one question for me and others like me is whether ... we will get truly distressed, even outraged, about unearned race advantage and conferred dominance and, if so, what we will do to lessen them.
Peggy McIntoshI was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance on my group
Peggy McIntoshIt seems to me that obliviousness about white advantage, like obliviousness about male advantage, is kept strongly inculturated in the United States so as to maintain the myth of meritocracy, the myth that democratic choice is equally available to all. Keeping most people unaware that freedom of confident action is there for just a small number of people props up those in power and serves to keep power in the hands of the same groups that have most of it already.
Peggy McIntoshAs a white person, I realized I had been taught about racism as something that puts others at a disadvantage, but had been taught not to see one of its corollary aspects, white privilege, which puts me at an advantage.
Peggy McIntosh