non-original white privilege title

Because I have finished "The Boys of Baraka", I will hold back on responding to the documentary until we have finished it as a class. I will say though, that I found it very moving, powerful and hugely sobering in spite of all of our readings.

In response to the "White Privilege" article however, I'm sure I have nothing new to add to this discussion but at the same point, I think it's amazing how little we all knew about the power and privileges we have all been enjoying. It was very sobering to realize that white people are not taught to see ourselves as privileged but instead we are conditioned to think of minorities as disadvantaged and the conversation stops there. There don't seem to be two sides to the coin in this scenario and there needs to be.

One thought in particular that stuck out to me was this one, "...[I was] taught to recognize racism only in individual acts of meanness by members of my group, never in invisible systems conferring unsought racial dominance on my group from birth." I find myself in the exact same boat, I have never thought of racism as something more than racial slurs, overt oppression from some higher power of authority or blatant hatred.

I'm very excited to get my hands on my classroom and begin to educate children of all races, at an early age, on what racism is, what it looks like and how it affects not just minorities but every human being. I think it's very important to make sure that white children are educated on their position of power and privilege so they aren't as blind to it as I was and so that they are mindful of their personal impacts instead of being totally oblivious. My hope is that this will help in delivering my overall message of compassion, tolerance and acceptance of others and that it will help teach white children especially, how to act responsibly, kindly and in the best interest of others.