How CNN constructs 'Whiteness' by discussing Black Privilege

“So...white privilege, huh?”

It probably isn’t the best dinner-time conversation starter in the world, but it’s a conversation that needs to be had. Many, including members of my own family, are adamant that while such a concept did exist back in the time of what is usually essentialized as ‘segregation and all that stuff’ it certainly has no place now. This discourse is repeated time and time again: Racism is over and we are a society of equal opportunity where race no longer plays a part.

Right?

Wrong.

It is undeniable that the invisible and unnamed ‘white privilege’ is everywhere; minorities are still framed and discussed by their social, cultural and political contrasts to ‘us’ and ‘who we are’. This inherent Saidian binary is certainly at odds with the overriding claim that we are ‘all the same’. White discourse consistently seeks to de-contextualize issues of race from their historical and social roots of oppression, and along with it any grounds for the existence of white privilege. On the individual level this may not constitute much of a threat, but at the institutional level that the media operates on, the ramifications are significant.

Nowhere have I seen this practice illustrated more clearly than a recent CNN article entitled ‘It's time to talk about 'black privilege'. In its discussion on the ‘flipside’ of racial prejudice which is apparently emerging to favour non-whites, the article only confirms and reinforces what it is trying so hard to deny; the existence of white privilege in the modern world. The more the scholarship of ‘whiteness’ emerges as a legitimate field of racial discourse like any other, the harder society tries to deny it as being ‘natural’ and simply ‘how things are’.

But why? Surely if the ‘equality’ which deniers of white privilege insist has been achieved does exist, wouldn’t ‘whiteness studies’ be encouraged a way to scrutinize white racial discourse in an ‘equal’ manner to what minority discourses constantly face?

The answer of course is because equality has not been achieved in the manner in which skeptics promote. Refusing to acknowledge the collective issues that race still pose to society by being ‘colour-blind’ is much easier than facing the fact that we still live in a world which is for the most part neo-conservative. Ironically, as the tendency towards change increases towards what is already claimed to exist, the more that this move towards true equality is actually resisted and labelled as ‘reverse racism’. ‘Black Privilege’ is just one of many such examples of exnomination; because ‘black discourse’ can be named as such, this is representative of its inferiority in comparison with the dominant and unnamed white discourse. The backlash against the very phrase ‘white privilege’, therefore, is a reflection of the societal fear of losing this discursive dominance.

Sadly, the main point of the CNN article is not that radical in that it is a point of view which is being increasingly echoed; black people in the US are becoming increasingly favoured over whites as shown by celebrations like ‘black history month’ and racially specified scholarships and internships. This ignores the fact that this favour cannot actually exist when there isn’t a basis of equality in the first place.

This uneven playing field where race is concerned is blindingly obvious in that the writer of the article, a white male, directs the opening of the article to “...All you black folks complaining about racism in America. You don't know how good you have it.” He already occupies a pedestal which allows him to target black people specifically from a platform which is statistically shown to be more difficult for them to reach; there is no opportunity to ‘talk back’ or challenge this ‘whiteness’ at its most explicit. The position that the writer occupies is the position from which society currently makes sense of the world and all who occupy it; by actively choosing to minimize or even ‘forget’ the power structures which created white privilege, and by association the socially constructed artifice of ‘black privilege’, then this discourse will only continue to be reinforced.

The article not only suffers from this ‘social amnesia’ but actively denies the fact that white privilege exists at all; privilege is ‘earned’ and no racial discourse has any part in this except when it is the discourse of the minority in question. Only then does it constitute a problem which needs to be discussed and ‘dealt with’. This, in the words of bell hooks, can be seen as “actively coercing black folks to internalize negative perceptions of blackness, to be self-hating” by encouraging black people feel guilty for something they don’t actually possess in any ideological sense.

The article, however, does raise an important issue which prevents white privilege from being challenged; “you can’t even talk about whiteness.” To label the idea as ‘racist’ is to misunderstand the very objective which the field is trying to achieve; to create equality between racial discourses and to stop ‘white privilege’ from being the invisible force pervading society that it currently is. Of course, we already know that this is the case; why else do we have so much inequality on the basis of race? It is actually ‘us’ who are currently feeling guilt and anxiety over the privileges that we incur on the basis of the colour of our skin. This has been naturalized for so long that it’s only in the past decade that this ‘invisible’ discourse has begun to be openly challenged by both academics and everyday people. As the historical and cultural context that this privilege has developed from becomes more and more widely addressed, the atrocities which created white privilege are no longer hidden within the pages of literature.

It isn’t surprising or an overreaction that this notion of ‘whiteness’ and ‘white privilege’ makes us increasingly uncomfortable due to the ways in which we continue to benefit even today from these wrongdoings, though we obviously played no primary role in them. So how do we deal with these feelings? The answer is not to construct an opposing binary, Edward Said style, which we can push all of these feelings and actions onto to subvert ourselves as the oppressed. Feeling ‘guilty’ over white privilege, though understandable, does not help the fight against it in any way. It is right that we feel uncomfortable at the thought that we are benefiting from something which simultaneously disadvantages other groups, but if we are not working to actively change this, we not only benefit but are also tolerant of it. Paradoxically utilizing this discourse to try and distance ourselves from it is a sign of our complicity; this will only entwine us further. It is only by openly disavowing white privilege and stepping away from it that any progress will be made in eradicating the notion, and also the binary of ‘black privilege’ which implicitly supports it.

Sources:

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/30/us/black-privilege/index.html?sr=fbCNN033016black-privilege0209PMVODtopLink&linkId=22869099