scientific, philosophical and political jargon are inevitably going to get abused and turned into oversimplified thought-terminating clichés when the platforms where those ideas are shared the most today are extremely horizontal, there is practically no barrier of entry, and attention is their main currency, rather than rigour and nuance. Most people don't want to read a thoughtful post thousands of words long about the intricacies of racial categorizations and their material consequences. A lot of people just want drama and the satisfaction of oversimplified black-and-white moral dichotomies. It's the same reason why the online right fell madly in love with the "SJW" stereotype and proceeded to expand it until it included anyone whose hair color and gender expression they didn't like.

[Liriena]

It's "no u".

Any other worthless arguments you'd like to make?

That wasn't an argument. Chill.

[Klorgia1]

If you show them this and then immediately after show them such a story, of course the mind draws these must be related; The sequence of reading is saying one caused the other.

As for white privilege, focusing on privilege as oppose to what other ethnicities don't have will likely do this, but understanding the History is needed, and that will inevitably show the problems ethnicities have faced full force. The trick is teaching this history as something everyone is suffering together, and just because one group might have (or is) suffering more on the whole, doesn't mean thats always true. Individuals can suffer just as much or more, race is only a part of any equation, and true equality will come from treating everyone as, well, equals.

It might also be worth noting the idea of economic transformation in Southern states specifically that uses the suffering of a lower-class across all races as a major marker (though there is the issue that empathy might end up playing out in Rich v. Poor instead).

Oh, and shoutout to Vice, a liberal company, for bringing this to the forefront. It'll be interesting to see how much the idea's of privilege are still talked about the next time we have a Liberal to Reactionary cycle.

[Gormwood]

So being less likely to get brutalized or gunned down by cops during a routine traffic stop compared to people of color isn't a privilege?

[Liriena]

So being less likely to get brutalized or gunned down by cops during a routine traffic stop compared to people of color isn't a privilege?

At the risk of maybe not reflecting his views properly, I'm pretty sure Ostro's argument is that, in order to be considered a privilege, white people would actually have to demonstrably benefit from that disadvantage faced by black people. As in, they would have to be receiving an advantage, rather than a lack of disadvantages.