I am invisible, understand, because people refuse to see me — Ralph Ellison, "Ibisible Man."
More and more I tend to speak less and less into FB conversations on race and white privilege because more and more as an African American... Nay as a brother in Christ who is Black living in America, I'm mostly "wrong." However, whether one is liberal or conservative in his or her politics, as a black person there is one thing that history cannot deny and that is the severe handicap that many of us have experienced collectively (not necessarily individually, which I'll explain); but together under a system that traditionally has awarded the "disaffected."
Ultimately, white privilege or white "advantage" is about economics. Money and education often grant access to opportunities that those who have not have no access to. However, putting money and education aside for a moment; white privilege (at its heart) is about acculturation/assimilation. It is about espousing values that marginalize, minimize and diminish the cultural values, beliefs, fears, pains and baggage of the "other" in order to maintain a status quo. It doesn't always recognize its purpose, but that status quo tends to deem the values of the "other" as incongruent with itself. It devalues cultural diversity. English-only is one example of this.
In France, I am at a severe disadvantage culturally and economically if I don't speak French. Even if I am not a native speaker of French, I'm marginalized at best. If I learn French as a second language, it grants more access. However, if I'm from N. Africa and Muslim (heck, if I'm from America and gung-ho American), I will find myself at a disadvantage there culturally. The French won't see it as rudeness. They will see it as the way it should be. Finding oneself on the fringe of a society and of its espoused values and beliefs systems is a disadvantage. Advantage and privilege will go to the members of that social club.
Earlier I mentioned how the marginalized often experience disadvantage collectively through history and injustice. The reason why some people of color will succeed individually and personally is because they will have had access to certain aspects or components of privilege. Yet, this often comes at a cost. If I lose my language, lose my patois; if I lose my gutteral and broken English; if I stop eating/cooking/smelling-like "guk" food (watch Gran Torino) and disengage my family/ethnic/nationalistic values — then I'm closer to "whiteness" in America. But can a leopard change his spots? Can a zebra change her stripes?
Think about the image of a zebra losing her stripes for a moment. In your mind's eye (and be honest), what color is the horse? If you said "white," then your closer to a large percentage of people who see "black" as bad or negative. I, too, see a "white" zebra. Why is that? Education. We're often taught that black/darkness is bad. What we do though is erroneously attribute that philosophical/moral sensibility to people and things. We don't realize this. And that is why "black" lives matter, not just "all" lives. This is why "black" is beautiful and not just "all" people; because when you are marginalized, you become invisible (read Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man — not to be confused w/ H.G. Wells' "The" Invisible Man). Invisibility means not counting, not being noticed, not-existent. White advantage/privilege doesn't see the problems. It only sees a white zebra because it has ignored the other stripes.
So, personally, I have to lose a lot plus have independent wealth and education to experience less marginalization and more "whiteness." What if I lost my blackness both physically and culturally? Then will I have the greatest advantage historically and traditionally? Yes. I'm still a man. If no longer invisible.
