A response to “Explaining White Privilege . . .” by Gina Crosley-Corcoran

Blog – A response to “Explaining White Privilege . . .” by Gina Crosley-Corcoran

That Crosley-Corcoran posts on a site called thefeministbreeder.com inferred I would not agree whole-heartedly with the comments made, and I did not.  However, in my attempt to be open-minded enough to understand other’s views while not letting my own brains fall to the side, I read the article.  Then, I read it again.  This author has a wealth of experience to apply to the issue at hand.  Having grown up as a white person of poverty, Crosley-Corcoran did not understand how anyone could consider that upbringing as privilege.  I, too have issues with presuming privilege based on skin color.  So, though I had read it before, I returned to McIntosh’s article, “"White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack."  While the link in Crosley-Corcoran’s article did not work, the article itself was easy to find. 

Maybe my middle-class upbringing in suburban California was a foundation for personal respect that blinds me to these concerns.  Maybe it is my twenty years in the Marines that made me think of skin color as no more defining than eye color or height. Maybe it is the sure and certain knowledge and belief that there is a God who loved me enough to die for my sins, and that the same is true of every person regardless of skin color. I still don’t get it.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary online, privilege is:

A right, advantage, or immunity granted to or enjoyed by an individual, corporation of individuals, etc., beyond the usual rights or advantages of others; spec.  (a) an exemption from a normal duty, liability, etc.; (b)enjoyment of some benefit (as wealth, education, standard of living, etc.) above the average or that deemed usual or necessary for a particular group (in pl. sometimes contrasted with rights) (OED, 2016).

As an example, McIntosh says, “6. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.” I know that there was a blow-up last year about race in the academy awards, but the issue I don’t get is one of reverse-privilege. It seems strange to me that it is okay to have Black Entertainment Television (BET), and special awards for folks who are black, or disabled, or have sexuality identification labels. I believe that there should be an equity that identifies people as great actors not because of their skin color, but because of their great acting. I have also noticed, that it has become such a sensitive issue that the only person-type about whom fun can be made is the heterosexual white male. Truly, in any group, there are going to be those who exaggerate the stereotypes of the group, and those who defy them.  Honestly, I’m more a believer in the bell curve.  There will be a few bright shining stars, and a few repressive dolts, and by and large the rest of us are somewhere in between. 

McIntosh sums up the comment list with “21. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.” I have. While in the Marines, I sat on several “boards.” For those who do not know, boards are committees who meet to make decisions after review – promotion boards, disciplinary boards, etc.  I often was selected for boards because someone’s ultimate wisdom had decreed a bunch of categories to ensure diversity on the boards.  I met many categories:  white, female, field grade officer, prior enlisted, educated, etc.  Because of my own diversity with the Corps, having started as a regular Marine Corps Recruit at Parris Island and retired as a field grade officer in the reserve Marine Corps, I could understand many issues of the parties represented to the board.  It did not hurt that while enlisted, I had been married to an enlisted man who died, making me an “unremarried widow” for benefits allocation. It also broadened my perspective when, as an officer, I married an officer. So, I understood the relationships relating to spousal influence.  I have been asked to speak – to represent one of the many groups into which I fall.  We all have, whether we realize it or not. 

Every time I open my mouth, I represent my white, middle-class, California upbringing.  Every time I open my mouth, I represent the Marine Corps – enlisted and officer.  Every time I open my mouth, I represent college professors, Christians, dog owners and any other category into which I could be placed.  While I deem it a privilege to be a natural-born American citizen, I have great respect for those who attain citizenship legally, and equal disdain for those who push through illegally.  In my mind, those people are criminals.  There is a place in my heart, however, that reminds me that Jesus died for them, too.

Some of the things on McIntosh’s list are true for everyone, and some I think do not apply to everyone regardless of the group.  Goodness knows, there are issues of concern in relationships. Goodness knows, that in today’s political climate of unrest, there are those who should be concerned.  I believe, however, that most of the issues are inflamed by a militant media who would take a small percentage problem and instead of allowing it to be handled quietly and locally, inflame those who would listen until riots and outbreaks occur.

It is not a matter of privilege to treat others well.  It is a matter of respect.  Yes. I grew up in a drastically predominately white neighborhood with a dog and a cat and a two-car garage. Somewhere, however, in my California public school education, I learned that all people should be offered courtesy, and that respect should be engendered until it is abused.  I learned that regardless of the color of skin, everyone bleeds red.  I learned that honor and integrity have no color. I learned that hate comes in every color, but so does love. I learned that it takes a generation or two to change people’s views.

I also learned that people tend to abuse privileges that they are born to because they haven’t earned them. I believe that feeding wild animals makes them dependent. I believe that the same is true of the welfare issue.  I believe that truly transgendered people are not the ones making a fuss over bathrooms as truly transgender people would choose to quietly live their lives and not bring attention to themselves any more than anyone else. I learned that there are a few political loudmouths who are given more credence than they warrant. I learned that my opinion and yours, whoever you are, should be listened to respectfully and considered.  I learned that every day we can learn a little more if we choose to do so, and in doing so, we will broaden ourselves. Alternatively, we can narrow our insights to where we don’t even see options in other views. 

I can and do respect Crosley-Corcoran for reaching beyond the poverty roots. I can and do respect McIntosh for a thought-provoking essay from 1988.  Just because I don’t think white privilege means I have to denigrate my own history does not mean I do not think every other person deserves my courtesy. It means that, in my view, we as a people have worked so hard at making up to a people who were once treated poorly that we are no longer construed as “created equal” but as somehow deficit, simply do to a lake of melanin in our skin. How I treat people reflects on me. How others treat me reflects on them. It isn’t a matter of privilege. It is a matter of respect.

The Beginning

As the good Charles Dickens once penned for David Copperfield, “to begin my life at the beginning of my life, I record that I was born . . . .”  To say such may seem redundant, for among the merest of mammals, birth would be the beginning and the mammal in question would not exist to tell a tale had she not been born.  However, as with most, the tale begins before birth though that portion which does not pertain directly to early childhood will be omitted for now and returned to later. 

I was born, as previously stated.  Late one evening, apparently a Wednesday, my mother labored briefly before I made an appearance.  She states that I was born holding my head up as she had been taking calcium shots during the pregnancy to stave off leg cramps.  While that may be a brief exaggeration, she has also noted that upon returning home the next morning, my father had to go buy crib bumpers as I could and did scoot along the mattress and they feared I would harm myself.  It would seem I have been moving ever since. 

Oh, I suppose in my early youth there were times of quiet, but they seem to have been imposed upon me do to my own action.  I was quite young when I found myself at the bottom of the pool, staring up through the water at the bright blue sky.  I had wanted to reach for a ball that was floating, and being but a toddler, I fell into the water.  My father was unaware I had followed him into the pool yard as he had gone to get some tool or such.  Fortunately for me, he had been a lifeguard in his youth, and was able to retrieve and revive me.  He has often said that if looks could kill, my mother would have struck him dead when she saw him crossing the yard with me, and both of us dripping wet.  There were no long term repercussions from my early water experience, as I became a bit of a water rat in my growing up years.

Assisted Suicide

When I taught argumentative writing, my students had to write an essay on which the topic was "an issue of social concern about which reasonable people may differ, and about which you feel passionately." Inevitably, someone would choose assisted suicide. However, on the next essay, they were required to do the research and write an argument in opposition to their prior essay. Generally, those who wrote in favor of assisted suicide were at a loss.

However, I would steer them into a reminder of decision-making until they realized the slippery slope of this issue: if it is acceptable to allow someone suicide, the value of life itself is diminished AND another is given the ability to make the choice. Where then, does that choice end? Is it parents deciding for children; children deciding for parents; spouses making a choice; or the state or courts making the choice. Eventually, in issues of conflict, the courts decide. That means that the state has made the choice.

It all boils down to value: what are the consequences and is it worth it? If the state is making these choices, eventually, the fiscal cost of maintaining life will overcome the intrinsic value of life itself. Then, the value starts being rated against contribution to society. Wow! When the Affordable-Care-Act was being touted, I received a letter from Medicare explaining that the costs of my monthly medication was too high and I could anticipate them being terminated. I was not yet 50 years old, and was told I cost too much. My 20 years of service to the Marines has protected me, but it is a mental blow to be told your life is not worth as much as the medication to keep you alive.

So, do we choose to actively kill those who cost too much and who do not contribute in someone's eyes? And what gives that someone the right to make that decision. If the state is making a cost-benefit-analysis for us, then we need to do some research into Germany, China, and other social-communist history states wherein the state decides that the old, the infirm, or the somehow less than perfect must be destroyed. Where then is the cutoff point?  Is it at age 50? It is when someone is on life-long meds for hypertension or diabetes? 

I don’t know the answers.  I know that my God put me here for a purpose, and as yet, I must not have finished serving it or I would not be here as the opportunity for my death has been stymied too many times.  I know this article scratches the surface of a horrible truth – that we are selfish beings, and in being so, our intrinsic value is also reduced.  Truly, in our humanity we have little enough value.  But, in our ability to do good, to help others, and to worship God, we have no reason nor authority to do ill to anyone who is not first doing it to us!