Tag Archives: Privilege

Repost: Shameless White Male Privilege

Here’s a repost from a few years back. I don’t think I’d agree with everything in it anymore and there are a few problems with the writing I’d probably change today, but I still like the gist of it.

Edit for clarification: There was a lot of pro-liberalism which I forgot about being in this post; that would be among the stuff I don’t agree with anymore and is an artifact of my libertarianism from that time. I only skimmed this when reposting (I posted it last minute after forgetting it was posting day) and forgot exactly how much libertarianism was in this and how much my political views have changed since then. It also seems I was less aware of the dangers of pathological altruism back then. It’s also interesting how bad my writing was back then (maybe it still is). By the gist I do like I was referring to specifically to not being ashamed of the privileges our ancestors blessed us with, which is the key point; that part I still agree with. As for the rest; take with a grain of salt, enjoy it as a snapshot of my change. Anyway, from now on I’m going to have to check these reposts more carefully.

So, this post on white male privilege by some sci-fi author has been making the rounds.

If you’ve ever spent time in the race-baiting and/or liberal weenie area of the blogosphere, you’ve probably heard the term white privilege before; it essentially it means that whites (and males) have inherent social advantages over others (minorities and females) that they don’t notice.

The post provides a fairly good analogy of the concept, and the author mostly avoids the moral superiority, butthurt, and male-shaming/white guilt that invariably accompanies liberal’s discussion of privilege. He doesn’t sound at all like the smarmy, self-hating, morally superior Tim Wise.

Now, among the right, conservatives, the manosphere, etc., the concept of white male privilege usually doesn’t gain much traction, and for quite a while it didn’t for me either; but after reading about it some, I’ve decided that I’ve got to go against the grain of my ideological brethren on this topic.

White privilege probably does exist; so to male privilege.

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Immediately, many reading those will protest: what of affirmative action, what of political correctness, what of family court, what of chivalry, and so on and so forth. Sure, there are many number of things that are  against males.

In fact, I’ll go further and say that most codified discrimination that still exists in Western society, is either anti-white (occasionally anti-Asian) and/or anti-male. Codified discrimination against minorities and women has been almost entirely eliminated.

But that’s irrelevant to the concept, as white male privilege goes beyond that.

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So, why do I accept this concept?

I’ll start with male privilege. Yes, females have some advantages over males: family court advantages, being the sexual gate-keeper, chivalry, less chance of prison, etc.

On the other males have so many more social advantages; I’ll just list what I think is the big one:

Unless I go to jail, I really never have to worry about rape. In fact, I almost never worry about my physical safety in relation to other people.

From what I understand, women keep their physical safety in mind quite a bit.

As for white privilege, the big one is this:

White is “normal”, other races are not. If someone describes me it’s based on height or hair colour or some other characteristic. When someone describes a minority to me, race is the first descriptor. In addition, there are no racial expectations placed on me either for bad or good; I never have to think about how I reflect on my race.

There’s more, but you can look elsewhere, this page is not a justification for the concept of privilege. All that’s necessary for my actual point is that I accept the concept of white male privilege.

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If you doubt the concept of white male privilege honestly consider this:

Would you trade being male for being female if given the choice?

Would you trade being white for being a NAM if given the choice?

Probably not. You know it’s awesome being a white male.

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Side note.

Don’t act like white males are victims, even if you don’t buy the concept of white privilege. I hate that.

Sure, some there may be some injustices (ie. family court) and these should be fixed, but creating white males as a victim class to rival other victim classes in being victims is just pathetic.

I disdain when feminist activists act like women are victims and I disdain when racial activists act like victims.

Life’s not fair. Deal with it.

You will eat shit; stop pretending that the shit you eat is worse than others’ shit, and because it’s worse it somehow makes you a better person or more deserving. It doesn’t.

Acting the victim only makes you weak and pathetic.

End side note.

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Of course, white male privilege is not the only privilege there is.

The single greatest social privilege any person can have is parent’s who speak English. Oral and written English is the most useful skill any person in this globalized (ie. anglicized) world can have.

There’s the privilege of being born in North America in the 20th century. The most prosperous and safest civilization of all time.

Not being born a disabled is a great privilege.

Everybody has a wealth of privileges they don’t notice and aren’t grateful for.

As P.J. O’Rourke said to his daughter: “Honey, you’re cute. That’s not fair. Your family is pretty well off. That’s not fair. You were born in America. That’s not fair. Darling, you had better pray to God that things don’t start getting fair for you.”

The focus on white male privilege, and white male privilege alone, is sometimes silly. Rarely do I see the other privileges (except maybe wealth) talked about. That’s besides my main point though. I just wanted to point out that you have other privileges that you may not be aware of.

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Now, here’s the part where most of those talking about the concept of privilege try to make you feel guilty for having privilege and try to turn you into some bleeding-heart idiot.

I’m not going to do that, because I’m not an emotionalizing liberal; I’m an analytical, cold-hearted conservative.

Instead, I’m going to explain why white male privilege exists.

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Why does it exist?

Simple: White male privilege exists because white males built the greatest civilization in the history of the world.

In particular, the people of a small island off the coast of Europe created and molded the modern world. The Germans, Italians, French, Russians, and Spaniards had some influence, but English liberalism (not modern progressivist liberalism, but Lockian liberalism and Burkian liberal-conservatism) is the basis for all the greatness of modern society.

English liberalism led to the creation of universal freedoms; allowing people to go about their personal and economic business free from worries of arbitrary exercises of power by those with power.

English liberalism championed and created the ideological basis for the free market, the single greatest engine of economic production ever conceived by man.

English common law created a system of justice where the rule of law prevailed, process was paramount, all were protected equally, and where state power was checked by law.

The protestant work ethic and individualist values prepared the English individuals to drive the above.

British heterogeneity in language, race, religion, and political culture created an English culture used to absorbing the best of other cultures.

Given these strengths, English civilization became the preeminent civilization for the last four centuries. (The USA is a part of English civilization).

All it’s real rivals, until the current rise of China, were other white European civilizations who shared some values with Englishmen. (No, the Japanese, Muslims, and Ottomans were never/are not a real threat to English civilization’s preeminence).

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This great civilization was created by Englishmen for Englishmen (and their families); through their blood, sweat, and tears.

Englishmen fought numerous wars against the continentals to keep themselves free and to spread English values.

Rightly or wrongly, Englishmen fought overseas to acquire territory and resources for Englishmen and to spread English values.

The English economic engine was built on the toil, risk, and ideas of Englishmen.

English political culture and law was created and protected by Englishmen.

By doing so, Englishmen created the civilization we currently live in. It is also the richest, most powerful civilization in the history of the world.

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White, male privilege exists because of this: English civilization was created for Englishmen by Englishmen.

Every liberal writer on privilege ignores this, but it is essential to understanding.

Why should white males feel guilty for enjoying the privileges their forefathers created for them?

Do not white males have the right to enjoy the civilization they created for themselves?

(You may be asking yourself right now, aren’t I conflating Englishmen and white males? Just wait, I’ll explain.)

White males absolutely have every right to enjoy the privileges they have created for themselves.

We owe nothing to no one.

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So, what did the English do, having created this unprecedentedly wealthy, free, and powerful civilization?

They shared it.

Think about that. Englishmen created a civilization with power beyond anything the world has seen, but instead of doing what almost every civilization in history would do, they shared it.

They invited their conquered to join their prosperity. They shared their freedom with their slaves.

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What do you mean they shared it? That’s not what I learned in school.

First, they gave it to non-English Europeans: the Irish, Scots, Germans, Norse, etc.  Other than French Quebec, they have been fully assimilated. We allowed them into our country and they adopted English values. They hold to English law, English individualism, English liberty, and identify as English (ie. American, a subset of English). In North America, specific types of European blood don’t matter very much. (As an aside: some interesting maps that may illustrate what I mean). They are all honorary English. Europeans of ethnicities have come to positions of power.

I don’t have a drop of English blood in me, but I am English to the core.

Englishmen gave it to women. They gave the benefits of English civilization to women through the family and mores of chivalry. Then they were extended the vote. Then they were giver more rights and privileges through feminism, affirmative action, the welfare state, etc.

The blacks were fucked over by Englishmen who had them as slaves, yes. (Although, not as much as by other Africans who enslaved them in the first place, but that’s neither here nor there).

But, then Englishmen fought a war to free them. Who else, other than Englishmen and a couple of other English-influenced European countries have freed their own slaves en masse out of morality? Who else other than English civilization fought a bloody civil war to free another group from slavery due to compassion? Then, decades later Englishmen allowed their ex-slaves full legal access to politics and economics. They created affirmative action and the welfare state to redress past wrongs. Until today, where the Englishman’s ex-slaves are in a far better position than they would have been had they never been enslaved in the first place.

Others, such as Asians, Jews, Latinos, etc. all had a similar process where we allowed them to share in what Englishmen have built.

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Now, these happened over long time-scales yes, and there were abuses by Englishmen, yes.

But how many civilizations, other than Englishmen (and some English influenced European countries) , have willingly and freely given power, wealth, and freedom to ex-slaves, conquered peoples, immigrants, etc.?

The American welfare state is a program for the mass transfer of wealth from Englishmen to everybody else, put into place by Englishmen. Other than Englishmen, who else has created an political-economic system where they willingly transfer vast amounts of wealth from themselves to others?

By the standards of power politics, Englishmen have been downright generous.

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The more Englishmen shared, the more entitled others became.

Rather than being thankful we allowed others into the prosperity and freedom we built, they demonized us as oppressors.

They demanded more, so we gave them more. Rather than gratefulness, all we earned were more demands.

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Now, you might think to yourself, didn’t others help create English civilization? What about black slaves? What about the Chinese railroad workers? What of Gurkhas? What about English women?

Yes, they did. Black slaves helped build the Southern economy. Chinese immigrants did help build the railroads. Gurkhas, Sikhs, and other such “warrior races” helped expand and defend English territory.

But so what?

These are all exceptions. The vast majority of the blood, sweat, and tears expended building this civilization was that of the Englishman. This no more invalidates what I have wrote, than the average white male not having an easy life invalidates the concept of white privilege.

As for Englishwomen, they helped preserve English culture and pass it on to the next generation. In the main, they did not build it. This is not to invalidate the importance of preservation and transmission, they are essential, but they are different.

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So, next time some emasculated liberal, rabid feminist, or race-baiter starts going on about white privilege this, male privilege that, just put on a smug smile and tell him/her:

Damn right we have privilege and we Englishmen earned every last bit of it. Instead of whining about it, how about some gratitude? We created unimaginable wealth, unprecedented freedom, and a fair legal and political system for ourselves. We created all this, then we willingly allowed you to partake in it. Stop whining about a couple small advantages we still have for creating all this and enjoy what we gave you instead.

Do not let them make you feel white guilt. Do not let them make you feel shame.

You’re privileged. That’s awesome. Enjoy it.

Critical Race Theory: Jewish Privilege

In all the critical theory writing of male privilege, white privilege, cis-privilege, thin privilege, ability privilege, etc. there is one major highly privileged group that no one ever writes about: Jews. So today, I’m going to add my own addition to the critical theory canon: Jewish privilege.

I started thinking about Jewish privilege a month ago when one Michael Mark Cohen wrote a paean to the word ‘douchebag’. He called himself “a white, middle class male professor” who asks his students to shout white racial slurs at him. Oddly enough, this Jewish person is not insulted by others insulting white people, saying:

The point of this sanctioned spewing of hate speech is that none of these words can hurt me. Because I am an individual. I can choose to not be offended, not to be affiliated with any group and rest assured in my sense of self.

I think the more likely answer for why he is not offended is because Cohen is not white, but Jewish.  I’m sure if people started throwing out insults like ‘hebe’ or ‘kike’ which actually applied to Jews rather than ‘cracker’ or ‘honky’, which do not, Cohen’s reactions would be much different.

Either way, Cohen then goes and advocates for the othering of white males by applying a new racial slur against them.

This is just one example of Jewish privilege: to be able to pretend to be of another ethnic group when convenient and using this position to advocate racism against that ethnic group on major media sites (the essay appeared on Gawker) without fear of backlash.

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Jews make up only about 2% of the population yet are vastly overrepresented throughout are cultural and governmental institutions. So, here’s a small list of Jewish privilege, feel free to contribute more in the comments:

Jews are very wealthy. The average Jew’s net worth is $372k (p. 187), almost three times higher than the average American’s ($135k). Almost half of Jews have income of over $100k, compared to 18% of the general population. The percentage of Jews with income under $30k is half that of the general population.

Jews are far more educated than the general populace (p. 56). 35% of Jews have a post-grad degree, three times as many as the general population. 59% of Jews have a college degree, over double the general population, while only 3% of Jews have not graduated high school, compared to 14% of the general population. 5.4% of college professors are Jewish (religion). Jews are heavily overrepresented at the Ivy League composing “21 percent of the enrollment at Ivy League schools (30 percent at Penn, 29 percent at Yale and 26 percent at Harvard).

Jews are heavily overrepresented in the legal system. Jews make up 33% of the Supreme Court. The protestant white majority have no Supreme Court justices representing them. I can’t find modern statistics of overall justices, but under Kennedy and Johnson 10% of judicial appointees were Jewish and I’m sure the proportion hasn’t changed too significantly since. They also make up 26% of the nation’s law professors and 30% of the Supreme Court clerks.

Jews are overrepresented in government. 6% of congress is Jewish; of that, 10% of the senate is Jewish. 13% (2/15) of the cabinet is Jewish.

Jews are heavily overrepresented in cultural creation industries. According to Ben Stein, 60% of important Hollywood positions are held by Jews, while every major studio chief is Jewish. Of the 8 major US media corporations, at least 3 of the CEO’s are identifiably Jewish from their wiki page, a few more could be JEwish but are not so identified.

Jews can present as either whites or Jews, allowing them to claim both minority or majority status as is convenient. This heavily obscures their Jewish privilege, as it is simply chalked up to white privilege. Quite often I found I had to use religion as a proxy for ethnicity because Jews were simply lumped in statistically with whites.

The privileges held by Jews dwarf those held by whites. I think critical race theorists should spend more time and effort studying this understudied area of privilege.

Why Would Any Self-Respecting Male be an Ally?

Trigger Warning: Some mansplaining goin’ down here.

A couple weeks back, I read Occupy Misandry (h/t: Mojo). It’s about one guy’s experiences at the Occupy Wall Street kerfluffle. He was your typical left-wing rage against the machine type, who describes himself as a “one-time Marxist feminist”. Here’s his experience:

The progressive stack technique is a something that compels the rotationally appointed stack-keeper to move people forward (or backward) on the speaker list depending on several criteria – chiefly, whether or not you were deemed to belong to a minority group or, conversely, whether you were apprehended as being part of the dominating class. It was there and then that I was duly informed that, as a white heterosexual male, I was a member of this dominating privileged echelon and that if I wanted to address the assembly, I may have to forgo my place in the line a myriad of times, in order to let others, who have been ‘traditionally denied a voice,’ to scoot in ahead of me. Women (surprise, surprise!) were always escorted to the front of the queue because, although they were not a minority per se, they were ausländers – outliers in that political hinterland beyond the perimeter fence of the big, bad encampment of domination.

This was not the first time I had ever had my ostensible privilege stare me in the face – but this time it felt a little different: it was suddenly right the fuck up in my face. Being a one-time Marxist feminist, this perennial charge of patriarchal privilege was bitter medicine, yet one that I felt compelled to imbibe. I had been holding my nose and swallowing this tincture, ever since the mid 1980’s. It seemed a small price to pay for trying to make the world a fairer place for all. And like most medicine, you tend to ignore the rancid taste because you are led to believe it is good for you, that it is curative.

This blatant discrimination from those supposedly opposed to it, unsurprisingly angered our soon-to-be MRA. Another little incident cements this, and he becomes disillusioned with left-wing shibboleths (welcome to the club). He became an MRA.

My immediate advice to him is to dig further. The far left may be particularly repellent in their lies, but even the “centrist” and “conservative” progressivism that dominates modern society are the same pill with a lighter blue hue. The MRA still buys into the dominant progressivist paradigm.

But that’s not my point today, my point today is simply to ask, rather rhetorically, what possesses a man to sacrifice himself to become an “ally” in the first place?

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Sidenote: In left-wing sociological terminology, majority and minority are not numerative descriptors, it doesn’t matter which group there is more of or less of. It is a descriptor of power, whichever group is the most dominant (according to left-wing ideology) is the majority. For example, even though whites have only made up 10-20% of South Africans over the last few decades, they would be the “majority” simply because whites are dominant. So women, despite being half the population, would be a “minority” in sociological newspeak.

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First, the term ally. An ally is someone who supports the political activism of the grievance industry that purports to represent a “minority” group but is not of that minority group. (It should be noted, not every left-wing crusader agrees with the use of the term allies, while others think otherwise). Examples of allies could include a heterosexual who supports gay rights, a male who supports feminism, or a white person that supports affirmative action and “anti-racism”. John Scalzi, Tim Wise, and Hugo Schwyzer are a few allies those of the manosphere may be more familiar with (although, I do not know if they would self-describe thus). People in the manosphere would likely refer to them as manginas.

Anyway, why would any male with any amount of self-respect decide to become an ally to the grievance industries which hate and disrespect them so?

The examples of left-wing  disrespect and callousness for their allies abound. There’s a newborn MRA up there. There’s Hugo Shwyzer getting thrown under a bus, which happened after he threw the founder of the Good Men project under the bus. There are other examples, but even more convincing is the general undertone of disrespect leftists grievance groups, especially feminists, have for their allies. The amount of intense anger feminists display towards those trying to be their allies is crazy. Even the male allies get in on making demands males must follow.

Let’s say you’re sympathetic and want to learn how to be an ally or be a better one. Nope, educate yourself; no cookie for you.

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So people don’t think I’m cherry-picking certain posts or extremists, this kind of demanding, angry, condescending is steeped throughout the grievance industry; it even forms the very basis of a lot of their language.

I didn’t just use the phrase “no cookie for you”, the cookie concept is a part of the language. It’s used to mock men who try to get on activists’ good side by buying into their frame. (Although, from my understanding, it’s become somewhat more positive on occasion.  The condescension of the concept is (or at least should be) humiliating for those who seek or receive them. Now, I think men who suck up to left-wing activists deserve mockery and humiliation, but they’re not trying to be my ally.

Other concepts major concepts among feminists also reek of condescension and humiliation of their supposed allies.

Check your privilege – When an ally starts talking from a position of “privilege”, this is used to get them to rethink their privilege. Essentially, it’s used a weapon for silencing those whose opinions don’t matter as much (ie. anyone not in the victim group).  Even some feminists think that it’s overused as a silencing tactic.

(Man)splaining – When a “privileged” person tries to explain something to a “non-privileged” person. Essentially, as “Michael Hawkins” learned in the comments here, mansplaining is whenever a man tries to debate with a feminist. Remember, a feminist knows everything, and trying to be helpful or having your own opinion is sexist. (Hint: Never help a feminist).

Gaslighting – Gaslighting was actually a respectable word used in psychology used for when sociopaths abused someone into believing unreality (see: public education). Feminists got hold of the concept and now gaslighting means anytime you point out to a women she is getting overemotional or anytime a women gets offended and you argue there’s no need to be. Remember, feminists never personalize, never get overly emotional, and never overreact. So, if you criticize a women for threatening suicide because you did not buy her a coke, you’re gaslighting.

Pretty much, all of these are used to silence, intimidate, and marginalize the “privileged” who dare interact with a feminist.

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Of course, evil patriarchs like me don’t care and aren’t silenced. If logic, self-control, and reason are considered mansplaining and gaslighting, then I’ll cop to both. And, no, I won’t check my privilege and don’t care in the least about their cookies. (I only want cookies made out of love by someone feminine or mass-produced in a factory engineered, designed, and built by men).

Nope, those of us who think feminism is a load of crap, aren’t effected or silenced.

So who are marginalized?

Allies.

Those weak liberal suck-ups who try to get on feminists’ good side (good luck, you have a 1/360 chance). Those are the ones whose voices are silenced. Those are the ones are ostracized by those they try to please the unpleaseable.

They’re the ones who want the cookie, so they’re the ones who’ll try to earn it and will be disappointed when they realize they’re mansplaining out of their privilege and therefore, their opinion is worthless.

Some will realize this, like our newfound ally up there, but others, the manginas of the manginas, will continue to try to “check their privilege” and like good little doggies beg for their cookies.

But why?

Why would any man with even an ounce of self-respect put up this?

Why would any man accept being constantly condescended to and humiliated?

What do they get out of it?

Is it worth it?

What could possibly possess a man to prostrate himself before feminists and hand them his balls?