Comment by Arn_Thor
5 days ago
And there's the rub. You feel like your hard work is dismissed. To be honest, that's a framing problem. I think you misunderstand what people are saying.
Take me as an example: I'm in a very enviable and privileged position. I worked really hard for it. But if someone were to tell me "you're privileged", I don't get my feelings hurt.
I recognize that 1) someone else working 10 times as hard as me still would be extremely unlikely to get where I'm at if they were from another group. 2) If I were in a disadvantaged group, all the hard work I have put in is unlikely to have been enough. 3) Therefore, the fact I'm sitting here, no matter how hard I worked, is ALSO very much down to luck.
The first time I thought about it in those terms, my ego took a hit. It is an uncomfortable upending of the way I used to see the world and my place in it. But it is nonetheless true. Trust me, I am not trying to dismiss your hard work, but make you see it in its true context.
And after some time thinking about this I have a much greater respect for those that struggle as hard as, or harder than, me because they don't have the privileges I was born with.
> I recognize that 1) someone else working 10 times as hard as me still would be extremely unlikely to get where I'm at if they were from another group. 2) If I were in a disadvantaged group, all the hard work I have put in is unlikely to have been enough.
These are massive, hand-wavey statements based on assumptions with no basis. 10 times? Really? Flip your skin colour and add 10x the hard work and you would still be worse off?
I completely agree with point #3, that we are all hugely lucky (and unlucky) in many many many visible and less visible (and, hey, invisible) ways.
I haven't sat down and quantified the difference, no. But it doesn't matter if the number is 2x, 10x, or 100x. The point remains the exact same: to not get personally offended when people point out our privilege. They are not, and have never been, dismissing the work we have done to get where we are. But put in an accurate context, we are perhaps not makers of our own success quite to the degree we once imagined.