Reason of The Black Lives Matter Movement

In this century across the nation children of all backgrounds are experiencing at an early age discussion about race, gender equality, sexual orientation, religion, and different cultures it’s at the forefront of their everyday lives many people avoid this discussion because they fear that conversation about race, bias, and racism lead to feelings of anger guilt discomfort sadness and at times disrespect. Due to the current state we have been in, I believe it is time that we are having this conversation with our kids to help better understand what is going around their communities. They need to understand how to love one another, without this lesson in their life they are prone to take advantage of their privileges.

Furthermore, white privilege is an inherent advantage possessed by a white person and the basis of their race in a society kept characterized by racial inequality and injustice, according to Washington Post, “white privilege is taking societal advantage that comes with being seen as the norm in America, automatically conferred irrespective of wealth, gender or other factors. It makes life smoother, but it’s something you would barely notice unless it was suddenly taken away from you or unless they have never applied to you in the first place.” Now due to current time minorities are becoming more vocal about how their experiences in America differ from those of their white counterparts, the term white privilege might finally be entering the mainstream, however, white privilege has always been around and it has always been talked about, in 1988 Professor Peggy McIntosh wrote about white privileged in an essay, Peggy described white privileged as a set of an earned asset that a white person in America can count on cashing each day, however, they remain largely oblivious to the concept that has been in academic circles.

When it comes to white privilege, white people always turn a blind eye and never noticed the statistics that are given with minorities such as job applicants with white-sounding names are 50% more likely to get it called in for an interview or how black defendants are 30% more likely to be imprisoned than white defendants for the same crime that is committed. Now people are finally beginning to talk about what it means in their own life, the term is finally coming to the mainstream to bring awareness. The black lives matter has been taking the time to help people understand the movement due to the death of George Floyd, a black man who was killed at the hands of police and due to that, thousands have taken to the streets to take part in the protest as well as voicing their opinion on social media signing petitions and taking part in fundraising events.

Black Lives Matter has used their platform to take advantage and bring more awareness to white privilege, according to The Scotsman, “Many supporters of the Black Lives Matter campaign have since taken to Twitter to point out the difference in the police approach to the Black Lives Matter protesters and the dominantly white demonstrators who protested coronavirus lockdown measures in April.” White privilege has existed for hundreds of years, ever since Black people were adopted and enslaved white privilege has existed, it might not be the same as it was back then, however, it still exists nonetheless, it wasn’t even until the 20th century that the civil rights act of 1964 officially outlawed racial segregation and discrimination in voting, schools, employment, and public housing.

In conclusion, white privilege is here to give white people advantages that minority people are not able to achieve without great effort, even though the system is built to keep minorities down there are ways that we can help bring more awareness to the white privilege we all have our implicit bias, civilization is about working against our instinct we won’t be able to change our prejudices until we address that we have them in the first place, we need to be able to educate each other and learn about what it means to have racial privilege, and also learn to understand different forms of white supremacy you may not even know you are engaging in it, there are different ways to address prejudice, according to Great Big Story, “start with Harvard’s project implicit, it allows you to take a series of test to see where you’re unconscious bias lies looking at race, gender, age, weight, disability, and sexuality.” Ways to get involved could include looking up an author like Michelle Alexander who talks about new Jim Crowe‘s, Robin DiAngelo, who in the majority of her books talks about white people being so fragile when it comes to bringing up white privilege or racism.