A friend reminded me of this. I wrote it a few years ago, and this seems like a good time to repost it.

People tend to think of “privilege” as a positive force that raises one person over another. “White privilege” doesn’t work like that.

“White privilege” is not a positive force that lifts white people above others. It is the absence of a negative force that pushes others down. That is the reason so many white people don’t see it. Quite literally it is something that doesn’t happen to us.

I have never been pulled over while driving because of the color of my skin. I have never been followed by store security because of how I look. Nobody looks at me with suspicion as I walk down the street. I have never been refused a lease because the landlord thought “people like me” weren’t good tenants.

I have never been made to feel uncomfortable in society, in my own skin. White privilege is the luxury of going through life without thinking about the color of your skin.

White people are not above some magical line that gives them better stuff. We ARE that line, we are the base by which we measure “normal”, and we don’t want to allow others to join us there.

And we sure as hell don’t get to tell anyone who’s got a foot on their neck to “get over it”.