You finally understand privilege, now check your FRAGILITY.
How its just not about you!
Guys, I’m mostly talking to you, but everyone should consider this. Fragility is a complex concept that I’m attempting to expand from the idea of white fragility. A phrase coined by author Dr. Robin DiAngelo, which is defined as “a state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves.” Let’s define the general concept of fragility as:
A state where a minimum amount of criticism, often directed at a group or another individual, is taken as a personal attack, triggering a range of defensive moves.
The trigger results from a paradox of including yourself into the group being criticized, when actually you are opposed or feel outside of said group. In the past couple years there have been several obvious instances where this reaction has been triggered. #metoo stories spawned #notallmen. #alllivesmatter was a reaction to #blacklivesmatter.
Plain and simple… ITS NOT ABOUT YOU!

One of the major problems with fragility is that the reaction tends to overshadow the original concern or point. We collectively end up spending more time consoling the fragile entity than hearing the criticism posed by the vulnerable entity.
I think we can all say we have been guilty of fragility at some point. I definitely have. I mean, it took me years to really understand my privilege. A concept that seems to escape you, until it doesn’t, and then its a 10,000 lb gorilla following you everywhere. I think fragility can be like that. It’s easy to fall into the paradox I spoke of earlier, where you defend a group because you feel inherently included in that group and therefore guilty.
You shouldn’t feel guilty. Why? ITS NOT ABOUT YOU!
In many instances, people who are otherwise allies in their current evolution, have gone through phases where they were not their best selves. They may have internalized guilt from previous situations where they caused harm or witnessed harm without helping. This guilt could make you reactionary as if you needed to defend your own past. If this is the case, what you need to do is own up to your mistakes and listen to what is being said.
If it was about you then, ITS NOT ABOUT YOU NOW!
I’m not saying the criticism doesn’t apply to you. On the contrary, it applies to all of us. If someone is explaining how a behavior is fetishization or triggering. They are trying to explain how a behavior makes THEM FEEL. If you force them to explicitly say that YOU didn’t make them feel that way, you are being fragile.
I’d like to bring up an example that really hit home for me. I saw a repost on FB of a young trans couple that transitioned in their teens. They were in love, they were beautiful, they represented hope for the future of identity equality. Someone on the thread, I’ll call them X, made a comment about the kids not having scars because they transitioned so early on. They made a statement that the scars are a point of pride for trans people. This person was not part of the gender nonconforming community. The first reaction to the comment was a thoughtful and well written criticism. The post simply stated, the way in which the comment about scars was made verged on fetishization of trans culture. Rather than make an assumption about a culture outside your own, it would have been better phrased as a question. This reaction also included a disclaimer that the author rarely commented on threads because of their fear of being marginalized. Well we both know what happened next. Person X went on the warpath. “I am not transphobic”, “I have friends who have told me stories of their scars and experiences”, “I’ve had experiences where I feel marginalized”, etc. This sub thread went on and on. The community kept trying to explain to person X that no one was implying they were a bad person. They were saying, you should listen, the person you are talking about is speaking. By taking this thoughtful criticism about a particular statement, as an attack on their entire personage, this is fragility. This sub thread took almost the entire attention away from the beauty of the original post.
Now multiply this by infinity and you have fragility on the internet today.
There are so many other examples of similar interactions, especially when it comes to the fragile male ego. If your are male and reading this, listen to me. When people comment that men are awful, think about it. We as a subspecies have been awful for the last…at least 10,000 years. Take colonialism for example…fail. Capitalism….fail. The patriarchy sucks and you know what, I can say that as a man and not hate myself. I can understand that criticism of male culture does not mean criticism of every male person. Men have been in control for as long as time and every system in place was created to keep that status quo. Are you going to cite scientific research to explain why men catcall? Guess what, science is also part of the patriarchy. Stop looking for excuses to legitimize bad behavior, that only reinforces the fragility paradox.
Here is the big point. When you hear a story about sexual assault, who do you identify with? Do you put yourself in the attackers perspective because they share your gender? Do you feel the need to justify them for all of your own questionable behaviors? Even worse, do you try to invalidate the accuser to make it all go away?
You don’t have to do anything. It’s not about you.
Listen. Try to empathize with the victim. If you do, you may actually learn something about yourself. Vulnerability is willingly facing the parts of you that scare you the most. Accept your own past decisions and try to understand their consequences. We are all fallible human beings who get to mistakes and grow from them. The sooner you accept that, the easier it will be to take criticism without becoming fragile.
