On “White Privilege”

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Whenever the topic of “white privilege” comes up, the near-universal response on the right is to bring up the existence of struggling white people. One often comes across a sepia-toned photograph of unkempt, underfed young white children, probably taken by Dorothea Lange, with the words “white privilege” emblazoned on it in scare quotes in the default Imgflip font. On the one hand, this meme works in our favor and is a clever way of stoking popular resentment toward the left. However, as an argument, it misses the point.

For the purposes of debates on the subject, I would suggest an alternative approach.

Certain leftist retards on the Internet invoke the concept of “white privilege” to convey the belief that whiteness is synonymous with wealth and that every single white person has the ability to accrue significant financial benefits on account of his or her whiteness. However, in theory, the concept of “white privilege” simply refers to the fact that America was created by and for white people and that white people have disproportionately benefited accordingly compared to other groups. Bringing up the existence of poor white people is analogous to insisting that that the existence of smart black people proves that there are no racial differences in IQ. It is not a sound rebuttal. Moreover, according to theorists of the concept, the benefits conferred by “white privilege,” are not merely material, but also social and psychological in nature.

It is an inarguable fact that white people have historically benefited from living in a country that we built. The only question is how much this affects present-day outcomes. Critical race theorists would argue that systemic inequality is the driving force behind racial disparities in income, intelligence, mortality rates, and so on, while hereditarians like myself attribute life outcomes primarily to genes. However, even if we could convince leftists that differences in outcomes are, say, 75% genetic in origin, I question whether it would change their worldview all that much. They would probably still obsess over the remaining 25% and use it to justify anti-white policies. (I am generally wary of over-reliance on race realist arguments, which are ideologically lacking in substance and thus more prone to subversion; see here.)

The response on the right to the concept of “white privilege” often comes from a place of personal outrage. Normie conservatives take offense at the suggestion that they advanced in life due to “white privilege” and not hard work, while the angry young men of the Alt Right (understandably, to be fair) bristle at the left’s dismissal of their misfortunes. More often than not, the discussion degenerates into an unproductive victimhood contest. Bringing up specific ways in which white people as a whole are disadvantaged today—e.g., anti-white hiring policies—is a more sound response than citing one’s own experiences or a random photograph of a poor white family, but even then, the end result is often the same.

It’s curious that right-wingers reflexively interpret the concept of “white privilege” to signify wealth, even though many, if not most, usages of the term have little to do with wealth. I would suggest that the non-material side of the equation does not occur to them because they have never been without it, like fish in water, and they lack theory of mind. This also applies to so-called “class reductionist” white male Marxists/communists, with whom the right has a bizarre, one-sided infatuation. (“Old-school” Marxists/communists are still subversive and wrong, but that’s a topic for another article.) 

One of the foundational texts on “white privilege” is Peggy McIntosh’s “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack,” in which she lists several “privileges” associated with whiteness. Most of them pertain to being a cultural outsider and being subject to stereotypes. For instance: “When I am told about our national heritage or about ‘civilization,’ I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.”

I am reminded of the following quotation from James Baldwin’s “Stranger in the Village,” an essay on the author’s experiences in Leukerbad, Switzerland:

For this village, even were it incomparably more remote and incredibly more primitive, is the West, the West onto which I have been so strangely grafted. These people cannot be, from the point of view of power, strangers anywhere in the world; they have made the modern world, in effect, even if they do not know it. The most illiterate among them is related, in a way that I am not, to Dante, Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Aeschylus, Da Vinci, Rembrandt, and Racine; the cathedral at Chartres says something to them which it cannot say to me, as indeed would New York’s Empire State Building, should anyone here ever see it. Out of their hymns and dances come Beethoven and Bach. Go back a few centuries and they are in their full glory—but I am in Africa, watching the conquerors arrive.

As it happens, this quotation was circulating on right-wing Twitter some time ago. Many of the replies dismissed Baldwin as a “resentful commie/nigger.” But is he wrong? His view that Western civilization is inextricable from whiteness is more accurate than the normie conservative delusion that Western civilization is the product of Christianity or “Judeo-Christian values.” Disputing the fact that white people possess an inherent link to Western civilization would demand that one parrot colorblind civic nationalist talking points. Many people on the Alt Right have not fully unlearned their Republican programming.

Ultimately, Western civilization was created by and for white men. Regardless of their nationality or background, they are not outsiders to Western civilization in the way non-whites (and, to a lesser extent, women) are.

Some people have observed that the non-whites who talk about “white privilege” tend to be more educated and affluent than their coethnics. These types are accused of promulgating a “luxury belief” and exploiting their POC status to score social points. This certainly happens, but it goes deeper than that. For figures like Baldwin, their immersion in white environments and affinity with Western culture is precisely why the concept of “white privilege” is salient to them. Uneducated/low-IQ non-whites do not care as much because they do not identify with Western civilization in any capacity.

It’s notable that many anti-white activists actually started off as optimistic civic nationalist patriots. For example, Michael X, who grew up in Trinidad and Tobago, was loyal to the British Empire and saw himself as a British subject in his youth. He only became vehemently anti-white upon relocating to the UK in his 20s, when he realized that he could never truly be British. Their resentment stems from feeling betrayed—they genuinely believed they belonged to Western civilization, only to experience a rude awakening upon coming of age.

Another item on the list is the ability to “criticize our government . . . without being seen as a cultural outsider.” It is self-evidently true that belonging to the majority grants one a certain immunity. In order to fully assimilate, racial aliens must display thorough ideological and cultural conformity. White people in white societies do not face this pressure, as their whiteness already codes them as members of the “in-group.”

This is why civic nationalism breeds groupthink, conformism, and distrust. In multiracial societies, it is impossible to know for certain whether people’s criticisms of the government are objective and well-intentioned and not motivated by tribal sentiments. The threat of racial rebellion is always present. People are freer to speak their minds in homogeneous societies.

Relatedly, this is why generic non-white Conservative Inc. grifters are relatively common, but acid-tongued non-white conservative contrarians like Thomas Sowell are rare (of course, this is also attributable to differences in intellect). The conservative base is overwhelmingly white, so non-whites in the movement have to go to extra lengths to prove their conservative bonafides. They flatter white conservatives at the expense of truth.

Rewarding non-white normiecon sycophants while treating disillusioned non-whites as targets of mockery is counterproductive and subverts our goals. Mocking the latter only radicalizes them further into anti-white hatred; instead of becoming level-headed advocates for racial separatism, they become spiteful radicals who want Western civilization to burn. It is honestly not hard to see why. This points to the Alt Right’s moral depravity and lack of seriousness. They are not interested in solutions—this is why they mock fat people who go to the gym. The cruelty is the point.

If anything, we should point to these privileges as proof of civic nationalism’s shortcomings. “White privilege” is more accurately termed “majority privilege.” We should advocate ethnonationalism as a means by which all groups can attain dignity and reap the privileges of living in a homogeneous society.