Privilege

These two pictures were taken in the men’s section at Dillard’s.  The suit on the right is a three piece suit with pinstripes and a cufflink, while the suit on the left is a less formal two piece suit.  Below the picture of the suits is the price tag from the three piece suit on the right showing that the jacket alone costs $495.00.

These images represent positions of privilege in our society where women and minorities are absent, scarce, or simply oppressed.  Peggy McIntosh in “White Privilege and Male Privilege:  A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences

 

Through Work in Women’s Studies” argues how denials of the existence of privilege by whites or men prevent progress to end oppression.  The high price of this single jacket represents the level of salary that is unlikely to be earned by most women in our society.  To analyze further, the man buying this type of item is also very unlikely to be willing to recognize how his unearned privilege has granted him the ability to have his salary in our society.  Even more, because he does not recognize the unearned status of his privilege, he may not be in a position to acknowledge that his merits alone did not help him achieve success, or likewise, that the disadvantaged around him cannot achieve success solely on their merits.  McIntosh states, “Only rarely will a man go beyond acknowledging that women are disadvantaged or acknowledging that men have unearned advantage, or that unearned privilege has not been good for men’s development as human beings, or for society’s development, or that privilege systems might ever be challenged.”  The unearned privilege that patriarchy has granted this type of person inherently leaves the minorities and women working with and around him oppressed.

Since a very young age, I have been feeling the effects of privilege, oftentimes considering myself to not be privileged.  Some examples of this have been living in poverty, being bullied because my body type put me at a disadvantage in society, or not having the same opportunities in the workplace as men with similar qualifications.  While working as a government contractor in the administrative field, all of my coworkers were women, most of them without degrees.  However, I did notice men I worked with that had better opportunities for education, advancement, or simply greater visibility with upper management.