What should socialists say about privilege theory?

[mojo.rhythm]

Hey comrades,

This introduction will be really, really short.

I'm pretty biased against privilege theory, as it seems to me to be inherently divisive for the working class, and not the most effective way to go about combatting racist and sexist oppression.

But I'm interested in what you guys think about privilege theory, and how it contrasts with the orthodox Marxist position on structural oppression.

Anybody well-versed on this topic? :)

[RedSonRising]

It's a common tension and there are numerous written critiques out there about it. I think privilege theory is useful for highlighting the different lived experiences among the working class. We can put massive populations into the same "proletariat" category, but that doesn't mean their subjective experiences in the face of oppression and exploitation can be immediately confronted in the same way. It doesn't inherently divide the working class but instead reveals those divisions imposed by the system.

The problem I have with privilege theory is that often seems to promote the idea that the solution for oppression (which usually focuses exclusively on discrimination, rather than economic exploitation) is allyship. Allyship puts those outside of the identity group in a position of relative silence in order for the group in question to make their own decisions and determine their own destiny. The principal of self-leadership is admirable, but it often turns struggles into isolated reform efforts that lose sight of the broader struggle against capitalism (if it even had that in sight to begin with). Articles and such online advocating privilege theory often give these tips on how to be a good ally through daily life and whatnot, never really proposing a transformative strategy that would create an alternative system, and limiting true solidarity to passive and fragmented roles of support.

So yeah, those are my thoughts. Useful for deconstructing the different ways discrimination manifests itself and layering on top of the broader framework of class struggle, but on its own a limited and short-sighted tool for combating oppression.

[CyM]

Privilege theory teaches us that instead of one enemy, the bourgeois, we have 7 billion enemies, every single worker being an oppressor in some way.

Basically, it's not a privilege to be stabbed once instead of twice. You're still a victim.

There is such a thing as double oppression, or triple oppression, where you're oppressed as an Arab or woman or whatever as well as a worker.

But that's far from white workers being privileged.

Essentially, privilege theory is white guilt and tokenism turned into politics by white academics.

[Devrim]

It's nonsense.

Devrim

[The Feral Underclass]

Hey comrades,

This introduction will be really, really short.

I'm pretty biased against privilege theory, as it seems to me to be inherently divisive for the working class, and not the most effective way to go about combatting racist and sexist oppression.

But I'm interested in what you guys think about privilege theory, and how it contrasts with the orthodox Marxist position on structural oppression.

Anybody well-versed on this topic? :)

The only reason that privilege theory could be divisive is if people apply it incorrectly or misunderstand it in the first place. The point of privilege theory is to acknowledge that within a white supremacist, hetero-patriarchal society some people experience access to the privileges and benefits of that society more positively than others. Because of the structural nature of oppression these privileges and the way they are experienced influence the way people behave, understand and interact with each other and the world. This behaviour, understanding and interaction then serves to reinforce the prevailing ideologies of society. A straight, white man is going to experience society more positively than a gay, black woman. Those experiences then create understandings of the world that influence how that person is in society. These experiences transcend class because even in working class societies the straight white man is reinforced in ways that a gay black woman is denied. Simply arguing that "we are all victims" doesn't address these prevailing ideas, it simply obscures or denies them and in turn reinforce the legitimisation of hetero-patriarchal white supremacist society.

Some people on the left will call this "oppression olympics" because they reduce the idea of privilege theory down to the constituent parts of identity as if identity was how we understand privilege. The issue is not what someone's identity is physically compared to someone else -- a trans women still experiences patriarchy; a 'camp' straight man still experiences homophobia -- but how people's experiences based on those identities affect the way they experience life in society and how those experiences influence their behaviour, understandings and interactions.

Edit: Why is this important? Well I think it's necessary to acknowledge that the defeat of capitalism is the only way to defeat a white supremacist, hetero-patriarchal oppression. But by acknowledging privilege theory, we are able to address structural oppression in people's conceptualisations within our lives, organisational efforts and interactions with people. It also paves the way to addressing the residual problems of oppression in a post capitalist society.

[#FF0000]

It's nonsense.

Devrim


There is such a thing as double oppression, or triple oppression, where you're oppressed as an Arab or woman or whatever as well as a worker.

But that's far from white workers being privileged.

How? From where I'm standing, it looks like calling the working class person who has to deal with gender/race/whatever based oppression "double oppressed" vs. calling the working class person who does not "privileged" is just a matter of how one wants to phrase the same phenomenon. What's actually the difference?

I hear a lot of people criticize "privilege theory" but I've never seen its critics on the left actually dispute anything it puts forward.

[Luís Henrique]

The name, "privilege" theory is unhappy, because it evokes ideas that White workers, or male, or straight workers, somehow benefit from class society.

But there are realities that need to be addressed, and the classic leftist response, "all those issues are going to be fixed in socialism, and we shouldn't concern with them because this would only divide our forces in our fight against the common enemy, the bourgeoisie", isn't good and isn't enough.

People face different treatment from the State - police, courts, schools, registars, administration, social services - because of their skin colour, their gender, their sexual orientation, their national origin, etc. And people who aren't on the taking end of the worse part of such treatment do often ignore the problem, and may even inadvertently contribute to it due to such ignorance.

A straight White man who wants to be a progressive person needs to understand why his Black comrade will rather not walk near a police car, or why his female comrades are reluctant to report sexual abuse to bosses or school authorities. He needs to understand that some things that are common place and natural for him are problematic to female, non-White, or gay comrades. He needs to understand that these things being common place to him is the result of systemic racism and sexism. Being oblivious to this is an actual impediment to having progressive politics - and with more reason, to having revolutionary politics.

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

The name, "privilege" theory is unhappy, because it evokes ideas that White workers, or male, or straight workers, somehow benefit from class society.

If someone does not experience the structural racism, sexism or homophobia of a society by virtue of the fact they are born into an identity that is continously positively reinforced by prevailing ideology, is that not a benefit?

[#FF0000]

If someone does not experience the structural racism, sexism or homophobia of a society by virtue of the fact they are born into an identity that is continously positively reinforced by prevailing ideology, is that not a benefit?

It is, but I understand what Luis is saying here. Everyone's got struggles, and so nobody likes being told that they have it good.

[Luís Henrique]

If someone does not experience the structural racism, sexism or homophobia of a society by virtue of the fact they are born into an identity that is continously positively reinforced by prevailing ideology, is that not a benefit?

If you and your friend are both mugged, but your friend happens to have all his money taken away, while you have had the idea of hiding a £5 bill inside your socking, can you really say that the mugging benefited you?

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

If you and your friend are both mugged, but your friend happens to have all his money taken away, while you have had the idea of hiding a £5 bill inside your socking, can you really say that the mugging benefited you?

Luís Henrique

But we're not talking about being mugged. We're talking about one persons entire identity and essence as a human constantly explained as nothing but worthless shit while their friend is constantly told their identity and essence as a human is inherently great and good.

Two siblings live in a home where they have no independence or autonomy. One sibling is told they are worthless by their parent while the other sibling is told they are priceless. That sibling is not just made to feel good about who they are, but everything that sustains them, determines their moral code, their self-worth and their development reinforces that they are good on a daily basis. Who is going to benefit in that situation? Each lives without autonomy or independence, but one experiences that without any sense of worth and is denied things that would give them worth and that the other sibling is granted freely and naturally. While they are told they are denied these things because they are worthless and deserve nothing, the sibling is told they are essential to everything, they have a high sense of self-worth, is constantly encouraged, told they deserve everything and is then given everything. Clearly someone benefits there.

[CyM]

Not only do they not like being told that they "have it good", the idea that they "have it good" is a lie. They have it "less bad".

If you're a worker, you don't have it good.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying "wait till socialism". But as an arab I'm sick of white people monopolizing our time to analyze their own whiteness. Which is exactly what the useless act of privilege checking is.

[Armchair Partisan]

I think recognizing privilege and all that is a useful thing to do, and everyone should be able to realize in what aspects they're privileged instead of going into hyper-defensive mode and complaining about the iron-fisted oppression of straight white people every time the subject comes up. In that sense privilege theory is quite sensible. Maybe a white male worker doesn't like to hear that he has it less bad than a black female comrade (or, rather, people of his social position have it better on average). That doesn't make it any less true.

On the other hand, it's not really something that should be the basis of revolutionary organization, or receive an inordinate amount of focus. By which I mean, obsessively purifying a revolutionary left space to make it perfectly equal and equally representative of everyone regardless of privilege is probably a waste of effort beyond a certain point.

[The Feral Underclass]

Turning the debate on privilege and privilege theory into who has it "more good" or "less bad," or fixating on a dictionary definition of the word "privilege", is a really crude and reductive interpretation of the issues. Entrenching yourself in a position where you are jealously guarding against the implication that your life is less terrible than someone else's is a really petty and superficial way to approach engagement with structural oppression. If you're unable to move beyond those basic positions and recognise that it has nothing to do with this false dichotomy of best vs worst then how do you intend to actually address racism, sexism, homophobia etcetera? This goes for those alleged proponents of privilege theory just as much as it goes for pseudo-critics of it.

[newdayrising]

I agree with Luis Henrique and we're both Portuguese speakers. Maybe our understanding of the word "privilege" has something to do with it. Would someone into privilege theory care to clarify exactly what the word privilege means in English?

[The Feral Underclass]

^Lol

The dictionary definition of the word privilege is: a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group.

I think it would be really useful for people not to see privilege theory as some kind of overarching theory of privileges in society, but rather as a very specific analysis of the consequences of structural oppression.

[CyM]

But we're not talking about being mugged. We're talking about one persons entire identity and essence as a human constantly explained as nothing but worthless shit while their friend is constantly told their identity and essence as a human is inherently great and good.

Two siblings live in a home where they have no independence or autonomy. One sibling is told they are worthless by their parent while the other sibling is told they are priceless. That sibling is not just made to feel good about who they are, but everything that sustains them, determines their moral code, their self-worth and their development reinforces that they are good on a daily basis. Who is going to benefit in that situation? Each lives without autonomy or independence, but one experiences that without any sense of worth and is denied things that would give them worth and that the other sibling is granted freely and naturally. While they are told they are denied these things because they are worthless and deserve nothing, the sibling is told they are essential to everything, they have a high sense of self-worth, is constantly encouraged, told they deserve everything and is then given everything. Clearly someone benefits there.
But in the end, both siblings grow up to be exploited and hate their lives because of capitalism. So... One had it twice is bad, the other didn't have to go through that second layer of oppression. But the idea that he benefited is bullshit.

[CyM]

More precisely, the idea that he benefited is counter productive.

I'm not interested in your solidarity with me out of some white charity or white saviour making up for his crimes kind of mentality. I'm interested in you realizing we are on the same side and every attack on me is an attack on you. I want you to help me out of self interest, because you benefit from our revolution together, as a united class.

It is the opposite idea, convincing workers that they do benefit from exploitation and then expecting them to reject it out of sainthood that makes this theory such a poisonous one. There is a material interest for white workers in opposing capitalism and racist capitalist divide and rule. Privilege theory implies otherwise.

Privilege theory is the white academic nemesis of "workers of the world unite" and "an injury to one is an injury to all".

[newdayrising]

^Lol

The dictionary definition of the word privilege is: a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group.

Like when you're able to laugh at people for not speaking English as well as you?

[newdayrising]

Two siblings live in a home where they have no independence or autonomy. One sibling is told they are worthless by their parent while the other sibling is told they are priceless. That sibling is not just made to feel good about who they are, but everything that sustains them, determines their moral code, their self-worth and their development reinforces that they are good on a daily basis. Who is going to benefit in that situation? Each lives without autonomy or independence, but one experiences that without any sense of worth and is denied things that would give them worth and that the other sibling is granted freely and naturally. While they are told they are denied these things because they are worthless and deserve nothing, the sibling is told they are essential to everything, they have a high sense of self-worth, is constantly encouraged, told they deserve everything and is then given everything. Clearly someone benefits there.

I still don't get it. The "priceless" one benefits from being told they're priceless, not from the other sibling being told they're worthless.

[The Feral Underclass]

Like when you're able to laugh at people for not speaking English as well as you?

That wasn't what I was laughing at.

[The Feral Underclass]

I still don't get it. The "priceless" one benefits from being told they're priceless, not from the other sibling being told they're worthless.

Yes, that's correct.

[The Feral Underclass]

But in the end, both siblings grow up to be exploited and hate their lives because of capitalism. So... One had it twice is bad, the other didn't have to go through that second layer of oppression.

Right, but like I said, it has nothing to do with who has had it more bad. That's a crude reduction of the argument.


But the idea that he benefited is bullshit.

[...]

More precisely, the idea that he benefited is counter productive.

What specifically is counter-productive about a white, straight man being aware of how society advantages them? How is it counter-productive, for example, for a white man to recognise that when they are in the streets no one thinks anything of it, but when an black man walks around, white people get nervous and that this has a negative consequence on that black man's self-worth. What is counter-productive about being aware of how society is materially organised to advantage able bodied people and that this disadvantages disabled people -- that the consequence of this negatively impacts on how disabled people see themselves. What is fundamentally counter-productive with being aware of that?


I'm not interested in your solidarity with me out of some white charity or white saviour making up for his crimes kind of mentality. I'm interested in you realizing we are on the same side and every attack on me is an attack on you. I want you to help me out of self interest, because you benefit from our revolution together, as a united class.

What you are doing here is creating a caricature of privilege theory and then attempting to assert that this caricature and your position are mutually exclusive. It's essentially a strawman argument. A white man being aware of the advantage they have in a class society is not white charity, nor does it somehow preclude them from following through with what amounts to your moral proclamation that they should "realise we are on the same side." All it is is an understanding and awareness of the consequences of structural oppression. It's an analysis, not a call to arms.

I think also anyone who proposes solidarity based on self-interest should be looked upon with suspicion.


It is the opposite idea, convincing workers that they do benefit from exploitation and then expecting them to reject it out of sainthood that makes this theory such a poisonous one. There is a material interest for white workers in opposing capitalism and racist capitalist divide and rule. Privilege theory implies otherwise.

This is a prime example of the reproduction of the social relationship that privilege theory criticises. Denying that a white, straight, man is advantaged in class society is to deny the consequences of inherent structural oppression that exists in class society.


Privilege theory is the white academic nemesis of "workers of the world unite" and "an injury to one is an injury to all".

Privilege theory was first proposed by a black man.

[Fire]

Its a good place to start but a bad place to stop.

[The Feral Underclass]

Here is a wonderful example of what privilege is and how being white privileges you in all sorts of different ways at the disadvantage of a black person. Not just in terms of how they are treated, but how they are able to respond.

GTvU7uUgjUI

[Luís Henrique]

But we're not talking about being mugged. We're talking about one persons entire identity and essence as a human constantly explained as nothing but worthless shit while their friend is constantly told their identity and essence as a human is inherently great and good.

We are talking about one person's identity being constantly treated as abnormal, and while their friend's identity is constantly treated as normative, ie, as a non-issue. So yes, straight White male are the standard producers of surplus value, not the weird variety that can be paid less for being weird.


Two siblings live in a home where they have no independence or autonomy. One sibling is told they are worthless by their parent while the other sibling is told they are priceless. That sibling is not just made to feel good about who they are, but everything that sustains them, determines their moral code, their self-worth and their development reinforces that they are good on a daily basis.

That's really not like it is. We are all told that we are incompetent and lazy idiots all the time, and our outputs at work say that even when the bosses don't make a point of telling us that personally. Capital doesn't pat us on the back when we fail to produce sellable commodities just because we happen to be White or cis or straight. We are just unlikely to be singled by the police as a usual suspect when a mugging happens, and we aren't expected to do unpaid labour ("non-labour"?) when it comes to reproduces our labour power and that of our families.


Who is going to benefit in that situation?

Probably the person that keeps both siblings in that situation, though I cannot really understand what his or her calculations are.


Each lives without autonomy or independence, but one experiences that without any sense of worth and is denied things that would give them worth and that the other sibling is granted freely and naturally. While they are told they are denied these things because they are worthless and deserve nothing, the sibling is told they are essential to everything, they have a high sense of self-worth, is constantly encouraged, told they deserve everything and is then given everything. Clearly someone benefits there.

This is a completely fictional description of the life of stereotypically normative workers in a capitalist society. We are not given anything freely and naturally, we have to work for a living. We are not told that we are essential to everything, we are told that we are disposable at any moment. We do not have a high sense of self-worth (and yes, our prejudices against gay, Black, trans or female workers are a desperate attempt to restore our sense of self-worth at the expense of our brethren in slavery). We are constantly encouraged to work more for less. We are not told that we deserve everything; we are told that we are lazy bums that do not work enough, as "proved" by the fact that we aren't rich. We aren't given anything, we sell our labour power at its value, and in exchange we produce surplus value for our masters.

Yeah, we don't have to worry about cops and unemployment as much as non-normative workers. As Marx puts it, the misery of workers is in inverse ratio to their torment in labour; normative workers get less misery and more torment in labour than non-normative workers, and non-normative workers get more misery and less torment in labour, but we are all screwed up.

And again, now not referring to hypothetical siblings, but to actual working class people,


Who is going to benefit in that situation?

That's an easy one. Capital does.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Like when you're able to laugh at people for not speaking English as well as you?

Come on, don't mess with TFU's anglo privileges, or he will get defensive about them.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

What specifically is counter-productive about a white, straight man being aware of how society advantages them?

Nothing.

But the real point is to make White, straight, cis males aware of how society disadvantages them. If we are stuck to the idea that labour is a good thing, that having a job is a privilege, obviously people will stick to whatever makes them more employable, and develop all kinds of prejudice in the hopes that this will help the burden of unemployment fall upon women, transpeople, gay people, Black people, non-English speaking people, immigrants, Roma people, Jewish people, Muslim people, disabled people, bastards, left-handed people, ugly people, young people, old people, fat people, etc, etc, etc, etc. That is the basis of prejudice; people need to understand their "privileges" as bullshit privileges that will end with them poor and unassisted at old age, not to fantasise about how wonderful it is to be exploited at a factory/farm/office because not being exploited is worse.


How is it counter-productive, for example, for a white man to recognise that when they are in the streets no one thinks anything of it, but when an black man walks around, white people get nervous and that this has a negative consequence on that black man's self-worth.

Nothing. If this is what privilege theory is about, I am all for it.


What you are doing here is creating a caricature of privilege theory and then attempting to assert that this caricature and your position are mutually exclusive.

That.

But your arguments are helping to create such caricature. You paint the life of straight White male workers as Paradise Unlost, and this cannot help in dispelling the idea that "privilege theory" is about White guilt, not about emancipation.


I think also anyone who proposes solidarity based on self-interest should be looked upon with suspicion.

Why? And what should solidarity be based on, if not (properly understood) self-interest?

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

I still don't get it. The "priceless" one benefits from being told they're priceless, not from the other sibling being told they're worthless.
Yes, that's correct.

Of that, I am not so sure.

You are a quite privileged poster here in revleft. One that can troll and re-troll, flame and re-flame, and get with it. Even when you crossed all lines, you got somehow pardoned and granted a second chance here, which I am absolutely sure the vast majority of other posters can never dream of happening if they behave like you, or at tenth of your likeyouness.

And I am pretty sure that you take a sadistic pleasure at humiliating other posters, bullying them, flaming them, making traps so that they get banned or restricted, and generally chasing them away. It is a strange kind of "benefit", this one, but I am pretty sure that you enjoy it very much. Likewise a White labourer may very well "benefit" of snitching on a Black co-worker (in that this gets the Black worker fired instead of himself), and take great (sadistic) pleasure in doing that. Maybe even laugh over it with his similarly bigoted company. So yes, there may be a psychological benefit to those who engage in bigotry.

But it is the "privilege" of flies happy because there is more shit for them at the expense of other flies.

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

We are talking about one person's identity being constantly treated as abnormal, and while their friend's identity is constantly treated as normative, ie, as a non-issue. So yes, straight White male are the standard producers of surplus value, not the weird variety that can be paid less for being weird.

Pointing out that white, straight men are working class isn't really a useful contribution to the debate, though...


That's really not like it is. We are all told that we are incompetent and lazy idiots all the time, and our outputs at work say that even when the bosses don't make a point of telling us that personally. Capital doesn't pat us on the back when we fail to produce sellable commodities just because we happen to be White or cis or straight. We are just unlikely to be singled by the police as a usual suspect when a mugging happens, and we aren't expected to do unpaid labour ("non-labour"?) when it comes to reproduces our labour power and that of our families.

The relations of production are what unite working class people, but the development of culture and ideology, while based on those relations of production, creates culture and ideology that establishes a hierarchy of identity -- not just economically, but socially, culturally, political and sexually. These divisions are reinforced constantly, often in overt ways, but also in insidious and covert ways.

You cannot reduce the totality of life as a worker down to the relations of production and ignore the entire legacy of culture and ideology and how it reproduces itself in people's daily lives.

Of course the reality is more nuanced than my crude analogy. The point is to highlight how the consequences of people's experiences affect the way those people behave and interact with society. Sure, working class people are told they are lazy and incompetent; sure capital doesn't discriminate against people based on colour, but we aren't talking about relations of production as cold, hard facts, we're talking about the subjective reality that those relations of production have created in relation to how human beings see each other.


This is a completely fictional description of the life of stereotypically normative workers in a capitalist society. We are not given anything freely and naturally, we have to work for a living. We are not told that we are essential to everything, we are told that we are disposable at any moment. We do not have a high sense of self-worth (and yes, our prejudices against gay, Black, trans or female workers are a desperate attempt to restore our sense of self-worth at the expense of our brethren in slavery). We are constantly encouraged to work more for less. We are not told that we deserve everything; we are told that we are lazy bums that do not work enough, as "proved" by the fact that we aren't rich. We aren't given anything, we sell our labour power at its value, and in exchange we produce surplus value for our masters.

You're taking my analogy a little too literally. Obviously no one is told these things. There isn't some privilege monitor that makes announcements. But the culture and ideology of society reproduces and reinforces those truths subjectively.

When the black woman in the video I linked is denied the same treatment as her white relative and then denied the voice to affect any consequence, that has a negative impact on how a person sees them self. When culture reproduces and reinforces the presupposition that a black person is a criminal and a gangster, or is less intelligent than a white person, and everything around you from the TV shows you watch, the papers you read, the music you listen to, the words politicians say, the jobs market, the check out girl in the supermarket reinforce that presupposition, you begin to subsume them as real -- a hyperreality of identity is created. You begin to accept them as true. A white person doesn't experience that. On the contrary, ideology and culture reinforces the opposite.

From a young gay teenager being denied the privilege of walking down the street without homophobic abuse and the black man denied the privilege of walking down the street and not being looked at suspiciously, to the gay couple being denied the privilege of adoption rights and the black man being denied the privilege of employment all of these experiences are not shared by someone who is white and straight. Now that's not to say they are not held in suspicion or that they don't get denied adoption rights or denied employment or are even safe from homophobic abuse -- the point is, they are not denied those things because they are white and straight.

This is all that privilege theory addresses. All it does is highlight that reality in order to inform how we behave towards one another. This is important for two reasons. Firstly, because it will inform how you organise and secondly because post-capitalism, these issues are still going to exist to some degree.


Yeah, we don't have to worry about cops and unemployment as much as non-normative workers. As Marx puts it, the misery of workers is in inverse ratio to their torment in labour; normative workers get less misery and more torment in labour than non-normative workers, and non-normative workers get more misery and less torment in labour, but we are all screwed up.

This is just a better articulated version of CyM's crude reductive argument that the issue is about who has it less bad. Of course we are all screwed up, but a white man isn't screwed up because he's white. A straight man isn't screwed up because he's straight.


But the real point is to make White, straight, cis males aware of how society disadvantages them. If we are stuck to the idea that labour is a good thing, that having a job is a privilege, obviously people will stick to whatever makes them more employable, and develop all kinds of prejudice in the hopes that this will help the burden of unemployment fall upon women, transpeople, gay people, Black people, non-English speaking people, immigrants, Roma people, Jewish people, Muslim people, disabled people, bastards, left-handed people, ugly people, young people, old people, fat people, etc, etc, etc, etc. That is the basis of prejudice; people need to understand their "privileges" as bullshit privileges that will end with them poor and unassisted at old age, not to fantasise about how wonderful it is to be exploited at a factory/farm/office because not being exploited is worse.

Forgive me if I've misunderstood you, but I don't understand how you have made the logical step from acknowledging black people are disadvantaged in the employment market in a way white people are not to fetishising work...


But your arguments are helping to create such caricature. You paint the life of straight White male workers as Paradise Unlost, and this cannot help in dispelling the idea that "privilege theory" is about White guilt, not about emancipation.

Where have I painted this life? This is just a strawman construction from which you can make your argument. Like CyM you are turning this discussion into some game of oppression olympics. No one is saying that being a straight, white man is a paradise...


You are a quite privileged poster here in revleft. One that can troll and re-troll, flame and re-flame, and get with it. Even when you crossed all lines, you got somehow pardoned and granted a second chance here, which I am absolutely sure the vast majority of other posters can never dream of happening if they behave like you, or at tenth of your likeyouness.

I currently have two infractions for flaming and was banned from the board for two years. What more, specifically, do you think should happen? Are you saying that I should have remained banned forever and that I should be banned now?


And I am pretty sure that you take a sadistic pleasure at humiliating other posters, bullying them, flaming them, making traps so that they get banned or restricted, and generally chasing them away. It is a strange kind of "benefit", this one, but I am pretty sure that you enjoy it very much.

I work as a support worker as well as training to be a nurse. My working days are dedicated to taking care of people with multiple sclerosis, motor neurone disease, Huntington's disease, cerebral palsy, various brain injuries and so on. I clean their shit and piss, assist them with their personal care, their meals, getting them up out of bed so they can try and enjoy their life, as well as try and accommodate their mental and emotional frailties and fears. I deal with grieving family members and sit with people as they literally draw their last breath. In the last two weeks two of my residents died and one is now in hospital battling for his life. That's just a very basic, normal snippet of my working life..So if you really think that I care about strangers on the internet enough to invest energy in taking pleasure from petty forum drama and making them feel a bit shitty, then you are desperately, desperately mistaken. Get a grip, Luis.

[The Feral Underclass]

Come on, don't mess with TFU's anglo privileges, or he will get defensive about them.

Luís Henrique

Like I said, that wasn't what I found funny.

I found it funny that someone posted asking for a dictionary definition of the word 'privilege' directly after I had made the argument that we shouldn't get bogged down in dictionary definitions.

[Devrim]

I think also anyone who proposes solidarity based on self-interest should be looked upon with suspicion.


This would include generations of socialists then from Marx onwards. The whole Marxist idea of class struggle is based upon workers asserting their self interests. It also recognises that that self interest is collective, not individual, but the motor of class struggle and class antagonism is self interest not altruism.

Devrim

[CyM]

I'm not caricaturing privilege theory. You're discussing it without taking into account its real world degeneration and counterrevolutionary role.

In the real world, privilege theory does nothing to help doubly oppressed workers like me. In the real world, privilege theory is a bunch of white people attacking each other for not checking themselves enough while the rest of us patiently wait to talk about the important things. In the real world, privilege theory is the expectation that white workers should share the blame with their capitalists.

I'm not interested in filling the heads of the white working class with guilt. I want them free of guilt so they can focus on anger against our common enemy, and they can help me because of their self-interest and need to win the fight with unity.

[The Feral Underclass]

I'm not caricaturing privilege theory. You're discussing it without taking into account its real world degeneration and counterrevolutionary role.

But why should I need to take this into account? I am defending privilege theory, not apologising for the way stupid people are stupid. Privilege theory is a necessary analysis for critiquing and fighting structural oppression. It's "real world degeneration" isn't a comment on that analysis, but on the way people abuse the analysis.


In the real world, privilege theory does nothing to help doubly oppressed workers like me. In the real world, privilege theory is a bunch of white people attacking each other for not checking themselves enough while the rest of us patiently wait to talk about the important things. In the real world, privilege theory is the expectation that white workers should share the blame with their capitalists.

You appear to be conflating privilege theory as an analysis with its real world application by some 'activists' that you have encountered -- this is where your caricature is coming from. They are not the same thing. I accept the analysis as correct, but I reject many privilege activists who apply it in the real world. Why can't you?


I'm not interested in filling the heads of the white working class with guilt. I want them free of guilt so they can focus on anger against our common enemy, and they can help me because of their self-interest and need to win the fight with unity.

But privilege theory isn't about assigning guilt. If people are using privilege theory as a way to assign guilt then you need to explain to them that they don't understand privilege theory. You can use the critique you are applying here to them specifically, not to privilege theory as an analysis.

Privilege theory isn't a cover for activists to make white people feel bad and if that is happening then they are wrong. But equally privilege theory is not just something you can dismiss because you've had some bad experiences. In any case, privilege exists whether you want to believe it does or not.

[Rafiq]

One thing I have noticed, is that your archetypal (that of privilege theory), "straight cis white male", with his hands in his pockets, who arrogantly reinforces this identity as a means of exerting power, I have noticed that almost all of these tend to be rich kids. Now do not get me wrong. I know that the poor white working class are more openly racist, etc. - but hear me:

In my experience with working class white kids, things really aren't so simple. Surely they are racists, deeply reactionary, but the dimension of this racism and these views is entirely different. It is born of ignorance, and more importantly, it is born of trying to fulfill a sense of self-worth and dignity where it is ripped away by their relationship to life. But the ultimate difference, no matter what, is that with working class whites I can have a conversation toe to toe, as an equal, I can talk to them, and they can be real with me. You can talk to them about why they have the views they do about gays, blacks, and they are totally backwards, but the difference is that to a certain level these views are reinforced consciously, meaning they do not have to exist. These are views which form at the top layer of their social condition.

For the children of the bloodsuckers, and exploiters, the salaried bourgeoisie, things are quite different. It is simply not the same - they are passive aggressive with their views, and there is a dimension of SEEMINGLY 'irrational' attachment to such views. Implicit in the very being of rich white kids IS all the dimensions of sexual, and racial oppression coming together. So this is the archetype of the guy with his hands in his pockets, sociopathic personality, in all his smug passive aggressiveness. I mean this isn't just about how much of a piece of shit they are - the smiling, PASSIVE aggressiveness signifies the very implicit nature of the reinforcing of such oppressions.

From my limited experience, the conclusion I have come to is that the white working classes have the necessary humility (i.e. they are degraded enough) to shed away their 'whiteness'. So this is the dimension that privilege theorists do not even address. The benefits derived by white working classes (Who happen to be straight and not transgendered) ARE real benefits, but it is not they who perpetuate them at the last instance, it is the peripheral bourgeoisie, who are white, and who reinforce bourgeois sexual relations by merit of their social being. The dominance of the white exploiters reinforces the totality of racism, the conditions of the ghettos, and so on. One thing being overlooked in this conversation is that blacks in ghettos are not the same as white working class kids. The conditions of life are different, even at a social level. This separation must be overcome, somehow, politically, that's our task.

Some white kids in universities may be content and find with such ingenuine masochism. Because it is a kind of culture of 'enlightened' white kids who know better than everyone else. This won't fly for the white working classes, who need a sense of identity and dignity to compensate for how the system humiliates them regularly, who do not understand the dimensions of racism. To this end, the destruction of their 'whiteness' (as an identity) and its replacement with something more over-encompassing, perhaps even a rejuvenated American identity built off of the past labor struggles, the John Browns, and so on. Whiteness is reactionary. But the white working classes do not have to be white (I.e. White is not just having white skin).

The problem for some privilege theorists is that they are too scared of truly becoming equals to non-whites. They are. Their stupid masochism is kind of an emergency reinforcement of their 'privilege' as whites, to separate themselves as already above the rest. What is truly horrifying for them is for their white skin to not mean anything at all. As for "cis, straight" privilege, this is not even worth talking about it, it is pure stupidity. Such 'political correctness' makes all of us privileged (even the blacks, who are straight, and cis), and tells us all that we should, through political correctness, 'check our privileges'. This is thoroughly a bourgeois perversion, it has nothing to do with the fighting spirit of the class struggle. It is weakness and it encourages passive aggressiveness.

It is high time we abandon all privilege theory. Racial oppression and sexual oppression exist, of course, but they do not concern passive notions of 'privilege'. Privilege theory is a postmodern one, thoroughly anti-Marxist, and the idea is simple: THE ROOT BASIS of oppressions is destroyed, oppresssion is no longer actively reproduced by our social conditions of life. So the task is now to deal with the ossified remnants of previous injustices by recognizing what is now 'privilege' held from such a legacy. Well fuck that! That's all there is to it. Fuck it! We are Marxists, not the therapeutic advisers of the neoliberal bourgeoisie. I mean what is next? Non-Native privilege? I can literally see it. That SHIT has nothing to with the class struggle, or the supersession of present society, but the presupposition that we are living in the end of history and that the task is now just to, with our behavior alone, solve past injustices.


This would include generations of socialists then from Marx onwards. The whole Marxist idea of class struggle is based upon workers asserting their self interests. It also recognizes that that self interest is collective, not individual, but the motor of class struggle and class antagonism is self interest not altruism.

Devrim

But self interest is quite a muddied word, and it is associated with the neoliberal, cynical notion of self interest. It is neither egoist self interest nor altruism that forms the basis of the (worker) class struggle, but identification with it.

What should interest us to this end is how exactly "self-interest" becomes the interests of the whole class as a collective. But the notion is ridiculous to begin with, because workers already do have a sense of external collective identification. With their country, with their ethnicity, their religion, and so on.

The neoliberal notion of self-interest not only does not apply to workers, it does not apply to anyone. "Rational self-interest" attempts to ossify the fulfillment of one's life within the framework of our social order.

[#FF0000]

I'm not caricaturing privilege theory. You're discussing it without taking into account its real world degeneration and counterrevolutionary role.

I think one can be critical of the white liberal flagellants you're talking about here without rejecting privilege theory though. And even so, it still doesn't seem like there's any actual disagreement here except on how to talk about the same thing -- whether to call one group "privileged" or the other "double-oppressed".

[newdayrising]

Like I said, that wasn't what I found funny.

I found it funny that someone posted asking for a dictionary definition of the word 'privilege' directly after I had made the argument that we shouldn't get bogged down in dictionary definitions.

Actually I was just playing with you there. But it turned out I was accidentally right in a weird way. It's one thing to not be bogged down in dictionary definitions, it's a different thing to try and understand subtleties of different languages that might undermine ones understanding of a theory that comes from the US and seems to make much more sense there than in other parts of the world, as American leftists seem to take it as the holy scriptures nowadays while people from other regions of the world don't even get it sometimes.

And this is not the first time I see English speaking proponents of such ideas seeming oblivious to this issue, talking about it as if it was all so obvious ( the dictionary definition of the word "privlilege" is apparently a problem though) when it's actually a relatively recent, mostly Academic and North American trend. If it doesn't make much sense to others it's their problem I guess.

[Sewer Socialist]

Well - this is tricky to discuss. Many usages of the theory are usages people here describe as not the point of the theory, which is likely true of the intents of its more sophisticated theorists. It's not supposed to be an oppression Olympics, it's not supposed to be an argument against solidarity, it's not supposed to be something to create divisions amongst the left, etc. I am not particularly familiar with privilege theory, but this seems to be true of most of the range of that which falls into this category.

And, yet, the criticisms of the theory are accurately describing real phenomena I have observed. In offering to help organize demonstrations for reproductive freedom, I was told I needed to check my privilege. To me, acting in solidarity should be exemplary of privilege checking, but apparently not. Usage by whites of the slogan, "I can't breathe" was similarly criticized, even its usage by those who experience the same poverty of the victim, Eric Garner. Surely race and poverty both played a role in his death? Shouldn't recognition of this be part of intersectional analysis? This widespread example of popular usage of privilege theory is surely an example of it being used to dissuade solidarity, as a force of division.

And so, while I think people can correctly say that this is an improper usage, just like we might say Marxism-Leninism is a distortion of Marxism, these usages must be acknowledged and criticized.

[Sentinel]

Offtopic diversion split, a general verbal warning to everyone in this thread to keep calm and stay on topic. If users have old grievances with each other I suggest such be discussed via PM, or reported to the BA - basically dealt with by any other venue except derailing interesting threads such as this one.

I can't believe even She who isn't to be named was brought up.

Anyhow the discussion has otherwise been quite constructive and interesting so far with elaborate arguments from both sides on the actual topic, let us see that continue :)

[blake 3:17]

Perhaps to have a better discussion a particular essay or theorist could be put forward?


The name, "privilege" theory is unhappy, because it evokes ideas that White workers, or male, or straight workers, somehow benefit from class society.

But there are realities that need to be addressed, and the classic leftist response, "all those issues are going to be fixed in socialism, and we shouldn't concern with them because this would only divide our forces in our fight against the common enemy, the bourgeoisie", isn't good and isn't enough.

People face different treatment from the State - police, courts, schools, registars, administration, social services - because of their skin colour, their gender, their sexual orientation, their national origin, etc. And people who aren't on the taking end of the worse part of such treatment do often ignore the problem, and may even inadvertently contribute to it due to such ignorance.

A straight White man who wants to be a progressive person needs to understand why his Black comrade will rather not walk near a police car, or why his female comrades are reluctant to report sexual abuse to bosses or school authorities. He needs to understand that some things that are common place and natural for him are problematic to female, non-White, or gay comrades. He needs to understand that these things being common place to him is the result of systemic racism and sexism. Being oblivious to this is an actual impediment to having progressive politics - and with more reason, to having revolutionary politics.

Luís Henrique

While in basic agreement, I just wish to point out that even Straight White Men may often fear the police and may have serious issues with reporting issues related to sexual harrassment.

I was part of a conversation not long a go where a friend opened up about being hit on at work and trying to problem solve on how to deal with it, and irritatingly was told "It's worse for women." Which was basically STFU.

[CyM]

I think one can be critical of the white liberal flagellants you're talking about here without rejecting privilege theory though. And even so, it still doesn't seem like there's any actual disagreement here except on how to talk about the same thing -- whether to call one group "privileged" or the other "double-oppressed".
The difference is that one is a clear-cut rejection of that white liberal guilt doctrine. The other one leaves a loophole big enough to drive a truck through, encouraging its adherents to treat it as the white guilt theory and to compete with each other over who can be most in touch with his inner white guilt (checking privilege).

Seriously, privilege theory is not "accidentally" this way in real life most of the time. It comes from the fact that it really is what the word "privilege" implies. You have to get people to drop the most natural meaning of the word and add all sorts of "that's not what I meant" before you get to a "privilege theory" that doesn't imply that white workers gain from racist capitalism.

The position of the white working class is not in the positives, meaning a gain, they're in the red like the rest of us. Below zero, just not as much. This is not privilege, this is being singly oppressed instead of doubly so.

Privilege theory focuses on the differences between us. "Double oppression" bases itself on our common cause, our unity. It bases itself on "an injury to one is an injury to all". It bases itself on convincing white workers that they are oppressed, and then it convinces them that their oppression is worsened by the double oppression their brothers and sisters are subject to. Shows them how division makes us weaker. How lower wages for one are used to drive down wages for the others. How police violence is perfected on minorities and then turned on the white workers when they begin to move. How it is in their self interest to unite and fight together, our only hope to rid ourselves of this system is "workers of the world unite".

Privilege theory teaches white workers that they're lucky. Marxism teaches them that they are screwed, then shows them how others are doubly so, then demands that they work to fight for their more vulnerable brothers and sisters in order to save their own allies in the same fight.

[The Feral Underclass]

CyM's position is very muddled and relies on definitions of terms and words that aren't actually meaningful. For example, he has attempted to stretch the word 'positive' to mean something that is 'gainful.' I think that is clearly an attempt to fit a circle in a square hole. Another example is the way he refers to privilege theory as "white liberal guilt doctrine." Privilege theory was first proposed by a black man and most of the theorists of privilege theory regarding race are black. Also, privilege theory isn't specific to race but also includes gender, sexuality, ability and so on. Referring to it as "white liberal guilt doctrine" misunderstands the comprehensive nature of privilege theory.

It is also necessary to clarify the "natural meaning" of the word privilege, since CyM seems to think privilege theory is distorting the word. Privilege literally means a, "special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group." In the video that I linked, the black woman talks about how she was treated differently at the check out in the supermarket and made to show identification during a process her white relative had just completed without having to show identity. The black woman was then denied the right to affect any consequence and in the end the white woman is the person that people listen and respond to. This means that the white woman not only gets treated more positively, her voice is also listened and responded to. What this highlights is a very real situation in which a woman is free from harassment and has a voice to affect change because she is white, compared to a woman who is not free from harassment and has no voice to affect change because she is black. Now in that situation, the white woman is clearly advantaged over the black woman. And by advantaged, I don't mean she is "lucky" or that she lives in a "paradise" or has "gained" something, but that in this specific situation under the same conditions, the white woman has a comparatively favourable outcome to the black woman.

That is privilege theory in a nutshell.

The problem with CyM's position (and there are many) is that he is viewing privilege theory as some kind of macro-social analysis in which the white working class are pitted against the black working class with the white working class being held up as a group of people who have better lives than everyone else. That's not the case. Privilege theory analyses micro-social phenomenon and explains the nuances of those interactions, and the consequences of them. Going back to the black woman in the supermarket, privilege theory doesn't argue that the white woman in that situation has an overall better life and should feel guilty about her overall better life, but that in these specific social situations a favourable thing happens to the white woman because she is white and unfavourable thing happens to the black women because she is black. It then further discusses the social, cultural, political and economic consequences of that for those groups of people. In other words, how does the black woman reproduce her life under conditions where unfavourable things happen to her when compared to the favourable things that happen to white people in the same situations. That's it.

The issue with this "double oppression" concept is that it doesn't address the material disadvantages that people of colour, queer people or disabled people encounter in their daily lives. Simply acknowledging that some working class people are oppressed more doesn't actually address the extensive objective problems that people face as a result of their identity. Yes, people are "doubly oppressed" (what a cumbersome term), but how does that manifest itself in reality? What consequences does that have? These questions are what privilege theory attempts to address. The "double oppression" concept does not deal with the nuances of sexism, homophobia and racism. For example, you cannot build solidarity against racism if in discussions about how to do that, the black man constantly gets talked over by the white man. You can't build against sexism if women involved in that are always left to fulfil domestic roles. You cannot build solidarity against homophobia if people casually use the word 'gay' as a pejorative. Equally, you cannot fight capitalism in a united way if all these things are reproduced, because all you are doing is reproducing the very structural oppression you claim to be against.

This is an interesting and relevant video.

HnSXqkpG9l8

On a practical level, it is illogical to create a privilege theory Vs Marxism dichotomy. Privilege theory makes no attempts to compete on the terrains of Marxism. Privilege theory isn't about "organising" workers, it's about explaining social phenomenon that occurs in relation to identity so that people can address this in their daily lives. It can help build the unity and solidarity that is apparently so important in a genuine and honest way

I also think CyM's position is inherently paternalistic towards the working class in the sense that he sees privilege theory as an attempt to muscle in on his organisational objectives. Limiting the working classes access to analyses of society by dismissing anything that does not directly conform to your organisational objective is not something that is beneficial or empowering to the working class. On the contrary, it is an incredibly restrictive way to approach your political organising.

[Luís Henrique]

I agree with Luis Henrique and we're both Portuguese speakers. Maybe our understanding of the word "privilege" has something to do with it. Would someone into privilege theory care to clarify exactly what the word privilege means in English?

Mk. I was so furious yesterday at TFU dismissive response to you that I didn't really thought this out through. Now I will try to address it, and I think you are up to something. There is a problem of what privilege means in English. But I do not think the problem is the English language. As far as I understand, "privilege", as a word, means pretty much the same in English as in Portuguese. CyM post above seems to show it:


It comes from the fact that it really is what the word "privilege" implies.

But there is a cultural difference between the Anglosphere and the rest of the world. The Anglosphere, or at least its core, is an important part of the imperialist centre, perhaps the "centre of the centre". And it is a place in which the working class has been thoroughly liquified. The American working class has long ceased to exist as an autonomous political entity; the British working class less so, but seems to be moving in that direction.

This, combined with the brute fact that the working masses in the central countries have gone into a kind of "reproductive strike" that puts at stake the existence of the surplus population that is so essential to the reproduction of capital (which in turn prompted massive populational migration from the periphery to the centre), has created a situation in which the workers are deeply divided in a horizontal divide between the autochthonous White working mass, and the immigrant, mostly non-White, immigrant mass of workers.

Which means in the Anglosphere the main resistance to capitalist hegemony is no longer a working class resistance. It is a resistance hegemonised by tiny layers of people who dwell in the border between the working class and the middle class: white collar workers, students, teachers, civil servants. These layers are not at all convinced of the deep unity between themselves and both the (“ignorant, bigoted”) masses of White autochthonous workers and the (“victimised, voiceless”) masses of non-White immigrant workers. But they do try to build such unity, in their own petty-bourgeois terms, which requires a patronising attitude towards the immigrants, and a dismissive attitude towards the autochthonous blue collar working mass. Women and gay people (as well as, to a lesser extent, disabled people) play a key role in this because they are “doubly oppressed”, like immigrants, though they are on the other hand “privileged” as members of the middle class or of the upper layer of the working class. They therefore represent a kind of both theorethical and practical bridge by which the petty-bourgeois left can try and build its hegemony over the immigrant working mass.

Since “the left” is the political expression of the resistance against capitalism, the left in the Anglosphere is hegemonised by these expressions of petty bourgeois anti-capitalism. This is what it makes the “privilege” in “privilege theory” different there as compared to here. While we do have the problem of a nasty divide between the upper and the lower layers of our working class, the political polarity is inverted here: it is the white collar workers, the students, the physicians, the civil servants, who have drifted to the right, to bigotry, to racism, xenophobia, sexism, punitivism. The working class, as in “blue collar” working class, remains the core of the resistance against capitalism, remains the core of a still functioning working class, remains the core of the organised left, and is overwhelmingly autochthonous and racially mixed; if it has drifted right, it was in the direction of reformism, not of full-blown racist xenophobic bigotry.

So there is a difference in meaning, and it is somehow related to language, English as opposed to non-English, but it is a difference that cannot be captured by dictionaries. It is a social or political difference. While "privilege" and "privilégio" are basically the same word, privilege as a social construct is different from privilégio as a social construct. That's why Anglo people will tend to understand "privilege theory" as an all-encompassing theory of how society is structured, while non-Anglo people will tend to either dismiss it or see it as a much more modest guide to personal pre-political behaviour.

Luís Henrique

[Rafiq]

It is also necessary to clarify the "natural meaning" of the word privilege, since CyM seems to think privilege theory is distorting the word. Privilege literally means a, "special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group."

Feral what you fail to understand is that CYM attacks privilege-mongering for precisely this reason. According to him, privilege theory implies that (if we abstract the condition of being a worker) the basic sense of dignity, and civic, formal rights before the law, and so on that working class whites enjoy is not a positive, it is - so to speak - a zero.

What does it mean? It means that blacks are not simply without privileges. It means that they are deprived of what it, in a formal sense, means to be a citizen in bourgeois democracy. This is not a matter of whites having privileges. It is a matter of blacks being oppressed.

And finally, why is this distinction important? Because in speaking of "privileges", you are effectively telling white workers to be grateful for what SHOULD BE and MUST BE a given. The white working class is not privileged. The black working class is deprived. This is CYM's contention.

But both of these are effectively not enough - not to say they are equal, CYM's is far ahead of yours. The reality is that racism is not a matter of privilege - or 'double oppression'. What is lacking in such notions is an understanding of the totality of racism, that is to say, a dialectical understanding of how both the black and white identity are contingent upon each other's existence. IT IS TRUE that as a pre-requisite for black liberation, the white identity must die. The white identity is contingent upon its juxtaposition to other peoples, without this juxtaposition, whites would be composed of a wide assortment of nationalities, etc. Black anti-racism, with a new identity built on universality for whites, will fulfill each other's aims.

We should all remember that the conditions of life are socially different. The white working class is more likely to be closer to the 'middle class', while the black working class are confined to ghettos, permanently unemployed, engaging in more precarious work, and so on. This explains much of the disparity between the two groups.

[Rudolf]

Because in speaking of "privileges", you are effectively telling white workers to be grateful for what SHOULD BE and MUST BE a given.


I fail to see how that follows from what TFU's been saying.





Anyway, i don't really have much to add other than pointing out that the number 1 "criticism" of privilege theory ive come across has literally been "but what about white men?"

Think of it, if i were talking about sexual harassment in the street and someone took exception to this by saying "well men get harassed in the streets too"... how would you look at this someone? Im pretty sure at the very least you'd roll your eyes. That's what this thread looks like btw. It looks like a collective "but what about white guys? We've got it bad too" Either that or just plain boring pedantry.

[Sewer Socialist]

I fail to see how that follows from what TFU's been saying.





Anyway, i don't really have much to add other than pointing out that the number 1 "criticism" of privilege theory ive come across has literally been "but what about white men?"

Think of it, if i were talking about sexual harassment in the street and someone took exception to this by saying "well men get harassed in the streets too"... how would you look at this someone? Im pretty sure at the very least you'd roll your eyes. That's what this thread looks like btw. It looks like a collective "but what about white guys? We've got it bad too" Either that or just plain boring pedantry.

I think it's more accurate to say the question is how this talk of privilege relates to class struggle - not what about white men, but what about the proletariat, including the white, male, etc. proletariat?

Anyway, to expand on what I was describing earlier, both in this topic and in the "Lack of Solidarity Between Workers?" topic, why is it that this theory seems to be so frequently improperly applied, and frequently misunderstood - something acknowledged by even the most enthusiastic defenders of privilege theory?

I think it is precisely because of what CyM is describing - speaking of privilege rather than privation, even if we could accurately describe the situation with either term. The focus on privilege fails to identify what we have in common, emphasizing difference.

To focus on privation identifies common ground, an obvious way forward - a unity in our struggle.

But why do those who disagree with this stance think that privilege theory is so frequently misapplied and misunderstood?

[Luís Henrique]

Anyway, i don't really have much to add other than pointing out that the number 1 "criticism" of privilege theory ive come across has literally been "but what about white men?"

Yup... and the number one criticism of the Obama presidency I have come across is that he is a far-left radical who is turning America into a socialist State. And so is the number one criticism of Lula and Dilma I have come across. Them main criticism of the welfare State I have come across is a criticism of the nanny State and is premised on the idea that the poor should be left to die. The main criticism of social-democracy and American-style "liberalism" I have come across is a neo-liberal criticism. I have seen workers echoing the idea that the Brazilian government is a bad one because it has prompted a "scarcity of manpower".

I guess however this doesn't mean that we should stop criticising those things from an alternative standpoint. Similarly, yes, the main criticism of privilege theory that I have heard is "but what about us Whites (us men, us Christians, us straight people). So? The point is not to agree with this far-right criticism (which is anyway not the mainstream bourgeois view); the point is to discuss, if possibly in a rational way, whether a given theory - "privilege theory" - benefits us, and how.

TFU says that


Privilege theory makes no attempts to compete on the terrains of Marxism. Privilege theory isn't about "organising" workers, it's about explaining social phenomenon that occurs in relation to identity so that people can address this in their daily lives. It can help build the unity and solidarity that is apparently so important in a genuine and honest way

And to that extent I can certainly agree with him and believe it is a valuable tool for us, as long as we rely on other theories and practices that actually are about organising ourselves. What is contested by other posters here, however, is that "privilege theory" is often, or even more often than not, used to hinder organisation because it makes people to focus on their special interests, and to actually cover such interests as the opposite of what they really are (White people stealing protagonism from non-Whites in a patronising way in order to fancy themselves as ueber-revolutionary guys, a fantasy that requires them to act as selfless, stainless knights in armour for the oppressed, and consequently to decry each others for not fulfilling the fantasy, in a most divisive way).


That's what this thread looks like btw. It looks like a collective "but what about white guys? We've got it bad too" Either that or just plain boring pedantry.

I am sorry that you think like that. But let's take the hint: what about White guys? Why do they have to constantly beat their own chests in demonstrations of non-racism, in order to compete against each others for leadership in social movements? What about straight cis men? Why do they have to do exactly that concerning sexism, and in the process reinforce sexism and male competitiveness?

What about White guys? That is precisely not the point. It is not about them. It is about oppression, and White men are only oppressed as not-White non-men: as workers, as have-nots, as foreigners, as denizens of the Global South, but never as White men. And what White guilt competition does is exactly to steal back protagonism, so that suddenly the bombing of an Iraqi town full of "non-Whites" is not about the concrete people who died or got mangled there, but about the amount of tears that non-Iraqis can shed about those otherised Great Victims. That may very well not be a necessary consequence of "privilege theory", but it is certainly a possible one. We should deal with that, in discussing "What should socialists say about privilege theory". Not because we should try and hide racism and sexism under the carpet, as the traditional or Stalinist left used to propose, but exactly because we cannot afford to allow otherisation and orientalism dictate the relations between workers of different origins and genders.

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

Feral what you fail to understand is that CYM attacks privilege-mongering for precisely this reason. According to him, privilege theory implies that (if we abstract the condition of being a worker) the basic sense of dignity, and civic, formal rights before the law, and so on that working class whites enjoy is not a positive, it is - so to speak - a zero.

Okay, but privilege theory isn't arguing that it's positive, simply that it's a fact. The argument here isn't that white people enjoy a better standard of life or have a more positive experience of life overall, but that they experience specific social situations at an advantage to black people on the basis that they are white. Not because it is positive, but because that is the nature of a white supremacist society.


What does it mean? It means that blacks are not simply without privileges. It means that they are deprived of what it, in a formal sense, means to be a citizen in bourgeois democracy. This is not a matter of whites having privileges. It is a matter of blacks being oppressed.

Then how do you explain the social phenomenon whereby in a given situation a white person or a straight person is at an advantage to a black person or a gay person specifically on account of them being white and straight?


And finally, why is this distinction important? Because in speaking of "privileges", you are effectively telling white workers to be grateful for what SHOULD BE and MUST BE a given. The white working class is not privileged. The black working class is deprived. This is CYM's contention.

But this contention is fictitious.

From the example that Joy De Gruy gave of her experience in the supermarket, how is it that identifying and acknowledging the advantage the white woman had in that specific situation "telling white workers to be grateful for what SHOULD BE and MUST BE given"?

[The Feral Underclass]

I think it's more accurate to say the question is how this talk of privilege relates to class struggle - not what about white men, but what about the proletariat, including the white, male, etc. proletariat?

Anyway, to expand on what I was describing earlier, both in this topic and in the "Lack of Solidarity Between Workers?" topic, why is it that this theory seems to be so frequently improperly applied, and frequently misunderstood - something acknowledged by even the most enthusiastic defenders of privilege theory?

I think it is precisely because of what CyM is describing - speaking of privilege rather than privation, even if we could accurately describe the situation with either term. The focus on privilege fails to identify what we have in common, emphasizing difference.

To focus on privation identifies common ground, an obvious way forward - a unity in our struggle.

But why do those who disagree with this stance think that privilege theory is so frequently misapplied and misunderstood?

To me, this view simply translates into a paternalistic attitude towards the working class in which they are too stupid to understand the complexities of ideas.

To reduce your political organising down to micro-managing specific words identifies deeper problems with your political organising. The word privilege does not preclude the working class from being united, to claim otherwise is petty and patronising.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Privilege theory is quite simple to understand - as workers we are all exploited for our labour power, which we have to sell in order to earn a wage that allows us to achieve a basic standard of living (housing, food, clothes, some leisure etc.). In addition, some workers are also oppressed because of other characteristics they have - oppressed because of gender, sexuality, religion, race, nationality and so on. For example, as a straight, white working class male, i'm privileged in relative terms in that whilst like every other worker i'm exploited for my labour power, I don't have to worry about being stigmatised for being gay, nor being sexually abused simply because i'm a woman, nor being shot by the police simply because i'm black. My privilege is not absolute - i'm not 'privileged' per se - but my privilege is relative to those who face different oppressions that I don't have to in my daily life.

I agree that 'privilege' is perhaps not the best word for this theory as its actual, context-specific meaning is very different to the colloquial meaning where privilege is a 'positive' thing. However, as people who are aware enough to know what privilege theory actually entails, we should be able to rise above hiding behind mis-interpretations of the word 'privilege' itself as a legitimate criticism of privilege theory.

[CyM]

If you're not interested in finding out "what about white men", what precisely is the point of your revolution?

Are we going to just Pol Pot the whole lot of them?

I know that you're attempting to mock the arguments of the far right, but this is the straw man you chose to attack a revolutionary criticism of privilege theory. Based on unity of the working class, on the path to the overthrow of capitalism and its divide and rule regime.

Since this is the argument you chose, you have to admit, you could not have chosen a better way of showing that privilege theory jumps the shark by focusing your hatred on the white working class as opposed to the bourgeoisie.

It is a dead end.

I'm not interested in self-hating white academics full of white guilt swooping down like Lawrence of Arabia to save the Arab masses. I can tell you flat out, I consider tokenism to be racist.

I, as an Arab worker who gets held up whenever he travels, am concerned first and foremost with how imperialism can be overthrown.

That means that I have to care about how to get the white working class to understand its oppression, win them over, and organize them.

The microagressions you commit while rolling your eyes about how spoiled the white workers are (another word for privileged), aren't going to get you anywhere. If you're not interested in winning them over, what exactly is the point?

Again, are we just going to pol pot them? Because you certainly aren't starting a monastery of hundreds of millions of white guilt monks.

[The Feral Underclass]

If you're not interested in finding out "what about white men", what precisely is the point of your revolution?

Are we going to just Pol Pot the whole lot of them?

I know that you're attempting to mock the arguments of the far right, but this is the straw man you chose to attack a revolutionary criticism of privilege theory. Based on unity of the working class, on the path to the overthrow of capitalism and its divide and rule regime.

Since this is the argument you chose, you have to admit, you could not have chosen a better way of showing that privilege theory jumps the shark by focusing your hatred on the white working class as opposed to the bourgeoisie.

It is a dead end.

I'm not interested in self-hating white academics full of white guilt swooping down like Lawrence of Arabia to save the Arab masses. I can tell you flat out, I consider tokenism to be racist.

I, as an Arab worker who gets held up whenever he travels, am concerned first and foremost with how imperialism can be overthrown.

That means that I have to care about how to get the white working class to understand its oppression, win them over, and organize them.

The microagressions you commit while rolling your eyes about how spoiled the white workers are (another word for privileged), aren't going to get you anywhere. If you're not interested in winning them over, what exactly is the point?

Again, are we just going to pol pot them? Because you certainly aren't starting a monastery of hundreds of millions of white guilt monks.

How does any of this in any way relate to anything anyone has said in this thread?

Just repeating yourself with a slightly increased urgency isn't an argument.

[CyM]

I fail to see how that follows from what TFU's been saying.





Anyway, i don't really have much to add other than pointing out that the number 1 "criticism" of privilege theory ive come across has literally been "but what about white men?"

Think of it, if i were talking about sexual harassment in the street and someone took exception to this by saying "well men get harassed in the streets too"... how would you look at this someone? Im pretty sure at the very least you'd roll your eyes. That's what this thread looks like btw. It looks like a collective "but what about white guys? We've got it bad too" Either that or just plain boring pedantry.
Apologies TAT, I didn't realize you needed a citation and copy paste doesn't work at all on this site on mobile.

[The Feral Underclass]

Well, I think most people would require a citation when the conclusions you draw is that someone in the thread wants to force all white men into collective farms and starve them to death.

[CyM]

Well, I think most people would require a citation when the conclusions you draw is that someone in the thread wants to force all white men into collective farms and starve them to death.
I'd have hoped that if you were going to make such a criticism, you'd also take to task anyone who has the audacity to compare a revolutionary to an MRA shit who steps in to talk about men when a woman is raped.

Which is precisely the straw man that was made.

My point was, if you're going to be attacking someone for thinking of how to win over the white working class, and rolling your eyes about it, you've got to tell me what your end game is.

Because as far as I see it, at least the third worldists know that the white workers would have to be destroyed if you don't care about how they fit into your revolution ;)

[Thirsty Crow]

The impression I got from this debate is that one of the underlying assumptions doesn't make much sense. There's probably no unified privilege theory. Maybe most people who'd advocate PT would agree on some very basic points.

Such as sexism. Fact. Racism? Fact. Other forms of diffuse, non-legal discrimination? Fact. Honestly it seems a bit silly to slap a "theory" label to something so basic, or am I missing some other fundamental points?

Now, obviously there's a kind of a problem with words used here:


The point of privilege theory is to acknowledge that within a white supremacist, hetero-patriarchal society some people experience access to the privileges and benefits of that society more positively than others.

One problem here is that benefits are thought of as not being discriminated against, but the basic point that the lived experience influences the way people think about the world and how they behave is not controversial at all. Which brings me back to the fact list above. I don't see why this basic recognition of specific factors of division within the class would necessarily translate to oppression Olympics or the notion that there are billions of oppressors.

Of course, in matters of organizational activities this indeed can take a very, very wrong turn. But these activities are such that there's almost an iron certainty that even a very strong conceptual framework will be turned upside down so I don't think the solution is to run around in circles and do this conceptual denunciation thing.

[Luís Henrique]

Privilege theory is quite simple to understand - as workers we are all exploited for our labour power

Of course. As long as people do agree that we are exploited for our labour power, there is no problem.

But I do get responses like this:


Next what? are you going to tell us that "all labour is exploitatioin"?

So it seems it is far from a pacified question, even in "progressist" or "leftist" environments.

People are still proud of their labour, and are going to great extents to present it, to others and to themselves, as a dignified/dignifying thing. It is probably what keeps them going on; if the reality of exploitation was immediate to them, they would explode, and that they don't want to do.

Luís Henrique

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

The impression I got from this debate is that one of the underlying assumptions doesn't make much sense. There's probably no unified privilege theory. Maybe most people who'd advocate PT would agree on some very basic points.

Such as sexism. Fact. Racism? Fact. Other forms of diffuse, non-legal discrimination? Fact. Honestly it seems a bit silly to slap a "theory" label to something so basic, or am I missing some other fundamental points?

Well, if this were the case we could criticise privilege theory for one thing at least: that it doesn't actually mean anything.

It seems, however, that it does mean something, and that "something" is not the existence of phenomena such as racism, whose existence almost everyone admits. Hell, you could probably get a fascist to admit the existence of racism (which to them would still be insufficient racism).

The point of privilege theory (going back to the Maoist theory of "white skin privilege", another aspect of the attack of academic Maoists in the seventies on the workers) is that the absence of multiple oppression is seen as a benefit enjoyed by workers of the "wrong" group, and that this "privilege" makes their contribution to political debate inherently suspect ("privilege checking" etc.). Attempts to deny this and to portray "privilege theory" as simply the recognition that racism etc. exist run into the slight problem that people talked about racism before academic Maoists started writing articles about how horribly privileged workers are.

This, in turn is part of an entire ideological complex that (1) bases itself on students and academia, often with open hostility toward workers; (2) proceeds from an essentially idealist position that oppression is the result of "oppressive" ideology; (3) politicises the personal and vice versa; and (4) stands against the unity of workers in the struggle against capitalism and oppression.

And this is a complex we have to cut ourselves off from if we're to amount to anything.

[Thirsty Crow]

The point of privilege theory (going back to the Maoist theory of "white skin privilege", another aspect of the attack of academic Maoists in the seventies on the workers) is that the absence of multiple oppression is seen as a benefit enjoyed by workers of the "wrong" group, and that this "privilege" makes their contribution to political debate inherently suspect ("privilege checking" etc.). Attempts to deny this and to portray "privilege theory" as simply the recognition that racism etc. exist run into the slight problem that people talked about racism before academic Maoists started writing articles about how horribly privileged workers are.

This, in turn is part of an entire ideological complex that (1) bases itself on students and academia, often with open hostility toward workers; (2) proceeds from an essentially idealist position that oppression is the result of "oppressive" ideology; (3) politicises the personal and vice versa; and (4) stands against the unity of workers in the struggle against capitalism and oppression.

Okay. I don't know much about the academic, Maoist influenced criticism you're talking about, but I think this confirms what I said about the dependence of the exact kind of PT on who is writing/saying exactly what. For instance, TFU who's been the most vocal advocate in this thread didn't go anywhere near the faulty notions you're describing here, at least if my memory serves me right. Now either they don't fully understand PT or selectively appripropriate some aspects of it. Maybe they're mistaken in their use of the label? I don't know.

[newdayrising]

Exactly. I'm not an expert on it but so correct me if I'm wrong, but frequently when PT is discussed there are people coming from one end where basically all it means is that racism, sexism and other forms of oppression must be taken in consideration - which I don't think anyone would be able to disagree with - to the other extreme where it's a specific politics that claims working class solidarity or a real class politics is not possible or maybe not desirable, at least for the time being, because part of the working class has the privilege of not being as oppressed as other parts and therefore, is the enemy or at leas an impossible obstacle to bypass.
The former seems healthy if it's goal is to destroy prejudices and backwards behavior that hinder working class unity. The latter is a reactionary ideology that seems to imply that it's somewhat undeserved to not be multiply oppressed, while it's actually oppression that's undeserved.
Also, it's difficult for it to fit into communist Politics because it's not about a class that's materially able to liberate itself, but about Oppressed identities who should and hopefully will liberate themselves, but don't have, by themselves, the material means to do it if their struggles aren't part of class "movement to abolish the present state of things".

[The Feral Underclass]

I'd have hoped that if you were going to make such a criticism, you'd also take to task anyone who has the audacity to compare a revolutionary to an MRA shit who steps in to talk about men when a woman is raped.

Which is precisely the straw man that was made.

My point was, if you're going to be attacking someone for thinking of how to win over the white working class, and rolling your eyes about it, you've got to tell me what your end game is.

Because as far as I see it, at least the third worldists know that the white workers would have to be destroyed if you don't care about how they fit into your revolution ;)

Well to be honest, I can't say that I fully disagree with Rudolf's assessment of this thread.

Your outlook is premised on the fallacious assumption that 'revolutionaries' have to "win over" working class people. Win them over to what, exactly? I think you have a paternalistic conceptualisation of political organising, which I think should be rejected. I call it paternalistic because it seems what you are advocating is a process in which these so-called 'revolutionaries' enter the class in order to tell the 'workers' that they would be better off if only they listened to what you had to say, while at the same time anointing yourself as arbiter of what the working class should or should not be exposed to.

Even if we are to accept your premise that we need to "think of ways" to "win over" white working class people, why is shielding them from the realities of white supremacist, class society a productive way to achieve this? Implicit in your opinion is the notion that if a white working class person was aware that they were at an advantage when in a supermarket á la Joy De Gruy's anecdote, they would somehow be consumed by guilt and incapable of uniting with a black working class person. I am a white working class man and I have no problem understanding that I am at an advantage in specific social situations because I am white and a man. I don't feel guilty about that, I just recognise that it's a fact and I make myself conscious of it in those social situations...

[The Feral Underclass]

Exactly. I'm not an expert on it but so correct me if I'm wrong, but frequently when PT is discussed there are people coming from one end where basically all it means is that racism, sexism and other forms of oppression must be taken in consideration

I think privilege theory goes further in explaining what that oppression is, how it manifests itself, what the consequences of it are and why it is necessary to be aware of it.

Fundamentally, we have to be aware that racism and sexism, for example, aren't just an overt hatred or contempt for black people or women, nor are they simply economic exclusions or judicial bias. These things are woven into the very fabric of our society, our attitudes, our language and our behaviours. Even the most revolutionary of revolutionaries can still reinforce oppression without even realising they are doing it. This is the insidious nature of oppression.

Privilege theory is useful not simply to say that racism and sexism etcetera have to be taken into consideration, but in explaining how racism and sexism reproduce themselves as a social phenomenon in specific social interactions within our daily lives, as well as the consequences of that phenomenon. I refer everyone back to the anecdote that Joy De Gruy gave in the first video I posted.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Fundamentally, we have to be aware that racism and sexism, for example, aren't just an overt hatred or contempt for black people or women, nor are they simply economic exclusions or judicial bias. These things are woven into the very fabric of our society, our attitudes, our language and our behaviours. Even the most revolutionary of revolutionaries can still reinforce oppression without even realising they are doing it. This is the insidious nature of oppression.


I have a story to elaborate on this. I will keep the details general.

I was doing an activity with a class in school, that involved the students splitting into 4 groups and each group picking a leader. When we re-convened as a group, the 4 leaders chosen were all male, so I decided to re-allocate two of the groups' leaders to female students to re-balance the power dynamic within the class. Job done, I thought.

About 5 minutes later, as the students were working in groups, a black, female student came up to me and pointed out that despite the gender re-balancing, all four chosen group leaders were white, and isn't this unfair? I acknowledged her point and we agreed that the next time we do a similar activity we would make sure to recognise the racial paradigm, as well as gender.

The story shows a few things:

1) Understanding notions of privilege meant that as a person (man) in a position of authority I was aware enough to take actions that re-balanced the gender dynamic in the class;

2) As a person who, aside from being a worker, suffers no other oppression (I am a straight, white, able bodied, male), I am also prone as TFU says above to a lack of consideration; reflecting later on, it became clear that the black female student in the class was probably alienated somewhat from the activity (something I can anecdotally confirm) because of my lack of consideration of the interplay of power and race within the classroom;

3) At not point did the activity nor my reflections become about my own 'white guilt'. I didn't and don't feel guilty about not picking a person of colour as a group leader. Rather, the interaction served as a way of remembering my own privilege - that, as somebody who is both white and in a position of authority, I am still prone to take actions that reiinforce white supremacy.

A better understanding of our own positions of privilege (or lack of) could be one way to ensure that solidarity is created between those who do and do not suffer different oppressions; by understanding our own privileges and lack of privilege we can empathise with the position of those around us.

[blake 3:17]

I think that first video you posted TFU was excellent. I think part of the problem we're having here is that the discussion overly abstract. What was described was an ad hoc coalition against racist discriminatory behavior and was absolutely correct.

We need our coalitions. They don't always work perfect. A few personal examples...

A few years back a group of workers who were in homes for the developmentally disabled were on strike. They started picketing the homes that these folks lived in and these very disabled people were frightened out of their minds. An injunction was sought, and some from the union reached out to those of us on the Left to fight it. A bunch of us refused, but expressed solidarity to the workers and offered to work with them on other militant actions, but ones that didn't endanger their clients. Do flying squad actions at managers houses or local politicians. Take up collections for the strikers. We asked them to voluntarily stop that particular picket and hopefully not get that injunction. I can't even remember how it worked out, but I mostly remember how the Left bureaucrats were shocked by our refusal to be simple trade unionists.

Down in NYC in 95 at the Stock Exchange shutting it down on behalf of Brother Mumia. There's like 60 Black nationalists, 60 anarchists, and whole lot of Bruderhfof, a huge number of little girls in blue dresses. We'd shut the Stock Exchange down, but I'm counting 800-1000 cops that are visible which means there 2000 not. Anyways, we got out fine because of those little girls in blue dresses.

There's been a huge problem in Toronto and other cities in Ontario called 'carding'. Police stop people at random and take down their information. It's a violation of civil liberties. There's been a big stink about it being a racist practice. Young Black males are way over represented. Was just having a discussion about it yesterday and found a black comrade had been writing about how the vast majority of people carded were working class white people. Having been arbitrarily stopped by cops half a dozen in the past few years for the crime of walking it was such a relief to hear a brother say that it wasn't just a black thing, it was both a race and class thing.

[CyM]

Well to be honest, I can't say that I fully disagree with Rudolf's assessment of this thread.

Your outlook is premised on the fallacious assumption that 'revolutionaries' have to "win over" working class people. Win them over to what, exactly? I think you have a paternalistic conceptualisation of political organising, which I think should be rejected. I call it paternalistic because it seems what you are advocating is a process in which these so-called 'revolutionaries' enter the class in order to tell the 'workers' that they would be better off if only they listened to what you had to say, while at the same time anointing yourself as arbiter of what the working class should or should not be exposed to.

Even if we are to accept your premise that we need to "think of ways" to "win over" white working class people, why is shielding them from the realities of white supremacist, class society a productive way to achieve this? Implicit in your opinion is the notion that if a white working class person was aware that they were at an advantage when in a supermarket á la Joy De Gruy's anecdote, they would somehow be consumed by guilt and incapable of uniting with a black working class person. I am a white working class man and I have no problem understanding that I am at an advantage in specific social situations because I am white and a man. I don't feel guilty about that, I just recognise that it's a fact and I make myself conscious of it in those social situations...
This is not the place to rehash anarchism vs. Leninism, it's completely off topic. Even if you do not have the concept of a political party, revolutionary workers have to reach out to other workers of all races to "win them over". Based on their common interests and not on white guilt. And any ideology that says otherwise is a direct barrier to revolutionary unity.

The problem is, if they really are privileged, there is no possibility of revolution. If they are, materially, interested in the maintenance of this system, no amount of convincing will be enough. The bourgeois would always have the edge of actually having what privilege theory says is the truth: racism is better for white workers.

This theory puts us at an insurmountable disadvantage as it supports the claim of people like Donald Trump that white workers would be served by intensified racism.

It is a lie. A bourgeois lie. White workers have no interest in the maintenance of this system. They lose, they do not gain, from capitalism and its racist and sexist divide and rule.


A few years back a group of workers who were in homes for the developmentally disabled were on strike. They started picketing the homes that these folks lived in and these very disabled people were frightened out of their minds. An injunction was sought, and some from the union reached out to those of us on the Left to fight it. A bunch of us refused, but expressed solidarity to the workers and offered to work with them on other militant actions, but ones that didn't endanger their clients. Do flying squad actions at managers houses or local politicians. Take up collections for the strikers. We asked them to voluntarily stop that particular picket and hopefully not get that injunction. I can't even remember how it worked out, but I mostly remember how the Left bureaucrats were shocked by our refusal to be simple trade unionists.

You stood against picket lines because it would scare the developmentally disabled?

Did you not think to ask them to participate in the picket lines and explaining why their carers need their help?

Another concrete opportunity for unity wasted by far too much focus on how normative workers are oppressive instead of focusing on how to unite against the real oppressors.

[The Feral Underclass]

This is not the place to rehash anarchism vs. Leninism, it's completely off topic. Even if you do not have the concept of a political party, revolutionary workers have to reach out to other workers of all races to "win them over". Based on their common interests and not on white guilt. And any ideology that says otherwise is a direct barrier to revolutionary unity.

This isn't an anarchist Vs Leninism rehash. For a start I'm not an anarchist. The issue here is that you are proposing a paternalistic model of organising that seeks to limit the political consciousness of the working class and make statements like "win them over," assuming that I know what that means. I don't. I'll ask you again: win them over to what?

Also, privilege theory isn't an ideology and white guilt has nothing to do with privilege theory, as I've demonstrated. Guilt is just something you seem to keep repeating as if doing so will make it true. What is it that white people should be feeling guilty about?


The problem is, if they really are privileged, there is no possibility of revolution. If they are, materially, interested in the maintenance of this system, no amount of convincing will be enough. The bourgeois would always have the edge of actually having what privilege theory says is the truth: racism is better for white workers.

None of this relates to anything I've said. You are just repeating your strawman caricature and not actually addressing my argument.


This theory puts us at an insurmountable disadvantage as it supports the claim of people like Donald Trump that white workers would be served by intensified racism.

It is a lie. A bourgeois lie. White workers have no interest in the maintenance of this system. They lose, they do not gain, from capitalism and its racist and sexist divide and rule.

CyM, no one has made the argument that white workers have an interest in maintaining "this system"...

[CyM]

This isn't an anarchist Vs Leninism rehash. For a start I'm not an anarchist. The issue here is that you are proposing a paternalistic model of organising that seeks to limit the political consciousness of the working class and make statements like "win them over," assuming that I know what that means. I don't. I'll ask you again: win them over to what?

Also, privilege theory isn't an ideology and white guilt has nothing to do with privilege theory, as I've demonstrated. Guilt is just something you seem to keep repeating as if doing so will make it true. What is it that white people should be feeling guilty about?



None of this relates to anything I've said. You are just repeating your strawman caricature and not actually addressing my argument.



CyM, no one has made the argument that white workers have an interest in maintaining "this system"...
This is all patently untrue of course, and yet you say it with a straight face ;)

Privilege theory, in the real world, is precisely all of those things.

And of course, "winning people over" is the basic definition of politics, but don't pretend not to know what it means.

[The Feral Underclass]

This is all patently untrue of course, and yet you say it with a straight face ;)

It is only untrue insofar as you understand privilege theory as a caricature and not as an actual analysis based on the ideas positioned by privilege theorists. Now either this is because you haven't really encountered privilege theory, you have just heard some scene kids talk about privilege and come to some crude understanding, or it is because this caricature serves some kind of political expedience. Either way you are wrong and I am happy to continue explaining why that is the case if you wish to continue maintaining this ridiculous parody.


Privilege theory, in the real world, is precisely all of those things.

No it isn't. This would be like if I said to you that Soviet Russia is Marxism "in the real world." I've explained what it is "in the real world" to you several times -- I've even provided videos that explain it. Whatever it is you are talking about is not privilege theory.


And of course, "winning people over" is the basic definition of politics, but don't pretend not to know what it means.

Winning them over to what?

[CyM]

I'm afraid we've come to a dead end here.

I already explained what people need to be won over to. You then took offense to the act of winning people over and made an anarchist critique of leninist revolutionary organizing. You then denied being an anarchist (news to me), and asked me what "winning people over" means. And then now you claim all you've wanted to know all along is "what are you winning them over to".

You're being intentionally obtuse as a political tactic. I don't play that game.

As for white guilt theory, I've only ever encountered the kind that is widely prevalent and dominant on campuses across north america. If it is not so tokenist and liberal a theory across the water, that's a geographical issue. But I somehow doubt that.

I suspect that you yourself are pretending not to have ever encountered this dominant aspect of the privilege theory crowd because it is politically inconvenient.

Either way, it seems no one else is really following anymore, so we'll get into this again next time a thread like this comes up, I'm sure.

[The Feral Underclass]

I already explained what people need to be won over to.

You have talked a lot about uniting workers, winning workers over and organising workers, but you haven't actually specifically stated what you want to win them over to or organise them for/towards.


You then took offense to the act of winning people over and made an anarchist critique of leninist revolutionary organizing. You then denied being an anarchist (news to me), and asked me what "winning people over" means. And then now you claim all you've wanted to know all along is "what are you winning them over to".

Well, It's been on the record here for well over a year now, so I'm not sure how you've missed that.

But I haven't made an anarchist critique of Leninist revolutionary organising, I have simply rejected your model of political organising as paternalistic. I asked you to tell me what you were winning people over to in this (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2863244&postcount=61) post. Assuming you had read that post, I then repeated my confusion.

I'm not offended by anything you've said. I am simply refuting your caricature of privilege theory and rejecting your model of organising based on the paternalistic framework of it.


As for white guilt theory, I've only ever encountered the kind that is widely prevalent and dominant on campuses across north america. If it is not so tokenist and liberal a theory across the water, that's a geographical issue. But I somehow doubt that.

So your experience of privilege theory has been in universities with university students?...Those well known hubs of revolutionary activity. It may very well be the case that in universities privilege theory is used by students to validate their nascent activism, but in the world of adults, it is used to understand the social phenomenon as outlined by Joy De Gruy (the black woman in the videos I posted).


I suspect that you yourself are pretending not to have ever encountered this dominant aspect of the privilege theory crowd because it is politically inconvenient.

Yes, I have encountered people trying to apply an incorrect understanding of privilege theory. This has mostly been in anarchist activist scenes, none of which were fit for purpose.


Either way, it seems no one else is really following anymore, so we'll get into this again next time a thread like this comes up, I'm sure.

So your participation in this thread is not for your own edification, it's to allow people to see you make arguments?...

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

On one hand, I think CyM is pointing to a very real phenomenon. White liberal academics/students - at least in North America - have totally misappropriated much of the language of privilege/intersectionality/etc. from Women of Colour feminists, and used it to justify a lot of self-pitying nonsense.

I think this is a clear case, however, where a discourse doesn't necessarily imply a strategy or project, but, rather, can be deployed to different ends. A look at, for example, the politics of INCITE! (http://www.incite-national.org/)reveal a fundamentally different set of priorities from what's being described.

[Sewer Socialist]

To me, this view simply translates into a paternalistic attitude towards the working class in which they are too stupid to understand the complexities of ideas.

To reduce your political organising down to micro-managing specific words identifies deeper problems with your political organising. The word privilege does not preclude the working class from being united, to claim otherwise is petty and patronising.

Sure, it is not impossible to understand, not by a long shot. I can understand quite well what people mean when they speak of privilege, I can generally have a productive conversation on it, etc.

However, I hoped to do more with that post I made than rehash what CyM said. There was a specific question I was hoping you'd answer, since we seem to have quite a bit of common ground here. There is a large amount of misapplication of this talk of "privilege"; this seems to be something acknowledged by all participants in this topic. TFU, you do so, when you say:


Turning the debate on privilege and privilege theory into who has it "more good" or "less bad," or fixating on a dictionary definition of the word "privilege", is a really crude and reductive interpretation of the issues.

And, since we both acknowledge this, what do you attribute the numerous examples of erroneous application to? How do you think we can improve upon this, and avoid these unfortunate misapplications, if not to emphasize different language, as CyM suggests?

[ComradeAllende]

For the record, I'm not well-versed in "privilege theory" or the associated literature, with most of my time focusing on Marxist and Marxist-influenced tracts on economics and history.
But from what I understand, privilege theory is very limited in its practicality regarding the rectification of social ills (racial or otherwise) and the revolutionary cause of the proletariat. It does shed light on the intersectionality of race, gender, and class (among other things) on politics and social attitudes within modern capitalist societies, but it doesn't seem offer a way forward on overcoming the barriers, at least for a mass-movement. You can protest against racism, homophobia, misogyny, etc., but too much is focused on the individual's recognition of his/her "privileges".

I also don't like the concept of "allies" and the relationship between the varying "intersections" of social dimensions like race and class. Privilege theory seems to limit the ability of, say, white women to agitate for the interests of all women. Not that white women are necessarily in the position to do so, nor that they necessarily have the interests of all women in mind. But it limits their ability to interact with nonwhite women effectively, and thus brings the practicality of "privilege theory" in question.

This whole paradigm kinda reminds me of when Malcolm X met an enthusiastic white girl after one of his speeches. The girl was obviously swayed by his rhetoric and asked if she could do anything to further the liberation of black Americans, only to be crushed by Malcolm X's dismissal of her ability to do so. While its important to stress that oppressed peoples need to rely on their own actions to achieve change, it's not contradictory to believe in this and accept the help of others. That is, after all, how some socialists thought during the late 19th and early 20th centuries; the white working class was indispensable for the cause of civil rights, yet they were not to "seize control" but to provide active assistance in the effort.

[The Feral Underclass]

Sure, it is not impossible to understand, not by a long shot. I can understand quite well what people mean when they speak of privilege, I can generally have a productive conversation on it, etc.

However, I hoped to do more with that post I made than rehash what CyM said. There was a specific question I was hoping you'd answer, since we seem to have quite a bit of common ground here. There is a large amount of misapplication of this talk of "privilege"; this seems to be something acknowledged by all participants in this topic. TFU, you do so, when you say:

And, since we both acknowledge this, what do you attribute the numerous examples of erroneous application to? How do you think we can improve upon this, and avoid these unfortunate misapplications, if not to emphasize different language, as CyM suggests?

You're asking me why do people not understand certain ideas and analyses correctly. I have no idea why. Why do people normally misunderstand these things? There are likely numerous answers to that question. I don't think I should be expected to have an opinion on that to be honest. I am not responsible for everyone who incorrectly speaks on behalf of privilege theory. It would be good to understand who those misapplying the theory are and why they are relevant?

Improving these misapplications would probably require those who are misapplying it to retreat from their stubborn position of conceitedness and appreciate that they are wrong.

[John Nada]

It seems the discussion assumes that white male workers are the proletariat, or implicitly that white people are the majority of the proletariat, so calling any section of the proletariat "privileged" is a contradiction that "divides the working class". White men are not the majority of the proletariat, even in the US. Statistically the proletariat's more likely to be a woman from India or China. GSRM might even be a larger share of the global proletariat than white men. The identity of the proletariat shouldn't be a stereotypical white manly-man, but a women of color. Oppressed peoples are the proletariat.

In the US(other nations might be different, but many similar in some aspects), it's proven white people get paid more than POC, have more wealth, less risk of arrest and lower rates of poverty. Men get paid a third more then women on average, even in the same field. Heterosexual people and cis-gender people get paid more than GSRM. US workers generally get paid more and have overall better conditions than workers in the third-world. There clearly is some material privilege and super-exploitation besides some mass hypnosis to trick the white proletariat.

Rather, the superstructure that leads to the bigoted ideas of society at large must have a material base. Capitalism itself was built upon colonialism and imperialism. The race divide in the US was one and the same with class, with the black slave class, lumpenized Indigenous Americans, white planters and white yeoman farmers. Even the white indentured servants were freed to be yeoman farmers and craftsmen, possibly one day planters or merchants themselves. Latin America and other colonies also had caste systems. All codified by law.

The wealth extracted from the colonies was a driving force behind the development of capitalism. Capitalism's continued existence today depends on imperialism, the super-exploitation of oppressed nations by a few oppressor nations, so said that liberal, Maoist, white guilt privilege theorist Lenin.

How can nobody but a small sliver of the bourgeoisie benefit from bigotry, yet maintain a superstructure that perpetuates hate that even workers upheld for centuries? And if racism, patriarchy and heteronormativity supposedly don't benefit an individual proletarian who more closely matches the bourgeois ideal, what about other classes? Do the petit-bourgeoisie, labor aristocracy or lumpenproletariat get privileges denied to others? Might a white-American lumpenproletarian have some privileges that a black petit-bourgeoisie does not?

And the classes are not static. Sure, we know meritocracy is a bullshit myth and effectively you stay in one class and are more likely to fall lower. But it's not usually a caste under capitalism, and this illusion of striking it rich creates many class traitors. There's proletarians that become haute-bougeoisie, and vis versa. There's peasant that become semi-proletarians, then later proletarians. Proletarians who joins the labor aristocracy, and labor aristocrats who become proletarian. Landlords turned lumpen warlords. National bourgeoisie and nobility who go bankrupt or become a comprador-bourgeoisie. Petit-bougeoisie might have once been proletarians. A reserve army of labor soldier that joins a lumpen gang, be it the mafia, police or military, maybe later becomes a worker, or even accumulates enough loot to become bourgeois.You might have this change all in one family or even one person over their lifetime.

That the thing. A lot of the white, heterosexual, abled, cis-males in the imperialist centers are not proletarian. I'm not a third-worldist, it's likely the majority of them are proletarian, or at least close to a majority. But those other classes are not "betraying their class" if their class interest is bourgeois. The managers, military officers, cops, bureaucrats, technical workers, forepersons, politicians, farmers, small businesspeople, ect. are not the proletariat, and in the US disproportionately white men.

So the dominate group has more bourgeois-democratic rights, materially more stable and maybe even improve, while oppressed peoples' situation is more precarious. The ruling class, originating from a racist system, propagates a bigoted ideology. A culture emerges, along with laws, that normalizes these forms of oppression. Then the white proletariat identifies with the oppressor they know, and not their class globally.
You're asking me why do people not understand certain ideas and analyses correctly. I have no idea why. Why do people normally misunderstand these things? There are likely numerous answers to that question. I don't think I should be expected to have an opinion on that to be honest. I am not responsible for everyone who incorrectly speaks on behalf of privilege theory. It would be good to understand who those misapplying the theory are and why they are relevant?

Improving these misapplications would probably require those who are misapplying it to retreat from their stubborn position of conceitedness and appreciate that they are wrong.I don't think it's that outrageous to say even some of the proletariat's more privileged than many people in some regards. None of the supposedly sensitive white, heterosexual, abled and/or cis-males I've spoken with(and presumably are friends/family/co-workers/students with) thought it was either shaming or that means bigotry is good. I usually explain it's part of the capitalist superstructure and not just individuals. That it's not right, doesn't have to be so and in all our best interests to fight. And if someone points out I unconsciously picked up some bigoted shit from society at large, I just apologize, recognize it and change my behavior so as not to perpetuate it.

Just my theory, I think the wildly differing opinions on privilege theory is because much of it is based on postmodernism(which denies anything but subjective and is just as faux-radical as harmlessly possible) and itself isn't a unified theory.Part of it makes sense from a left-wing perspective because it's borrowed from some Marxist and anarchist theorists, the other part bourgeois liberalism. Penance for class reductionist, economist and workerist sins of the left.

Also lot of people's contact with it is likely in college. Nowadays everything taught must have practical applications otherwise it gets cut. It's useful for service sector employees, management, law, medicine, academics, non-profits, ect. These depend on not being complete racist assholes and at least be condescending and hold it in. You can't piss off customers who's color is green, and can't let prejudice cloud one's judgement on managing variable capital.

And rather than constructive criticism-self-criticism to build solidarity, you have the so-called "oppressed Olympics" and "call out" brinkpersonship to get that Christian bourgeoisie pity money for a dead-end reformist NGO. There's big money in just about every reformist cause except a workers' movement not led by the labor bureaucracy. IMO these NGOs are a problem if the people want to move towards revolution and not just have nice thoughts and wait for the Democrats to do nothing.

[Rafiq]

Then how do you explain the social phenomenon whereby in a given situation a white person or a straight person is at an advantage to a black person or a gay person specifically on account of them being white and straight?

[According to CyM's argument, but he can defend himself, as we know]

Because a white person, or a straight person, is treated - 'normally'. Blacks and gays are treated unjustly. White people are treated like ordinary citizens. Black people are not. Their blackness makes them extra-ordinary, even as workers.

The reason this must be emphasized is that according to CyM's argument, white workers should have no reason to be grateful for being treated normally. That is the logical conclusion of privilege theory in our society, "checking your privilege" is no different to how we're constantly told how much we should be grateful for living in the US, UK or Canada compared to some despotic third world country.

Of course, this needs further elaboration - the white identity is not simply passively outside of relations of oppression, the white identity is an oppressor identity. Only the 'white' proletariat (compared to the propertied whites) are capable of shedding away their 'whiteness' as such and substituting it for an identity built from universality. The white and black identity exist in totality. But their relationship is not one of privilege, for privilege is passive.

The white identity does not passively hold privileges over the black identity. The white identity is sustained by the active oppression of blacks, not simply their lack of 'privileges'. Take away this oppression and the white identity no longer exists. As I stated, the word privilege insinuates, ideologically, ossified relationships of power that one must keep in check now that we as a society have socially moved past old demons. We Marxists say no - racism is actively perpetuated and is not a matter of privilege, but oppression and relations of power.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

I think theories of privilege have one particular utility, which is in emphasizing how certain voices within a radical discourse itself can dominate over others. I find the complaint of activists who are non-white, women or lgbt are often that their particular issues get glossed over by activists of the hegemonic community. Black women, for instance, made that critique of the BPP (which, incidentally, it also made of white activists). It's not that these institutions can't be important for defending the interests of the working class, it's that as our society privileges certain perspectives over others, we must actively struggle to make sure that our movements are inclusive. Otherwise they will unintentionally reflect the biases of our society, not only theoretically but practically.

When it is being used to "shame" white workers with a kind of white guilt, or an implication that they too are passive oppressors simply by the color of their skin, then we're in different territory. We're neither guilty for our ancestors' crimes, nor are we to blame for their benefits landing in our lap.

[blake 3:17]

You stood against picket lines because it would scare the developmentally disabled?

Did you not think to ask them to participate in the picket lines and explaining why their carers need their help?

Another concrete opportunity for unity wasted by far too much focus on how normative workers are oppressive instead of focusing on how to unite against the real oppressors.

The picket was at the home of the people with developmental disabilities. They were hearing shouts and screams outside their windows. They were terrified. Many of the people living in the home were non-verbal and physically disabled.

I have worked with people with physical and developmental disabilities and gone on strike or nearly gone strike. In the lead up, I have spent time explaining that we were not striking against them, but striking for them, to defend our rights, public services, and my ability to give decent care. I apologized in advance for interruptions in services and asked them to contact management and the appropriate level of government to bargain fairly and to provide increased funding for services and proper pay and benefits for care givers.

[Luís Henrique]

The picket was at the home of the people with developmental disabilities. They were hearing shouts and screams outside their windows. They were terrified. Many of the people living in the home were non-verbal and physically disabled.

In which case, the people in the pickets are outright arseholes. This is inadmissible, reactionary, bigoted behaviour. Next what, teachers on strike terrorising children?

Privilege or not privilege, double oppresion or not double oppression, these tactics are repulsive and counterproductive; they cannot fail to isolate the strickers, and directly lead to defeat.


I have worked with people with physical and developmental disabilities and gone on strike or nearly gone strike. In the lead up, I have spent time explaining that we were not striking against them, but striking for them, to defend our rights, public services, and my ability to give decent care.

And that is how it has to be. It is Strike-o-logy 101, indeed: you have to build a net of sympathy for your cause, and try your best to isolate and politically defeat your employers. Without that, what is the saying? Oh yes, united we stand, divided we fall.


I apologized in advance for interruptions in services and asked them to contact management and the appropriate level of government to bargain fairly and to provide increased funding for services and proper pay and benefits for care givers.

Again it seems obvious. I am frankly surprised with the amateurish nature of the strickers' actions, as much if no more than with the sheer lack of sensibility and solidarity towards their customers. Gee, those people are caretakers, how can you be a caretaker if you so obviously don't care?

Luís Henrique

[blake 3:17]

In which case, the people in the pickets are outright arseholes. This is inadmissible, reactionary, bigoted behaviour. Next what, teachers on strike terrorising children?

Privilege or not privilege, double oppresion or not double oppression, these tactics are repulsive and counterproductive; they cannot fail to isolate the strickers, and directly lead to defeat.

And that is how it has to be. It is Strike-o-logy 101, indeed: you have to build a net of sympathy for your cause, and try your best to isolate and politically defeat your employers. Without that, what is the saying? Oh yes, united we stand, divided we fall.

Again it seems obvious. I am frankly surprised with the amateurish nature of the strickers' actions, as much if no more than with the sheer lack of sensibility and solidarity towards their customers. Gee, those people are caretakers, how can you be a caretaker if you so obviously don't care?

Luís Henrique

I can't speak to the personal character of these strikers, but being familar with the sector, I think amateurish is a good way to put it. There were other more effective places to either picket or to other kinds of civil disobedience.

Regarding the teachers, a couple of years back, a few in a Left bloc asked for one exemption during a work to rule campaign. There was a young man who needed to be enrolled in after school activities in order not to go back to jail. The teachers union had suspended after school activities. These friends had asked at a union meeting that an exception be made for that student. And the stupid bureaucrats started calling them a bunch of scabs and sell outs that were trying to destroy the union. All they were thinking about were their pensions and their members pensions, not the class struggle.

[Luís Henrique]

And the stupid bureaucrats started calling them a bunch of scabs and sell outs that were trying to destroy the union. All they were thinking about were their pensions and their members pensions, not the class struggle.

I would say even stupid bureaucrats who only think about pensions and wages would protect wages and pensions more effectively if they took heed of the obvious negative PR of these moves, and of how easily they could be used by employers as a pretext to stall negotiations.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

And, since we both acknowledge this, what do you attribute the numerous examples of erroneous application to?

But are those "erroneus applications", or the theory is actually open to several different interpretations? Maybe divisionist interpretations follow logically from it, as much as more radical, class-struggle related ones? Maybe the point is not to try and make the theory unassailable to bourgeois and petty-bourgeois interpretations, but merely to positively use it only within a proletarian framing?

Luís Henrique

[JaffaRed]

Privilege theory teaches us that instead of one enemy, the bourgeois, we have 7 billion enemies, every single worker being an oppressor in some way.
Exactly. It is a theory pushed forward by the bourgeoisie in order to dilute class struggle and confuse workers. Suddenly a worker who makes $1 an hour more than you becomes your enemy, rather than the boss who makes $1,000,000 an hour more than you, owns the means of production and steals your surplus value.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Okay. I don't know much about the academic, Maoist influenced criticism you're talking about, but I think this confirms what I said about the dependence of the exact kind of PT on who is writing/saying exactly what. For instance, TFU who's been the most vocal advocate in this thread didn't go anywhere near the faulty notions you're describing here, at least if my memory serves me right. Now either they don't fully understand PT or selectively appripropriate some aspects of it. Maybe they're mistaken in their use of the label? I don't know.

Ah, but that's the thing: most of the people who are defending privilege theory in this thread have indulged precisely in the sort of rhetoric they're trying to distance themselves (and privilege theory) from now, from the "how dare you criticise [group X], you're not a [member of group X]" to "[member of group X] isn't really oppressed because they [don't fit this arbitrary standard I made up] and are privileged". That accounts for the sheer vitriol in some of these posts: we want to take away their favourite rhetorical cudgel. So they have to pretend that they're just saying that racism exists. Well, as as I said: if this were the case they should be criticised for abusing commonly understood terms, and completely falsifying the history of the socialist movement by insinuating no one noticed things like sexism etc. until the Maoists wanted to attack the "white" working class.


Exactly. I'm not an expert on it but so correct me if I'm wrong, but frequently when PT is discussed there are people coming from one end where basically all it means is that racism, sexism and other forms of oppression must be taken in consideration - which I don't think anyone would be able to disagree with

Not on that level of abstraction, no, but where things get interesting is when you try to specify what kinds of oppression exist, and who is doing the oppressing.

For us, oppression is a material, not a cultural phenomenon, and the root cause of oppression is class society. Not cultural constructs like "patriarchy" or supposedly privileged groups like men. For people who subscribe to privilege theory, it's the other way around - and then you have things like gay men being attacked as being "privileged", attacks on cross-dressing, attacks on trans-women and so on.

Which, lest we forget, you're not allowed to criticise if you're a man because most radfems are women.


I think theories of privilege have one particular utility, which is in emphasizing how certain voices within a radical discourse itself can dominate over others. I find the complaint of activists who are non-white, women or lgbt are often that their particular issues get glossed over by activists of the hegemonic community. Black women, for instance, made that critique of the BPP (which, incidentally, it also made of white activists). It's not that these institutions can't be important for defending the interests of the working class, it's that as our society privileges certain perspectives over others, we must actively struggle to make sure that our movements are inclusive. Otherwise they will unintentionally reflect the biases of our society, not only theoretically but practically.

And yet whenever explicit steps are taken to remedy this exclusion of certain voices, what you get is this process being used for nothing more than striking factional blows, mostly but not exclusively by white men (e.g. what happened with the various SWP-UK splinters). There is no substitute for good politics.

[Luís Henrique]

I think this is a clear case, however, where a discourse doesn't necessarily imply a strategy or project, but, rather, can be deployed to different ends.

That's what looks more probable to me. It is a transversal issue - it needs to be addressed from a proletarian perspective, but can very well be used from a bourgeois or petty-bourgeois point of view, without necessarily negating its principles or threading into inconsistency.


A look at, for example, the politics of INCITE! (http://www.incite-national.org/)reveal a fundamentally different set of priorities from what's being described.

That's quite certain, but it starts from the fact that INCITE! is an organisation of non-White people (and to be precise, non-stereotipically-male non-White people). So the race and gender perspectives are present from the start, which is not the case with generic leftist organisations where White males, White females, and non-White males abound, are usually hegemonic, and can appropriate the discourse from a completely different, non-liberatory perspective.

Even then, I don't know INCITE except from a cursory reading of their website, and they may be much more radical in actual practice than in internet posting, but I don't see anything there that goes beyond radical "liberalism" in the American sence; there is no class perspective that I can see. They seem to be way more radical because of what they are than because of what they say.

Naturally, from the perspective from someone like me, that is commonly mistaken for a reformist or accused of being lenient towards reformism, this doesn't invalidate their stand; I think they are (or can be at least, if their practice is compatible with their propaganda) important and that they raise fundamental issues that our class ignores at its own peril.

But I am always somewhat :rolleyes: at ultra-ueber-radical people (disclaimer: I am not thinking of you) who condemn anything and everything for not being revolutionary enough, but then when you go check what they actually propose, it is little more than "equal rights for everybody" and "let's fight poverty" and denounce "illegal violence".

Luís Henrique

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Exactly. It is a theory pushed forward by the bourgeoisie in order to dilute class struggle and confuse workers. Suddenly a worker who makes $1 an hour more than you becomes your enemy, rather than the boss who makes $1,000,000 an hour more than you, owns the means of production and steals your surplus value.

I think that this has to either be an intentionally obtuse caricature, or an extremely narrow set of experiences. Privilege theory doesn't posit false class divisions (wherein the privileged become "enemies") - rather, it challenges that sort of binary compartmentalization, and helps us to understand real intra-class divisions (divisions, that, frankly, you'd have to live under a rock to not see the real material consequences of). The "double oppression" of racialized workers, for example, fails to explain how, for example, white workers in the imperial center are mobilized by the bourgeoisie against immigrant workers. Or, how male workers are successfully mobilized against women and queer workers. Simply saying "hegemony" in this context is a cop-out, akin to "Well, they're being duped." It's not historical materialism: It doesn't tell us the material 'how' or 'why' or how this came to be. Further, it erases the agency of the working class within capitalism and offers an imaginary in which the bourgeoisie are active, thinking, and transmitting, and the workers are a homogenous and passive receptacle. Insofar as the possibility of working class self-activity is a necessary theoretical precondition for revolution, we have to reject this proposed one-sided relation.
The trick is, for effective working class unity that includes both "the wretched of the earth" and home-owning tradespeople with flatscreens, trucks, and fully stocked refrigerators, there are real complexities and difference of interest to work through.


Quote: Originally Posted by The Garbage Disposal Unit http://www.revleft.com/vb/revleft/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showthread.php?p=2863323#post2863323)
I think this is a clear case, however, where a discourse doesn't necessarily imply a strategy or project, but, rather, can be deployed to different ends.
That's what looks more probable to me. It is a transversal issue - it needs to be addressed from a proletarian perspective, but can very well be used from a bourgeois or petty-bourgeois point of view, without necessarily negating its principles or threading into inconsistency.

Merci.


Quote: A look at, for example, the politics of INCITE! (http://www.incite-national.org/)reveal a fundamentally different set of priorities from what's being described.
That's quite certain, but it starts from the fact that INCITE! is an organisation of non-White people (and to be precise, non-stereotipically-male non-White people). So the race and gender perspectives are present from the start, which is not the case with generic leftist organisations where White males, White females, and non-White males abound, are usually hegemonic, and can appropriate the discourse from a completely different, non-liberatory perspective.

I wholly agree, and I think this is crucial. There is a a big difference between white/male/etc. workers going through the song and dance of "checking" privilege, doing a "radical" version of affirmative action, etc. vs actually listening to and adopting theoretical insights and practice from, for example, radical anti-capitalist women embeded in communities of colour. So, for example, while you might be able to pick up a copy of INCITE!'s "The Revolution Will Not Be Funded" at your local university Women's Centre (and the staffer who helps you find it may even be a radical queer woman of colour!) you're unlikely find the "base" of the said Women's Centre engaging in a strategy of block-by-block organizing and building a membership funded and directed anti-violence organization. I don't mean that as a cheap shot against campus feminists (who do, in my opinion, much valuable work) - I just want to point to the disconnect (which, I believe, is of strategic importance).

Sorry for not taking on the rest of your post, Luís. I think it's very interesting, but is also another can of worms that likely warrants its own thread. I'm an ACORN member. It's complicated, haha.

[The Feral Underclass]

Ah, but that's the thing: most of the people who are defending privilege theory in this thread have indulged precisely in the sort of rhetoric they're trying to distance themselves (and privilege theory) from now, from the "how dare you criticise [group X], you're not a [member of group X]" to "[member of group X] isn't really oppressed because they [don't fit this arbitrary standard I made up] and are privileged".

I have certainly criticised straight people for their covert homophobia, if that is what you're referring to. For example, when a straight person tells gay people that creating safe spaces is counter-revolutionary, then they are essentially homophobes. Many straight people can't fathom why queer people would want their own safe spaces, but that's because they are advantaged in society and don't need safe spaces based on their sexualities. It's very easy to sit from a position of never having needed a safe space because of their sexuality and telling those who do that they are wrong for wanting them.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

And yet whenever explicit steps are taken to remedy this exclusion of certain voices, what you get is this process being used for nothing more than striking factional blows, mostly but not exclusively by white men (e.g. what happened with the various SWP-UK splinters). There is no substitute for good politics.

I'm sure this happens sometimes, but any organizing principle can be carried beyond the realm of reason. I've also seen it used by POC/women to express how they get (unintentionally) silenced. The fact that some white bros use the notion of privilege to silence other white bros doesn't mean that there isn't still some utility in the notion.

[CyM]

I have certainly criticised straight people for their covert homophobia, if that is what you're referring to. For example, when a straight person tells gay people that creating safe spaces is counter-revolutionary, then they are essentially homophobes. Many straight people can't fathom why queer people would want their own safe spaces, but that's because they are advantaged in society and don't need safe spaces based on their sexualities. It's very easy to sit from a position of never having needed a safe space because of their sexuality and telling those who do that they are wrong for wanting them.
That is, of course, what safe spaces were created for.

It is, of course, not at all related to their current form. Their original form being a blow for rights, their current form on campuses being absolutely correctly described as counterrevolutionary ;)

[The Feral Underclass]

That is, of course, what safe spaces were created for.

It is, of course, not at all related to their current form. Their original form being a blow for rights, their current form on campuses being absolutely correctly described as counterrevolutionary ;)

Which campuses are these? On what basis do you think your individual experience can be extrapolated to all queer safe spaces in the world? Indeed, why is your experience relevant at all? I'm genuinely interested in the answers to these questions.

Also, what have safe spaces got to do with "rights"? The idea that queer people having their own spaces in order to socialise, organise and feel safe from a violent heternormative society is "counterrevolutionary" is essentially a homophobic view that seeks to deny queer people the opportunity to protect and defend themselves.

[CyM]

Which campuses are these? On what basis do you think your individual experience can be extrapolated to all queer safe spaces in the world? Indeed, why is your experience relevant at all? I'm genuinely interested in the answers to these questions.

Also, what have safe spaces got to do with "rights"? The idea that queer people having their own spaces in order to socialise, organise and feel safe from a violent heternormative society is "counterrevolutionary" is essentially a homophobic view that seeks to deny queer people the opportunity to protect and defend themselves.
Safe spaces today are not the same as "queer safe spaces", but nice bait and switch ;) Especially since my comment quite clearly says the new safe spaces have nothing to do with that.

My personal experience is fairly generalized on north american campuses. Again, I doubt Europe is any different, but can't speak to that.

"Safe space" policies today are used to shut down the left on a regular basis.II recall calling out the president of the Concordia Student Union in the middle of the Quebec student uprising in 2012. She had decided to send 30,000 letters to the homes of every student "informing them" that picketing is illegal. Not because she was oppose to the strike, no of course not, but because she wanted them to "know their rights".

Seeing as she condemned the spontaneous assembly, I had to call her out on her bullshit. But referred to the CSU instead, because well, she represented them as president and I didn't want this to be "personal". The criticism made her feel unsafe, and took false offense to not being referred to by name. Of course, I completely ignored the white "mood watcher" and continued being the annoying Arab with my revolutionary criticism of a scab.

[The Feral Underclass]

Safe spaces today are not the same as "queer safe spaces", but nice bait and switch ;) Especially since my comment quite clearly says the new safe spaces have nothing to do with that.

To be perfectly honest, I didn't understand what you were actually talking about. If we're not talking about "queer safe spaces" then why were you directing your post to me?

And I am not engaging in some kind of weird game with you. Please stop accusing me of trying to be devious.


My personal experience is fairly generalized on north american campuses. Again, I doubt Europe is any different, but can't speak to that.

Could you elaborate on how your personal experience is fairly generalised? Have you visited all the campuses in North America? Also, why are we talking about campuses at all?

Student activism is almost like a single-issue campaign forum that exists in its own little bubble. It's incredibly limited. It doesn't really serve to inform or provide utility to social struggles against structural oppression by working class people in everyday working class lives.


"Safe space" policies today are used to shut down the left on a regular basis.II recall calling out the president of the Concordia Student Union in the middle of the Quebec student uprising in 2012. She had decided to send 30,000 letters to the homes of every student "informing them" that picketing is illegal. Not because she was oppose to the strike, no of course not, but because she wanted them to "know their rights".

Seeing as she condemned the spontaneous assembly, I had to call her out on her bullshit. But referred to the CSU instead, because well, she represented them as president and I didn't want this to be "personal". The criticism made her feel unsafe, and took false offense to not being referred to by name. Of course, I completely ignored the white "mood watcher" and continued being the annoying Arab with my revolutionary criticism of a scab.

I don't really understand what this has to do with what I'm talking about...? Are you saying the concept of safe spaces necessarily creates situations like this? How does this relate to what I was saying about straight people attacking the very concept of queer safe spaces?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I have certainly criticised straight people for their covert homophobia, if that is what you're referring to.

Curiously enough, the example I had in mind was you doing the exact opposite - siding with an obvious homophobe to criticise a gay person for running one of those "sudo fund me" campaigns (I don't remember the specific platform). Because of course, the person was obviously horribly privileged.

And there are tons of other examples on RevLeft (not all of them necessarily involving you), from the boilerplate "how dare you criticise hawt Kudish women with AK-47s, you're not a Kurd" (hilariously, one of the critics of PKK policy was Kurdish, and one was closer to the events than any other poster), to (and this is probably RevLeft's finest moment) the time when a lot of users defended a troll posing as a Black (sorry, "person of colour", them darkies and Injuns are all the same) misogynist, homophobe and anti-Semite.


For example, when a straight person tells gay people that creating safe spaces is counter-revolutionary, then they are essentially homophobes.

You wish.

Try as you might to erase that past, there are enough people and organisations, gay and otherwise, that have rejected and continue to reject safe spaces and similar proposals. And "safe space" policies can and have been used for homophobic purposes, for example shutting up communist opponents of the ayatollah regime in Iran and its gruesome treatment of gay people.


I'm sure this happens sometimes, but any organizing principle can be carried beyond the realm of reason. I've also seen it used by POC/women to express how they get (unintentionally) silenced. The fact that some white bros use the notion of privilege to silence other white bros doesn't mean that there isn't still some utility in the notion.

It happens all the time, and it's been happening for longer than "privilege theory" was a thing (I'm reminded of the unprincipled attacks by Breitman on Fraser, in the old SWP-US - for the record, Bretiman, the proponent of black nationalism, was white, the opponent, Fraser, was black). It's not just used by "white bros", of course; the self-proclaimed representatives of their entire race/colour/sex/gender etc. have had a lot of use of this as well (the various "Black community leaders", for example, or as they should be called - misleaders).

[The Feral Underclass]

Curiously enough, the example I had in mind was you doing the exact opposite - siding with an obvious homophobe to criticise a gay person for running one of those "sudo fund me" campaigns (I don't remember the specific platform). Because of course, the person was obviously horribly privileged.

That's a really unfair reading of what I actually said, which was a defence of people who were not privileged enough to have internet and a support base to raise $60,000 dollars to help one individual. You then became increasingly irate.

Now, I stand by my position. It's all fine and well to set up a GoFundMe campaign to raise $60,000 for one person for having shitty parents, but this is simply a gesture by liberals to channel inactivity into something they can do without actually doing anything. It also fundamentally ignores the political and economic issues facing many other young gay people who live in economically deprived situations and who don't have access to technology and the support this individual had. If you think that we should uncritically support liberal social media campaigns then that's fine, but I do not.

Also, for the record, I did actually donate money to the campaign: Post (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2784205&postcount=42)

Here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/not-easy-watch-t190285/index.html?highlight=homophobic+parents) is the whole thread if any one wishes to read it.


You wish.

Try as you might to erase that past, there are enough people and organisations, gay and otherwise, that have rejected and continue to reject safe spaces and similar proposals. And "safe space" policies can and have been used for homophobic purposes, for example shutting up communist opponents of the ayatollah regime in Iran and its gruesome treatment of gay people.

What am I wishing for exactly?

Yeah, I'm fully aware of the liberal nature of many gay people and their organisations. People have shitty politics, even gay people. That is a different issue all together. I'm also not really making a defence of all safe spaces that exist everywhere and through all times.

[JaffaRed]

I think that this has to either be an intentionally obtuse caricature, or an extremely narrow set of experiences. Privilege theory doesn't posit false class divisions (wherein the privileged become "enemies") - rather, it challenges that sort of binary compartmentalization, and helps us to understand real intra-class divisions (divisions, that, frankly, you'd have to live under a rock to not see the real material consequences of). The "double oppression" of racialized workers, for example, fails to explain how, for example, white workers in the imperial center are mobilized by the bourgeoisie against immigrant workers. Or, how male workers are successfully mobilized against women and queer workers. Simply saying "hegemony" in this context is a cop-out, akin to "Well, they're being duped." It's not historical materialism: It doesn't tell us the material 'how' or 'why' or how this came to be. Further, it erases the agency of the working class within capitalism and offers an imaginary in which the bourgeoisie are active, thinking, and transmitting, and the workers are a homogenous and passive receptacle. Insofar as the possibility of working class self-activity is a necessary theoretical precondition for revolution, we have to reject this proposed one-sided relation.
The trick is, for effective working class unity that includes both "the wretched of the earth" and home-owning tradespeople with flatscreens, trucks, and fully stocked refrigerators, there are real complexities and difference of interest to work through.
There is a difference between fighting racism and sexism - which is an important and very central part of class struggle - and all the cases I encountered of people who spoke of "white skin privilege" or "male privilege". In all of these cases, the people who held these views made the contradictions among the people (i.e. internal divisions inside the working class) primary and the contradiction between the people and the enemy (i.e. the contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie) secondary. In some cases, in Israel-Palestine, this meant denying that there is a Jewish working class at all, i.e. saying "all Jews in Palestine are privileged occupying settlers and not workers" - this view comes mostly from Jewish leftists, by the way.

I don't know about the way this works in other countries, but here this kind of discourse seems to attract a particularly nauseating type of liberals like moths to flame. This also attracts liberal "radical" feminists who see all male workers as enemies and even rapists and not as potential allies vs. sexism and the capitalist system which enables it.

[Zoop]

Safe spaces are intended to prioritise the voices of the oppressed, so that they feel empowered and able to participate.

Basically, it is a desire to be free from bullshit, discrimination and bigotry.

I'm in favour of them.

[Thirsty Crow]

Exactly. It is a theory pushed forward by the bourgeoisie in order to dilute class struggle and confuse workers.
Just to ask out of curiosity, do people really think that the global capitalist class needs to push something like PT do dilute class struggle? It seems like a conspiracy theory of some kind, one which also fails to recognize that no theory at all is even necessary for cementing working class weakness and consequent divisions within the class (which on their own are a product of the historical shifts in class composition and the continuing smashing of the working class worldwide).

I surely didn't come across any instance of labor struggles where it would make sense to conclude that workers were confused by PT.

[Luís Henrique]

What exactly makes "safe spaces" safe?

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Just to ask out of curiosity, do people really think that the global capitalist class needs to push something like PT do dilute class struggle?

Of course, this is the traditional mistake of the traditional left: that reformism is an ideology actively pursued by the bourgeoisie. It isn't. It is the ordinary ideology of the working class; the ideology of labour trying to assert itself against capital within the hegemony of value. It is the ideology of workers trying to affirm themselves as a working class, the ideology of "pride in being a worker".

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

What exactly makes "safe spaces" safe?

More precisely, what exactly makes "safe spaces" safe in times in which we live under the bourgeois State's monopoly of legitimate violence?

Luís Henrique

[ckaihatsu]

There is a difference between fighting racism and sexism - which is an important and very central part of class struggle - and all the cases I encountered of people who spoke of "white skin privilege" or "male privilege". In all of these cases, the people who held these views made the contradictions among the people (i.e. internal divisions inside the working class) primary and the contradiction between the people and the enemy (i.e. the contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie) secondary. In some cases, in Israel-Palestine, this meant denying that there is a Jewish working class at all, i.e. saying "all Jews in Palestine are privileged occupying settlers and not workers" - this view comes mostly from Jewish leftists, by the way.

I don't know about the way this works in other countries, but here this kind of discourse seems to attract a particularly nauseating type of liberals like moths to flame. This also attracts liberal "radical" feminists who see all male workers as enemies and even rapists and not as potential allies vs. sexism and the capitalist system which enables it.





Just to ask out of curiosity, do people really think that the global capitalist class needs to push something like PT do dilute class struggle? It seems like a conspiracy theory of some kind, one which also fails to recognize that no theory at all is even necessary for cementing working class weakness and consequent divisions within the class (which on their own are a product of the historical shifts in class composition and the continuing smashing of the working class worldwide).

I surely didn't come across any instance of labor struggles where it would make sense to conclude that workers were confused by PT.


The word that *isn't* being said here is 'social opportunism', which can happen both intentionally and inadvertently, as much as people of the socially dominant identity may or may not intentionally use *cultural imperialism* (of various degrees of assertiveness and aggressiveness) for their private benefit.

So, in 'schematic' terms, the 'distance' that a person's own consciously intentional social identity falls-short (to-the-right-of), of their actual *objective class interests*, presumably that of the working class, is the degree to which they're exercising *social opportunism* of some kind. Granted, in many cases 'identity' politics (identity politics) will be appropriate to the situation, as in fighting for particular reforms or rebuffing the right, but overall we'd rather see people consciously represent their best *collective*, *class* interests.


[3] Ideologies & Operations -- Fundamentals



http://s6.postimg.org/6omx9zh81/3_Ideologies_Operations_Fundamentals.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/cpkm723u5/full/)





Of course, this is the traditional mistake of the traditional left: that reformism is an ideology actively pursued by the bourgeoisie. It isn't. It is the ordinary ideology of the working class; the ideology of labour trying to assert itself against capital within the hegemony of value. It is the ideology of workers trying to affirm themselves as a working class, the ideology of "pride in being a worker".


Reformism isn't inherently the 'ordinary ideology of the working class' because reformism isn't a threat to bourgeois rule.

[GLF]

This is a touchy subject for myself. I am called white, and I am biologically male - though I don't identify as male or female (I see myself as a third gender and am also bisexual). So I do believe cisgender people are privileged, and I do believe that straight people and even gays to an extent are privileged more so than I (because bisexuals are often looked upon as gay with one foot in and one foot out). And of course I believe that those who are called white are privileged.

But some of this privilege cannot be helped. Much of it can. But even if we eliminated every injustice perpetuated against minorities in the west, they would still be under privileged. I realize that no matter how many rights I get, the fact remains, that I live in a society that is over 90% straight, and probably 99% cisgender. That's who I am going to see on TV. That's whom most of the products and services will cater to. And you can't expect anything else.

As far as "race" is concerned, there are definitely privileges that are associated with whiteness - but not always. And even poor whites like me who have less privilege should realize that we can put on nice clothes and go to a nice neighborhood and obtain instance privilege - that is a luxury people of color do not have. But in many ways the common white males are the ones making concessions, and in some ways, this is unfortunate. The evil comes from the White Man - not the white male.

I think the reason you don't hear about this among leftists is because no matter how bad poor whites such as I have it, the truth is, minorities have it far worse.

So yes, privilege exists - even white privilege to a degree (though in many ways it's majority privilege, but whiteness still has it's benefits unfortunately). I know this may sound cruel, but perhaps poor white males being ostracized and made to take the fall for the White Man can be a positive learning experience - because even then it's nothing compared to what poor people of color go through.