3. The Privilege of Checking White Privilege

The Privilege of Checking White Privilege

McWhorter seems to be implying that checking white privilege is harmful, or that is weakens good, traditional, politically charged activism found in groups like the ones that came out over Ferguson. And that's a pretty wild accusation.

I think because it's essentially apolitical and focused on policing individual actions, rather than addressing structural problems and fostering integration.

Also I think that you could easily make a case for the preeminence of this kind of identity political thinking might be hampering efforts to address structural issues. So there have been protests ongoing in Ferguson (seemingly) aimed at getting various police, mayoral and other institutional figures to resign and to get police policy to change through promotion of black figures in the council/etc.

But, there are districts not that far away from Ferguson where the council is majority black and there are lots of black police, but similar policies (aggressive policing and collection of tickets for minor parking violations) that were seen as ones that heavily contributed to the recent deaths, and the general community feeling of victimization, that was the tinder for the protests and riots. While racism is certianly a factor, it looks like changing the mayor, racial make up of the council and/or police are things that effectively won't change the situation, because other causes (like the economic situation in the city center, lack of adequate tax base etc) would still be there.

More broadly, focusing on things like affirmative action disproportionately benefits middle class people (in the European sense of the word) while the lack of focus on economic factors that have hurt the majority. I think a full employment policy (if properly implemented) would do more to eliminate racism in the US than anything else. But I think this generally is a symptom of the elimination of class from US politics and political activism.

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