Why I do not like the term "privilege"
[This post is basically a holding page for a discussion that started on Twitter but quickly spiralled beyond 140 characters per point.]
I think that the term "privilege", as used by feminists and other equality-campaigners, is unhelpful. I think the concept to which it refers (which I attempted to explain here) is extremely helpful and important; ( Read more... )
I think that the term "privilege", as used by feminists and other equality-campaigners, is unhelpful. I think the concept to which it refers (which I attempted to explain here) is extremely helpful and important; ( Read more... )
I don't think it does. What doing that tends to do - outside of technical/engineering fields where the words and concepts genuinely don't exist - is make the people inventing them feel clever and important while achieving very little.
"let's get on with doing that" is actually very easy. You make and enforce laws which ban sexual discrimination, you educate young women that they're equal (not better!) to men (thanks, Spice Girls), then you wait for the older generation who are set in their ways to retire/die. But that doesn't get you any awards or praise from your peers and nobody thinks you're clever. So you start writing masturbatory essays and inventing technical terms and so on. Shut up, and go and chain yourself to some railings outside a government where women have no legal rights. I'll be right there with you (well, in spirit at least, but hey, you know my thoughts of the pointlessness of direct action)
I'm also reminded of Morgan Freeman's thoughts on racism - to paraphrase him: "I am going to stop calling you a woman and I'm going to ask you to stop calling me a man." Problem solved.
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/10482634/ns/today-entertainment/
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