White Males Essay Example for Free

White Males Essay What is white male privilege? It is important that white male privilege is defined because the majority of whites males want to deny that it exists at all. The denial of its existence by white people is racialized. People of color say white people enjoy white privilege while white people deny, as often as possible, that they have it and that such a power structure exists. Before defining White male privilege we must first understand the idea of privilege in an anti-oppression setting. Privilege is defined my the webster dictionary as a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor. It is a status that is conferred by society to certain groups. â€Å"It’s about advantages you have that you think are normal. † When this idea is applied to a certain group of people rather than others you begin to see a social polarization, one group that benefits from the privilege and another group that is setback by it. To understand white male privilege one must first understand each factor of privilege, how they work together, and how they effect society. White male privilege is made up of two different privileges, white privilege which is defined by race and male privilege which is defined by gender. White privilege is defined (Clark, 2005), as (1a) a right, advantage, or immunity granted to or enjoyed by white persons beyond the common advantage of all others; an exemption in many particular cases from certain burdens or liabilities. (b) A special advantage or benefit of Stephens 2 white persons; with reference to divine dispensations, natural advantages, gifts of fortune, genetic endowments, social relations, etc. (2a) A privileged position; the possession of an advantage white persons enjoy over non-white persons. (3a) The special right or immunity attaching to white persons as a social relation; prerogative. (b) Display of white privilege, a social expression of a white person or persons demanding to be treated as a member or members of the socially privileged class. (4a) To authorize or license of white person or persons what is forbidden or wrong for non-whites; to justify, excuse. (b) To give white persons special freedom or immunity from some liability or burden to which non-white persons are subject; to exempt. Peggy McIntosh describes white privilege as â€Å"an invisible weightless knapsack of special previsions† in the sense that white privilege provides the beneficiary with advantages that they don’t realize others lack. These advantages can range from being late and not have that count against your race to not worrying if your skin tone makes you the target of police brutality. Many whites against the idea of white privilege believe that the notion of racial preference originated with affirmative action programs and that is should be dismantled to address the issue of privilege. Others against white privilege simply believe it is a myth to essentially make them feel bad for there â€Å"ancestor mistakes†. Most people do not fully understand the privileges that they benefit from so they can not ever truly except this reality. Most men feel this way when they are presented with the idea of male privilege for the first time. Male privilege is a set of privileges that are given to men due to their institutional power in relation to women. While every man experiences privilege differently due to his Stephens 3 own individual position in the social hierarchy, every man, who is seen as male by society, benefits from male privilege. Male privilege branches out over all men no matter what there race, class, or sexuality is. In our patriarchal society male privilege is a bit more inherent. Female workers are, on average, are paid more than 20 percent less than their male components doing the exact same thing. Male privilege can be found in most things in our lives from tv and entertainment all the way to mannerism and how we hold ourselves in our day to day lives. Now that both white and male privilege have been defined we can go into detail about how the both are intertwined White male privilege is an institutionalized power structure in which white males are at the apex of the social pyramid. White males have a very disproportional amount of power compared to women and people of color. Some people would describe being a white male as â€Å"the lowest difficulty setting in a game call the real world†. Both white and male privilege are the most prevalent advantages throughout time. Those who are opposed to this say that white male privilege is a thing of the past and is no longer relevant because we live in a post racial society where citizens may create their own destinies. With Barack Obama as president they believe any structure that existed before hand is nullified by the presence of an African american president. To some white male privilege provides a group with advantages they don’t realize they have. Unchecked it can be used deny it’s very existence with ignorance. The them the best way to combat this issue is to face it head. It’s hard to acknowledge some you don’t you have or why you have it. If people were more aware of their privileges they could find ways to end them or Stephens 4 even making them a common thing provided for others no matter what your race, gender, or sexual preference was. To others white male privilege is nothing but an illusion. They believe that in a post racial society privilege is what you make of it and we all are equal. Some would even go as far to say that white privilege is nothing but a crutch people of color use to take advantage of the white people. Now that I’ve defined Privilege whether it be male privilege or white, showed examples of it in our day to day life , and described it implications on society how will you perceive it? Will you go out teach others about this invisible advantage or will you see it as anything else that’s invisible.

Cultural Diversity in The Tempest Essays -- Tempest essays

Cultural Diversity in The Tempest      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   If we look at Shakespeare's atypically short play The Tempest, the character of Caliban represents a "noble savage" who is enslaved, exploited, and endowed with low-self esteem due to the ethnocentric views of those who encounter him.   In much the same way as the British originally exploited the Hindus or Americans exploited Native Americans, Caliban is considered the "property" of those who encounter him, solely because he is not of the same heritage, customs, and manners of his oppressors.      The ostracism and exploitation of Caliban because he is perceived as a brutish animal compared to "civilized" folks is in keeping with the theme and intent of the play-to show that reality is more a manifestation of mentality and conscious perception than concrete black and white, definable phenomena.   As one scholar of Elizabethan imagery suggests, "The poet who imitates not the visible world but the intelligible as manifested in the visible will not consider that the use of artifice to emphasize form makes imagery less 'true to nature'" (Scanlan   1).   In The Tempest   we see a great deal of artifice to understand what is manifested in the visible, however, with Caliban we see that all the artifice in the world does not help him be accepted by those who inhabit the island once his own.   Prospero has enslaved the son that Sycorax "did litter" on the island, and his lovely daughter Miranda says of his slave, "'Tis a villain, sir,/I do not love to look on" (Shakespeare   5).    Of course, Prospero says he enslaved Caliban because he tried to coupled with his daughter, however, Caliban, sounding like someone who has had their land and culture stolen from them, replies to this, "O ho,... ...nce and diversity are often perceived as evil, wrong or somehow inferior in relation to the dominant culture or social norms.   These issues are very timely as we face the increasing globalization of the world and increasing pressures to accept and integrate with diverse cultures.    Works Cited Baker Siepmann, K.   (ed.)   Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia.   New York, Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, 1987. Moore, P.   "The Tempest and the Bermuda Shipwreck of 1609."   Shakespeare Oxford Newsletter.   Summer, 1996, 1-2. Scanlan, R.   "Shakespeare's New World Fantasia."   http://fas-www.harvard.edu/~art/center.html   April 21, 1999, 1-3. Scanlan, R.   "The Veil of Poetry."   http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~art/poetry.html   April 21, 1999, 1-2. Shakespeare, W.   William Shakespeare:   The Complete Works.   New York, Gramercy Books, 1975. Cultural Diversity in The Tempest Essays -- Tempest essays Cultural Diversity in The Tempest      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   If we look at Shakespeare's atypically short play The Tempest, the character of Caliban represents a "noble savage" who is enslaved, exploited, and endowed with low-self esteem due to the ethnocentric views of those who encounter him.   In much the same way as the British originally exploited the Hindus or Americans exploited Native Americans, Caliban is considered the "property" of those who encounter him, solely because he is not of the same heritage, customs, and manners of his oppressors.      The ostracism and exploitation of Caliban because he is perceived as a brutish animal compared to "civilized" folks is in keeping with the theme and intent of the play-to show that reality is more a manifestation of mentality and conscious perception than concrete black and white, definable phenomena.   As one scholar of Elizabethan imagery suggests, "The poet who imitates not the visible world but the intelligible as manifested in the visible will not consider that the use of artifice to emphasize form makes imagery less 'true to nature'" (Scanlan   1).   In The Tempest   we see a great deal of artifice to understand what is manifested in the visible, however, with Caliban we see that all the artifice in the world does not help him be accepted by those who inhabit the island once his own.   Prospero has enslaved the son that Sycorax "did litter" on the island, and his lovely daughter Miranda says of his slave, "'Tis a villain, sir,/I do not love to look on" (Shakespeare   5).    Of course, Prospero says he enslaved Caliban because he tried to coupled with his daughter, however, Caliban, sounding like someone who has had their land and culture stolen from them, replies to this, "O ho,... ...nce and diversity are often perceived as evil, wrong or somehow inferior in relation to the dominant culture or social norms.   These issues are very timely as we face the increasing globalization of the world and increasing pressures to accept and integrate with diverse cultures.    Works Cited Baker Siepmann, K.   (ed.)   Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia.   New York, Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, 1987. Moore, P.   "The Tempest and the Bermuda Shipwreck of 1609."   Shakespeare Oxford Newsletter.   Summer, 1996, 1-2. Scanlan, R.   "Shakespeare's New World Fantasia."   http://fas-www.harvard.edu/~art/center.html   April 21, 1999, 1-3. Scanlan, R.   "The Veil of Poetry."   http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~art/poetry.html   April 21, 1999, 1-2. Shakespeare, W.   William Shakespeare:   The Complete Works.   New York, Gramercy Books, 1975.

“How to Tell a True War Story,” by Tim O’Brien Essay

In the essay, â€Å"How to Tell a True War Story,† Tim O’Brien tells several stories of war to illustrate to his readers the criteria for truth in storytelling. O’Brien offers his readers a guide to telling and determining war stories that are true, for the author, true does not necessarily mean actual or real. Instead, O’Brien tells us what a true war story is, but his requirements are not always clear precise—a true war story â€Å"never seems to end,† (O’Brien 273) â€Å"embarrasses you,† (270) â€Å"are contradictory,† (275) and have an â€Å"uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil† (270)—they are defined and given context by the author through the telling of his own accounts. The essayist Jon Krakauer offers up his own version of a war story, of sorts, in his telling of the story of Chris McCandless, a young man not participating in a war of nations, or a conflict with others; he, in his own wor ds, was involved in â€Å"the climactic battle to kill the false being within and victoriously conclude the spiritual pilgrimage† (Krakauer 207). The battlefield for McCandless was not a booby-trapped jungle, saturated with enemies and soldiers for the opposition; no, McCandless’s battlefield was the Alaskan frontier. Like a soldier going to war, McCandless knew that where he was going was dangerous. Krakauer remarks that â€Å"he was fully aware when he entered the bush that he had given himself aperilously (emphasis added) slim margin for error. He knew precisely what was at stake† (Krakauer 219). One can draw many parallels between the essays, or war stories, of Krakauer and O’Brien; they are both provocative, and both use descriptive language and paint vivid pictures in the minds of their reader, they both write of young men in the midst of a conflict—emotional or physical—but the stories differ as well. O’Brien presents his ideas of what makes a true war story; based on these ideas, we can determine that the war story told by Krakauer is not a true war story because it is committe d to morality. There are no lessons in true war stories (O’Brien 269); Krakauer offered a lesson in youth and growth in his story about Christopher McCandless. O’Brien and Krakauer are similar in that they both place importance on relaying to the reader the fact that youth and war go hand in hand. It is mainly the young who serve on the frontlines in battle and who are willing to accept the risks associated with war, and it is also the young who become victims of their own inexperience and succumb to the perils  war—being involved in war does not equate to readiness for war. For instance, O’Brien tells a true war story of two young men, soldiers in the Vietnam; he writes, â€Å"They were kids; they just didn’t know. A nature hike, they thought, not even a war †¦ they were giggling and calling each other yellow mother and playing a silly game they invented† (O’Brien 270). Here, O’Brien sets up his readers with words reminiscent of childh ood, the soldiers could have just as well been two kids at summer camp or in a school yard, or any place where kids play, laugh, and call each other names. O’Brien then takes that childhood scene and infuses it with the brutality of war. He describes how one of the young soldiers who, while playing and laughing, detonated a landmine and was killed. True war stories show the gruesomeness of war—kids die horrific deaths, and life is lost in the blink of an eye. War forces â€Å"kids† to grow up quickly, and not on their own terms. Goofing, giggling, and silliness have no place in war; death is a consequence of playfulness, and youth must quickly give way to maturity. In a true war story, a young man may never have the opportunity to figure out life for himself, war does not afford him the opportunity to come to appropriate conclusions about what is right, wrong, moral, or immoral; he will either die, or he will be so exposed to the death of his friends that his moral compass will be disrupted, and he will engage unconscionable behavior. Krakauer presents a similar of theme of youth in the face of danger. Like O’Brien, Krakauer uses words that construct a rich mental image for the reader; in this case, the image is that of an overly eager child. Krakauer writes, â€Å"The boy could hardly contain his excitement. He was about to be alone in the vast Alaska wilds† (Krakauer 206). Krakauer refers to his subject, Chris McCandless, as â€Å"the boy,† conveying the inexperience and ineptitude and childlike enthusiasm of McCandless who, because of his bubbling excitement, sounds more like a kid in a candy store or a child on Christmas morning, than he does a like man about to confront the isolation and bitter cold of the wilderness. Later on, that excitement would turn to desperation and eventually death—like the soldier in O’Brien’s story, the boy meets an early end to his life. In spite of this similarity, Krakauer does not tell a true war story. For some young warriors, adulthood is thrust upon them, maturity it is meted out with no opportunity fo r choice or deliberation; there is no rite of passage. This is not so for McCandless;  Krakauer recognizes growth and maturity arising in McCandless, noting that he made the decision to postpone the river crossing â€Å"after weighing his options,† then â€Å"settl[ing] on the most prudent course† (Krakauer 212). Learning to tame impetuousness allows one to make moral choices, choices that show respect for oneself and one’s surroundings. This type of learning happens with contemplation, introspection, and time. It is not a true war story; not because Krakauer authored a majestic death for McCandless, but because it seemed McCandless lost his war, and it appeared that the battle was too much for him in the end; because Krakauer wrote of a young man who was able to mature during his war, and was able to learn lessons of humility, morality, and caution during his time alone in the Alaska wilds. Imagery in a war stories can be graphic, but in a true war story there is no redemptive value in the gratuitousness of violent acts. O’Brien writes about Rat Riley’s who after witnessing the death of his best friend, encounters a baby buffalo in an abandoned village, â€Å"He opened up a can of C rations, pork and beans, but the baby buffalo wasn’t interested. Rat shrugged. He stepped back and shot it through the right front knee. It went down hard, then got up again, and Rat took careful aim and shot off an ear. He shot it in the hind quarters and in the little hump at its back. He shot it twice in the flanks. It wasn’t to kill; it was to hurt. He put the rifle muzzle up against the mouth and shot the mouth away†¦. There wasn’t a great deal of pity of the baby water buffalo† (O’Brien 274).† O’Brien uses the graphic details to give his reader a glimpse into the mind of soldier who has lost his innocence, one who has l ost empathy because of the grotesque things he has witnessed. The killing of the baby buffalo was not only a response to the pain (or numbness) felt by Rat, but was also a response to rejection. War makes people to terrible things, things that they may not do otherwise. In a true war story, there is little or no remorse for the terrible act. For a soldier, terrible acts and normal acts may become indistinguishable after a while. Death, killing, and suffering is an expectation in war, in a true war story, virtue does not exist; therefore, remorse and empathy cannot exist either. O’Brien clearly illustrates this idea, when writing about the buffalo. Krakauer also uses graphic imagery to show the grisly reality of war. Krakauer tells a story about a moose shot by  McCandless, â€Å"He butchered the carcass under a thick cloud of flies and mosquitoes, boiled the organs into a stew, and then laboriously excavated a burrow in the face of the rocky stream bank directly below the bus, in which he tried to cure, by smoking, the immense slabs o f purple flesh (Krakauer 209).† The shock and gore of cutting up a dead animal with insects biting and flying about could lend itself well to a true war story, but here, it does not. What differentiates this story from O’Brien’s is that Krakauer writes that McCandless felt â€Å"remorse soon after he shot the moose† (Krakauer 209). Because of this remorse, this is not a true war story. If this were a true war story as identified by O’Brien, there would be no sympathy for the animal, no moral outrage by the killer that every part of the animal could not be used. A true war story would not show the level of respect for life, for human and animal value; a true war story disregards life. O’Brien writes that when the buffalo torture was over, it was simply thrown in a well with no regard for the animal, an act that not only punished the animal, but demonstrated a lack of respect for human life as the drinking water from that well would be contaminated. Conversely, Krakauer emphasizes t he great measures McCandless took to preserve the moose meat, and the moral dilemma McCandless faced because he was not successful. O’Brien leaves little room for a story that has any moral significance to be considered a true war story. The author contends that â€Å"If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie. There is no rectitude whatsoever† (O’Brien 269). War, for O’Brien, is inherently devoid of morality; so any action occurring as a part of war is fruit from a poisonous tree—it is tainted and cannot be separated to be made clean, or right. True war stories acknowledge this. To say that there can be moral action as two sides are determined to kill more of them while they are trying to kill more of you, is an absurdity. The fighting and conflict, the struggle to maintain one’s humanity in the face of death and dying is challenging to say the least. Four times within â€Å"How to Tell a True War Story† Oà ¢â‚¬â„¢Brien tells the story of Curt Lemon being killed by a landmine. Each time the story is told, there is a new variant, or one taken away; his changes in language, words,  and details range from revolting to beautiful. Certain things change, but the story stays the same—there is death and loss everywhere. That is the story, the true war story. No matter how it is told, Lemon dies and Riley will never laugh with him again. Contrast this with Krakauer who writes Into the Wild after having already written a magazine article on Chris McCandless. Krakauers â€Å"Selections from into the Wild† could not be considered a true war story in the way that O’Brien defines it, because the selection itself is an act of morality. The magazine article Krakauer wrote prior to his writing of the essay can arguably be considered a true war story as it portrays an ill-prepared young man who is done in by his own arrogance. Many who read the article lacked sympathy for the fallen, and instead ridiculed him. People love stories of heroes, but they l ove stories of failures just as well, as long as the failure is some arrogant jerk getting his just deserts. Krakauer could have left the story there, but he did not, he chose to look deeper to get to the truth, to get to the â€Å"absolute occurrence† (O’Brien 277) that O’Brien warns is irrelevant in a true war story. Krakauer wanted to experience what the subject of his story experienced, and make right the wrong he had done with his article—he wants to do the morally responsible thing. Krakauer writes of his journey to set out on the path blazed by McCandless, â€Å"I, too, hope to cross the river. I want to visit the bus. I want to see where McCandless died, to better understand why† (Krakauer 213). Crossing the river—a metaphor used by O’Brien as well—meant facing the unknown in order to learn more and continuing the search for whatever was lost or missing. In some war stories details are important. They can change they the story altogether. They can change an incompetent, arrogant, boy into a disciplined young man who was willing to take up a dangerous challenge just to prove to himself that he could, even if he did not. Krakauer used the essay as tool to change perceptions to ones based on truth; in changing the details he changed the story. Not all war stories are true, in â€Å"How to Tell a True War Story,† Tim O’Brien lays out the elements needed in a war story to be considered true. Jon Krakauer tells a war story, but it is not a true war story by O’Brien’s standards. Morality is the dividing line between Krakauer telling a war  story, a true war story.

Gender Roles And Specific Ways - 1372 Words

The idea of â€Å"boy clothes† and â€Å"girl clothes† is something heavily engrained in our culture. We often attribute certain clothing items or styles to be specifically for a girl or for a boy. Feminine dresses and skirts for girls and pants and suits for boys. Why is it that clothes hold so much meaning to them? Because of this much gendered approach to dressing, there has always been a strict limit to what gender can wear what. Gender roles and specific ways that each sex should act are culturally assigned to men and women and are reinforced by the use of clothing as they highly emphasize the qualities of biological sex. Fashion is something that promotes gender stereotypes of femininity and masculinity and this is represented in clothing, hairstyles, shoes, accessories and more. Clothing is essential to our identities and how people view us. It is something that is used to emphasize a person’s gender based on biological features. For women specifically, th roughout history, the general erotic body parts such as arms, busts, hips and breasts have always been what is highlighted in dress (Marcangeli). These features are stressed because they support the social perception of what a women should wear or how the female body should look like. Feminine attire is how we stereotypically identify someone as a woman. Being â€Å"feminine† or having characteristics that contribute to the gender stereotypes and expectations that come along with being a woman. Traits associated with femininityShow MoreRelatedWomen And Women Are Like Dogs1544 Words   |  7 Pagesdifferences between the genders. Advertisers capitalize on the fact that men and women are different in order to persuade individuals to consume products and services. Advertising is an important medium in modern society and is used to influence many of the purchasing decisions made by male and female consumers. 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First, an attitude is how we feel about someoneRead MoreGender Identity And Children And Gender1335 Words   |  6 PagesGender Identity Children and Gender Gender Identity refers to how we feel and express our gender. From the time we are born, we are identified as being a male or a female. We learn gender identity from others and interaction helps produce it. A baby by the age of 1 knows if they are a boy or girl and by the age of 2 to 3 they form an opinion about the way they feel about their gender. Children take cues from their environment and the people around them to form gender identity. Anthony SchulloRead MoreThe Article Gender Role Models896 Words   |  4 PagesThe article Gender Role Models ... who needs ‘em?! By Stephen Hicks encouraged me to reflect on my childhood gender roles as well as how I portray my gender roles today. 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