We have been hearing a lot about white privilege lately and I have been trying to understand what the purpose of this onslaught is about. Racism and privilege has suddenly become the main theme in our every day news cycles and is the basis for many of the decisions being made by politicians and even large companies. I understand what the word "privilege" means but do not understand how it can be assigned to only one race of people in the universe unless those assigning it really believe that white (not including Hispanics) are better than all of the others and have somehow been able to prove it through time. Kind of a silly thought is it not? Well I want to start this blog with a story about two young boys growing up in a dairy farming region in central New York. Billy is black and Johnny is white and they both live in a small town of one block with a village green along one of the streets. Billy lives around the corner from Johnny and both have great parents and siblings. At twelve years old Billy starts to ride with his father on his morning milk route picking up milk cans from farmers and taking them to the creamery. Soon Billy is helping and picking up cans of milk at about 100 lbs. each and putting them on the truck. Not long after he started to work his father started to let him drive the truck. Billy had a job at twelve years old and would continue on with this duty for years.
Johnny at twelve years old started to work on his uncle's dairy farm for the Summer months . It was up at 4:30 am and herd the cows into the barn for milking, washing the udders before attaching the milking machines. His job then was to carry the milk to the milk house and dump it through a strainer then into the cans that Billy would pick up later. After milking the cows were fed corn ensilage and grain before returning to the pasture. At this time breakfast was served after which Johnny backed a manure trailer into the barn and cleaned the gutters. The manure was then taken to a field and hand spread with a manure fork. (Read my blog about blue jeans) The morning was half done by then and it was time to cut hay, cultivate corn or rake the hay cut the day before. After drying the hay was loaded loosely on a wagon and taken to the barn where Johnny set the horse fork and then jumped down to run the tractor to lift the fork full of hay into the barn loft where his uncle would release it and mow the hay away. There were many loads of hay and the work never stopped. Later there was the combining of the grain and Johnny's job was to take the full bags of grain at 100 lbs. each to the barn and put them in the grain room.
Both boys were doing a man's work at twelve and this continued through school until Billy quit school and took over his father's milk route at sixteen. He wasn't old enough to get a driver's license to drive the truck but no one cared or bothered him. He continued with this until bulk tanks took over and milk cans disappeared. At eighteen Billy took another job at a local factory. Johnny left the farm in the Summers and went to a canning factory at sixteen to make money for college. After high school Johnny went to college but after one year he dropped out because he could not raise enough money to return. After working for a couple of years Johnny went to a state university for two years and received a AAS degree in Medical Technology. He went to work at the local hospital, got married a started a family all the while staying in college one course at a time. Later he changed jobs and became a bench chemist at a drug company and the story continues until he is the Vice President of Manufacturing at a drug company in Vermont. Billy later bought a back hole shovel and started an excavation business and became very successful at it.
Now tell me where the privilege was. The fact that Johnny went on to school and Billy did not was not because of privilege but a choice they both made. Their privilege was equal in the fact that they had been taught to work hard and keep working to achieve their goals in life. Neither went after riches but to make a life for their families. At the time Billy would not be able to get a room at the big hotel in Syracuse and neither would Johnny. Billy because he was black but Johnny because he could not afford it. I suppose that gave Johnny some privilege but that would not have helped either boy from their eventual success. So what is real privilege? I just saw a movie star that married a prince of England that is worth over one hundred million dollars talk to a TV host that is worth over a billion dollars and discuss how they were the subjects of racism. One problem is that both are privileged and live in a class that most just dream about. Both are black by race and are telling us they are the victims of white privilege. They are saying that a white coal miner in West Virginia has more privilege that they do. It is sick and the new way to divide people and justify new laws and rules to eventually gain voting support by non-white voters. There is no other reason. A white coal miner giving up his privilege and paying reparations to someone because their great great grandfather was a slave will not solve anything but cause more hate and division in the country.
Who are the real privileged people in the world? It is those that are living with most amenities like TVs and cell phones but not working. They live at the expense of those who are working but supposedly have some sort of privilege over them. The athlete that is good enough to get a free college education is privileged and the athlete that is making millions is privileged even though they seem to think that they are discriminated against. If that was true no one would buy tickets to their games. The kneelers are privileged to be able to disrespect the American flag to show their sympathy to the black community that they refuse to re-enter and help those that are getting into drugs and crime before they have a chance to live their lives. The actors and actresses that we see each and every day making millions are privileged and guess what: the Queen of England is privileged. Working is not a privilege and making choices that keep a person form accomplishing their goals is not a victim of others with privilege. Calling one race privileged is an excuse to not go to work and succumbing to the idea that one race is really better than another one. It is really silly and stupid and is causing much harm to this nation. There is and never will be a time when each human being cares for or likes all of his fellow human beings but we have arrived at a time when most Americans do accept their neighbors and with a majority of white people voting for a black president should have settled that argument. White privilege or any other race that is privileged does not cause a young person to inject heroin, join gangs, drop out of school or just continue the generational welfare community. These are choices that people make but blame their plight on racism and white privilege. As long as there is a reason to not succed and go to work like Billy did the status quo will continue.
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