Today’s thoughts come by way of a video our Media & Religion class viewed, 5 Tips For Being An Ally, by Ches Caleigh.  The first tip defines Privilege in a way that was really helpful for me, got to thinking, egad, I could describe this to others now.

“Privilege means there are some things in life that you will not experience or ever have to think about just because of who you are.”

Ches continues with an analogy, saying that:

“It’s kind of like those horses that have blinders on. They can see, just fine. It’s just that there’s a whole bunch of other stuff on the side that they don’t even know exists.”

This, to me makes sense.  Being a white, straight male, upper middle class and Christian, privilege defines me.  It’s something to be aware of that impacts how – and what – we see in the world. My own demographics, traits I was born with, are all in a dominant position in culture currently with respect to race, sexuality, gender, income and religion. There’s nothing wrong with this, tho it is something to be conscious of, and how that changes what we see in the world by default. Things like immigration, paying for college, and Ferguson. Our conversation after watching the video was predictable for a while, what you’d expect in a room of future pastors taking a class at a seminary affiliated with a progressive Christian denomination. We talked about gender and income, and the privilege that comes with being a male of some means. One of my classmates hails from Liberia, and spoke to the difference of being on the other side of mission work done in Africa through churches in the US. “People want to visit and be benefactors for us” he said.  “We really prefer if you come to visit, sit and talk, learn our ways.  Maybe we can share in finding solutions.”   That reconfirms my own sense of international mission, it’s a great perspective.

What happened next really opened my eyes and removed the blinders for a moment as to what other types of privilidge are out there.  Another person in class, former military, spoke about the high incidence of suicides among veterans.  While veterans make up about 1% of the population in the US, 20% of suicides are veterans.  Whoa!  I was floored.  Here we live in the land of the free, the home of the brave, most of us living a life of privilege by *not* having to serve in the military.  And yet those that do are TWENTY TIMES more likely to commit suicide than the general population. That’s huge.
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What are the solutions to this? We only touched on that a bit, but my sense from listening to this is the US could to better, much better at reintegrating veterans back into society. Offering vets jobs that reflect the leadership skills they honed while in service is one way to get at this, there are likely others.

I’m still processing this experience a bit, tho suffice to say there is more privilege in our daily lives that each of us enjoy without realizing it.

What are some of your privileges? What kind of blinders does this create? How can you use this knowledge for good? Post any thoughts in the comments section below.