Privilege and Our Duty

According to Tim Wise, white privilege generates anxiety disorder, depression, and substance abuse among advantaged white people because they are constantly afraid of others gaining on them. Those pathologies are demonstrated by a statistic showing that in the U.S. those kinds of mental disorders are twice the global average and five times the rate in Nigeria. Although white privilege was formed early in the history of the U.S., It still exists in this modern world, a society where racist and discrimination are banned by law. We can realize those instances appearing anywhere; for example, a white mother always keep her children away from the “strange” people who might not like them, or a white person shows that the people of his or her color made what is called the national civilization heritage, and many more that we tell. The white privilege is not our guilt because we simply inherit it from the past, and the only thing we can do now is taking responsibility for the creation inequality, of privilege in a simple way that we should treat others equally like the way we want others to treat us. After all, I coincide with Tim Wise’s point of view that every American’s duty is to fight the injustice of privilege.

Phuc Le

Kin 338I, Sec. 1