Talk:White privilege/Archive 16

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Response to NPOV/N discussion

@Keith Johnston, HandThatFeeds, William Avery, Doug Weller, François Robere, Grayfell, Michepman, Ian.thomson, ColumbiaXY, Eggishorn, Slatersteven, Sridc, EricR, EvergreenFir, Allenwiliams, JzG, Simonm223, and Jacona: There's a consensus of editors that white privilege is a fact and not a theory, and any viewpoint that denies the existence of white privilege is fringe. However, there is legitimate controversy among scholars, particularly in the area of education, about whether or not the framing of antiracism as renunciation of white privilege and the focus on white privilege in teacher training are the best approach. In response to concerns raised at WP:NPOV/N, especially a point raised by User:EricR concerning unclarity in the lede, I replaced an unclear paragraph in the lede with a summary of criticisms, and added a section on criticism. I give 5 sources, all by people who admire and respect the seminal work by Peggy McIntosh and all of whom acknowledge that white privilege is a phenomenon, but who have some criticisms. I pinged the participants in the NPOV/N discussion hoping that other editors will look at my edits and comment on the talk page. I think that the discussion belongs here rather than at NPOV/N. Thank you. NightHeron (talk) 02:02, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Again, this has already been the subject of an WP:RFC: Talk:White privilege/Archive 11#RfC should this article contain a "Critique section". Your edit ignores prior consensus, so this will not work. I also do not agree that your summary of the "controversy" here on the talk page is an accurate reflection of the edits you have made. While this particular aspect may be a controversy in some senses of the term, by presenting this as a "Controversy" section, this is misrepresenting both the scope and greater significance of this controversy. I would strongly recommend rephrasing this to avoid the issues raised by WP:CSECTION, the previous RFC, and the dozens of other times this has been proposed and shot-down on the article's talk page. Pending that, perhaps a new RFC could be raised, but you will have to address WP:CSECTION either way, so you may as well get ahead of the curve and figure it out now. Grayfell (talk) 09:01, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Grayfell, I think you're right. Adding factors such as class is only adding confusion, as the data shows pretty clearly that African-Americans in particular have substantially lower social mobility. "You're not disadvantaged because you're black, but because you're poor" ignores the fact that you're much more likely to be poor if you're black.

The point I always focus on is that white privilege doesn't mean that white people can't have shitty lives, it's just that their lives aren't shitty because of the colour of their skin. Guy (help!) 11:03, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Class is actually extremely relevant and should to be added as well. LeBron James and many other African-Americans in sports, showbiz, business or medicine enjoy benefits way above the homeless or the average Appalachian or Californian Hispanic. Let's not pretend these differences do not exist or are not relevant.--ColumbiaXY (talk) 06:21, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy: Yes, of course. I'm sure that the critics I cited would agree with that, too. What they would say (if I understand them correctly) is that if one wants to reach out to white people who lead shitty lives, in many cases it is not a good strategy to try to convince them to confess to having privileges because of being white. There are better ways to frame the issue of racism (such as when talking to future teachers, which is a focus of several of the critics) --- for example, one can talk about the divide-and-conquer strategy that destroys unions, gets Trump elected, undermines social welfare programs, etc. I'm not asking for editors to agree with the critics, but just to agree that their viewpoint should be explained in a clear way in the lede and main body of this article. NightHeron (talk) 13:24, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

NightHeron, not sure that reaching out to people is our concern. Documenting the concept of white privilege, is. It's a bit like having an article on feminism that worries about reaching out to incels. Guy (help!) 16:35, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy: Not our concern, but definitely the concern of the 5 sources I cited --- as well as the concern of Peggy McIntosh and other originators of the 'white privilege' framing of anti-racism. Clearly the intent of McIntosh and her followers was to reach out to whites and get whites to turn away from racism. The article from the Harvard Educational Review discusses what they see as the need (in multicultural and antiracist education, especially for ed students) to reach out to students from poor white background. That's one of the two main reasons given in the article for having become somewhat disillusioned with white privilege pedagogy as a strategy. They're talking about open-minded but not well-informed (white) young people from rural America who want to be teachers. Not incel idiots. NightHeron (talk) 20:58, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy, one major criticism of the concept of "white privilege" is that it mislabels the absence of oppression "privilege." Another is that it ignores all sorts of differences within racial groups (as defined by skin-color). For example, immigrants from some African countries are actually much better off than the average American. -Thucydides411 (talk) 15:43, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

I disagree that that is necessarily a criticism in the sense you mean it, ie. some people mention this as a possible aspect to consider without intending it as a broad criticism of white privilege as a concept. More generally, that sort of thing is why having a WP:CSECTION is generally a terrible way to organize an article; actual scholarship rarely divides evenly into "people supporting this idea" and "people opposing this idea." If you have reliable sources for those aspects we can put them in a more appropriate section instead. (Not just opinion pieces, though? I don't feel dropping a bunch of duelling opinion pieces into an article like this helps much.) --Aquillion (talk) 16:29, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Thucydides411, the absence of oppression is indeed a privilege. Ask any American other than a native-born cis white man. Guy (help!) 16:30, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

@Aquillion: The argument that "privilege" is a fundamentally misleading term in this context is indeed a broad criticism of "white privilege." I don't see how else it could be interpreted. There are several prominent criticisms of white privilege theory, and they should be discussed clearly in this article.

Guy, that's your opinion, and the opinion advanced by academics inhabiting certain (highly political) areas of social studies, but it's not a universally held position. Your assertion that everyone other than native-born cis white men agree with that opinion is incorrect (and pretty insulting, actually). Just to illustrate this, the page used to include criticism of the term "white privilege" by Lewis Gordon (see [1]). -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:32, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy how about we ask LeBron James and a random, homeless native-born cis white man? Your turning this discussion into a display of your own ideological biases and stereotypes, and treat Wikipedia as if it were Reddit, when this should be about what RS say. --ColumbiaXY (talk) 05:21, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

ColumbiaXY, See earlier answers. White privilege doesn't mean that white people can't have shitty lives, or that black people can't become rich, it just means that white people don't have shitty lives because of their skin colour and black people can become rich despite their skin colour. If you look at demographic data the picture is absolutely clear: being black makes you more likely to be poor, more likely to be arrested, more likely to be jailed, less likely to do well in school, less likely to get to the top in any profession - and this holds even when you control for all other factors. Example: black and white teens use weed at the same rate but black teens are four times more likely to be arrested and prosecuted for it. Guy (help!) 09:52, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy In the USA, the white privilege claim doesn't hold much once you control for ethnicity (as others have pointed out repeatedly) instead of lumping all people of a given color together. According to : "Median Household Income in the Past 12 Months (in 2016 inflation-adjusted dollars)". [from American Community Survey. United States Census Bureau. 2016] - Indians have the largest household income in the US ($128,000). White Americans: $67-68,000. Sri Lankan Americans: $73-74,000. Ghanaian Americans: $66-67,000. Pakistani Americans: $72-73,000. Pennsylvania German Americans: $48-49,000 and so on.

Outside of the US -in countries like Pakistan, Indonesia, China, India, Nigeria, Egypt, Iran and so on- your claim seems to be on even shakier ground -as there's no data to support it. --ColumbiaXY (talk) 07:26, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

ColumbiaXY, Most of the studies showing white privilege to be a thing are from America. I mean, you could cut out the weasel words and call it systemic racism, but the facts are pretty clear here. Guy (help!) 10:28, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

ColumbiaXY: It seems that the arguments that it's reasonable to deny the existence of white privilege have a basic logical fallacy. There are many examples of what's undeniably white privilege; I've mentioned a few. It does not refute the existence of white privilege to give examples where it is not present and to point out that it is not present everywhere or in all situations. This is the same logical fallacy as denying global warming by saying that last year we had an unusually cold winter. NightHeron (talk) 12:13, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

The appropriate place for this is the NPOV board where impartial editors can adjudicate. Keith Johnston (talk) 10:52, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, this is also an appropriate venue. Guy (help!) 10:58, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

You will confuse contributors to the discussion by having it in two places. The board exists for a reason. I note NightHeron (talk) You have failed to list many editors who take a more nuanced view or disagree with you. These include Sparkle1 (talk) Scorpions13256 (talk) Correctus2kX (talk) Byulwwe (talk) MagicatthemovieS (talk) Nikolaneberemed (talk) Thucydides411 (talk) Tornado chaser (talk) Hesperian Nguyen (talk) Cummin14 (talk) 64.125.109.37 Liberty axe1 (talk) Ϫ(talk) Telenarn (talk) ShimonChai (talk) Jobberone (talk) SRichardWeiss (talk) Keithramone33 (talk) Jacona (talk) Obsidi (talk) Keith Johnston (talk) 11:31, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, the issue affects one article, so this is an appropriate venue. Noticeboard discussions get archived pretty aggressively so it's arguably a better venue, but it's certainly an appropriate one. It's also a bad look asserting your opinion as fact when dealing with people vastly more experienced on Wikipedia than you are. Guy (help!) 13:02, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

I pinged all 18 editors who participated in the NPOV/N discussion, without regard to what viewpoints they expressed. I admittedly did not research the history of debates over this article and did not know about the RfC that occurred before I was a Wikipedia editor. Is that a requirement before editing? If so, that's a great way to discourage newcomers and others. The article in its present form, after all my edits were reverted, has obvious problems that others have noted. The lede contains a poorly written paragraph (the one I replaced) trying to summarize some criticisms. But there's very little mention of criticism in the main body. As my edits showed, there's a substantial body of legitimate criticism of the 'white privilege' framing (not of the existence of white privilege), especially in education. To ignore this, or to give a garbled paragraph about it, violates WP:NPOV, which is a core policy. WP:CSECTION is not a policy at all, but an essay, and many editors clearly disagree with parts of that essay. Wikipedia includes a huge number of criticism sections and even entire criticism articles, including Criticism of Mother Teresa. The essay states that it's better to work criticism into appropriate places in an article, rather than gathering it together into a separate section. If anyone sees a way to do that in white privilege, then fine. But the only way I could see to include the critical commentary without disrupting the coherence of the article was in a separate section.

I initially thought the article complied with NPOV, but then a comment by User:EricR made me think more carefully about the article, especially the main body, which, according to MOS:LEAD, should explain what's in the lede, and I changed my mind. Is there a consensus of editors that the article in its present form is fine, and adequately accounts for legitimate mainstream criticism? I don't see the evidence for that. NightHeron (talk) 12:52, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

I think that dividing sources into "critical" and "uncritical" is already a mistake, and I would strenuously disagree with your assertion that most of the sources you added were "legitimate mainstream criticism." They discussed the topic and how to apply it; they were not, broadly, criticism. That said, if you really think that there's a substantial body of legitimate criticism of the 'white privilege' framing (not of the existence of white privilege), especially in education according to your personal gut instincts on what qualifies as "criticism", the obvious thing to do is to add the sources you read as critical of certain specific approaches in education to the education section, ideally in a paragraph devoted to the approaches they're discussing. (If we don't even mention the approaches or concepts they're discussing - ie. there's no clear place to put them because the aspect they discuss isn't in the article - then they're possibly not WP:DUE; intentionally hunting for sources you read as adopting a critical tone and adding them regardless of whether the aspect they're critiquing is in the article risks a degree of WP:FALSEBALANCE.) But my reading is that your edits generally pushed to label certain scholars as 'critical' (ie. you added a 'criticism' section and rewrote the lead paragraph to add Several scholars have criticized...; to me, that risks both WP:SYNTH and a WP:POV framing. If you want to cast a scholar as broadly critical you need to actually cite a source describing them that way rather than just your own personal gut feeling on how to categorize them. Also, I feel it's WP:SYNTH to combine these individual lines of commentary (many of which are aimed at refining or improving the concept) into a paragraph or section of "look at how many people have criticized this." To answer your original question, though - yes, the article, as it stands (prior to your edit) gives a broadly-accurate summary of mainstream scholarship on the topic. It is neutral and accurate, and your changes introduced WP:POV issues by crowbarring a non-neutrally critical WP:TONE into the article voice by synthizing together a bunch of sources that didn't individually support the tone or thesis of the section. If you want to argue that there is broad criticism of the concept in academia beyond what is currently in the article (something I don't think you've any evidence for), you will need comparable broad, mainstream academic sources covering and describing this criticism as a whole - not a few scattered, disconnected sources focused on refining or questioning specific narrow applications braided into some sort of WP:POV amalgam. --Aquillion (talk) 16:38, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Aquillion By no means was it my idea to lump together the 5 sources I used and call them criticism. If you look at the most recent of the 5 sources (the one from the Harvard Educational Review), you'll see that its introduction identifies itself as criticism and briefly surveys earlier critical articles, specifically discussing the other 4 sources I cite. You write If you want to cast a scholar as broadly critical you need to actually cite a source describing them that way rather than just your own personal gut feeling on how to categorize them. The 5th source I cite is thus a source that does precisely what you call for.

White privilege pedagogy is used in teacher education, in gender studies and ethnic studies departments, in diversity training programs, etc. The original Peggy McIntosh article from 1988 has been hugely influential as pedagogy, reprinted many times (usually in a shortened form), and serving as a basis for many educational efforts aimed at combatting racism. If this isn't clear from the article, we should add more sources that make it clear. The critics I cite are not opponents of these efforts, but supporters of and participants in them. They don't question the existence of white privilege as a component of racism, but rather question whether the 'white privilege' framing is really the best approach in educational efforts. NightHeron (talk) 21:19, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Aquillion: I agree that it's important to avoid POV-pushing in the way we cite sources. Please look at the way the Lawrence Blum article is used in the body of this article. It is cited many times, though this might not be apparent at first, because it is listed in 4 different places in the references (reference numbers 11, 13, 62, and 63). In the main body of the article (White privilege#Applications in critical theory) the source is presented as an elaboration on the notion of 'white privilege', whereas in fact it is a critique. The title is White Privilege: A Mild Critique, and here is the abstract: White privilege analysis has been influential in philosophy of education. I offer some mild criticisms of this largely salutary direction — its inadequate exploration of its own normative foundations, and failure to distinguish between `spared injustice', `unjust enrichment' and `non-injustice-related' privileges; its inadequate exploration of the actual structures of racial disparity in different domains (health, education, wealth); its tendency to deny or downplay differences in the historical and current experiences of the major racial groups; its failure to recognize important ethnic differences within racial groups; and its overly narrow implied political project that omits many ways that White people can contribute meaningfully to the cause of racial justice. The way this source is currently used in the article is a clear example of what you're concerned about, namely, distortion of the author's viewpoint to make it appear to agree with an editor's POV. NightHeron (talk) 13:34, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Thanks NightHeron (talk) I appreciate you are acting in good faith. I would be happy to work with you try to weave in mainstream critique but given the ongoing noticeboard I still think its better to discuss there. I would recommend duplicating your comments in that forum. Keith Johnston (talk) 17:38, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston: I'm happy to work with you, and also with the other 17 editors I pinged, to try to achieve consensus. I don't think this has to go to another forum, since many editors are involved in or following the discussion here. When in doubt, the article talk page is the best place to go, rather than adding to the backlog of unresolved issues on NPOV/N. To achieve consensus, we should be very careful about sources, using high-quality mainstream ones. They can be conservative as well as liberal, as User:Thucydides411 suggests (below), but, frankly, high-quality conservative sources might be hard to find, since (at least in the US) so many conservatives have gotten into supporting fringe views. Denying the existence of white privilege in the face of factual examples is fringe, as is claiming that "racism in reverse" is the real problem. I think we'll find that the best critical sources are written by people who acknowledge that white privilege exists as a consequence of racism but believe that using that term as the main way to frame the problem of racism is a mistake. NightHeron (talk) 13:09, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

@NightHeron: Rejecting the existence of white privilege is not fringe. When you say "in the face of factual examples", you should recognize that the factual examples you're talking about are facts that are used to support the idea of white privilege. The facts (so long as they really are factual statements about census figures, etc.) are not what is at question, and the facts themselves are not what constitute the theory of white privilege. The interpretation of those facts as establishing a privilege based on whiteness is what constitutes the theory of white privilege.

There are several reasonable ways that people who acknowledge the facts argue against the theory of white privilege. One is to argue that absence of certain types of discrimination is not a "privilege" - that is, that the idea of white privilege fundamentally mixes up rights and privileges. This is an argument put forward by Lewis Gordon. Another argument (also made by Lewis Gordon) against the theory of white privilege is that most whites do not have access to the actual privileges that are often claimed to make up white privilege (even though white people might on average fare better in certain ways than some other groups, there is huge variation). An argument against the theory of white privilege that I have read in conservative publications is that the theory relies too heavily on a comparison of white Americans and African Americans, ignoring the numerous minority groups (including Indian Americans, Chinese Americans, Nigerian Americans, Ghanaian Americans, and many others) that fare significantly better (on average) than white Americans in many broad measures (income, education and health). These conservative critics will agree that there are comparisons between, say, average income of white Americans and African Americans that indicate that white Americans are better off, on average, but the critics say that the fact that the exact same measures show many minority groups doing better than white Americans undermines the idea of "white privilege." Then there are, of course, Marxist arguments against the theory, centering on the idea that race is actually being used as a fuzzy stand-in for class (fuzzy because there are rich African Americans and poor whites). Eric Arnesen additionally argues that the term "white privilege" is used by so many different writers to mean so many mutually contradictory things that it is an ill-defined moving target. Arnesen compares white privilege theory to Freudian psychoanalysis (which I don't think Wikipedia is about to declare to be absolutely true).

These are all reasonable, non-fringe criticisms of the existence of white privilege. There are prominent representatives of these various criticisms. This old version of the page goes through several of these arguments, with sources. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:09, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Thucydides411 Most of what you say is very reasonable. I certainly did not say that all examples of white privilege are necessarily valid or aren't open to question. Nor is it true that an example has to be statistical. The many cases of specific situations where there is indisputably privilege for being white are enough to justify the statement that white privilege exists as a phenomenon (but not enough to necessarily support a sweeping theory of the ubiquity of white privilege or the value of white privilege as a way of framing the issue of racism). For example, a manager hires a white guy who reminds him of his son, passing over a more qualified black guy whose appearance reminded him of some criminal he saw in a movie. Or in the NFL a head football coach who's white replaces a black coach who was fired after a 10-6 season and gets kept for years despite his team's record being worse than 10-6. Students give a white professor high evaluations despite his being tough, but give a black professor low evaluations if he/she is tough. Or if police are devoting most of their effort to stop-and-frisk of people of color, then a white person who's speeding on the highway has less chance of being pulled over. I'm sure people who've thought about this much more than I have could give you many more examples. NightHeron (talk) 17:48, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

@NightHeron: Would you consider the view that those specific examples (which could be matched by countless other examples where being a member of any particular group is an advantage or a disadvantage) do not establish the existence of a generalized "white privilege" as fringe? I acknowledge that there are commentators who argue as you do above, but it's not Wikipedia's place to declare those commentators correct, and the commentators who disagree with them incorrect. This is not climate science, and there is not a definitive interpretation that Wikipedia can declare to be correct. There are Critical Race Theorists, conservatives, Marxists, and commentators from many different strains of thought that have mutually contradictory views on whether white privilege exists. -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:32, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

@Thucydides411:: The common meaning of the word privilege is a right, immunity, or benefit enjoyed only by a person beyond the advantages of most: the privileges of the very rich. This is the first definition in dictionary.com. Suppose that a manager has a white guy and several people of color apply for a sales job. He says to himself, "The white guy doesn't seem to be as good as the others. But many of my customers are uneasy around people of color, and I can't afford to lose their business. So I'd better hire the white guy." This is not at all an unlikely scenario, at least not in many parts of the US. The white guy getting the job is an indisputable beneficiary of white privilege, and it would be fringe to deny that. On the other hand, it would be reasonable (though controversial) to say, for example, that from a statistical standpoint this is not an important form of racism, because only a small percent of all whites have ever received a job because more qualified people of color were passed over. Whether or not the notion of white privilege should be extended to cover cases where the common meaning of privilege doesn't apply (such as simply not being discriminated against) and whether or not the terminology white privilege is a good way to frame racism in general, and whether focusing on white privilege is a good strategy or a distraction in efforts to reduce racism --- all of this is the subject of mainstream debate. But denialism of the existence of white privilege amounts to denying facts. NightHeron (talk) 21:29, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

@NightHeron: "The white guy getting the job is an indisputable beneficiary of white privilege, and it would be fringe to deny that" - no, it's not fringe, because there are many commentators who do deny that. The argument against that view is pretty simple: that's not a privilege that most white people enjoy. The fact that some white people (and people of very race) get jobs because they know someone is not necessarily reflective of a general privilege that white people benefit from. The definition of "privilege" that you quoted actually gets right to the point: a privilege is something reserved for the few, not something that is broadly viewed as a universal right (like non-discrimination). That's one of the central criticisms of white privilege theory, voiced by many critics.

I'm really not here to argue who is right or wrong in this debate, though. My views are irrelevant here. What is important is that there is very significant criticism of the concept of white privilege, and it's not correct to call it all fringe. I don't think we should be declaring that commentators from a few subfields of academia are correct, while commentators from other subfields are incorrect and social commentators outside academia writing for well known publications (whose views are just as weighty as someone with a position in academia) don't matter. -Thucydides411 (talk) 21:51, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Thucydides411, how many of those denying it are white libertarians? Guy (help!) 09:53, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy, of the dozen or so critics whose views were noted in an earlier version of the article, I think zero are white Libertarians. That isn't to say that the views of white Libertarians should be discounted or excluded from this article. Wikipedia doesn't have any policy of excluding the views of either white people or Libertarians. I would be against instituting any racist policies of that sort. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:36, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

@Thucydides411:: The definition says a benefit enjoyed only by a person beyond the advantages of most, where presumably most means most of the relevant group of people, such as applicants for a job. So my example clearly fits. The benefit in fact was a generalized white privilege, because most any white applicant could have been substituted for the not-so-well-qualified white guy and still would have gotten the job. Here's another example, a true story told me by an acquaintance. She's a white British citizen having an extended stay in the US, and she had overstayed her visa. Once she was on a bus in southern California that was stopped by Immigration. All the other passengers were Latino, all were checked carefully, and all had their proper papers. She was skipped, much to her relief --- and also amusement, since she was the only "illegal alien" on the bus. She was granted that privilege because she was white, and presumably another white person would have been granted the same privilege. On the other hand, most of the people she encountered traveling by bus in southern California would not have been given this privilege. Using the common meanings of the words white and privilege, both of my examples can indisputably be called cases of white privilege.

I agree with you that, rather than discussing content issues, we need to find a way to improve the article. For that we need consensus, which in this case might not be easy to achieve. But I don't think it would be so difficult to come to an agreement if editors agree to forego positions at the extremes, that is, if we all could compromise by agreeing that (1) this article needs to give due coverage to responsible critics of theories and approaches that focus around the term white privilege, and (2) the existence of white privilege as a phenomenon is not in contention. NightHeron (talk) 22:46, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

@NightHeron: I agree with your point #1, but strongly disagree with your point #2. There are many prominent social commentators who reject the notion of white privilege (in the US, at least). These critics range from conservatives to Marxists. Their views should also be presented. -Thucydides411 (talk) 08:14, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

@Thucydides411:: Other editors agree with (2) and disagree with (1). It doesn't look like either side is likely to convince the other to change their minds, so I'm suggesting compromise as the only way to reach consensus. If everyone insists on having their way, then the article won't be improved, any attempt to insert criticism will be reverted as "not reflecting consensus", and this could devolve into edit-warring. Note, by the way, that the male privilege article also has very little criticism --- just a sentence mentioning that men's rights advocacy groups and anti-feminist men deny it. As I understand the Marxist position, they believe that talk about either white privilege or male privilege is divisive in the working class and gets in the way of class struggle, which is not quite the same thing as saying that neither phenomenon exists. Or do you know a reference where Marxists say that white/male privilege doesn't exist? NightHeron (talk) 11:53, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, bear in mind that we cover criticism according to its prominence. That's why we state as fact that climate change is real. Guy (help!) 18:44, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

That is not the case currently. One source in the lede is an article entitled "The Year in Hashtags: 2014". At the same time conservative or liberal critique is sidelined or banished. You may not like or agree with Denis Prager but he is one of the most prominent conservatives in the world. You may not like Toby Young but he is a prominent British conservative - see https://thecritic.co.uk/issues/december-2019/no-need-to-plead-guilty/ - There is an unacceptable double-standard at play here. Keith Johnston (talk) 22:27, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy, the comparison to climate change is precisely the problem here. Critical Race Theory is not science. It is an interpretive framework and a political program. The term "white privilege" is a highly polemical term, and whether or not you think it's an accurate, appropriate or useful term depends very much on your political outlook. Does the fact that Nigerian and Ghanaian Americans, on average, earn far more than white Americans undermine the idea of white privilege? Is the real division one of class rather than race? It depends very much on whom you ask. Marxist academics, conservatives, and Critical Race Theorists will give different answers to each question. Who are we to declare that only the Critical Race Theorists are correct? On the contrary, climate change is a reality - something that you can objectively measure using the scientific method. We should not be presenting white privilege theory as if it were on the same footing with climate change. Concretely, that means that the various criticisms of the concept - from both left-wing and right-wing commentators, should be discussed in the article. -Thucydides411 (talk) 23:45, 5 December 2019 (UTC)

I see we've descended to the "social sciences aren't real science!" part of the argument. Such a stance does not even bear consideration. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 15:40, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Are you actually suggesting that Critical Race Theory is a science, and that the theses put forward by people in that field have the same certainty as scientific laws in areas such as physics, chemistry and biology? That's just not credible, in my opinion. -Thucydides411 (talk) 16:45, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Observing the behavior of populations is science, definitely on par with physics, biology and chemistry. This page describes a documented phenomenon. That you dismiss it speaks more to yourself than anything else, and I have no further comment on your opinions. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:59, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

That's not a reasonable view at all, and the way you're discussing here is not reasonable. There is an important distinction between scientific fields like physics, chemistry and biology and fields like Critical Race Theory or Freudian psychoanalysis. The fact that you so emphatically proclaim them to be on the same level is just strange to me. -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:25, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Just because you do not understand HandThatFeeds does not invalidate his point. "Science" has to do with method, not subject matter. SPECIFICO talk 18:28, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Fixing ping error @HandThatFeeds: above. SPECIFICO talk 19:19, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

I never said that I don't understand what HandThatFeeds is saying. I agree that science (no scare quotes) has to do with method, and Critical Race Theory (and related areas of academia that we're talking about here) do not follow the scientific method. -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:35, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

One more thing, @SPECIFICO: Please stop stalking me. -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:43, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

If you have sources for Critical Race Theory (and related areas of academia that we're talking about here) do not follow the scientific method, I suggest you present them and they may help you to elucidate any concerns you have about the article or any content you feel should be included. SPECIFICO talk 19:22, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

As I've asked you kindly several times before, stop following me to random articles. -Thucydides411 (talk) 22:12, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

SPECIFICO Critical Race Theory is not a Science and there's plenty of criticism from scholars about it, even on its wikipedia page. No reliable sources call it a Science or claim it's following the scientific method.--ColumbiaXY (talk) 07:39, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

OK so now you've repeated Thuc's assertion above, but neither of you has responded to my request. I've rebutted your assertion in several posts on this page. I think you're getting tied up in language. It's possible to discuss White Privilege in terms of factual assertions that can be tested against observed evidence, and for these purposes that makes it a legitimate field of inquiry, measurement, classification, discussion, inference, and all the other things credible social scientists do. What good does it do to deny the facts because you don't like the way they are discussed? SPECIFICO talk 20:27, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

fields like Critical Race Theory or Freudian psychoanalysis I see the problem now. You equate modern peer-reviewed social sciences with Victorian-era early psychoanalysis, and paint them as equally invalid. That's a serious category error and colors your entire understanding of the matter. That's why you don't see my stance as reasonable: you're equating all social sciences with century-old therapy techniques. It's not equivalent. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 19:49, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

No, the problem is actually much simpler than that. It is patently absurd to claim that interpretive frameworks in the social sciences have the same level of solidity as theories in the hard sciences. If you believe that they do, then you're going to have to decide which of the many mutually contradictory "truths" that the different social science theories develop is actually true. Which, exactly, of the following philosophies should Wikipedia declare to be true? Critical Theory, Post-Structuralism, Marxism, Postmodernism? They all have their journals full of peer-reviewed papers. But they also contradict one another on very basic points, and we obviously can't proclaim all of them to be true without entering into contradiction. A central problem with this article, in particular, is that it takes a highly polemical concept from one of these fields, which is very controversial beyond the circle of practitioners of that field, and treats it as if it were the correct interpretation of society, largely sweeping the criticisms under the rug. That's just not appropriate for Wikipedia to do. -Thucydides411 (talk) 22:10, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

This elaborate description of social sciences isn't "much simpler". It's also not anything new, but either way it seems needlessly complex. It is holding social science to a higher, more arbitrary standard than physical sciences. The purpose of this proposal was, ostensibly, to highlight a specific issue some academics have with this term's use in pedagogy. Extrapolating from that subtle point to decry all social sciences as lacking rigor tips the hand that this is just an excuse to complain about something else entirely. It also doesn't match reliable sources (or my personal experience). A term, or a larger framework, is often used to understand a more complex situation. You can try and use quantum mechanics to explain racism, if you want to, but it's not going to get you very far, is it? Instead, people who study these fields develop different approaches. Some of these are more complicated, and more contentious, then others. This doesn't invalidate them, and even when people dislike the conclusions, that doesn't make them somehow less real or less legitimate than physical sciences. Grayfell (talk) 04:19, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

The fact that there are multiple mutually contradictory interpretative frameworks does indeed make them less solid than the sciences. We're not talking about scientific fields, and it's frankly ridiculous to say that disagreeing with Critical Race Theory's view of society is like denying climate change. It's pretty scary that there are several editors here trying to elevate CRT to the same level as climate science. Wikipedia cannot declare one or another sociological theory to be the truth. It should describe the theory and the relevant criticisms. -Thucydides411 (talk) 08:09, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Agree - Thucydides411 (talk) is correct here. Putting Critical Race Theory or other political discipline on equal footing with the psychical sciences is like putting the claims in OpEd articles in BuzzFeed on equal footing with those in Nature magazine. This article is clearly biased in favor of political claims coming from the field of Critical Race Theory - a field which some would want us believe should be given weight over any other academic discipline, since its theories and definitions are, for unclear reasons, as legitimate as physical sciences.--ColumbiaXY (talk) 06:21, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Thucydides411 (talk) is quite correct. We now need to move to specific proposals to include the critical arguments. Keith Johnston (talk) 08:55, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

@Keith Johnston: That requires that we first reach consensus, which is not likely to occur through heated debates about content issues such as science vs social science. In an exchange with Thucydides411 above, I've suggested that if both sides compromise, we can proceed to specific edits, and I've proposed as a possible compromise that we all agree that (1) this article needs to give due coverage to responsible critics of theories and approaches that focus around the term white privilege, and (2) the existence of white privilege as a phenomenon is not in contention. To put it another way, we would agree to add the viewpoints of moderate critics, but not the more extreme ones (such as conservative pundits and bloggers). NightHeron (talk) 12:15, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

NightHeron (talk) I sympathise, but consensus on what changes, exactly? I believe its better to propose precise changes backed by rs than have a general debate about white privilege which is unlikely to lead to concrete suggestions.Keith Johnston (talk) 13:18, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

@Keith Johnston: I added a new section on white privilege pedagogy that I hope satisfies the editors who objected to and reverted my earlier edit. I did not change the lede, and I put my sources in a section on pedagogy rather than a section labeled 'criticisms'. Hopefully it won't get reverted. Please read the whole article in its present form. I think you'll find that there's actually quite a bit of criticism of various aspects of how white privilege is used to frame the issue of racism. On the other hand, many editors rightfully insist that white privilege is a phenomenon that indisputably exists, and any claim to the contrary is fringe. My own feeling is that the article in its present form now does a pretty good job of complying with both WP:NPOV and WP:FRINGE. NightHeron (talk) 13:43, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, status quo ante works for me. We already cover critical arguments in the article. The fact that the far right don't like the fact of white privilege really isn't our problem to fix. Guy (help!) 12:02, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy I don't see how it's possible to say that in its present form the article gives due coverage to criticism. But I agree with you that we should not include criticisms from the far right, per WP:FRINGE. NightHeron (talk) 12:15, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree with JzG here. There are areas of "Physics" that are inconsistent with areas of "Chemistry" among the most widely recognized "sciences". It is to be expected that a relatively new area of inquiry -- currently labeled (among others) "White Privilege" -- will be less well-organized and canonized than long-established sciences. That does not invalidate it. Among the established social and behavioral sciences -- economics, psychology, and others -- we see an intermediate stage of development, wherein there are broad areas of common frameworks but still many apparent contradictions and unexplained phenomena. Attacks on the concepts relating to White Privilege appear to stem from denial or opposition to its nascent, sometimes imperfectly-stated, conclusions. SPECIFICO talk 14:24, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

I don't think we need to debate whether or not social science theories can have the same validity as theories in the natural sciences. White privilege is first of all a set of empirical facts that are indisputable. Secondly, the term refers to an approach to discussing racism and teaching students about racism that is controversial, even among people who are deeply committed to combatting racism. The article I cited from the Harvard Educational Review (in my edit that was reverted) is an example of responsible mainstream criticism. NightHeron (talk) 14:51, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

@NightHeron: White privilege is not a set of empirical facts. It's a theory of the structure of society that comes from Critical Race Theory (CRT). There are certain statistical discrepancies between whites and African Americans in the US that Critical Race Theorists argue constitute a form of privilege, but this interpretation is very contentious, not least because: 1. The idea that oppression of one group equals a privilege for another is an invention of CRT that is widely disputed, 2. There is a lot of argument about whether the primary divide is race- or class-based, since there are also many privileged African Americans and many poor whites, 3. There is the argument that the success (on average) of many non-white minority groups (such as Nigerians or Indians) in the US indicates that white skin does not confer a privilege. White privilege theory is not just the acknowledgement of certain empirical facts about the distribution of wealth. It's an interpretation based on those facts (and according to critics, it ignores many facts that contradict the interpretation). -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:03, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

All three of your points are debates within the framework of the theory. They do not invalidate its status as an observed phenomenon or as a field of science. So your argument doesn't actually alter anything. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:51, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

You're confusing the notion of observed phenomenon (ie: statistical differences in income among groups) with political interpretations of empirical observations (ie: what Critical Race Theory claims to be behind those differences). --ColumbiaXY (talk) 06:40, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

This view presents such a garbled misunderstanding of fact, theory, explanation, and empirical tests that it cannot even be discussed. SPECIFICO talk 18:16, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Thucydides411, no, actually, the concept predates any such argument and is based on empirical observation. White privilege has always existed (ask any random sample of black and white people how many times they have been unable to hail a cab). It's only the theory of measuring and describing it that's relatively new.

On a personal note, as one who benefits from a great deal of privilege, as a middle-class white guy from a thousand-year-old school with a stable family background and all the rest, I find it disturbing when people can't see that denying privilege is in itself a form of privilege. No black man can walk out of the door in America or the UK and say "right, today, I will pretend I have no disadvantage due to the colour of my skin", and expect to have that survive until the end of the day, whereas any white man can successfully pretend that being white confers no privilege and can preserve this delusion indefinitely simply by ignoring the evidence of their own eyes. Guy (help!) 09:58, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Re: hailing a cab. Many years ago on the show "TV nation" Michael Moore ran a clip where he had asked a successful, well-known and wealthy black actor (Yaphet Kotto) to stand on a street corner in New York and try to get a taxi. Kotto was dressed in a suit, carrying a baby in one arm and a bouquet of flowers in the other. One empty cab after another passed him without stopping. Then Moore had a white ex-felon, dressed in scruffy clothes, do the same. He got a cab right away. That's white privilege. NightHeron (talk) 13:10, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy The concept is fairly new actually (not even 5 decades), does not exist everywhere and has not always existed as you wrongly claim. The Trans-Saharan Slave trade where people from Southern and Eastern Europe, and the Caucasus were among the most often enslaved is just one counterexample to your claim. The Nogai slave raids in Eastern Europe is another such counterexample. And so are the Ottoman Slave Trade, the Armenian genocide and many, many others. Your examples are annecdotes, often personal, that seem to ignore the History of the World. You also seem to imply that your experience and history as a privileged American or Brit is equivalent to that of european Poles, Moldovans, Armenians, Chehens, Ukrainians, Georgians or Yazidis -and this is not a reasonable claim.--ColumbiaXY (talk) 07:58, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

ColumbiaXY, white privilege started existing after black people became people rather than property in majority-white countries - though you could make a solid case that Columbus having claimed to "discover" a country already inhabited by people who were perfectly well aware of its existence would also qualify. Guy (help!) 00:44, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy, this article is about a concept from CRT. It's important to keep this in mind, because many of the arguments for excluding criticism here revolve around essentially the following argument: "I think white privilege is obvious because of XYZ empirical observations, so any fundamental criticisms of the idea are WP:FRINGE." The problem is that we're discussing a sociological concept which is actually strongly criticized by academics from other fields (for example, Marxists) and social commentators outside academia. Regardless of what you or I think about whether the concept is obviously right or wrong, or whether you think its disturbing to disagree with it (as many social commentators and academics do) or not, the prominent criticisms of the concept should be described in the article. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:46, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

@Thucydides411: The article is not about a concept from CRT. It's about white privilege, a phenomenon that existed well before CRT existed. More precisely, as I wrote earlier, it's about both the phenomenon and the idea of framing discussions of racism around the term white privilege. The latter, as you say, is promoted by CRT, among others. If you read through the article in its present form, I think you'll find that there's actually a lot of criticism. Some, but not all, relates to the use of the "white privilege" framing of discussions of racism in educational settings. Criticism has not been kept out of the article. On the other hand, the claim that there's no such thing as white privilege or that it's not notable would be fringe. NightHeron (talk) 19:47, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

NightHeron, exactly. Especially in the United States, where the legacy of slavery is part of the very fabric of the country. Guy (help!) 23:09, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

There are many empirical facts to which the term white privilege clearly applies in the sense of the common meaning of the words white and privilege, that is, an unearned/undeserved benefit that someone gets as a direct result of discrimination against people of color and of being white, a benefit that would be enjoyed by most any white person in that situation and not by a person of color. Above I gave a couple of examples. Those instances of white privilege would exist even if Critical Race Theory had never existed, and they cannot be denied. These facts exist even though one can point to non-white groups with privilege, to white groups without privilege, and to whites who get privileges for reasons other than being white. Legitimate controversy arises when writers extend the use of the term white privilege in ways that don't agree with the common meaning of "privilege", such as the absence of oppression. Critics can also object to the notion that white privilege terminology and analysis is the best way to frame the problem of racism and is the best way to teach students (white privilege pedagogy). Can we try to reach consensus about some of this? NightHeron (talk) 20:20, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

@NightHeron: Even assuming that all your empirical claims were true, the idea that not being discriminated against is a "privilege" is something that was promoted by CRT, and which many critics point out does not accord with what the word "privilege" generally means (a benefit reserved for a few). That's one of several prominent criticisms of the theory of white privilege. You keep on saying that white privilege theory is just a set of empirical observations, but it's not just that. It's an interpretation that extrapolates from several empirical observations. According to many critics, it both misuses the word "privilege" and ignores other empirical facts that undermine the theory (such as the success of African immigrants and other non-white immigrant groups in the US). The "legitimate" controversy over white privilege theory extends far beyond educational theory. There is legitimate controversy over the core of the theory. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:29, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

@Thucydides411: The examples I've given, such as the cab-hailing episode on "TV Nation", amount to more than just the absence of discrimination. In a city with many people wanting taxis (this was in the pre-Uber days) taxi drivers could afford to be picky. If it weren't for race, a driver would normally prefer a well-dressed guy (who'd be likely to leave a big tip) to a poorly-dressed seedy-looking guy (who might not pay or at least would be less likely to tip). However, the point of Michael Moore's little experiment was to show that not only was Yaphet Kotto discriminated against, but also the white guy was automatically accepted and not viewed critically as he would have been if the driver had not been distracted by his own racist preference. Similarly, in the case of my acquaintance who had overstayed her visa but was skipped over by Immigration because of her skin color, she was afforded a benefit beyond what she "deserved" that was not available to the majority of bus passengers, who were Latino. That's a form of privilege, as the word is normally understood. NightHeron (talk) 19:36, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Is this your opinion, or can you cite sources for all the assertions you attribute to "many..." etc.? Please state what you refer to as "legitimate controversy over the core of the theory." Otherwise, this comes off as cable news punditry and handwaving and it does not enable other editors to give substantive responses that might lead to resolution of some or all of what you say. SPECIFICO talk 17:38, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Certainly. In his book, Intellectuals and Race, Thomas Sowell agues that 'privilege' represents an effort by the intelligencia to "downplay or discredit achievement by verbally transforming it into privilege".

Full quote is:

"The very concept of achievement fades into the background or disappears completely in some of the verbal formulations of the intelligencia, where those who turn out to be more successful ex poste are depicted as being privileged ex ante. How far this vision can depart from reality was shown by a report titled 'Ethno-racial inequality in the City of Toronto', which said "The Japanese are among the most privileged group in the city because they were more successful economically than either other minorities there or the white majority'. What makes this conclusion grotesque is a documented history of Japanese discrimination in Canada where people of Japanese ancestry where interned during the second world war longer than Japanese Americans. Efforts of the intelligencia to downplay or discredit achievement by verbally transforming it into privilege are by no means by no means confined to the Japanese minority in Canada." Intellectuals and Race, pp52-53, Basic Books (12 Mar. 2013) 978-0465058723 Keith Johnston (talk) 19:09, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

The core of the theory is that whites benefit disproportionately as against other ethnic groups. Yet In England, working-class whites are doing badly when it comes to higher education. A 2015 report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that white British pupils in the lowest socio-economic quintile are 10 per cent less likely to participate in higher education than any other ethnic group in that quintile. But it isn’t just whites from disadvantaged backgrounds who are struggling. According to the Department for Education, whites in general made less progress in England’s schools in 2018 than Asians, blacks or Chinese. These facts do not support the theory.

When it comes to income, whites are also lagging behind some other ethnic groups. In 2016, white Americans had a median household income of $67,865, lower than Indonesian Americans ($71,616), Pakistani Americans ($72,389), Malaysian Americans ($72,443), Sri Lankan Americans ($73,856), Filipino Americans ($84,620), Taiwanese Americans ($90,1221) and Indian Americans ($110,026). These facts do not support the theory. Keith Johnston (talk) 19:49, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Apologies, @NightHeron and Keith Johnston: -- my previous request for citations was in response to @Thucydides411:.

No problem. Here Phoebe Maltz Bovy subtitled her book - The Perils of Privilege: Why Injustice Can't Be Solved by Accusing Others of Advantage (ISBN: 9781250091208) She also claims "the main result of privilege talk is scrappiness one-upmanship among the privileged." https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/05/check-your-check-your-privilege/361898/

No-one is seeking to deny that privileged people exist, or that racism exists, but they don't see all ethnic group differences as evidence of "white privilege", especially since whites are not the groups which are doing the best. Keith Johnston (talk) 21:50, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, again, ask any white person if they have ever had trouble hailing a cab in Dallas. Guy (help!) 23:07, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for raising this it may be the key to unlocking the difference in views. It appears many editors believe that white privilege and racism are synonyms. But critics of white privilege point out that to blame an entire ethnic group (whites) for the sins of a minority is unfair and some even go as fa as calling that conceptualization itself racist. Others note that poor whites in particular suffer discrimination so the conceptualization is best one of class, not race. Naturally it would be quite wrong to claim that racism does not exist, so its understandable if editors believe that is what is happening they object quite forcefully. The solution would be to make this clear in the text by emphasizing the critics of the concept are not denying the existence of racism. Keith Johnston (talk) 08:01, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

@Keith Johnston: No, I think there's already agreement that white privilege means something different from racism. It's a consequence of certain (not all) situations when racism is present. None of the editors is "blaming" all white people for anything. Even the direct beneficiaries of white privilege are not necessarily to blame for anything and are not necessarily racist. For example, my British acquaintance (who overstayed her visa but was skipped over when Immigration stopped the bus) was a beneficiary of white privilege, as she would happily admit. But she wasn't to blame for anything. As I wrote before, at present there's quite a lot of criticism in the article. Not of the existence of white privilege as a phenomenon, but rather of the idea that the "white privilege" framing is the best lens through which to view racism. Saying that the focus on white privilege in Critical Race Theory is excessive and should be dialed back -- a viewpoint of many responsible people, including some who are deeply committed to combatting racism -- is very different from claiming that there's no such thing as white privilege or that it's not a "thing" that merits treatment in Wikipedia. NightHeron (talk) 12:24, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Thanks I was not suggesting that any editors are blaming all white people. Rather I am talking about the views reliable sources take of white privilege. For example here is JD Vance, author of Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis: "One side sees white privilege while the other sees anti-white racism. There is no room for agreement or even understanding." https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/08/race-relations-getting-worse-america-why/?itm_source=parsely-api

Here is David French "conservative white Americans look at urban multicultural liberalism and notice an important fact: Its white elite remains, and continues to enjoy staggering amounts of power and privilege. So when that same white elite applauds the decline of “white America,” what conservatives often hear isn’t a cheer for racial justice but another salvo in our ongoing cultural grudge match, with the victors seeking to elevate black and brown voices while remaining on top themselves." https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/08/great-white-culture-war-race-political-divides/?itm_source=parsely-api

Here is Dennis Prager "So then why all this left-wing talk about white privilege? The major reason is in order to portray blacks as victims. This achieves two huge goals for the Left — one political, the other philosophical. The political goal is to ensure that blacks continue to view America as racist.The political goal is to ensure that blacks continue to view America as racist." You can see from these examples that many mainstream conservatives fundamentally disagree with the conceptualisation of white privilege and believe it is part of a wider anti-white, anti-conservative worldview. These are controversial views amongst those on the liberal-left, but they are not fringe views.Keith Johnston (talk) 14:43, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, Dennis Prager? Seriously? GTFOH. Guy (help!) 00:35, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, white privilege and racism are not synonymous, but they are related. White privilege is, in large part, the state of not being subject to racism. The condition of not having to even be aware of racism. The worldview where racism does not exist because it's never happened to you. Guy (help!) 00:36, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

@Keith Johnston: There are a large number of empirical facts that show that whites sometimes get privileges because of skin color. It's unclear to me from your quotes from the National Review whether or not the conservatives are denying those facts, that is, whether or not they're claiming that there's no such thing as white privilege. In the US some conservative politicians and pundits have been adopting fringe views, denying scientific facts (anthropogenic climate change, evolution, etc.) and other facts. However, if all the conservative pundits are doing is complaining that liberals and progressives talk too much about white privilege, then that opinion is not necessarily fringe. But I'm not sure it's relevant to the article, since we have much more credible critics of white privilege framing who are already quoted in the article. Also, please remember that we're not interested in a false balance. The claim (alluded to in the JD Vance quote) that the real problem is anti-white racism is just a case of right-wing anger, and it's fringe. Also we should keep in mind that Wikipedia is international, and politics in the US is skewed to the right of the international average. So some of what passes for "mainstream conservative" in the US can still be fringe, such as climate change denialism, evolution denialism, and white privilege denialism. NightHeron (talk) 16:18, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

If you have reliable sources that help contextualise the arguments set out by such conservatives all good. We are here to report reliable sources views on a topic including critical arguments. what we cannot do is pretend arguments in reliable sources don't exist or pre-empt them with original research. given this, my personal opinions on white privilege is not relevant, only reliable sources are Keith Johnston (talk) 16:37, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

What I'm suggesting is that a well-known scholarly journal (such as Harvard Educational Review) is a better source than a political magazine for conservative pundits (National Review). I think that the criticism that's now in the article provides balance and is well-sourced. There is no need for additional low-quality sources when we already have high-quality ones. NightHeron (talk) 18:28, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, this has been a useful discussion. I find it useful in this article to focus on specific proposed changes, which I will do in due course. In the meantime the NPOV noticeboard discussion is ongoing and I note that since the creation of this section two new and uninvolved editors support the contention that it is not neutral and not a scientific fact. I shall leave it to an uninvolved editor to summarise the entire discussion once it concludes. Keith Johnston (talk) 18:35, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Keith Johnston, just be sure you cite reliable sources. Which means not Dennis Prager, National Review, Breitbart, InfoWars, Tinfoil Hat Monthly or anything else but solidly peer-reviewed academic research. Guy (help!) 00:41, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Do you include journals in Critical Race Theory as "solidly peer-received academic research"? Such journals exist in order to perpetuate CRT. They're not going to publish essays (since that's really what we're talking about, not scientific articles) that dispute the existence of white privilege. The National Review publishes political essays from a different perspective. I see no reason why CRT journals would be given more weight on Wikipedia than prominent conservative publications like the National Review. -Thucydides411 (talk) 23:50, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Thucydides411, if you define CRT journals as any journal with a scope that is narrowly focused on CRT then that would be reasonable. I would not cite the Journal of Critical Race Theory (if such a thing existed) not because it's unreliable but because some people here would not accept it just on that basis.

If, on the other hand, you define it as any journal that includes discussion of white privilege, then no. Guy (help!) 16:58, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Reverted rewrite of lead sentence

The rewrite introduced confusion about the term white privilege. It describes it as a sociological concept, and then later in the paragraph traces it back to European colonialism and the Atlantic slave trade. Whereas write privilege as a phenomenon has its roots in much earlier times, the sociological theories related to white privilege do not have roots from hundred of years ago. In any case, these issues have been discussed at length on this talk page, and consensus is needed before making changes in the lead. NightHeron (talk) 17:00, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

I read the other section and didn't notice this section, oops! Anyway the discussion is here. Regarding consensus it's hard to determine at this point, a good number of editors are split in terms of what should be done in said discussion.SprayCanToothpick (talk) 18:50, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Indeed, consensus is difficult to determine. There have been large numbers of editors who have objected to the overall tone of the article (describing a contested sociological concept as a fact) and relative lack of criticism, but they've been repeatedly chased away (for example, see the above talk section, "Bias in the article"). -Thucydides411 (talk) 13:46, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Equally there have been many editors whose assumption has been that because they reject the concept of white privilege, so it is not a thing, and they will not accept any other answer. Newsflash: white privilege is a thing. Guy (help!) 15:14, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

The problem is subjective comments like "Newsflash: white privlige is a thing." keep getting made and have no actual policy weight. If everyone here focused on Wikipedia policy rather than subjective opinions it could be a productive discussion. I respect and thank @NightHeron:, while holding a differing opinion, for engaging in such policy discussion and hope to follow up to him once I have enough time to.SprayCanToothpick (talk) 03:59, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

SprayCanToothpick, actually the problem is people who are here to try to deny that white privilege exists, because it causes them cognitive dissonance. Wikipedia documents the fact that it exists. Same as we do with climate change, evolution and the rest. The fact that some people want it not to be so is our problem only in as much as it causes these arguments. Guy (help!) 08:48, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

@SprayCanToothpick: I agree. We should focus on policy rather than subjective opinion. I think one fundamental issue that prevents agreement here, however, is that some people view Critical Race Theory as equivalent to biology or physics (that is, a science), while others (such as myself) see it as a more subjective field that can make arguments, but doesn't have a particular claim on truth (and certainly doesn't have more claim on truth than competing sociological theories). Those who view CRT as scientific truth view those who view it as subjective as "deniers", equivalent to people who deny evolution and climate change. Those who don't view CRT as a scientific field think equating CRT with evolution, climatology or physics is absurd, and don't think the article should push the view that CRT is correct. I don't know how to break this logjam, because these two different views (on whether CRT is a science) are fundamentally at odds. -Thucydides411 (talk) 11:33, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

@Thucydides411: At least in my case you're making an incorrect assumption. My opinion of CRT (which is irrelevant, except that you speculated about our opinions) is not entirely positive. I initially entered discussions on this page because I thought that more criticism from RS was needed especially in the area of white privilege pedagogy, which has been criticized by some educators. After discussions I added those criticisms in a new section on white privilege pedagogy. Personally, I happen to agree with the criticisms. My position is not that CRT should be immune to criticism. Apparently other editors whom you're arguing with also do not believe that CRT should be immune to criticism, because if they did believe that, they would have reverted my edits on white privilege pedagogy. NightHeron (talk) 12:07, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

NightHeron, indeed. In academic discourse, this is normal and expected. But criticism of CRT is not a critique of the fact of white privilege, which appears to be part of the error we see in the discourse above. Guy (help!) 12:11, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

@JzG: As a matter of fact, much of the criticism of CRT disputes the concept of white privilege. The article used to include some of this criticism (mostly removed now): [2]. Do you think Wikipedia should say that these criticisms are incorrect, in the same way that it would say that creationism is incorrect? -Thucydides411 (talk) 13:13, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

@Thucydides411: Note that the first sentence of the earlier version you're citing from 20 March 2014 defines white privilege as a phenomenon, not as a concept. Also it has a [note 1] giving several authors' definitions of the term, and all 7 of those authors define white privilege as a phenomenon, not as a theory. So the version you're citing actually supports the edit I made to the first sentence of the lead. NightHeron (talk) 14:52, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

@NightHeron: I'm not endorsing that version of the article. I'm just pointing you to the "Aspects" section, which contained criticism that disputed the concept of white privilege. You and Guy have essentially been saying that such criticism is fringe. -Thucydides411 (talk) 15:08, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411, you just undermined your own point. Guy (help!) 08:30, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Not at all. I pointed to a section in an old version of the article that cites a number of critics who dispute the concept of white privilege. That's a critique that NightHeron has been saying either doesn't exist or is fringe, but there it is in the old version of the article, sourced to two well-known social commentators. NightHeron ignored that section, and somehow assumed I was saying I agreed with everything in the old version of the article. It's irrelevant if the old version of the article says white privilege is a fact. What's relevant is that the critics NightHeron is saying don't exist do, in fact, exist in abundance. -Thucydides411 (talk) 01:31, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

I said that denying the existence of white privilege is fringe, but I have never said that it's "fringe" to criticize the use of white privilege analysis or framing of an issue on the grounds that it might not be accurate or helpful in a given situation. I didn't carefully read all of the criticism in the earlier version, but I didn't see any that claimed that there's no such thing as white privilege. Marxist criticism, for example, takes the position that it's much better to focus on class than on race, and that use of the term white privilege when talking to workers is divisive and counterproductive, especially since in most cases the white people among the workers are not big beneficiaries of white privilege. W. E. B. DuBois, who was philosophically pro-communist, would have undoubtedly agreed with that Marxist criticism, although he also talked about the ways that racism resulted in privileges for whites. NightHeron (talk) 16:34, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

"I said that denying the existence of white privilege is fringe": Then you're effectively calling the views expressed by Gordon Lewis, Naomi Zack and Eric Arnesen in the previous version of the article "fringe". "I didn't see any that claimed that there's no such thing as white privilege": That is essentially the claim being made by Lewis Gordon and Naomi Zack in the quotes presented in the previous version of the article. They do not think the concept reflects the reality of society, in which, in their view, most white people are not privileged. The disagreement is not only about whether white privilege is helpful to talk about, as you are claiming, but is also about whether the concept of white privilege accurately describes society at all. -Thucydides411 (talk) 22:13, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

The term white privilege accurately describes a phenomenon that exists in society. That's not to say that it is present everywhere or all the time. By analogy, no reasonable person could deny that government corruption is a phenomenon that exists. But that's not the same as saying that "government corruption accurately describes society". NightHeron (talk) 22:26, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

"The term white privilege accurately describes a phenomenon that exists in society": According to you, and according to Critical Race Theorists. Not according to many critics of the theory, two of whom I've just named for you. They're not fringe, and their views must be represented in the article. We've gone around in circles, and I've tried (and failed, so far) to get you to acknowledge the fact that many social commentators do not think that the concept of "white privilege" accurately describes society. Can you just acknowledge that one fact? I've demonstrated it above pretty clearly. -Thucydides411 (talk) 01:24, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

After "tried and failed" comes "drop stick." SPECIFICO talk 02:14, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

The term white privilege accurately describes a phenomenon that exists in society not a concept in a theory. To describe it as a concept is inaccurate. The article should clearly state it is a phenomenon. Attempts to describe it as a concept are WP:FRINGE   // Timothy::talk  02:04, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

TimothyBlue, the open RFC above leans to that view, certainly. Guy (help!) 13:48, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

// thanks JzG. From a look at the archives, it seems like this is unfortunately a perennial discussion.

Since it was mentioned here, I looked at the Male privilege article and this concept nonsense has actually made it into the lede. I was going to comment there and maybe open an RFC, not sure if the RFC would be appropriate at this time.   // Timothy::talk  15:16, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

TimothyBlue, oh good grief. Privilege is a thing. The fact that some privileged people like to think it isn't, is a big part of the problem. Guy (help!) 15:33, 14 January 2020 (UTC)