I just read an awful article on white privilege. I hate it when people conflate race with money. Being white doesn't mean you're automatically rich and educated. It just correlates with a higher likelihood of being rich and educated. The color you are at birth certainly doesn't predispose you to anything, except maybe some last vestiges of racism that exist in forgotten neighborhoods in the south.
It's crazy. Of course they get these statistics that say that black people are more likely to be accused of stealing, are more likely to be thrown in jail, are more likely to get the death penalty, are less likely to succeed, are more likely to drop out of high school. It's a culture that unfortunately is predisposed to failure. White people in the same situations perform the same. As do hispanics. And black people born to wealthy, privileged, or middle class black parents perform almost on par with their white counterparts. Its just that it's less likely to be born into privilege if you're black. And of course it's less likely! Desegregation isn't even 50 years old! Black people haven't had access to quality public education -- really, they still don't. Education levels are more closely correlated with future wealth than race and future wealth, when education is controlled for. People tend to marry within their own classes, to people who speak the same as them, act the same as them, and look the same, which is why black people tend to marry black people and have black children in black ghettos.
The segregation of black people in America created an environment in which they were left to create their own culture. They weren't allowed to interact with upper class whites. So they created their own languages and customs in a closed off environment. And after desegregation, it wasn't as though black parents were going to send their kids off to college. Even white people who haven't had a college education aren't likely to send their white children off to college. So it was more difficult for black people to succeed initially, and this has trickled down over the last 50 years to help create a cyclical culture of not-succeeding. (Our sucky public education system has also added to this)
It has,after all, only been 50 years. It is difficult to completely transform the values and habits of your grandparents over this time period. These kids eschew college, as their gradnparents never went, and nobody at school is telling them to go. So they grow up, surrounded by wealth, have nothing, and steal. Everyone else steals. Its normal. But they are marked, by their manner of speaking, their clothing, their names, their walk. It is so clear who is a black man or woman from the ghetto. And they are discriminated against. I am not contesting this.
But I also say that if you take a white person, and you give them a gold tooth, dredlocks, an ebonic accent, a "black" swagger, and an unusual name, they will be discriminated against in exactly the same way.
It is culture that is discriminated against. Some dumbasses are still afflicted by pure racism, but the majority of America is simply guilty of being distrustful of another culture with a strong history of crime. The color of your skin is a minor player in this discourse. Education levels, culture, and wealth are the true factors, and it is a disappointing, temporary reality that skin color is strongly correlated (though not causal!!!!!!!!) with a lifetime of failure.
