White Privilege Thesis

Privilege, a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor (merriam-webster). The idea of privilege is fairly recent dating back to around 1903 when American civil rights activist/historian/sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois published an essay called ‘The Souls of Black Folk’. In the text he discussed that African Americans at the time were very mindful about white Americans and where mindful of racial discrimination. While white Americans on the contrary, did not think much about African Americans, nor about the effects that institutional and racial discrimination would have towards the group. This ignorance to racism and its effects to the colored community by white Americans has created what people today call as ‘white privilege’. White privilege is not something that white individuals actually do, benefit or relish on purpose. It is a result of hundreds of years of an American culture that revolved around the dehumanizing of the minority (colored people) to benefit the majority (white Americans). Creating a modern clear preference for whiteness, that allows white Americans to capitalize and benefit immeasurably more from America’s political systems and institutions compared to people of color. Now, explaining that white people have certain privileges that colored people are not afforded to a white American deems a common response. Many white Americans genuinely think that our
But that is just a small illustration in a sea of examples of why white people benefit more in the US from its institutions than colored people. This was not meant to attack white individuals for being privileged. This is more of my way of notifying white individuals of their privilege, by showing them why colored people are not equal. This way we can work together with a unified understanding to help each other create a truly equal