How do you feel about the word "privilege"?

submitted by moody_ape from self.GenderCritical

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[–]Anna_Nym 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

"Privilege" is in the list of things like "emotional labor," "intersectionality," and "cultural appropriation" that were perfectly good concepts as used in academia by people who spent the time to be grounded in the theory.

Unfortunately, as these phrases went through the equivalent of a game of telephone migrating from academy through blogs, Tumblr, and Twitter into pop culture, they've become phrases used to short circuit thought.

Too often "privilege", in particular, is used as a rhetorical tool to dehumanize and decrease empathy.

[–]moody_ape[S] 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I think what you're saying makes a lot of sense. I'd add "Empowering" to the list. Someone else commented about how the word "privilege" has different usages for common people x academia and how academics seem to colonize common language, which creates this sort of conflict (or misunderstandings). Maybe there is a little of both things happening: there are terms created in academia that are very useful there, but they lose their original meaning when they leave academia and go into social media activism; and there are common words (like privilege) that have a certain meaning and are used differently in academia, generating confusion.