BY LAUREN RAMANATHAN

In print | Published April 23, 2009

This column is a response to two young men who responded to my recent Facebook status. It read: “I hate all white, heterosexual, middle class men. They are assholes, all of them!” Now the first young man who is from my hometown commented on the status by rewriting the same statements only directing them at “brown, homosexual, working class women.” The other individual who goes to Swarthmore commented asking me if I was referring to all white men as assholes. When I deleted both these comments, the second individual posted very angrily calling me personally “an ASSHOLE AND IDIOT,” saying that clearly I was uninterested in starting a dialogue, that he “worked for Feminist Majority” and that he had taken a long time to think about the ways in which he was privileged. Well, this column is an attempt to start the dialogue that I was so rudely accused of evading.

Obviously, I don’t really think that all white men are assholes. However, I do hate structures of privilege that favor white, heterosexual, middle to upper class men. My Facebook status was a direct response to a situation (many situations, in fact) where I had felt silenced by others who have privilege. Obviously, such statements are interpreted and taken very personally. Still, I believe that the two individuals who responded to my Facebook status exemplify some of the fundamental hypocrisy that exists within discussions on privilege.

Dealing with the first individual is fairly easy, as there is an obvious difference between calling out identities that are privileged in higher education and other realms of power and denigrating those who have been historically and still are oppressed. There is no arbitrary double standard here. History speaks for itself. However, there is a common strain that runs through both individuals’ comments, and that is an anger that stems from feeling attacked that elides the injustices that drove me to make such an admittedly unfair statement in the first place. As I said, I do not honestly believe that all white men are assholes. But there are times in which I feel broken by the ways in which the “real world” works. It’s become evident to me that higher education still regularly capitulates to larger structures of oppression, which is disappointing to say the least, heartbreaking to say the most. It might be appropriate to insert here that my writing said status was simply an attempt to vent anger at a system. Well … really… that’s not true … it was venting at specific individuals, with whom I am forced to interact, and who not only benefit from the system of oppression in which we live, but embody privilege in ways that have prevented me from getting the most out of my educational experience.

Which brings me to the second individual who commented on my status. His comments are the hardest to analyze. But I can start by saying that his statement accusing me of “not wanting to start a dialogue” simply betrays his privilege. He can afford to be objective, to start a dialogue, because he is not constantly embroiled in a battle for survival that is necessitated by his identities. Damn right I didn’t want to start a dialogue! I was FUCKING FED UP! Did it ever occur to him that maybe I didn’t want to engage with him right then and there because 1) I, as a queer woman of color, have had to engage in so many “dialogues” just for my own self-preservation, with so many hurtful misunderstandings that I just wanted to vent on my own Facebook page without repercussion? 2) Facebook is a shitty forum for communication anyways?

It is extremely interesting to me that my comments aroused such furor in these two individuals, who had obviously put no thought into why an individual who is oppressed would make such a statement. So often on this campus and in this world people say and do things that are totally problematic and oppressive and yet go unchallenged. Where is the ire for them? Why are they allowed to feel safe? I readily admit that my Facebook status conveyed what is perhaps an unfair blanket generalization. But I stand by it, like it or not. It was the perfect verbalization of how I was feeling at the time. I was reacting to a very real and deeply felt oppression that is neither rational nor eloquent. Which is why we should perhaps look within ourselves before pointing the finger at those who do not have privilege.

Lauren is a sophomore. You can reach her at lramana1@swarthmore.edu.

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