Privilege

In the Privilege, Oppression and Difference reading it talks about privilege within different racial groups and how it effects peoples lives. When you are part of the white race you have a tendency to either ignore the prospect of race or use it to your advantage. Race isn't something we have control of, or for that matter we talk about unless we are put in an environment where we deal with certain races. Often we categorize people with a certain disability and that descibes the whole person. Instead that should be referred to one aspect of a persons feature because they are human beings just like you and me. The author talks about how whites do not need to get to know blacks because they are the dominant race and blacks need to get to know whites for they are the minority. The white race has a distinct advantage because of the better education, the type of surroundings they come from. This is quite evident in the case of the job market. When a person has a disability it significantly hurts them in the case of trying to compete with a white person especially a male.
Often we seem to label people by their lowest status group. For example we might say "She's part Jewish", but we hardly ever say "He's part white". When someone describes you as privileged that is how we are put into social categories. It is not done by ourselves but by the outside. When you are going for a job you don't need to change your identity. You need to out perform the other individual in order to gain acceptance. One who wants to take themselves outside the system of privileged cannot because we are always in the system. I can change the institutions around me but I cannot leave the system. We tend to compare ourselves with people from our own gender not with people from other lower classes. Both privileged and oppression are part of the social relationship, but oppression sees opportunities get slammed shut. Sometimes we have a tendency to mischaracterize oppression with males in talking about their daily hardships about providing for a family. Instead we should be talking about people who are at the bottom half of the social chain.
Is Privilege and Oppression something that we can change? Yes we can change it but not by moving outside of our general roles. We can change it incrementally but not through sweeping change. Institutionally it can be changed. In our society unfortunately people are going to still use these tactics. If we can continue to educate people then change will occur quicker.
I felt the author did a really good job of explaining Privilege and Oppression. People might like to ignore privilege and think that they are not privileged, but indeed they are without even knowing it. Male whites have a distinct advantage when it comes to privilege. While people of color, women, gays and disabled have a harder time trying to be on equal footing with white males. I wish we never had these categories for describing people, but the sooner we can correct these problems with privilege and oppression the better off we will be as a society.