White Privilege and The Inventory of Personal and Collective Racial Evil: A Checklist

Peggy McIntosh “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”

I recently became aware of something called “White privilege,” which is apparently very bad and is responsible for every social problem in the world.  I have always thought of myself as White, no naturally, I was concerned.  I read elsewhere that White privilege is something that all White people enjoy, and only White people have it.  In other words, to have White privilege is to be White; to be White is to have White privilege.  Having realized how awful this White privilege must be, I was naturally anxious to see if I was burdening Diversity with my Whiteness.  I decided immediately to go through the checklist.  My responses are in green.

1. I can, if I wish, arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
No, I live and work in places that are entirely Diverse and I lack the money and connections to change that.

2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure of renting or purchasing housing in an area that I can afford and in which I would want to live.
No, see above.

3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
Maybe they would be, I’ll never know.

4. I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.
There were two shootings at two different businesses a mile from my house.  Does worrying about being caught in a shootout in broad daylight count as harassment?

5. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
On pretty much every TV show, they’re the villains. 

6. When I am told about our national heritage or about civilization, I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
They mostly did.  For the author, this is the problem.

7. I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.
They will, and the material will explain how evil their race is and how the world is worse for their having existed.

8. If I want to, I can be pretty sure of finding a publisher for this piece on white privilege.
That's because academia is infested with decadent, spoiled, self-loathing radical Marxists who eat this sort of thing up.  No one will publish these responses.

9. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented, into a supermarket and find the staple foods that fit with my cultural traditions, into a hairdresser's shop and find someone who can deal with my hair.
I’m not sure what the “music of my race” is, but judging by the bass-accented stream of slurred profanities I hear everytime I come to a stoplight, I doubt anyone of any race has trouble finding their own music.  Whole aisles at my grocery store are dedicated to staple foods not of my cultural traditions.  The hairdressers?  Are you kidding?

10. Whether I use checks, credit cards, or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.
That must be why my wife’s credit card was used in Detroit to purchase several hundred dollars’ worth of Church’s Chicken.  The woman who stole it was clearly worried about the prejudice she would face using her own card.

11. I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like them.       If I sent my children to the local public school they would have a 100% chance of being beaten and robbed.

12. I can swear, or dress in second-hand clothes or not answer letters without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
My race is equated with evil by the author of this article.  This same author attributes the disproportionate poverty and illiteracy of Diverse people to that evil.

13. I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial.
The author is putting my race on trial, but then, she’s a woman, so maybe this one is true.

14. I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.
If that’s bad, then what’s the point of the various Diverse History Months?

15. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.
Unless I am defending White privilege, which according to the author, I always am.

16. I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color, who constitute the worlds' majority, without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
Most people on Earth are oblivious to the languages and customs of most other people.  I am not one of them, given that due to reasons laid out in 1 and 2, I remain surrounded by Diversity.  The author seems to equate not being noticed by White people with oblivion.

17. I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.
Being seen as a cultural outsider is the goal of every multiculturalist. 

18. I can be sure that if I ask to talk to "the person in charge" I will be facing a person of my race.
Unless I have to go to any government office.

19. If a traffic cop pulls me over, or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven't been singled out because of my race.
People can never be sure exactly why they are being pulled over, unless they assume it is racism, which presumably the author believes it always is.  As for the IRS, everyone is still waiting to find out why conservative, overwhelmingly White groups were denied tax-exempt status before the last election.

20. I can easily buy posters, postcards, picture books, greeting cards, dolls, toys, and children's magazines featuring people of my race.
So can anyone else.

21. I can go home from most meetings or organizations I belong to feeling somewhat tied in rather than isolated, out of place, outnumbered, unheard, held at a distance, or feared.
So can anyone else, although in my case, having to get teacher certification means having to deal with the aforementioned Marxists who make it their business to render me “isolated, out of place, outnumbered, unheard, held at a distance, or [hopefully] feared.”  But then, feeling even “somewhat tied in” with those people would render me unable to sleep at night.

22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having coworkers on the job suspect that I got it because of race.
By definition you may have, and there is nothing unreasonable about your co-workers suspecting that.  If affirmative action is a good thing, why should anyone worry about being seen as benefitting from it?

23. I can choose public accommodations without fearing that people of my race cannot get in or will be mistreated in the places I have chosen.
That doesn’t happen.

24. I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help my race will not work against me.
That also doesn’t happen.

25. If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether it has racial overtones.
According to White privilege theory, everything everywhere has racial overtones.

26. I can chose [sic] blemish cover or bandages in flesh color that more or less matches my skin. You’re really reaching with this one.

Since the items in this list either don’t apply to me, apply to me in a way not intended by the author, could apply to anyone, or don’t apply to anyone in 2014, I am forced to conclude that either White privilege does not exist, which is absurd, since why else would Diversity have any problems, or that I do not have White privilege.  If the latter, then I cannot belong to the category of White.

If All Whites have White privilege, defined as possessing the above characteristics

And if only Whites have White privilege, defined as possessing the above characteristics

And if by the above definition, I do not have White privilege

Then, necessarily, I am not White.

But at least now I'm part of the solution.

http://ted.coe.wayne.edu/ele3600/mcintosh.html  [Note, this is taken from an abridged version of a longer article Dr. McIntosh wrote, and from a much longer list she compiled.  Fifty examples of White privilege were evidently too much for the delicate souls at the College of Education at Wayne State to bear.  However, enough words were spelled incorrectly, or confusingly omitted, by the editor for the future teachers to feel comfortable]