I wrote an essay expanding on this idea if anyone is interested.
Mark Twain wrote:
A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.
This is my steelman of the idea of “privilege”. If you’ve never seen the color red before, and I try to describe it to you, no amount of description will teach you as much as seeing a red object would. So I’m fairly persuaded by claims like “You’ll never really understand what it’s like to be (gay/a woman/black)”. In fact, there are lots of human experiences I will never really understand. And like Jeff says, that doesn’t make me a bad person.
It isn’t apparent to me that under your definition of privilege, [demographic] privilege is nearly as significant as many other unique experiences. And also, [demographic] privilege is often used as if everyone in the demographic has the same experience as the average. “White privilege” despite being born in a South African neighborhood where whites are ostracized, “Male privilege” despite being in a female-dominated field, “First World Privilege” despite being born into a situation devoid of growth opportunities, etc.
I wrote an essay expanding on this idea if anyone is interested.
Mark Twain wrote:
This is my steelman of the idea of “privilege”. If you’ve never seen the color red before, and I try to describe it to you, no amount of description will teach you as much as seeing a red object would. So I’m fairly persuaded by claims like “You’ll never really understand what it’s like to be (gay/a woman/black)”. In fact, there are lots of human experiences I will never really understand. And like Jeff says, that doesn’t make me a bad person.
It isn’t apparent to me that under your definition of privilege, [demographic] privilege is nearly as significant as many other unique experiences. And also, [demographic] privilege is often used as if everyone in the demographic has the same experience as the average. “White privilege” despite being born in a South African neighborhood where whites are ostracized, “Male privilege” despite being in a female-dominated field, “First World Privilege” despite being born into a situation devoid of growth opportunities, etc.