General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: "Let's work to end racial discrimination" is a better approach than "whites are so privileged". [View all]BainsBane
(53,029 posts)to distinguish the influence of race and class. Clearly they have not. To claim there is no such thing as white privilege or that they don't benefit from it shows they don't understand how race and class operate along different axes. Comments that white privilege doesn't exist because Beyoncé and Oprah are wealthy, as I have seen posters on DU say, show they don't understand the basic distinctions.
When I make an observation that people are conflating two concepts, that is not the same thing as saying they said explicitly race and class are the same. They are conflating the two. When one conflates, they don't understand distinctions.
I find all of this perplexing: that I have to explain the difference criticizing someone's exact language and observing an assumption or issue underlying their analysis is completely bizarre. Then the fact that we have to argue something as basic as white privilege confounds me. I don't understand how it is possible to have had any higher education in the past forty years and have not explored ideas of race and class.