In the following video you will view multiple sketches by Sociology live describing American history and how it shaped our country. Many of the laws were negatively affecting the smaller minorities who had no power or voice in society. It began with the Jim Crow laws in 1965 and this "white privilege" took a huge toll on our society.
According to Christine Emba, white privilege is a level of societal advantage that has become a norm in America. White privilege is based on wealth, gender, and many other factors. A lot of Americans or anyone who fits into this category of “privilege” do not notice that they have an advantage, unless it had never applied to you to begin with. For example, a young, white, wealthy man might not notice that he is already given an advantage based upon the color of his skin or his gender. Many of Americans believe that there is no privilege, or it is simply not real. However, a Hispanic man or anyone who identifies as non-white will be more likely to notice the advantages that the other person has. One great example that we can look at is ourselves and something as simple as our name on our resume. According to Emba, you are fifty percent more likely to be chosen for a job or an interview if your name sounds white. For example, when I was sixteen years old I applied to Target and was luckily given an interview, along with ten other applicants who were at a much higher and wealthy high school than the one I was attending. I was not given the job, but I noticed another young girl my age was, so we compared our resumes and the only difference was our high school names. This comes to show that not only the color of your skin, or where you live make up the chances of you gaining employment, but they are a huge role as well. We may ask ourselves, “why is this continuing to happen?” or “what can we do to stop it?”, but we have accepted “white privilege” and it is only affecting us more.
In our justice system criminal cases are approached differently based upon the perpetrator’s background history. This may include anything from the color of their skin to the city they were born in. Emba states that black defendants are thirty percent more likely to be imprisoned than white defendants for the exact same crime. If we nonwhites, continue to accept white privilege, this social injustice is only going to worsen.
Even though these factors may define what wealthy or apart of the “one percent” looks like, there are also many nonwhites who have become very wealthy, but will never be as great as the “elites”. The reason being is because as a white person of any kind, you are automatically classified within a dominate group. A group that tends to be more respected and given “the benefit of the doubt” more often. Whether the person is wealthy or comes from a wealthy family, it does not apply to any other race, only the superior. This does not conclude that all white people are racists, because they are not. It is more of a matter of awareness, what can we do to be more aware of “white privilege” and understand our own rights. How can we recognize the minorities and achieve equal opportunity in a society built upon gender, wealth, and education factors?
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AuthorLinda Reynoso Archives
December 2016
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