Privilege

To have "privilege" in a society means that an individual has unearned advantages based solely on race, sexual preference, and gender. Lisa Nakamura defines it as "a structural benefit that [individuals] receive without trying." Privilege is often given to those who fit a certain norm or ideal for what people in power should look and act like, as defined by a specific culture.

In the book White Reign edited by Kincheloe et al., the authors write:

"In US society, white is the norm; people of color are defined as deviating from that norm" (Weiler qtd. in Rains 80). In this sense, many whites do not conceive of themselves in racialized terms, even though their race matters very much in the social pecking order, in which power, prestige, and respect are distributed." This belief of white is the norm is so engrained it remains obscured from view, a natural as the air we breathe but do not see. This inability to see something that truly affects all of our lives contributes to the invisibility of white privilege as a corollary to racism. (80)

Whiteness is also immunity -- "Immunity carries with it a certain power, for being immune means not having to be mindful of that from which one is exempt. The complicity in racism that privilege provides remains nameless and unnoticed" (Kincheloe et al. 81).

In Western societies, participation in civic life has been a privilege of white men at the exclusion of women who were associated most often with domestic life. Men have historically been treated as more fit to reason through debates, vote for leaders in a democracy, and add their voices to the public sphere.

People who do not fit the norm of straight white male but who obtain privilege (through education, wealth, ambition, etc.) are often seen as outsiders even if they are equally or more qualified than the privileged norm.

In John Scalzi's essay, he uses the metaphor of playing a game and choosing a certain difficulty level for the player's character. The lower the difficulty level, the more privilege the player has by default. A player with a lot of privilege might still do badly at the game. As Scalzi writes, "You can lose playing on the lowest difficulty setting. The lowest difficulty setting is still the easiest setting to win on." According to Lisa Nakamura, this metaphor helps Scalzi explain "how race and gender confer automatic, unasked-for, mechanical advantages on players who are lucky enough to be born white and male. Just like the difficulty level one chooses while playing a game, these advantages gradually become invisible as the player becomes immersed in the game." Likewise, in society, the privileges from which an individual benefits are often invisible to the person who is benefiting.

Works Cited

Kincheloe, Joe L. et al., eds. White Reign: Deploying Whiteness in America. New York: Palgrave Macmillan Trade, 2000. Print.

Nakamura, L. (2012) "Queer Female of Color: The Highest Difficulty Setting There Is? Gaming Rhetoric as Gender Capital." Ada: a Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, No. 1. doi:10.7264/N37P8W9V

Scalzi, John. "Straight White Male: The Lowest Difficulty Setting That There Is." Whatever. 15 May 2012. Web.