White Privilege, White Guilt, White Joke

Long ago (somewhere… don't ask me to find it) I wrote that black people would vote for Barack Obama because he's black, while many liberals will vote for him out of white guilt. What do I mean about this exactly? Let's go to a source.

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White Privilege, White Entitlement and the 2008 Election

by Tim Wise For those who still can’t grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are constantly looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help. White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because "every family has challenges," even as black and Latino families with similar "challenges" are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.

Man, I'm gonna have at this fool's essay. First of all, this guy is courageous: he uses a rant on white guilt to verbally beat up on a teenaged girl. Yeah, that's a real man. Now let's get to the real issues at hand. Conservatives do consider teen pregnancies a private, family matter. White liberals do as well, however since you have that white guilt in you and believe that "black and Latino families with similar 'challenges'" are hampered by decades, if not, centuries of oppression by The Man, they had to make up social programs that would even the playing field. The result: liberals screwed the black family by using government to replace the father. More side effects: high crime, unacceptable teen drop out rates, unacceptable out-of-wedlock teen birthrates, and if not for your initial meddling, we wouldn't be considered "irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay". Maybe that's something white liberals could feel guilty about. But when you took us in and looked down upon us as your pets, what do you expect? Let's not get off track here. Mr. Wise is still beating up on the teen Palin.

White privilege is when you can call yourself a "#’ redneck," like Bristol Palin’s boyfriend does, and talk about how if anyone messes with you, you'll "kick their #' #," and talk about how you like to "shoot #" for fun, and still be viewed as a responsible, all-American boy (and a great son-in-law to be) rather than a thug.

Yeah, young conservative boys may call themselves a "#' redneck" but you wanna start comparing kids? Do you really want to go there? Like those liberal geniuses who went to St. Paul to have peace marches against Republicans that turned violent. How about those young Hollywood Democrat types who consistently drive drunk, get knocked up before they can legally drive, and abuse coke to the point where they can't even function on a movie set where they're being paid millions? Maybe that's something white liberals could feel guilty about.

White privilege is when you can attend four different colleges in six years like Sarah Palin did (one of which you basically failed out of, then returned to after making up some coursework at a community college), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement, whereas a person of color who did this would be viewed as unfit for college, and probably someone who only got in in the first place because of affirmative action.

White privilege is when you can attend a college and major in some bullshit like Women's Studies. White privilege is when you can spend your entire adult life as a student, sucking up scholarship money so you don't have to get a job and can go home to your little room at your parents' house. White privilege is thinking yourself superior enough over others that you can make fun of someone else's academic adjustments. By the way, Al Gore was a C- student that flunked out of divinity school. He became a senator and later vice president. Sarah Palin had a troubled college career became a governor. And thanks to your white guilt, Mr. Wise, whenever I've gotten a new job, liberals were the first to look at me as a possible affirmative action hire, thus instantly assuming I was unqualified for that job. Thanks for nothing, Mr. Wise.

White privilege is when you can claim that being mayor of a town smaller than most medium-sized colleges, and then Governor of a state with about the same number of people as the lower fifth of the island of Manhattan, makes you ready to potentially be president, and people don’t all piss on themselves with laughter, while being a black U.S. Senator, two-term state Senator, and constitutional law scholar, means you’re "untested."

White privilege is having such a superiority complex that you can demean anyone's achievement. Mr. Wise, after growing up in Boston, living 40 miles south of Tokyo, living in Los Angeles for a dozen years, we moved to a small town. During my six years here, this town hasn't suffered one murder. We can leave our doors open, although we don't. Volunteerism is something people do here because it's needed. In Wise's more enlightened metropolitan areas, volunteerism is a fad. And speaking of government, I know of no black president that would ever put a cigar into an intern's vagina and get away with it. I guess that's called white privilege (while most Democrats considered that an offense worth ignoring).

White privilege is being able to say that you support the words "under God" in the pledge of allegiance because "if it was good enough for the founding fathers, it’s good enough for me," and not be immediately disqualified from holding office–since, after all, the pledge was written in the late 1800s and the "under God" part wasn’t added until the 1950s–while believing that reading accused criminals and terrorists their rights (because, ya know, the Constitution, which you used to teach at a prestigious law school requires it), is a dangerous and silly idea only supported by mushy liberals.

Aside from atheists with time on their hands, liberals are really bothered by God. It must be hard for these white liberals, who are used to priviledge, to have to consider the fact there may be something more important than themselves. Ever notice how many award ceremonies the entertainment business has for itself? The Oscars, the Emmys, the Grammys, the Golden Globes, Blockbuster Awards, the Video Music Awards, the Image Awards, the Tony Awards, the Teen Choice Awards, The Cleos, and more. All in an effort to remind us and the world just who we should be worshipping. Liberals charge us to see their bad movies, listen to their bad music, and watch their stupid sitcoms. God hasn't charged me #. What would Mr. Wise prefer? In Streisand we trust?

White privilege is being able to be a gun enthusiast and not make people immediately scared of you. White privilege is being able to have a husband who was a member of an extremist political party that wants your state to secede from the Union, and whose motto was "Alaska first," and no one questions your patriotism or that of your family, while if you're black and your spouse merely fails to come to a 9/11 memorial so she can be home with her kids on the first day of school, people immediately think she’s being disrespectful.

"White privilege is being able to be a gun enthusiast and not make people immediately scared of you"? Mr. Wise, next year go to any rap and/or hip hop award show and see how long you'll wish you were packin'. And the way the federal government sucks money out of us, just to waste it and want more whenever they like, there are many times I've thought about living in a different country. Then again, I've been to some of those countries…. Michelle Obama did the right thing by staying home during the 9-11 memorial proceedings with the children. If she had listened to white-privileged, Margaret Sanger-loving liberals, Michelle would have aborted those "unfit" little black babies. Then she'd have been freed up for the day.

White privilege is being able to make fun of community organizers and the work they do–like, among other things, fight for the right of women to vote, or for civil rights, or the 8-hour workday, or an end to child labor–and people think you’re being pithy and tough, but if you merely question the experience of a small town mayor and 18-month governor with no foreign policy expertise beyond a class she took in college–you’re somehow being mean, or even sexist

. White privilege is to be able to keep blacks out of your neighborhoods, using government entitlement programs and lousy schools, so they'll need community organizers to sift through the red tape they've created. Maybe even a lawyer. Maybe a black lawyer. A black lawyer who'll eventually run for president, using his experience organizing in the hood. And liberal white privilege is knowing there is no person or group you can't look down upon. At one moment, whites like Mr. Wise can diss the fact that someone jumped around a bit in college, and then later diss the college she decided to stay in. Sarah Palin would've stayed in one school if her privileged parents put her through one.

White privilege is being able to convince white women who don’t even agree with you on any substantive issue to vote for you and your running mate anyway, because all of a sudden your presence on the ticket has inspired confidence in these same white women, and made them give your party a "second look."

Obviously, Sarah Palin is better convincing women than Hillary Clinton. Jealous?

White privilege is being able to fire people who didn’t support your political campaigns and not be accused of abusing your power or being a typical politician who engages in favoritism, while being black and merely knowing some folks from the old-line political machines in Chicago means you must be corrupt.

White priviledge is being able to write a piece devoid of common sense. Bill Clinton trumped up charges on innocent employees of the White House Travel Offices. He had a Billy Bob of a security chief collect the personal FBI files of political opponents, and pardoned genuine criminals who were either personal friends or, through others, donated big bucks to his campaigns. Bill Clinton didn't know folks from the old-line political machine. He was the political machine, was that corrupt, and no Democrat would EVER let a black man have that kind of power.

White privilege is being able to attend churches over the years whose pastors say that people who voted for John Kerry or merely criticize George W. Bush are going to hell, and that the U.S. is an explicitly Christian nation and the job of Christians is to bring Christian theological principles into government, and who bring in speakers who say the conflict in the Middle East is God’s punishment on Jews for rejecting Jesus, and everyone can still think you’re just a good church-going Christian, but if you’re black and friends with a black pastor who has noted (as have Colin Powell and the U.S. Department of Defense) that terrorist attacks are often the result of U.S. foreign policy and who talks about the history of racism and its effect on black people, you’re an extremist who probably hates America.

White priviledge is being able to ridicule the church. The same church the Democrats' most loyal constituencies belong to. And when you, Mr. Wise, and the Reverend Jeremiah Wright take the time to learn even one page of the history of racism and it's effect on black people, you'll probably understand why we consider you an extremist who belongs to the party that took hating black people to the next, murderous level.

White privilege is not knowing what the Bush Doctrine is when asked by a reporter, and then people get angry at the reporter for asking you such a "trick question," while being black and merely refusing to give one-word answers to the queries of Bill O’Reilly means you’re dodging the question, or trying to seem overly intellectual and nuanced.

White priviledge is feeling free to express an opinion about an interview you knew was edited, while expecting no more than one-word answers from a black presidential candidate.

White privilege is being able to claim your experience as a POW has anything at all to do with your fitness for president, while being black and experiencing racism is, as Sarah Palin has referred to it, a "light" burden.

White privilege is being able to dismiss anyone's experience you can't relate to. Barack Obama was sent to the best schools, had better opportunities than most black people, and the only racism he and his wife wrote about came from the other white liberals that they associated with. Read the forward of Michelle Obama's thesis. John McCain endured being a prisoner-of-war for years. Mr. Wise would've been crying like a # in 24 minutes, ready to rat out his nation after just being told about the waterboard.

And finally, white privilege is the only thing that could possibly allow someone to become president when he has voted with George W. Bush 90 percent of the time, even as unemployment is skyrocketing, people are losing their homes, inflation is rising, and the U.S. is increasingly isolated from world opinion, just because white voters aren’t sure about that whole "change" thing. Ya know, it’s just too vague and ill-defined, unlike, say, four more years of the same, which is very concrete and certain

. And liberal white privilege means this is a great time to dump all that # on the black man to deal with, and since he's a liberal black, he's destined to fail. Then you never have to elect another for years, and you can cite Obama as the reason.

White privilege is, in short, the problem.

You would know, Mr. Wise.