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

by Jennifer Kesler

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 an “angry guy”, but I don’t really feel the need to add race into it. So my question is, why is there a need to put race into the picture?

Wow, dude, the privilege is like right there and you don’t see it. ABW nails the problem: her race is making Angry White Guy uncomfortable.  He wants her not to mention it for all the reasons she says.

“White” is not a race.  It is a cultural (delusional) default.  It’s everyone who’s something other than white who belongs to a race.  White people have the privilege of being race-less.  Angry White Guy feels no need to bring race into it because he doesn’t belong to a race.  He simply belongs.


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Posted in Race on March 14, 2007

2 Responses to “White guy asks: why do you need to bring race into it?”

  1. [...] It relies on the framework of white as the unmarked default. It only really works if you agree that the dominant cultural paradigm here is not a white one, and [...]

  2. [...] It relies on the framework of white as the unmarked default. It only really works if you agree that the dominant cultural paradigm here is not a white one, and [...]

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