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Comment by eonw | Hacker News Reader

many people with lots of privileges to not see themselves as privileged, simply because they know nothing else.

> simply because they know nothing else.

So lemme get this straight, if my ancestors worked hard to provide for their families and I, down the line, inherit some land or money I should feel bad about this? Why?

That's a false dichotomy; you can recognize that you're privileged without simultaneously feeling bad about it.

Except all rhetoric I see involving privilege is ultimately about me having to keep my mouth shut about real issues or concede benefit to another, all because I'm a white guy. In fact I didn't inherit wealth or any "privilege", but I'm meant to feel as though I did something wrong by virtue of my skin color. You may not say "feel bad" but the type to use that word sure are.

> if my ancestors worked hard to provide for their families and I, down the line, inherit some land or money I should feel bad about this? Why?

You don't have to feel BAD about it; just recognize it. People inherit vastly different conditions by sheer accident of birth.

So what is the point? I have "privilege", now what?

Now you're supposed to feel bad about it, because the word connotes injustice by virtue of denoting a concept of "private law" - one rule for me, another for thee. But people who want you to feel bad about it don't want to be seen to be saying they want that, so they ignore the denotation and the connotation in their rhetoric, whose every deployment demonstrates further that it is enormously unhelpful toward its stated purpose, but which persists nonetheless. One wonders why.

why so defensive about being privileged? it almost illustrates the concept for us... you claim to be privileged but also claim to not understand how it might make you different.

I am not one of those people. I said nothing to suggest that I might be either.

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