@“Cardinal Fang” I don’t think a lot of people had it top of mind, which was kind of my point. I was really surprised when I started reading the posts on this thread expressing surprise at his beliefs. I think that we are just conditioned to certain assumptions we make when viewing people.
@hunt there were previous efforts to get the mural removed, which clearly got less attention than occupying the President’s office. At least I know that some student groups were handing out flyers about the mural at the beginning of the school year this year, and that it was a “thing” within the college.
I knew about Woodrow Wilson, but only because of reading Joyce Carol Oates, Princeton novel, The Accursed which made me investigate him further. It is not something ever taught in any history class I took, which is a big problem imho.
Although I’m late to the discussion of “privilege” I recognize that I have huge privilege as the result of the circumstances of my birth. That doesn’t make me bad. It is just who I am, just like my height and hair color, and lack of musical talent are part of who I am. What I do with that privilege is what defines me as moral or immoral. imho.
I think it is true that occupying the president’s office is more likely to get things done than having a discussion of issuing a position. That isn’t in itself a justification.
Threatening to sue is in many cases more likely to get you want you want than a friendly meeting. Whether or not this is an appropriate response depends entirely on the issue at hand. Depending on the circumstances, the threat can be anything from a desperate but necessary last resort to an absurd and obnoxious overreaction.
So, if everyone is using a different definition, what’s the point? It is quite literally a disconnect in the conversation. If we’re going to talk about this, discussing the formal definition (and the common misunderstandings) is a good place to start.
As I said in my previous posts, we are in agreement. Instead, you have to explain what you mean. Not the person who would be told that: the person who is trying to explain privilege to you for whatever reason. You don’t have to explain anything: your part is to listen, that’s all. I’m pleased with the direction the thread is going, because we’re actually discussing the issue here, and it seems like the misconception is much more disagreeable than the actual concept.
I guess the big problem is that the phrase now has this connotation when it has little to do with that.
To Harvest Moon, there’s obviously a lot more going on there than what you led on. I can’t possibly see how a single headband comment between two friends would cause any of that. My primary guess is that more was said than a simple headband comment, and that’s the story the kids are telling to the adults. Either way, anecdotal cases are distracting from the matter at hand.
Perhaps this is a rather naive question, but are the protesters proposing solutions to help bring about real change? I am not sure how to ask my question and I am afraid it is going to be misconstrued, but it is asked in sincerity for the many young lives impacted. I spent several yrs working with young girls from the inner-city projects. The girls ranged in age from K-5th grade. These children faced immense hurdles. They had no family or home life stability; many moved from one residence to another frequently (an aunt, a grandmother, a friend). There was no support for academics. They lived in poverty with far more implications than financial poverty.
I agree whole heartedly with the protesters that black lives matter. But, is raising awareness of racism going to break the cycle or are the hurdles are much more complicated? How can we as a society bring the stability to these young lives that will help them move out of all of the types of poverty?
The only “more going on there” is the simmering racial tension that appears to be present on many campuses today. When you have this sort of tension present, even the most benign comment or event can precipitate an unnecessary or unwarranted escalation. In this environment that “escalation” becomes a weapon unto itself.
My initial understanding of what transpired did not come from the students, rather from my D’s advisor and the Dean of Students. There were too many students present for there to be any misconstruing of the facts.
But you are correct, my anecdotal comments are my experiences only and might be distracting from the bigger conversation.
A lot of the less savory aspects of US notables, institutions, and history tend to be downplayed or omitted in K-12 coverage in most US school districts not only due to time limitations, but sometimes also due to the sensitivities of the local school board and a critical mass or majority of parents in said school district.
I recalled reading a dead tree article of one school district with a large presence of US military families where a new HS history teacher got reprimanded by the principal, local school board, and yelled at by many parents in the board meeting because he covered topics like the American-Philippine War, US Occupation of Haiti which President Wilson initiated in 1915, and the various US military interventions in Central America in the early 20th century which in their words…made the US and the US military “look bad”.
The only reason why I knew about Wilson’s racism or some of those wars was because my HS US history teacher made it a point to discuss those less covered aspects of US history and even then, struggled to do them justice due to the sheer amount of material she was mandated to cover by the NY State/City DOE regulations.
Even then, I had to do extra readings beyond what was covered in school to understand them even at a cursory level. The vast majority of students won’t go through the trouble unless they are already interested and open to going beyond class readings in a given subject/field to begin with.
Connotations, however, become indistinguishable from a phrase’s “true” meaning after a time. The phrase “check your privilege” is increasingly being used as shorthand for “You haven’t experienced the disadvantages I have, so how can you have an opinion on this issue affecting my group?” That implication is an accusation of insensitivity at the very least, and can be code for “Stop being such a misguided racist, you oblivious WASP male” at worst.
A “(derogatory term for gay men. Starts with “F,” ends with “T”)” used to mean a bundle of sticks. I don’t know of anyone who, upon being termed such a person, would think “He/she must be calling me a bundle of sticks.” A word or phrase’s meaning in everyday conversation can be different from the dictionary definition, and I believe this to be true of the phrase “Check your privilege.”
The impetus for Black Lives Matter was police shooting unarmed black people at alarming rates. One of the things BLM is asking for is for the police to stop shooting unarmed black people. Seems to me satisfying that particular demand would make a difference to a community, making them feel that the police were on their side, rather than being trigger-happy goons who fire at a black person when they wouldn’t have shot a white person in the same circumstances.
For example, the Chicago police officer who killed Laquan Wilson was just indicted for first degree murder. Wilson was killed more than a year ago, and the police had refused to release video of his death, though those who had seen it called it graphic and inculpating. Finally, once a judge ordered the release of the video, the officer was indicted. The community suspected a murder and a cover-up because there was a cover-up. The only way these crimes are going to stop is by the community demanding they stop.
Being asked to acknowledge you have privilege can feel like an attack. We all want to believe we did it all ourselves and being told we had advantages can somehow feel humiliating. But I bet we all know and roll our eyes at the people in the old quote: “Some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple”
Back to Wilson–I also didn’t know his racist history, even though I am from Virginia, and like to think that I know a lot of stuff. My expectation on first hearing about this dispute was that we’d learn that Wilson had some typically racist views of a person of his times, and that the whole thing was kind of silly. Well, it’s not as silly as I thought. It’s always wise to let some facts catch up before we stake a position out too strongly.
The derogatory term for gay men and the term for bundle of sticks are actually different words and spelled differently. The former has two gs…the latter just one.
Also, words and their meanings/connotations can evolve over time due to various factors. For instance, the term “Negro” historically was considered a polite way to describe African-Americans in the 19th century and into the early-mid-20th century.
However, by the mid-20th century onward, the connotation from the way it had been used used by many Whites towards African-Americans was such that it became one which was no longer acceptable to use in polite company.
On the flipside, the word “damn” was once considered so obscene that it was practically banned in some town ordinances against obscenity/profanity, censored from print publications, and prompted much controversy when used in films such as that famous Clark Gable line from a certain late '30s film depicting an idealized version of plantation life from the perspective of a southern White plantation owner and family. However, over the intervening decades, the word lost much of its obscene connotation to the point it’s commonly uttered even in polite company without much murmur.
Only exceptions I’ve noticed were among older generations and those who are extremely religiously conservative or socially old fashioned.
But see, that’s just it, CF. I participated in some of the early BLM protests. But “police are disproportionately killing minorities and rarely being held accountable” isn’t even in the same ballpark as “I have to go to a school with a building named after a racist.” Treating them as if they are equivalent - or demand similar types of activism – is absurd.
That doesn’t mean the question of how to deal with Wilson’s racism - and that of any number of other figures in American history – is invalid. But it does mean I’m going to look on these protests a heck of a lot less sympathetically than I would one protesting for more substantive changes.
Was the legacy of Wilson the only–or even the main–topic of the protest at Princeton? Not surprisingly, it got all the press, but does that actually reflect the issues?
Yes, Wilson’s racial views were “hidden in plain sight,” so to speak. And I’ll say it again…Princeton was long known, maybe still is, as 'the Northern School for Southern Gentlemen." I read a copy of an early 20th century essay, written by a southern alum of Princeton, who proclaimed that Princeton was a much more hospitable place than Harvard because the latter had a ‘prevalence of Negroes.’
And then there’s the famous story of New York Criminal Court Judge Bruce Wright. The late judge right became a minor celebrity in the 1980s for his critique of the judicial system in New York. A story that Judge Wright liked to tell is that Princeton responded to his application for admission in the 1940s with a letter which stated that he was rejected because there were few if any Negroes at Princeton and therefore the young Mr. Wright wouldn’t be happy there, despite his stellar academic preparation. To my knowledge, Princeton never denied the story. They just said they could find no record of such a letter.