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So You Want to Talk About Race
Privilege, in the social justice context, is an advantage or a set of advantages that you have that others do not.
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
runs whether we pull the levers or not, and by just letting it be, we are responsible for what it produces. We have to actually dismantle the machine if we want to make change.
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
Every day you are given opportunities to make the world better, by making yourself a little uncomfortable and asking, “who doesn’t have this same freedom or opportunity that I’m enjoying now?”
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
Instead of posting on Facebook: “This teacher shouted a racial slur at a Hispanic kid and should be fired!” you can say all that, and then add, “This behavior is linked to the increased suspension, expulsion, and detention of Hispanic youth in our schools and sets an example of behavior for the children witnessing this teacher’s racism that will
... See moreIjeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
We don’t want to think that we are harming others, we do not want to believe that we do not deserve everything we have, and we do not want to think of ourselves as ignorant of how our world works.
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
This becomes even stickier in social justice movements where you are targeting oppression. When you are supposed to be fighting the evils of “the man” you don’t want to realize that you’ve become “the man” within your own movement.
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
It is very hard to survive as a woman of color in this world, and I remember saying once that if I stopped to feel, really feel, the pain of the racism I encountered, I would start screaming and I would never ever stop.
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
But the same hammer won’t tear down all of the walls. What keeps a poor child in Appalachia poor is not what keeps a poor child in Chicago poor—even if from a distance, the outcomes look the same. And what keeps an able-bodied black woman poor is not what keeps a disabled white man poor, even if the outcomes look the same.
Ijeoma Oluo • So You Want to Talk About Race
At its core, police brutality is about power and corruption. Police brutality is about the intersection of fear and guns. Police brutality is about accountability. And the power and corruption that enable police brutality put all citizens, of every race, at risk. But it does not put us at risk equally, and the numbers bear that out.