Racism is still alive in 2018 and white privilege exists within society. The two can be quite different though, as this example will show. According to tolerance.org, “white skin privilege is a transparent preference for whiteness that saturates our society.” The site also notes that white privilege isn’t something that white people necessarily ask for or create on purpose.
Sometimes, people call out white privilege where it just simply does not exist. When they do this, it just makes problems even worse. A screenshot shared by Imgur user Dresslerj1 is now going viral, showing the perfect example of what I’m talking about. It’s a Facebook comment thread, and everyone can admit that it’s pretty “cringe-worthy.”
One girl got into her dream school and decided to post her success on social media. She posted, “Thank you, everyone, for all your support!! I’m so happy to say after years of hard work I have been accepted into Yale Med School!!”
She finished her post by saying, “There’s a long road ahead!”. People were posting their congratulations, but one friend commented, “Good job, might I add a shout out to your white privilege for you”.
The girl who got into the school replied back, saying “LMAO you just have to insert your opinion everywhere?” I mean, you’d probably say something back too if someone wrote something that rained on your parade!
The friend commented back, “Just saying, you come from a white privileged background. You make it seem like you did all of this yourself, but I’m just keeping things real by giving a nod to your privilege”.
That’s when MedSchool Girl decided to get REAL with her friend Melissa. She began her post by saying, “Melissa, I grew up in a foster home. Both my parents were alcoholics and gave me up when I was 5…”
She continued, “…I had to take care of my brother for 2 years until we got adopted, and then we were both abused by that family…I spent nights studying, and working part-time in high school just to support myself and my brother…”
The girl ended her post, saying “…I understand the concept of privilege but it sounds more like you are trying to condescend to me rather than be helpful”. Melissa responded with “umm. Ok sweetie, you claim to understand privilege, but you can’t even self crit. Bye-bye”
Once people saw this, they were pretty quick to voice their opinions. One person wrote, “There isn’t a middle finger in the world big enough or angry enough to shut that b*tch down. That is why I don’t respect ‘privilege’ claims”.
Another person commented, “wow. Congrats on overcoming such hardships and dealing with that moron amicably”. Congrats to this girl who got into the school of her dreams, and showing that you can achieve anything you put hard work into!
IMGUR
