Privilege and Oppression

This morning, our learning session discussed privilege and oppression. We began by reading Peggy McIntosh's "White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack." I read this article first in college in my Women's Studies classes. The premise of the article is that just as we talk about the oppressed as lacking access to resources that allow you to pursue certain goals, we must acknowledge our own privilege, which is having access to those same resources. When I first read it in college, I was blown away. Back then, I was learning about my identity and understanding the ways in which I had or didn't have agency in society. Today, understanding the premise of privilege and having acknowledged my own privilege in the US, I saw privilege somewhat differently here in Israel.

We created the Circle of Oppression, which looks similar to the picture below.

We drew one first for North America and then one for Israel. The normative individual in the US is a white, Protestant, upper-middle class, able-bodied, heterosexual man (we didn't include Language or Appearance in our circle). The normative individual in Israel by comparison is an Ashkenazi/white, Jewish, middle/upper-middle class, able-bodied, 100% heterosexual, alpha male. We each have our own identities that give us advantages and disadvantages. Let's take Mitt Romney for example. Even though he has many of those characteristics, because he is Mormon, he lacks as much agency as someone else. At the same time, Anderson Cooper also has many of those characteristics, but because of his sexuality, he also lacks some agency. People may say, well we have a black President, so your description is wrong, or that we have more women in the world than men, so that is where the power lies. Despite those facts, the idea of the normative individual is stronger. There may be more women in the world, but power is not based upon the majority. It is based upon who can wield the power. How many women are in leadership positions in the US compared to men? How many African-Americans are in Congress compared to whites?
We looked at how the US differed from Israel, and there differences were mainly in religion and race/ethnicity. We debated about whether it is skin color or ethnicity/point of origin that really determines privilege. For example, though Russians are considered Ashkenazim, they are considered in a different position perhaps because of when they arrived in Israel. Ethiopians for sure are far from the normative individual (there are differences within groups, as well, between men and women for example who are Ethiopian), they are in a better position than Arab Israelis/Israeli Arabs.
We concluded that while we can talk all we want about our own privilege or oppression, it is even more important to recognize what we can do about our privilege or oppression. White guilt isn't useful, if we feel that. Instead, we must acknowledge our privileges and also learn how to use that knowledge for social change.