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Thought provoking column from an ex-colleague of mine...

torbee

HR King
Gold Member
Interesting to note, too, that Scott is one of the most conservative, straight edge people I've ever met in my life. This is most definitely not some "woke" screed:

COMMENTARY


This is what white privilege looks like​

Scott Reeder

SCOTT REEDER


APRIL 4, 2022 5:39 AM​





A few months ago, I was pulled over by a Springfield, Illinois-area police officer for a minor traffic violation.

He shined a flashlight in my car and said, “Mr. Reeder, are you carrying?”

I replied that no, my firearm was home locked up in a safe.

He replied, “You should always carry. It doesn’t do you any good if it’s home locked up.”

He gave me a verbal warning and sent me on my way.

I couldn’t help but wonder how different that encounter might have been if I were Black.

In 2020, I wrote a piece about Illinois state Rep. Curtis Tarver, who was pulled over not far from his home for having a burned-out headlight. An officer asked him, “Do you have a gun in the car?” He responded he did and showed them his valid conceal carry permit.

But he says he was still hauled into a police station, handcuffed to a table for seven hours and not allowed to call an attorney. They treated him this way despite knowing he was a lawyer and a state lawmaker.
Nine months later, charges against him were dismissed because it was determined he hadn’t broken any law. But the cops kept his gun.

Tarver is Black. I’m white. He was arrested despite being licensed to carry. I was scolded for not carrying.

That’s the definition of white privilege.

I might add that white privilege isn’t necessarily something someone seeks. And it doesn’t mean you haven’t had struggles in your life. It just means that one of those struggles wasn’t related to the color of your skin.

Sometimes it manifests itself in big ways such as whether one is arrested. But often smaller things are more telling.

Last week, our puppy chewed up my well-worn pair of work boots. I went to my favorite shoe store, a place where I’ve always found the service to be excellent.

There was one other customer there, a Black man with his family. He has a good job as a union dry wall installer, and he too was buying a new pair of boots.

After trying a pair on, I asked if I made the purchase whether they could throw in a free pair of socks. In a rather officious tone – as if he were speaking to an audience, not just me – the manager told me, “We never do that.”

And he pointed at my sales associate and said, “He could be fired if he did that.”

I stepped into the washroom and when I returned the African American family had left. The associate had my boots boxed up and handed me a free pair of socks. He said, “You’re a good customer – you deserve this.”

My first reaction was, “That’s nice, he changed his mind.”

As I drove home, it dawned on me that whole charade was done so they wouldn’t be obliged to also give a free pair of socks to the Black customer who was spending the same amount as me.
White folks, myself included, can be pretty clueless when it comes to the privileges we are extended.

Several years ago, I was driving just south of Springfield Memorial Hospital when I came across a van that had broken down on a side street.

The driver was a young African American man who had recently graduated from high school. He said he had run out of gas and was worried about being late for his job working in a restaurant.

I had him climb in my truck and I drove him to a gas station several blocks away. I got out of the truck and grabbed a nozzle to fill up my gas can.

The young man said, “You can’t do that. This is my neighborhood station and you have to pre-pay.” But it was the station I stopped at routinely on the way to work, and I had never prepaid.
Sure enough, as soon as I stuck the nozzle in the can, gasoline flowed.

I looked at the young man who was dressed in a nice pair of jeans. I had been doing yard work that day and was wearing a pair of bib overalls. So, it wasn’t how I was dressed that got me treated better.
He drove an old van, but I was driving an old pickup.

Perhaps I was treated better because I have some gray in my hair, but I doubt it.

It would seem my skin color offered me a privilege that’s denied others. That’s just not right but it won’t change until more white people realize that the privileges they receive often are denied others.

This column was originally published in the Iowa Capital Dispatch, which like the Nevada Current is part of the States Newsroom network of nonprofit news outlets.
 
Fallacy after fallacy with this white privilege argument. You can not compare two different outcomes with two different cops. How do you know the cop that told him “you should be carrying” wouldn’t have said it to a black man? How do you know the intent behind another persons decisions? Just assume it’s racism?
 
Fallacy after fallacy with this white privilege argument. You can not compare two different outcomes with two different cops. How do you know the cop that told him “you should be carrying” wouldn’t have said it to a black man? How do you know the intent behind another persons decisions? Just assume it’s racism?
Really hard to know on a per incident basis, but in aggregate.
 
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Fallacy after fallacy with this white privilege argument. You can not compare two different outcomes with two different cops. How do you know the cop that told him “you should be carrying” wouldn’t have said it to a black man? How do you know the intent behind another persons decisions? Just assume it’s racism?
Zero mention of racism in the column at all. It is not a column about racism - it's a column about white privilege.
 
Fallacy after fallacy with this white privilege argument. You can not compare two different outcomes with two different cops. How do you know the cop that told him “you should be carrying” wouldn’t have said it to a black man? How do you know the intent behind another persons decisions? Just assume it’s racism?
I am guessing you are not a person of color?
 
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Racial profiling definitely happens, and I have been subjected to it. However, I find the article to be white knighting in a way that is unnecessary and paints police in a bad light.
 
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They should! I give them ‘em a wide birth on the roads - they either drive like a 95 year old grandma or like they just got off the family tuk-tuk straight outta Delhi. #notrascistjuststereotyping @GOHOX69
Haha, nicely put. I am headed to the grandma stage!
 
I firmly believe there is such a thing as white privilege.

I don’t believe the writer’s examples are good examples.

That said, if it made him rethink his worldview, good on him.
This
 
Zero mention of racism in the column at all. It is not a column about racism - it's a column about white privilege.
For an almighty race war fighter you sure don't have a good understanding of the concepts behind racism.
 
Good strategy. I know our interactions with the po po are most likely different because I’m white, but I also try to avoid them, but when I can’t, I ALWAYS act calm and courteous and try not to piss them off.

And don't look them in the eyes. I sometimes act as though I am sleeping just so I don't have to look at them.
 
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I won't deny that I have been the beneficiary of white privilege, but I don't agree with his explanation/definition of it:

"I might add that white privilege isn’t necessarily something someone seeks. And it doesn’t mean you haven’t had struggles in your life. It just means that one of those struggles wasn’t related to the color of your skin."

I have definitely had struggles during the course of my lifetime based upon the color of my skin. Specifically, having to defend myself from physical violence.

We can, and do, talk all day about what society needs to do to make things better for black people, but at the same time we shouldn't just accept that there are places that aren't safe for white people to exist. We are subjected to article after article after tweet after Instagram post after opinion piece about how white people need to think about the things we say, do, and think but none of us will ever move forward if racism continues to be addressed unilaterally.

Cue the "you're a racist" accusations.
 
Fallacy after fallacy with this white privilege argument. You can not compare two different outcomes with two different cops. How do you know the cop that told him “you should be carrying” wouldn’t have said it to a black man? How do you know the intent behind another persons decisions? Just assume it’s racism?
Yeah!! White people get told to go back to their country all the time. Oh wait...no they don't. That's white privilege. There are so many examples of it but people like you refuse to accept it.

I've told this story before...a friend of mine lives in a smallish Iowa town. She has almost all of her life. Never once has she been pulled over in town for anything. Her husband, who is black, has been pulled over 6 times since he has lived there. Not one ticket, because he doesn't speed. That's white privilege.
 
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Zero mention of racism in the column at all. It is not a column about racism - it's a column about white privilege.
This is where democrats specifically the woke super left wingers, go wrong. They want to play with words when we all know what's really being said. It offends many centrists and worse yet it causes people to downplay real problems.
 
I could have told you who the posters would be who disagreed with the article without opening the thread.
I didn't even intend for people to agree or disagree -- I thought it was pretty thought provoking, particularly since it was coming from a rural downstate Illinois conservative perspective.
 
I can’t think of any here in DSM where I have had to “pre-pay” unless it was after 9pm.

Really? Wow! That is non exsistent in my part of the country.
Most that I’m aware either have the option of pay at the pump or pre-pay inside. Since I usually don’t have more than a rough estimate of how much gas I need, I usually select pay at the pump.

what’s increasingly rare is the pay inside option after getting the gas. That was a growing trend before, but Covid essentially killed the option for good.
 
Most that I’m aware either have the option of pay at the pump or pre-pay inside. Since I usually don’t have more than a rough estimate of how much gas I need, I usually select pay at the pump.

what’s increasingly rare is the pay inside option after getting the gas. That was a growing trend before, but Covid essentially killed the option for good.
Pre-pay only in Davenport these days. City actually passed an ordinance for pre-pay only as a way of eliminating drive offs when they realized just how much time the police department was spending responding to them.
 
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Most that I’m aware either have the option of pay at the pump or pre-pay inside. Since I usually don’t have more than a rough estimate of how much gas I need, I usually select pay at the pump.

what’s increasingly rare is the pay inside option after getting the gas. That was a growing trend before, but Covid essentially killed the option for good.

I can't even remember the last time I had the option to pay inside after filling up. 20+ years, at least.
 
Most that I’m aware either have the option of pay at the pump or pre-pay inside. Since I usually don’t have more than a rough estimate of how much gas I need, I usually select pay at the pump.

what’s increasingly rare is the pay inside option after getting the gas. That was a growing trend before, but Covid essentially killed the option for good.
In CR, as far as I can remember, Katrina and the high gas prices it temporarily brought killed the 'pay after pumping' option. Lots of drive-offs around that time.
 
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