The loss of privilege

[Music]

[Applause]

privilege

is on the table for some it’s a tasty

dish it smells so good we can’t wait to

tuck in and relish the feast

for others it’s a toxic stench of toxic

sludge we’re gagging on the fumes and

waiting for someone to please

please just take it off the table again

why for so many of us is it so awkward

to talk about privilege

why for so many of us is it so difficult

to acknowledge we might have privilege

let alone embrace the idea of losing it

and indeed why is losing it so scary

when it just might be the best thing we

could do

for ourselves our relationships and the

planet

i’m a writer a teacher a filmmaker and i

research what happens to people at the

point where they lose some of their

privileges what i call privilege loss

now what interests me about privilege is

that it’s the often neglected flip side

of social justice campaigns

you know if you’ve got a campaign for

greater social equality well if it’s to

any degree successful and gain some of

its intents

that relative balance between privilege

and disadvantage shifts

when this happens some will relatively

gain privilege but others will

relatively lose it

so what happens to people at that point

of privilege loss well some might say

hey forget those people

they had their time in the sun let’s sit

back and watch them suffer

i don’t want to sit back and watch them

suffer for two reasons

one they’re us as i’m going to argue

today we’re all connected

in privilege but two if we do forget

those people in their privilege loss

we risk facing the worst consequences of

it where people get angry

fearful resentful and look for someone

to blame

now i grew up reasonably aware of

privilege my parents were both feminists

interested in social inequalities when

they split up one became rich and the

other poor and i got some idea of the

pros and cons of both sides

when they died i got some idea of loss i

went on to become an academic and i

wrote a book about inequality and health

care

now my mum always warned me uh son don’t

become an academic

she’d worked as a secretary for some and

found them all to be egomaniacs

something about being told all day that

you’re an expert gives an over-inflated

sense of self

well i didn’t listen but it’s only been

in recent years that i’ve come to

appreciate the massive role that

privilege

plays in all of this see at this stage

in my life i lead a double life

half of my time i live here in auckland

a global city

where i’m widely recognized for

possessing many lines of privilege for

being white

male straight employed i mean i get well

paid to research privilege loss you know

the irony is not lost on me

but the other half of my life i live

with my wife’s tribe an indigenous

community in a small isolated town

in northern canada where very different

privilege rules apply

while in the city my voice is sought out

i’m given platforms to speak

and the phd by my name heralds my status

and my expertise as a teacher and a

researcher an indigenous arctic canada

expertise isn’t measured by the letters

after your name and believe me no one

needs to know the opinion

of a doctor of media studies when it’s

minus 30 degrees outside the generator

stopped working

and a pack of wolves just ate your

neighbor’s dog

so what interested me though wasn’t that

the rules were different i knew that

much going in

what fascinated me was the physical

feeling of adjusting to the most minor

of privileged changes

relatively losing speaking rights for

instance for an entitled white male who

lectures for a living

felt like a burning injustice when i

wasn’t allowed to speak as much as i was

used to it felt so

unfair and i had to put so much effort

in to forcing down this feeling of

indignation lest i start blurting out

inappropriate things at inappropriate

times

and i thought why is this so hard

and if it’s so hard for me is it hard

for other people to

and i looked on the news and saw around

the world and saw that yeah apparently

this is hard for a lot of people

adjusting to privileged loss so hence

this project

to try and understand the loss a little

better and maybe develop some tools

to help us embrace it with more dignity

so what are we talking about here what

is this privilege well

i’m a social scientist so let’s social

science this

word literally means private law privacy

ledge

now some have interpreted this well what

does that mean

that means a rule for some and some for

others that means advantages for some

and not for others that means access to

resources for some

and not for others some have taken this

very literally and only interpret it

as meaning what the law says one can and

can’t do legal privileges

but in the social sciences we know that

society is governed by much more than

law alone

the unwritten rules the informal rules

the norms the etiquettes

these govern our lives and these involve

privilege and unfair advantages too

there’s no law for example that says

women can’t get paid as much as men

some have also interpreted privileges

only meaning white privilege

often in a united states sense of black

white racial dynamics

and look white privilege is real there’s

no doubt about that colonialism the

triangular slave trade the exporting of

european values around the world

have created the conditions we now live

in and they are conditions that

privilege

whiteness but the growing field of

privileged studies

looks at unfair advantages in a much

wider sense

going beyond ethnicity to look too at

class age

gender sexual orientation employment

status housing status physical health

able bodiedness mental health

languages spoken religion and so forth

and looks at the unfair and unshared

privileges in these too

one of the most interesting things about

privilege is that those who have it

often don’t know they have it it’s

invisible to them peggy mcintosh

famously called privilege an invisible

backpack

full of passports and maps and visas and

blank checks that you can cash in at any

time but which you were meant to remain

oblivious about others have called

privilege the wind at your back where

just like going for a bike ride with the

wind at your back

you often don’t realize it’s there until

you turn around and start trying to ride

into it

i like to think of privilege as an

invisible door person someone who opens

the door for me at certain times and

then closes it in the face of others or

sometimes

closes it in my face now there’s been

a lot written about privilege in recent

years both in

the academy and in the media and there’s

a tendency in this commentary to talk

about it in terms of people who have

privilege

and then people who don’t and i want to

reject this binary i don’t think it

makes so much sense

you see who we are all of us who we are

is complex

and complicated we’re all made up of so

many different identity categories our

age our ethnicity and so on i like to

think of us

all as complex machines made up of many

levers his age

his body type his religion his language

is spoken now whether or not that lever

is turned to privilege or not depends on

the structure

you find yourself in if the structure is

patriarchy the lever will be turned to

privilege

if it’s male if the structure is

heteronormativity

it will be there at heterosexual but

here’s the thing

the structures change and they change in

space and in time

where the rules governing privilege in

this room or an inner city boardroom are

very different to those in a small

isolated town in northern canada

and in that town the rules in the

speaker’s circle the sharing circle

will be very different to those in the

kitchen

but they also change in time where the

rules governing gender

in new zealand right now are very

different to how they were 30 years ago

and very different to how they will be

in the future the trick is to work out

what the actual structure is to work out

where the levers are turned and can we

find someone

who has every single lever turned to

privilege or indeed to disadvantage

in every possible context i don’t think

they could exist

but this isn’t some free-for-all way of

saying that everyone’s equal

and privileged far from it privileges

are not equal

not in how they impact human well-being

or human misery

the privilege of speaking first last and

most often in a business meeting is not

the same

as the privilege to not be put in jail

because of your sexual orientation

or to not be taken away from your family

as a child because of your race

privileges are not equal and the trick

is always to work out what the context

is

so what happens when that context

changes and a lever is turned to loss

what happens at the point of privilege

loss well the first thing to note

there’s no real objectivity when it

comes to thinking about our privilege

loss how we feel about our privileges

relates to how we perceive them not how

they actually are you know often the

loudest complaints about privileged loss

occur well before any actual loss

happens when loss is a hypothetical

possibility on a distant horizon and yes

us angry white males complain very

loudly about this

but why is this well look for many of us

the moment of facing the prospect of

losing a privilege is also the first

moment of realizing that that privilege

even existed

if you’re used to your entire life of

someone opening the door for you and

then they stop

it feels unfair it feels like it’s

getting slammed

in your face and you might ask seriously

how could you not realize someone was

standing there opening the door for you

all this time it seems so obvious to

everybody

else or to be fair we’re actually

conditioned to not see

the invisible door person we’re

conditioned to not see our privileges

and we’re conditioned to see unequal

privilege

as normal hollywood movies for example

normalize an idea of male dominance and

female subservience

consumer advertising normalizes an ideal

body type and an ideal of beauty

our physical cities normalize the

able-bodied and the youthful and our

mainstream education and mainstream

media systems

normalize colonizer culture over

indigenous ones

now there’s exceptions to all of that of

course but the dominant tendencies are

clear so with all that going on

hey it’s understandable why some would

internalize the idea of unequal

privileges

whether they benefit them or whether in

fact they don’t

but look going even further there are

two

ideologies that are circulated so often

in western societies that we’ve come to

see them not even as ideological and

just as the way things are

and the two ideologies that make it very

very difficult to see

and appreciate privilege the ideology of

meritocracy

and the ideology of individualism

these tell us that not only are we all

unique individuals whose categories do

not define us

but also that we have all equal

opportunities in life and thus

our achievements are the fair fruits of

our efforts and skills

well these are beautiful ideas in

themselves but when seen through a

privileged lens

they’re complete fantasies and that’s a

hard pill for many to swallow

if you see the invisible door person

they’re forcing us to ask how much of

what i’ve achieved in life was due to my

category and not to my individuality

am i really as capable as what i always

thought

am i as worthy am i as ethical

am i actually much much more average

the concept of privilege has very real

impact for how we see ourselves

so it’s understandable why we often

struggle so much with the idea

and you know because of all of this we

have developed many many powerful

strategies

for evading and deflecting privilege and

its challenges to us

i call these privileged deflection the

art of evading accountability

this is a type of mental martial art

very well developed

and it’s full of moves to deflect

perceived attacks

on your privilege the first move is a

simple one denial deny privilege exists

for you and for other people

it’s worked very well to delay

accountability on climate change and it

works for privilege too

the second move is to justify the

inequality this one acknowledges

that society is unequal but it justifies

it as the natural order

statements like societies need

hierarchies in order to function

women are great they’re just not as

strong as men and poor people had their

chance they’re just lazy

articulate these naturalizing the

inequality

this feeds really easily into another

strategy delegitimize

the non-privileged have you ever noticed

in society how many powerful people

dedicate so much energy

to delegitimizing and disparaging the

already disadvantaged

ethnic minorities migrants welfare

dependents

i mean why what threat are they what

threat are we to the powerful

well the logic goes like this if the

disadvantaged or unworthy

then inequality is justified and if

inequality is justified then no one

needs to take ethical account of your

own privileges

privilege has been deflected intact but

look

there’s deflection moves for everybody

even if you’re interested in creating a

more equal society there are still some

ways that you too

can evade accountability for your

privilege

one is to insist on absolute comfort

when discussing your privilege

if you’re feeling at all awkward about

the privileged conversation

the conversation must end your safety is

paramount

privileged intact

but my favorite deflection technique is

privilege solidarity

this is a subtle one but it might be

familiar to people

this is one where we comfort people

against threats to our privilege comfort

is similarly privileged

it might be familiar to people who are

deeply worried about climate change but

also fly on planes a lot

you know that moment you’re flying on a

plane you don’t know the person next to

you and you start chatting and you’re

getting on really really well but then

after a while you start talking about

climate change and it gets really

awkward because

you’re flying on a plane you need to

find a way to comfort each other very

quickly

to reassure each other that you’re one

of the good guys plastic cups

a single-use plastic cup on this airline

that’s disgusting my friend i know i

recycle you recycle we recycle

we are one of the good guys this is

privileged solidarity it’s the

privileged fist pump

and in this example it does for the

privilege of flying what the locker room

chat does

for toxic masculinity and we have many

other moves and you know it’s

understandable

you see addressing our privileges let

alone losing them it’s scary

it just might mean changing our view of

ourselves

it might mean offending people we love

it might mean rejection from our

communities and let’s be real

privileges bring material rewards

how comfortable are we really to give up

all that cool stuff

well as cool as all that stuff is

i’d like to argue that the benefits of

privilege loss far outweigh the costs

in one of the 20 most watched ted talks

of all time

brene brown tells us that meaningful

connection with other people

is the most important part of leading a

worthwhile life and that vulnerability

is a key pathway

to connection well privilege blocks

connection with other people

and it builds an insulating cocoon

around vulnerability

and look if relationships aren’t your

priority but you do like being right

about stuff

privilege is worth losing too you see if

your analysis of society

and of yourself doesn’t cater in all

those informal ways that unshared

advantages work it’s just not going to

be very accurate

but look i don’t want to give the wrong

impression today

i don’t want to give the impression that

i’ve got this privilege lost stuff down

because believe me i don’t you know i’m

trying to overcome a lifetime of

entitlement

and i’m constantly failing in it falling

down chewing up the scenery disgracing

myself

and insulting people and all i can do is

get up

try and own it and do a little bit

better

but i want to do a lot better and i want

you to help me

you see i’m collecting stories about

privilege loss in order to find a way to

deal with this better

so if you have a story of your own

privilege loss or you know someone

come and find me and tell me share it

with me because i want to hear it

i’m betting that in our collective

wisdom we have all the tools we need

to embrace the loss with dignity

fairness and courage

and this isn’t an ethical question this

is a necessity

you see there’s one privilege that all

of us in this room right now share

and that’s the privilege to consume more

than our fair share

of the earth’s resources and that’s a

privilege we do need

to lose but i think in losing it

we’re going to find something much more

precious

so let’s work together to manage

smoothly our transition

to a more equal world let’s lose the

privilege

and gain the connection

thank you