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Confront Inequality
Uneven distribution of wealth
Unequal wealth distribution
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Privilege can come in many forms. Financial privilege comes immediately to mind although this is a privilege that we should as a society strive to ensure in not a barrier to a worthy individual. This would be relatively straight forward to address given the privilege of a supportive environment is as important or more so than a financial privilege yet more difficult aspect in which to level the playing field. I consider myself privileged to have two parents that taught me the value of education as means to do good for the world. My parents, children and grandchildren of immigrants, grew up in poor circumstances but they had the privilege of parents who valued education. They strove to become engineers and used their education to make
a positive impact. How to engender this type of cultural privilege engendered over generations is probably a larger challenge for society yet it is an inescapable obligation. To be privileged comes with an obligation to address these inequities. I believe we a students, honors or otherwise, should take upon ourselves the mentoring the underprivileged to achieve academically and in life. Honors programs specifically should carry this as a component.
In conversations many people get defensive when someone says, “You have this because of your privilege” they feel as though that the person they are talking with doesn’t understand that they have worked hard for what they have, however that is not the point that anyone is trying to make. What someone in that position is saying is that although you have worked hard to get where you are your journey have been well furnished with privilege on account of your race. It is said to think about that you got somewhere in life due to the color of your skin, but it is also sadder to think that someone got declined a job, got stereotyped, or got overlooked because of their race or
When I read “Checking My Privilege” written by Tal Fortgang, a freshman at Princeton University, it made me stop and think. What does privilege mean, how should it be used and does it affect me and my life? Fortgang never really states the exact meaning of the word privilege but goes on to complain about the mistreatment of the word and how it is a form of reverse racism; could that be true, I wondered? However, he also claims that privileges do not exist based on race or gender, and that is something I do not agree with. I imagine many people will not agree with his stance on the word privilege or mine, as a matter of fact. Mainly because the word privilege has a different
I will first discuss his views on the predominance of business in lobbying policy makers.
Getting one good grade in school is easy, the difficult part is to keep getting good grades. This concept applies to other things also. For example when a group is given a certain privilege they have to maintain it. In the essay “The Unexamined” by Ross Chambers, the author discusses that different races are perceived differently depending on where they are. He says that white people are the superior ones, and they bare the privilege of not being marked by others. While other races are discriminated, the whites are excluded from discrimination. Together with the color category there are other ones which also are the privileged ones, like for example: men and straight people. In the other essay “Man Royals And Sodomites” by Makeda Silvera,
Privileges are things that a person receives that gives them an advantage over most people (Merriam-Webster). These are benefits that only certain people receive for being in a certain group or discourse. Peggy McIntosh, director of the Wellesley College Center for Research on Women, wrote “White Privilege and Male Privilege” and states “I think whites are carefully taught not to recognize white privileges, as males are taught not to recognize male privilege” (605). She argues that whites and males receive certain privileges, yet they do not even notice them. This shows that different races and women are still put at a disadvantage, but the people who receive the benefits are blind to the problem. Many people will argue that she is correct while some others will explain why this not is the case.
Privilege is a topic with, any definitions and many angles of interpretation. My definition describes privilege as a step-up or positive opportunity in a specific situation or circumstance that is not available to everyone. These privileges are sometimes earned while others are totally unwarranted by the recipient. An example of what I consider an unwarranted privilege would be a child living in a certain county and being able to attend a highly sought-after school strictly due to the way an area is zoned by the county. The privilege of a military veteran having his tuition paid for by the Government is a earned privilege by my beliefs. Privilege far extends far outside the boundaries of education. You will find privilege in virtually all facets
Why are so a large number of people that beg for money, sitting on the streets, looking for food 's some sort? It is not day-to-day that we consider situations like this, but it is out there constantly without all of us realizing it. A number of states have poverty 's more issues than others, but it is sad to think about how plenty of people are actually considered to be in poverty. This is an inequality concerning me a lot, and is getting worse daily. Poverty in the United States relates to people whose annual household earnings are less than a poverty line set by the United States government. Poverty is common, resulted in by numerous different factors such as failing markets, structural problems, unfortunate mishaps, and poor individual
...fe of privilege. Education as well is more accessible to the privileged and becomes harder to succeed as one goes down the hierarchy of wealth. This higher education to the higher class allows them to continue to build whatever wealth they have which can be passed down to their children who will as well live a privileged life. This horrendous cycle unless stopped will simply keep the children of poor also poor. This is the United States of America, and this nation promotes an educational system which in turn promotes a class system where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
Throughout history, there are stories of ordinary individuals who rose up to live extraordinary lives. To not allow someone the opportunity to achieve their potential would serve not only to separate the classes further, it would also cause the stagnation of our economy. Jobs would be easier for the educated, as there would be less competition. The truth is, it is that very competition that pushes every sector of our economy, driving companies to make better products or offer better services.
In the beginning of the year I entered this class with a very sheltered and ignorant view of current and past events. Through time and sociological evolution I have begun to see things in a different light. The development of my ability, to look at something or some kind of situation, lets me use the sociological terms in such a manner to relate them to micro and macro problems in society. This started with the assigned readings of the class; the aim was to decipher the messages the authors were presenting. The goal was then to dig deeper and use my experiences to help myself understand the concepts throughout the course. "The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be ignited." Plutarch (46-120 CE--common era) I was no longer supposed to retain knowledge on a factual basis but to observe the problems and challenge my own thoughts, values, and beliefs. Challenging these aspects lights the fire that creates the ability to use working sociological terms in my analyses. Through my analyses of the authors in the course I developed questions about the particular readings that we were assigned. The questions I present from these authors are on the basis of learning and seeing the macro picture from micro events. The authors that we read from were: Allan G. Johnson, James W. Loewen, Jonathan Kozol, David Nibert, Arnold Arluke, Clinton R. Sanders, and Elie Wiesel. From each one of these authors we are able to relate a theme of sociology to what is happening in their books, which results in the discussion questions.
With this in mind, it is clear that the majority of my privilege as a student emerges from my social location. As a gay male coming from a white, upper middle-class family with two college educated parents, most of my educational experiences and opportunities have been predominantly due to my privilege. When looking at my youth, the idea of continuing my education and pursuing a college degree was not an option, but rather an expectation. My parents decided to take me out of public education after completing elementary school, and enroll me in a rigorous K-12 college-preparatory school, cultivating the expectation of attending college that would soon be permanently engrained in my mind and would affect every decision I made in and out of the
The prevalence of white privilege had not occurred to me previously, but after reading White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack I have a better understanding of the impact my privilege has on myself and others. I also started to realize that this privilege can not only cause emotional distress for people, but also prevent them from achieving success. For instance, privilege can cause people from wealthier areas to receive more money for their school compared with those from poorer areas. This does not only impact the student by affecting the quality of their education, but also makes it harder for these students to rise above the poverty
White Privilege The belief that white privilege never existed or that it is no longer a problem is skewed by the selective use of facts to support this claim. How do we address this problem? We must define the what is to be privileged, acknowledge the problem and identify a means to fix it. "The idea of privilege- that some people benefit from unearned, and largely unacknowledged, advantages, even when those advantages aren't discriminatory. "
From a very early age, children experience many different stages of life until they become adults with distinguished personalities, but the concept of social inequality has different impacts on different classes of individuals. Throughout this essay, I will discuss what social inequality is. Furthermore, to accomplish this task, I will describe three different ways a society can be stratified (the upper class, the middle class, and the poor). I then aim for the audience to comprehend the various ways our current society in the United States of America is unequal with a couple of examples. While defining and describing the concepts of class, race, and gender, I will further give a couple of general examples of how inequality related to that
Wealth inequality is the uneven distribution of resources in a given state or population, which can also be called the wealth gap. The sum of one’s total assets excluding the liabilities equates the person’s wealth also known as the net worth. Investments, residents, cash, real estates and everything owned by an individual are their assets.In reality, the United States is among the richest countries in the world, though a few people creating a major gap between the richest, the middle class and the poor control most of its wealth. For more than a quarter of a century, only the rich American families have shown an increase to their net worth.Thisis a worrying fact for the less fortunate in the country and calls for assessment (Baranoff, 2015).