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