Privilege

The recent protests across the Western world against systemic racism have been, for the most part, a powerful expression of anger and frustration by people of colour, with the focus being on the Black community. I use the term Black instead of African-American because while they started in the US, the protests have now spread to a number of countries. It’s also forced people in positions of privilege to look inwards and social media has been awash with stories of people having epiphanies, which hopefully translate to more than just words.

I say this because we do a lot of what we do nowadays for social media validation, and to follow the herd. Also, it’s easy to write a post about how privileged you are or change your picture to a black square to show solidarity while continuing to hold the biases you hold in daily life. But I am being unfairly cynical in assuming that everyone follows the same way of thinking, especially since I'm going to do the same later on in this post. It’s hard to change things overnight, and more reasonable to bring about a change at an individual level in daily life, which of course goes unnoticed, often by oneself as well.

Acknowledgement of privilege can be scary, involves a hit to the ego, but can be liberating. As a ‘visible minority’ as I’m officially classified in Canada, it’s comforting to see people acknowledge their white privilege as a first step. Injustices have been done in the past, and while there is nowhere near the level of racism in today’s society as there was in the past, there’s no doubt that it still manifests itself today in the form of privilege. You can’t acknowledge that it doesn’t exist, just because you yourself say you are not racist. Great, but society has been constructed with the racist lens of the past and it’s not going to disappear overnight. I don’t believe it’s fair to hold people accountable today for what their ancestors did, or for that matter, to judge their ancestors with today’s moral standards. I don’t expect any special treatment either, it’s a merit-based society for the most part, but recognize that you’re in a privileged position and work on your biases and we can then all move forward.

So I’m calling out white people’s privilege, but what about my own? Yes, it’s possible for everyone to have privilege really. I mean, just a little bit of looking inward was enough for me to realize that I pretty much hit the jackpot in terms of Indian society. Male, Hindu, Upper Caste (yes it still matters, to say you don’t believe in it is in itself a sign of privilege), grew up in a city, went to an ‘English-medium’ school. That’s more than most in India. In a country with so much income inequality, I definitely landed up closer to the ‘right’ side. And yet it’s something I’ve always taken for granted, it’s like I thought that was the only way, and at times thought of myself as superior to others. Isn’t that privilege? Where you take your position for granted and don’t realize the struggles others have to go through to have the opportunities that just come to you? I’m not saying I haven’t worked hard, or made sacrifices or taken risks, but I had a headstart. And that’s through no doing of my own, it’s not my fault that I had those boxes ticked for me, I just happened to be dealt a good set of cards.

So how to deal with privilege? It’s easy to point out what others should do, but what about yourself? I first started thinking about this when Akanksha and I watched the Hindi show, Paatal Lok a few weeks ago, and I said “Holy shit, we’re so lucky on so many levels!” To be able to watch TV, after a day of working from home while getting full pay, and having the time to think about stuff like this, that in itself is a privilege. I struggled with my feelings. I felt stupid in a way, like how could I not realize this all these years? I felt inconsiderate- what a horrible person I've been in the past. I felt self-entitled- did I even deserve to complain about things in my life? How do I make this right?

The answer is, there’s no way, or no need, to make it right. Like I said earlier, it’s no one’s fault. I can’t go back in time, and I shouldn’t have to apologize for the position I find myself in. It's going to make me uncomfortable, but that's good. It will help me change going forward. To become more compassionate, to become more tolerant, and to become more grateful. While I expect others around me who are more privileged to be considerate to me, I can do the same too. Because if you think about it, all of us have something we take for granted, we just need to find out what it is. And that’s where the journey begins.

Thank you for reading!