Niceness privilege

Being nice should mean being genuinely kind, caring and empathetic. But in reality, the standard’s much lower. Just saying “please” and “thank you”, tucking your shirt in and failing to commit violent crimes can win you the “nice” label. And yet we put huge amounts of value on that label. “Nice” young men can avoid [...]

Mind-boggling example of male privilege

Over on Hathor, I wrote an article called If anything makes women hate men, it’s not feminism: it’s patriarchy. In a nutshell, I argued that patriarchy puts out a lot of ugly messages about what cheating, abusive assholes men are in hopes of convincing women to put up with crap from men. Women who refuse [...]

We do what we can

I recently recognized a layer of privilege I didn’t know I had. As some of you probably know, I also administer The Hathor Legacy, which looks at how film and TV portray women. It’s a feminist media site. I founded it in 2005, and I’ve been proud of it. But here’s where a subtle shift [...]

Privilege means never having to explain why it doesn’t work for Others

One of the most annoying privilege memes I’ve ever dealt with is “Anyone can get rich in this great country; if they don’t, it means they’re just not working hard enough.” I encountered this meme almost daily as a kid growing up in a highly conservative “red state” in the US, but I imagine there [...]

If you look Mexican, you’re probably uninsured

Here in sunny California, there are families of Mexican descent who’ve been here longer than my white ancestors. There are also people who arrive here everyday from Mexico, often without much in the way of resources. I have a friend who’s Mexican-American by descent but her family’s been in the US for several generations. She [...]

White Trash Blues: Class Privilege v. White Privilege

If you blog about white privilege, you’re probably sick to death of people playing the “white trash” card in your comments. Their argument usually goes something like this: “Being white didn’t give me all these privileges you’re talking about.” “I know plenty of [minority] people who are better off than I am.” And the advanced [...]

White guy asks: why do you need to bring race into it?

Here’s a nice example of what this site’s about.  Angry Black Woman was asked by a man – presumably white, since he didn’t say, and we all know what that means – why she feels the need to identify herself with race, in addition to “angry” and “woman”?  He says, I mean, I myself am [...]

Extroversion privilege

(This post has a definite US slant, simply because that’s the only country whose culture I’ve experienced firsthand.  I suspect it’s different elsewhere – feel free to comment.) This all started from a comment made by DNi on my post, Personal Privilege List. I started thinking about it, then some stuff happened, then I thought [...]

Personal Privilege List

I’m making a list of personal privileges I’m aware of having. You’re invited to post your own list in the comments. The purpose of this exercise is to get us thinking, so there are no wrong answers. Some of these privileges are pretty lame.  Some of them have a flipside.  For now, I just want [...]

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