SmokeAndMirrors
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- May 20, 2011
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I got a 31. I think I'm more privileged than that, for one reason the quiz should account for, and one reason it can't.
Firstly, although I have been incredibly poor, I am not now, and I was not during the formative years of my childhood. That made a BIG difference in how much all those other things affected me.
Secondly, although I have had a very complicated life and in many respects didn't get dealt the best hand, one thing I did get was support, and consequently unusually good self-esteem. And that has cancelled out a lot of problems I could have had, and which I have seen people have because they didn't grow up with as much support as I did.
As to those complaining about the mere concept of acknowledging their lucky births, contemplating one's privilege is not about feeling guilty. It is about realizing that perhaps some people's experience of life is very different from yours because of fundamental things you had that they don't. It's easy to tell a privileged kid with poor grades and no disabilities that they need to study harder, but that isn't helpful or practical to say to a poor kid with illiterate parents who is attending a school district that can't even afford to have a library.
Realizing your frame of life has given you opportunities that some people simply don't have helps us actually figure out what we can do to make those avenues open to them. Why is that poor kid's school so underfunded to begin with? How can we make it POSSIBLE for them to study harder? Because you can whine all day long about how they should study harder, but if they can't get books, their parents can't help, and their teachers spend the entire class simply trying to keep control because they have way too many students, where are they supposed to get it from?
Simply pretending those inequalities don't exist is doing nothing for anyone. You're simply insisting on continuing to be part of the problem.
ETA: It's really interesting, now that I've read the entire thread, to note that people are complaining that this quiz is "biased against" whatever their hobby horse is. Posters who have a bone about a particular issue inevitably think the quiz is "unfair" about that one issue, whatever it is, rather than perhaps considering that they themselves have a chip on their shoulder about it.
Interesting.
Firstly, although I have been incredibly poor, I am not now, and I was not during the formative years of my childhood. That made a BIG difference in how much all those other things affected me.
Secondly, although I have had a very complicated life and in many respects didn't get dealt the best hand, one thing I did get was support, and consequently unusually good self-esteem. And that has cancelled out a lot of problems I could have had, and which I have seen people have because they didn't grow up with as much support as I did.
As to those complaining about the mere concept of acknowledging their lucky births, contemplating one's privilege is not about feeling guilty. It is about realizing that perhaps some people's experience of life is very different from yours because of fundamental things you had that they don't. It's easy to tell a privileged kid with poor grades and no disabilities that they need to study harder, but that isn't helpful or practical to say to a poor kid with illiterate parents who is attending a school district that can't even afford to have a library.
Realizing your frame of life has given you opportunities that some people simply don't have helps us actually figure out what we can do to make those avenues open to them. Why is that poor kid's school so underfunded to begin with? How can we make it POSSIBLE for them to study harder? Because you can whine all day long about how they should study harder, but if they can't get books, their parents can't help, and their teachers spend the entire class simply trying to keep control because they have way too many students, where are they supposed to get it from?
Simply pretending those inequalities don't exist is doing nothing for anyone. You're simply insisting on continuing to be part of the problem.
ETA: It's really interesting, now that I've read the entire thread, to note that people are complaining that this quiz is "biased against" whatever their hobby horse is. Posters who have a bone about a particular issue inevitably think the quiz is "unfair" about that one issue, whatever it is, rather than perhaps considering that they themselves have a chip on their shoulder about it.
Interesting.
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