Chamblee54

PG had heard the phrase “white privilege” a few times, and decided to ask Mr.Google about it. The top choice was White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack. “This article is now considered a ‘classic’ by anti-racist educators.” It is four pages long, which might not break the attention span.
A document like this is almost impossible to read with an open mind. You are a member of a group, such as a white male like PG. There are a lot of things here which PG agrees with, a few his disagrees with, and a few that are dependent on the reader’s point of view. The sentence that PG felt obliged to copy was ” I was taught to think that racism could end if white individuals changed their attitudes”. It is as if the attitudes of black people did not matter.
There are more headshakers in this article. In a list of privileges white folks take for granted, number 18 was ” I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to “the person in charge,” I will be facing a person of my race.”. That might have true once, but is not today.
Getting back to White Privilege (and ignoring the White Privilege Conference results), there are lots of people thinking about this subject. The University of Dayton contributes Defining “White Privilege”. In the text, the author mentions starting a site, Whiteprivilege.com. This site is currently under construction. It does give you the opportunity to buy “Privilege Car Insurance”.
A feature, What is white privilege?, compares every person with pale skin to the Palin family. “White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because “every family has challenges,” even as black and Latino families with similar “challenges” are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.” This runs counter to line 21 of the Invisible Knapsack list, ” I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group. “
PG went looking for answers, and got more questions. He does not deny that being caucasian has advantages in our society. These advantages do not mean that one should lay down quietly and let black people get their revenge. We are all G-d’s children. You should be proud of who you are, without taking advantage of your neighbor.

After publishing a feature about white privilege , PG thought it would be fair to look into black privilege. When you visit Mr. Google, some of his suggestions are black privilege checklist, black privilege furniture, and black privilege fact or fiction. The top result is a feature in American Thinker. “Personally, I have never had a moment of white guilt in my life. Now this is a significant statement given that I am Jewish and from New York. I feel guilty about pretty much everything!”.
NPR has an audio file called Black Male Privilege? . It is downright fascinating.
Prof. LEWIS: I think youve unfortunately identified one of the central issues of black male privilege. So often, black men are used to being under attacked that when it comes to being accountable for the actions we may have, we quickly say, well, I couldnt possibly be doing anything wrong. Look at all the ways in which Im oppressed. Look at all the ways in which Im at the bottom of the barrel. What that does is rob us of an opportunity to actually build stronger community and it robs black men of a chance to actually take hold of the actions that they have so that we can empower the community.
MARTIN: What reaction do you get when you talk to people about this?
Prof. LEWIS: Among black women, in particular, I get a lot of amens and saying, thank for actually exposing this. Among black men, one of the most common ones I get is, well, this seems ridiculous. Its an oxymoron. How could black men be privileged? Its like jumbo shrimp. It doesnt add up. … And they say, you know, what did my black male privilege get me? Im unemployed. … : Initially, my first exposure was actually around the Million Man March. I felt that I was transformed by the Million Man March, and I thought it was one of the most powerful events ever. And I was having a conversation in class with a professor, Dr. Beverly Guy Sheftall, and she said that she couldnt support the Million Man March because it was very patriarchal and it put black men at the center. And I said, well, it doesnt always have to patriarchal. You dont always have to put black men at the center. And if she said, isnt it an amazing privilege to tell someone else what they dont have to take seriously? And that paused me for a moment. And I said, wow. What is it in my past that makes me say I can define what someone else would think of as important? (Here are more thoughts on this subject by Dr. L’Heureux Dumi Lewis )
Times are tough in the US of A. To an unemployed white person it is easy to say, what good has this privilege done me? And isn’t it a form of privilege to label anything you don’t like about someone as being due to privilege? Has privilege become a catch22 for anything you don’t like about a person?
This feature is not a complete recap of the google results for black privilege. There were a couple of white racist sites that are best ignored. Two wrongs do not make a right. This is a double repost. Pictures are from The Library of Congress. This is written like H. P. Lovecraft.

There is a lot of chatter about privilege these days. Where people used to talk about racism, today the buzzword is privilege. Chamblee54 has tried to contribute to the dialog (polylog) with recent posts about black privilege and white privilege. This is a repost.
One day recently, PG was exercising his vehicular privilege. The thought occured to him about another form of privilege. This privilege is stronger than race based privilege. In fact, many of the people, who whine about white privilege, benefit from this privilege. The president of privilege in America is Christian Privilege. (CP)
If you ask Mr. Google about CP, you get 3.6 million results. The first few give us plenty of text for this feature. A report about CP from About.com Agnosticism / Atheism has the traditional list of examples. The last few paragraphs tell more about the story.
A nonconscious ideology is analogous to the water fish swim in: fish don’t think of the water as wet because this environment is all they know — it structures their experience of life itself. Water simply is. Members of privileged groups don’t have to think about their environment because, for them, that environment simply is. They don’t have to be concerned about others’ opinions because it’s safe to assume that most think like them.
Those who don’t benefit from such an environment do have to think about it all the time because they are so susceptible to being harmed by it. For members of less privileged groups, what others think matters a great deal because their opinions and actions control access to the larger benefits of society. Fish don’t have to think about the water; mammals must remain conscious of it at all times lest they drown.
In most of the examples here, we can replace Christian/religion with male/gender or white/race and come up with the same results: examples of how our social, political, and cultural environment reinforce the dominance of one group over others. Male privilege and white privilege are closely related to Christian privilege because they have all been undermined by modernity and have all become part of America’s Culture Wars.
Christians realize that many of the above privileges are in decline. They interpret this as persecution because privilege is all they have ever known. The same is true when men complain about the decline of male privilege and whites complain about the decline of white privilege. The defense of privilege is a defense of dominance and discrimination, but for those who benefit it’s a defense of their traditional way of life. They need to become conscious of their privileges and realize that in a free society, such privileges are inappropriate.
A blog called Shakesville weighs in with On “Real” Christians and Christian Privilege . It tells the story of being asked not to identify Ann Coulter as a Christian. PG totally understands being embarassed by Ms. Coulter. There was a radio show once, with Ann Coulter promoting a book and PG listening. Some famous person was mentioned, and Ms. Coulter started to make jokes about what would happen to this famous person when he died. The line was that when he gets to heaven, he is going to wish he had been a Christian. This assumption that your ideas about life after death are correct, and universally practiced, is one especially vile example of CP.
The feature at Shakesville (which is easier to pronounce than Shakespearessister) is about how many people deflect complaints about bad behavior by saying “He is not really a Christian”. This is unsatisfactory on a number of levels. Many of the “good” Christians support “bad” Christians in their evil work. This excuse is one reason why PG prefers to say Jesus Worshiper to describe the members of this tribe. Shakes addresses this issue: “Frankly, it’s hurtful to me when Christians address what happened to me by saying, “Those aren’t real Christians,” expecting me to salve their discomfort about the baggage of privilege by not disagreeing. People who would never in a million years think to try to console a victim of a hate crime with “All [white/straight/cis/abled] people aren’t like that!” nonetheless responded that way to me when I was targeted and threatened by droves of self-identified Christians.”
Shakes is a good writer. She says things much better than this slack blogger. Maybe we should just let her explain a few things.
Christianity has a 2,000-year history that has seen countless iterations of the religion based on countless interpretation of the text and shaped to fit countless times and spaces and needs in disparate cultures all around the world. Christians have done great things, and not-so-great things—and anyone who makes the personal choice to carry the Christian mantle associates themselves with a history that includes all the good stuff and all the shitty stuff, too. One can’t say, “I only associate with the good Christianity—not the inquisitions and the genocides and the warmongering and the colonialism and the institutional misogyny … racism, antisemitism …”
That’s all part of Christianity’s legacy, too—and it just isn’t intellectually honest to say, “Well, those weren’t real Christians.” Yes, they were. And so are the Christians who do shitty stuff today. They might not be the same kind of Christian as you are, but they are nonetheless Christians.
Christianity, at least (and especially) in America, is a privilege—and, like any privilege, it can be uncomfortable to face the ugly reality of what other members of a privileged class can do to non-privileged folks, even if you don’t do it yourself. I’m white, I’m straight, I’m cisgender: I understand the impulse to distance oneself. But as a white person, I am obliged to acknowledge that the history of white supremacy in America is one of slavery, of lynchings, of segregation, of sundown towns, of internment camps, of genocide, and of all manner of institutionalized racism. I don’t get to say (nor do I want to) that the KKK aren’t “real” white people. They sure as hell are.
That Christianity is a chosen privilege does not mean its members can claim a lower standard of rigorous self-examination. And it doesn’t mean that less privileged Christians, i.e. progressive Christians, can claim a lower standard, either, just because the more privileged Christians marginalize them. Poor whites don’t get to disclaim their white privilege just because they are further marginalized by their lack of wealth.
In fact, chosen privileges demand, if anything, a higher standard of self-examination, because one has a choice whether to participate in the privilege. But so often, the fact that Christianity is a choice is instead used to deny the effects of that privilege altogether—”I’m not one of those Christians; I’m one of the good ones!”

October 16 is Oscar Wilde’s birthday. On that day in 1854, he appeared in Dublin, Ireland. He is one of the most widely quoted people in the english language. Some of those quotes are real. Since he was a published author, it should be easy to verify what he really said. This birthday celebration is a repost, with pictures from The Library of Congress.
One night in 1974, PG was talking to someone, and did not know who Oscar Wilde was. The conversational partner was horrified. PG became educated, and learned about a misunderstanding with the Marquess of Queensberry. Soon the “Avenge Oscar Wilde” signs made sense.
Mr. Wilde once made a speaking tour in the United States. One afternoon, in Washington D.C., the playwright met Walt Whitman. Thee and thou reportedly did the “Wilde thing”.
The tour then went to Georgia. A young black man had been hired as a valet for Mr. Wilde on this tour. On the train ride from Atlanta to Augusta, some people told Mr. Wilde that he could not ride in the same car as the valet. This was very confusing.
After his various legal difficulties, Oscar Wilde moved to Paris. He took ill, while staying in a tacky hotel. He looked up, and said “either that wallpaper goes, or I do”. Soon, Oscar Wilde passed away.

@jimgoad “I had an aneurysm before finishing the headline.” The headline in question is Doctors seek approval to transplant dead man’s sex organs onto trans-identified woman, appearing in The Christian Post. The story is tacky yellow journalism. A major source appears to be Jennifer Bilek, who has created a cottage industry out of badmouthing trans people. A comment typifies the approach here: “Frankenstein. And not much different than attaching the dead religion of the Torah/Talmud onto the living word of the New Testament.” This is a repost.
“Penis transplant performed on soldier at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore considered a success” The procedure has been performed, although not on ftm trans. “… a complex genital transplant on a soldier who also lost his legs in a bomb blast in Afghanistan, the man says he has normal functions and is “feeling whole.” The man … received a donated penis, scrotum and part of an abdominal wall during a 14-hour surgery in April 2018. … the man has “near-normal erections and the ability to achieve orgasm,” and can urinate “while standing, without straining, frequency, or urgency, with the urine discharged in a strong stream.” … Hopkins covered the $300,000 to $400,000 cost of the procedure and doctors donated their time. The hospital approved up to 60 more such procedures for service members, though not for transgender individuals or those born with defects.”
The CP article linked to a more serious medical magazine, Hospital Debates Penis Transplant in Transgender Patient. This article had some solid information, and will be quoted in the next few paragraphs. This article got a comment: “This is such a long article, that I feel comments probably are needed to be made, but I can think of nothing to say.”
“The main objectives of penis transplants are to provide an aesthetic phallus, urinary function, and sexual function (including erections and “erogenous sensitivity”) … While outcomes remain unknown, the prospect of penis transplants in transgender men is “huge” … phalloplasties – in which phalluses are constructed from flaps of skin – have complication rates of 80% to 90%, and that’s not the only limitation. … phalloplasties “don’t have the same aesthetic appeal [as natural penises] and they don’t enlarge and get hard on their own. They’re always the same size.”
“Metoidioplasties (met-oh-id-ee-oh-plas-tees) are another option for transgender men, but they also have limitations. In these procedures, surgeons form neophalluses out of clitoral tissue. The phalluses are disappointingly small … “You do have an erection and it can stay hard. Some people are capable of penetrating a partner, and some are not.”
“Compared to these existing options, a penis transplant ideally will offer “fewer urethral complications, better cosmetic outcome, and better physiological sexual capacity.” Still, limitations include the fact that transgender men who receive penis transplants will not be able to ejaculate since they lack a male reproductive system. It’s also not known if they’ll be able to have erections. For now, … the plan is to see if physical stimulation of the transplanted penis will engorge the clitoris enough to trigger blood flow to the corpus cavernosa in the penis – an erection.”
“Not surprisingly, penis transplants in transgender men will be more challenging than in cisgender men. In addition to connecting nerves and blood vessels, … patients will need urethra lengthening, as in phalloplasties, so the transplanted penis can urinate. However, … “the beauty of taking transplanted tissue is you can take as much tissue as you want. You can take the extra length of the donor’s urethra so you wouldn’t have to do the lengthening procedure.”
“Penis transplants in transgender individuals raise many other questions. Will scrotums also be transplanted, as was done in the Johns Hopkins transplant? What about testicles, which could produce sperm and – conceivably – offspring of the original donor? Testicles were not transplanted in the soldier … at Johns Hopkins for this reason … “Then the offspring is technically whose child?”
“VCA transplants (vascularized composite allotransplantation) in general are a controversial topic among bioethicists, especially in light of their high cost, high risk, and need for lifetime immunosuppression. “Unlike most solid organ transplants which are typically lifesaving, the goal of VCA is to improve quality of life. One of the challenges in VCA is that the [bioethics] field is still determining how to define and evaluate quality of life.”
“One critic questions whether penis transplants should be performed at all. They raise “ethical questions concerning aesthetics, morbidity, function, and cost-burden given the more readily available and less morbid alternative of phalloplasty” … The cost of a penis transplant in a transgender patient would likely be covered by research grant funds. … The transplant at Johns Hopkins cost a reported $300,000-$400,000, all covered by the institution.”
Pictures are from The Library of Congress. Here is another look at ethical issues.

The uproar over Breonna Taylor has cooled off a bit. Those who feel the need will continue to stir. Whatever inconvenient facts come along will be ignored. Cognitive dissonance, and narcotizing dysfunction, are real. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. repost.
Louisville Metro Police Department compiled a 39 page report that was leaked to the press. Much of the report is transcripts of phone calls made from jail. The people in these calls do not look good. They argue, say the n-word, and generally act like a bunch of jerks. Jamarcus Cordell Glover, the primary person we are looking at today, was a known crack/fentynyl dealer. After a while, the reader is left with a feeling of disgust for the people in these calls.
JCG was a former lover of Breonna Taylor. There were indications of a continuing business relationship. Was Breonna Taylor dealing drugs? It is tough to say. Were her hands clean? Almost certainly not. Associating with drug dealers is not a reason to be killed. However, it does made this sad occurrence much more likely.
“PBI detectives … 03/13/2020 – executed simultaneous search warrants at 2424 Elliott Avenue, 2425 Elliott Avenue, 2426 Elliott Avenue, and 3003 Springfield Drive #4 (see attached). During a search of 2424 Elliott Avenue, PBI detectives were able to recover a large amount of suspected crack cocaine and suspected Fentanyl pills … Jamarcus Glover, Demarius Bowman, Rayshawn Lee, and Alicia Jones were located at 2424 Elliott Avenue at the time the search warrants were executed. … When the search warrant was executed at 3003 Springfield Drive #4, which Breonna Taylor was listed on, an officer involved shooting (OIS) occurred and as a result Breonna Taylor was killed. Present inside the apartment at the time the search warrant was executed was Breonna Taylor and Kenneth Walker.” (Demarius Bowman is the brother of Fernandez Bowman, whose body was found in a car rented by Breonna Taylor on December 3, 2016)
JCG made a series of calls from jail on March 13. It should be noted that we don’t know if he is telling the truth in these calls. There was a recorded message at the start of these calls: “This is a prepaid collect call from an inmate at Louisville metropolitan corrections department. This is not a protected or privileged phone call. This call is subject to recording and monitoring. To accept charges press one to refuse char … Thank you for using securus. You may start the conversation now.” What follows are selected quotes from these calls.
08:52 J Glover calls Kiera Bradley, the mother of JCG’s child.
KB – “Chop that girl got killed over you.”
09:27 JCG calls KB
JCG – “I’m hurt my name gettin called about Bre’s death … This ***** (Kenneth Walker) in jail … this ***** got Bre dead … At the end of the day it was not my fault. It’s this *****’s fault that’s in here. The reason why it happened, the ***** is sittin right here.”
KB – “Okay did y’all talk or is he still on some defensive shit?”
JCG – “He said they were beating on the door.”
11:30 JCG calls KB, tells her to put Domo (Dominique Crenshaw) on the line.
JCG – “What up Domo (Dominique Crenshaw) … Kenneth just got her killed *****. Sitting in this jail like it’s all good, like he’s straight, like it ain’t his fault.”
DC – “So he the one shooting the gun?”
JMG – “Yeah he shoots at the police, they shoot back, Bre in the hallway and she gets killed.”
12:27 JCG calls KB
KB – “Everybody’s calling because their saying your baby momma got killed. … Her momma (Breonna Taylor’s mother) and the no limit crew… they basically like the ***** that she was fucking with got her all caught up … the no limit they don’t play.”
JCG – “Man I don’t care.”
KB – “I know you don’t care, you don’t care about shit.”
12:58 JCG calls unknown female
JCG – “He (Kenneth Walker) said motherfuckers knocked on the door but he didn’t know who it was. They asked who it is but don’t nobody say nothin … He said they kicked that door and he “bocked” on them. He said they started shooting back and Bre was in the hallway and she caught bullets … Scott (Scott Barton – J. Glover’s attorney) know Bre, he know her, he been dealing with me and Bre the whole time I’ve been going through this shit.”
13:07 JCG calls KB
They argue over him not being honest and him, having money at other people’s house.
JCG – “Why are you doing this?”
KB – “Cuz my feelings are hurt.”
JCG – “Why cuz the bread (money) was at her house?… This is what you got to understand, don’t take it wrong but Bre been handling all my money, she been handling my money… She been handling shit for me and cuz, it ain’t just me.”…
KB – “Motherfuckers are posting videos of you and all of that.”
JCG – “Who posts videos of me?”
KB – “This bitch (Breonna Taylor) where she’s been with you, since you ain’t been over at my house… the same day you post a picture I guess she post a video, you knew it because she said what’s up she was in the bed with you, you kissing all over her. This shit is embarrassing.”
16:27 JCG calls KB
KB – “It ain’t even really about Bre because I already know… Motherfuckers done already gave me the blueprint … I know she was fuckin with you…You bounce back and forth between these bitches and I’m not doing none of that, it’s messy… That could have been me bro…”
JCG – “Could have been you because you around a *****?”
KB – “No because I’m around you … You bringin mess on yourself … You think a motherfucker trying to criticize you … You bring shit on yourself like the messiness, its how you move, how you’re so flamboyant, how you putting shit out … I don’t even know what I got myself into … You want me to text your side bitch Rica (Robrica Johnson)? She got gas to get up there to you? … You act like a motherfucker can’t be mad, I got your daughter and you tell me you got money somewhere else, when you’re out here risking your life and your freedom every motherfucking day, like I can call Bre and ask Bre to do anything for my daughter.”
17:20 JCG calls Adrian Walker
AW – “I thought you said they found some money over there?”
JCG – “It was there, it was there, it was there… They didn’t do nothing though that’s the problem … Kenneth said ain’t none of that go on.”
AW – “So they didn’t take none of the money?”
JCG – “Kenneth said that none of that go on. He said Homicide came straight on the scene and they went to packaging Bre and they left.”
AW – “He said they didn’t announce themselves or something?”
JCG – “He sayin they wasn’t, he’s sayin they were just beating so hard.”
AW – “She was in the hallway?”
JCG – “In the hallway *****. That’s just so sad bruh. … “She (Breonna Taylor) gonna turn her back on me cause she love that ***** … that ***** did this shit. At the end of the day if I would have been at that house, Bre would be alive bruh … I don’t shoot at no police.”
17:58 JCG calls KB
KB – “…You had Bre’s car on Valentine’s Day, we weren’t together …
You don’t care about nothing but the money.”
21:27 JCG calls KB
JCG – “How you gonna bond that man out of jail? This shit happened because of this ***** (Kenneth Walker)… he fired shots at the police.”
KB starts arguing with J. Glover over what if the police would have run in her house last night, and he wasn’t going to be there, and she has their daughter…
JCG – “Bre, Bre.”
KB – “I’m Kiera, I’m Kiera.”