PRIVILEGE
Home\n\nRandom\n\nNearby\n\nLog in\n\nSettings\n\nAbout Wikipedia\n\n\xa0\n\nDisclaimers\n\nOpen main menu\n\n\ufffc\n\nSearch\n\nWhite privilege\n\nLanguage\n\nDownload PDF\n\nWatch\n\nEdit\n\nFor the clothing protocol in the Vatican, see\xa0Privil\xe8ge du blanc. For the Macklemore & Ryan Lewis song, see\xa0White Privilege II.\n\nWhite privilege\xa0(or\xa0white skin privilege) is the\xa0societal privilege\xa0that benefits\xa0white people\xa0over\xa0non-white\xa0people, particularly if they are otherwise under the same social, political, or economic circumstances. Academic perspectives such as\xa0critical race theory\xa0and\xa0whiteness studies\xa0use the concept to analyze how\xa0racism\xa0and\xa0racialized societies\xa0affect the lives of white or white-skinned people.\nAccording to\xa0Peggy McIntosh, whites in Western societies enjoy advantages that non-whites do not experience, as "an invisible package of unearned assets".[1]\xa0White privilege denotes both obvious and less obvious passive advantages that white people may not recognize they have, which distinguishes it from overt bias or prejudice. These include cultural affirmations of one's own worth; presumed greater social status; and\xa0freedom to move, buy, work, play, and\xa0speak freely. The effects can be seen in professional, educational, and personal contexts. The concept of white privilege also implies the right to assume the universality of one's own experiences, marking others as different or exceptional while perceiving oneself as\xa0normal.[2][3]\nSome scholars say that the term uses the concept of "whiteness" as a proxy for\xa0class\xa0or other social privilege or as a distraction from deeper underlying problems of inequality.[4][5]\xa0Others state that it is not that whiteness is a proxy but that many other social privileges are interconnected with it, requiring complex and careful analysis to identify how whiteness contributes to privilege.[6]\xa0Other commentators propose alternative definitions of whiteness and exceptions to or limits of white identity, arguing that the concept of white privilege ignores important differences between white\xa0subpopulations\xa0and individuals and suggesting that the notion of whiteness cannot be inclusive of all white people.[7][8]\xa0They note the problem of acknowledging the diversity of people of color and ethnicity within these groups.[6]\nWriters have noted that the "academic-sounding concept of white privilege" sometimes elicits defensiveness and misunderstanding among white people, in part due to how the concept of white privilege was rapidly brought into the mainstream spotlight through\xa0social media\xa0campaigns such as\xa0Black Lives Matter.[9]\xa0As an academic concept that was only recently brought into the mainstream, the concept of white privilege is frequently misinterpreted by non-academics; some academics, having studied white privilege undisturbed for decades, have been surprised by the seemingly-sudden hostility from\xa0right-wing\xa0critics since approximately 2014.[10]\n\nDefinition\n\nHistory of the concept\n\nApplications in critical theory\n\nGlobal\n\nIn the United States\n\nIn South Africa\n\nIn Australia\n\nIn New Zealand\n\nSee also\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links\n\nLast edited 2 days ago\xa0by\xa0InternetArchiveBot\n\nRELATED ARTICLES\n\nColor blindness (race)\n\nsociological term for disregard of racial characteristics\n\nWhite guilt\n\nOne of the psychosocial costs of racism\n\nSocial privilege\n\nsocial theory that special rights or advantages are available only to a particular person or group of people\n\n\ufffc\n\nContent is available under\xa0CC BY-SA 3.0\xa0unless otherwise noted.\n\nTerms of Use\n\nPrivacy\n\nDesktop