I don't think they're mutually exclusive they just apply at different times because we have inconsistent standards.

Being white gives you a lot of advantages, but I'd say on occasion (affirmative action, diversity based decisions, etc.) then playing non-white can be advantageous.

My underlying concern is that in a highly competitive society where we're so pushed at every corner we look for any advantages we can take to get ahead (reasons people lie about silly things like race/ethnicity), how do we maintain trust and cohesion in our society?

At some point, people will lie about anything and everything to get ahead to a point that I no longer believe even the most trivial of statements they claim. At that point, my trust is completely removed. It's already well on its way down to nothing but at least now I can look at motives and question why someone may or may not lie and think about the large obvious factors. At some point, the factors people lie about may become so asinine to get ahead that I have 0 trust in anyone at all anymore. How do you operate in a society where trust is all but completely removed.

These aren't really contradictory statements, tho.

It seems like not as strong. A more jokish version might be:

> Having no kids is a financial advantage

> You have to claim kids on your tax form to save more on taxes

The two may not be as exclusive as they seem.

It's a privilege to gain the benefits of an ethnicity while not having to suffer the disadvantages associated with that ethnicity.

2 things can be true at once. It’s doubtless that at a overall societal level white privilege exists in the United States. From the article it also seems that in some isolated situations there are benefits to not being perceived as white.

i know you're conflating 'privilege' on purpose but i'll outline the terms in this context for anyone actually curious.

`privilege` - this is the whole concept that you're treated as a good, honest person by default, and that you behave the way all others _should_

to have a college say:

'hey, we would like to know your race so we can attempt to correct for the general over-indexing in our society for matching white cultural values'

isn't removing your privilege, and to have someone check your privilege doesn't remove it.

to sit here and complain about privilege when it's finally being used against the person experiencing it is top tier cognitive dissonance

>White people have a skewed view of their extant privilege, and do not actually have to take the steps they do to gain a non-existent "minority privilege"

being white is generally a huge privilege but in some contexts being not white is advantageous.

Why do you have to pick? The benefits or drawbacks of something can be situational.

While I believe white privilege is overstated, the sibling comment is correct that these are not mutually exclusive. https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/05/23/can-things-be-both-pop... makes an analogous point.