Unpacking White Priviledge
I recently watched an Instagram live feed as a young, white, able bodied feminist struggled with her privileged and whether or not she should speak on behalf of Middle Eastern women and what their experience is like.
For many of us, we might be thinking, how dare she. Am I right? You mean to tell me that she thinks her privilege gives her the right to speak on behalf of an experience she has no clue about?
Well of course she does. It’s not her fault. Like many of us who find ourselves lost and struggling with who we are, we know what we know and not what we don’t know because that’s all we were taught.
At first glance, I was thinking that exact same thought. In fact, it made me realize that in all my life I never felt entitled to speak on behalf of an experience of another individual or ethnicity of which I know nothing about. NEVER. So it was not easy for me to emphasize with her present dilemma. It was easy for me to take up opposing arms because that was all I knew.
And that is where we overlapped. The feeling of being limited by a lack of knowledge…a lack of understanding of ourselves as well as others.
Upon second thought, I had so much admiration for this young woman. I realized, she was on her live feed seeking clarity, asking women of color if what she was considering is an acceptable thing to do. Of course, there was a resounding “no” from the women in her audience.

I won’t deny that I was flooding her comments. I and others were letting her know it was not a good idea and commending her for sharing her journey and seeking guidance as she did her best to navigate and make sense of the various privileges she had including able-bodied, cisgender, heterosexual, and yes, her white priviledge. There was so much pulchritude in it.
She also inquired about alternative suggestions. I was proud to witness this transpiring and it has given me a totally new perspective of priviledge. Some people are not as aware as others. There are people out there who don’t know how to make sense of it and doing their very best to unpack their white privilege and all of the other types of privilege as well.
