I walked into my leadership class today with few apprehensions about the subject matter. Today we were going to talk about Power & Privilege. Typically when the subject of power and privilege comes up a privilege walk is in order - this class was no exception. I've done a number of privilege walks since arriving to high school and have done a lot more since my arrival to American. Though I have very little opposition to participating in a privilege walk, today was the first time in which I felt like a minority while amongst my peers. Being the token black/Mexican girl has never been something that has bothered me before merely because that has always been the way its been, yet when I stood with my peer and stepped farther and farther away from them, I felt more and more like the minority I am perceived to be.
In this exercise we were asked to hold hands with the people beside us and to continue to try to hold hands when we took steps either forward or backward. You are to hold hands with your neighbors for as long as you can until distance ultimately separates you and hopefully you reunite later down the line. Five questions. It took only five questions to separate me and my partners. Three steps back for me, two steps forward for them. At first it seemed a little funny that we got separated so quickly, but as the activity drew on and I stood farther away from my partners, I found myself alone. Alone against a back wall with only a spattering of people close enough to hear me if I were to speak. As I looked around the room and continually backed myself into a literal wall every time I was asked to do so, I realized that though I had the privilege of living the life I did... I was alone.
I stood there silently staring at a group of my peers and every piece of my being was screaming to find a way to hide. With no one else to stand beside me, I could feel the pity radiating from them. I could feel their solemn eyes being drawn toward me and was nearly brought to tears. My life has by no means been easy or pretty, but it has always been beautiful. It has always given me hope, resilience, and faith, but today I was disheartened to see I was alone in these views. It hurt to see the pity. It hurt to feel their perceived sympathy. It hurt to finally be told what I truly was without any words. I am a minority. An outcast. And a breed all of my own. It hurt to see that though I was amongst some of the best minds and hearts I could possibly imagine, I still couldn't escape their conditioning. I couldn't escape the stare and so I cried (internally, of course). I cried because all the perceptions of power and privilege that I hoped would dissipate as I arrived to DC seemed to only strengthen until it was finally able to shake my core.
When I left that class, I couldn't help but ask - Am I privileged?
- Sam
That is how I feel now Sam... Lost in the between of neither this or that. I am not white, but I look like it. I am not colored but my ethnicity is a vast array of different people. I exemplify 'white' privilege. Looking what is supposed to be the ideal within America. While I work in a place that embraces diversity I am consistently reminded that I am not one of them. Not someone who was raised as someone who can be easily identified as 'black' 'Mexican' 'Philipino' 'East Asian' 'Arab'. That I am someone not like them. Their parents are healthy, but their families are even worse off than mine financially. I might want to be apart and be the same as my peers, but I just can't. No one is like me. No one understands that I am white and multicultural. That my relatives range from 'black' 'Mexican' 'Philipino' 'East Asian' 'Arab' and they have shared all these world with me. But I have (and never will) experience what it is like to be judged as a person of color. How do I make these two world make sense together?
ReplyDelete- Am I priviledged? Or am I cursed to be lost in the between of both worlds?
That's a question I've been spending a great deal mulling over these past few months since that unfortunate but somewhat eye opening class. After much thought and discussion, I've rediscovered the importance our color and socioeconomic status plays in our society. I think in high school we were able to detach ourselves from our privilege and marginalization because in the end we were all the same. Yet now that we've come to college, we're almost being forced to reevaluate where we fall in the privilege scale. That is why we've had a great deal struggle with where we fall because for so long, we weren't one or the other - we just were.
DeleteYet now that we've been tasked with the question of "Are you privileged?" We must now define privilege. Is marginalization a round hole and privilege is the square peg? No. In fact that two have quite an inextricable relationship and it is quite easy to be both. It is quite easy to be privileged outwardly but inwardly marginalized and that is where I believe you fall.
On the outside, for all intents and purposes, you are privileged. You are the ideal. Yet because of your experiences and the story beneath the image, you are also marginalized and that's what makes us feel lost. We've always been told to only be one or the other. To only belong to one story, but there is nothing more dangerous in this world than a single story.
We are blessed to be on both ends of the spectrum because we get an image of the world that other don't get to see. We are given the opportunity to become objective rather than subjective so that we can better understand ourselves and others. And in this understanding we are able to learn how to become allies for ourselves and others.
Why are you not here helping me with this stuff? You literally are the best are solving all my inner turmoil. Thank you Sam for reminding me that 'other' isn't bad. Only an opportunity to share my experience with those 'other' than myself. Because really we all are never like our parents, never like our friends, and never like our co-workers; instead we are all the same because we share in this worldly experience together. Each and everyday struggling for equality. Struggling in find our place in a universe where we are undeniably 'other'. Only for the simple reason that we are all otherly beings in this universe.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the humbling kudos, just keep in mind that I'm never the one solving your inner turmoil. I merely relay information you already intuitively know in a way that best serves you. You're smarter and more intuitive than you think, you just need a reminder sometimes.
DeleteP.S. I love you.
ReplyDeleteP.S. I love you too!
DeleteP.S. I love you too!
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