The Myth of White Privilege

I am tired of the false labels that zealous people love to hang around the necks of those they perceive to be different. If they can't make a convincing argument for their beliefs, they hang a negative label on their opponent.

"Homophobe", "racists", and now "white privilege" are labels designed to make the "others" feel guilty that they are not as wonderful as the "intellectually enlightened".

I loved a quote from Stephi who responded to a blog about "white privilege". 

"There is no such thing as white privilege, the phrase is a lazy misappropriation of class privilege, and the concept is utterly rejected outside the USA. If white privilege really existed, it would be a social privilege that applied to all white people regardless of wealth or social station, this clearly isn’t the case."

In over 60 years of life I have learned one very important lesson:

Everyone else's perception of us is usually better than our own.

I have lived and travelled mostly in the western United States, with random trips to nearly every other part of this Nation and countries in Europe. I have met and spoken with many people from many different walks of life. The message always remains the same. 

If you think you are a loser, nearly everyone else shares your attitude about you. If you believe you are a valuable, participating citizen, most others will agree.

Where you live makes a tremendous difference as to how you see the world. A young black man in Salt Lake City can be just as overwhelmed as a young white male in Nigeria. A 16 year-old Protestant girl on her own in Cairo would have just as much trepidation as a Muslim woman in Rome. Whenever we see ourselves as a minority or find ourselves outside our culture, it is easy to feel threatened. By seeing the best in others and being our best selves, we overcome our fears and excel in what ever environment we are a part of.

There are some narrow-minded people that at first glance will place you in a pigeon hole that resembles the last person they met who looked or acted like you. If you act as they expect you to act, you will remain in that pigeon hole. If you act the best you really are and can become, they will move you to a more elevated position in their minds and hearts.

The writer and philosopher, Johann Wolfgang Goethe said, "Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is, but treat a man as he can and ought to be, and he will become what he can and ought to be."

If we act as we were, we will always be seen as we were, but if we act as we can and ought to be, then people will see us as we can and ought to be.

Idiots, bigots, and victims are not confined to any particular race or locale, but they are most skillfully surpassed by those who do their best and treat everyone else as though they are important.

A still from "The Illusionist"

The parable is often told of a man who was sitting along the road at the entrance to a town.

A stranger happened by and asked, "What kind of people live in this town?"

The man responded, "What kind of people lived in the town you came from?"

"They were all liars, and thieves," the traveler responded. "I hated everyone of them."

"That's what kind of people live in this town, too," the man replied.

A short time later another man happened by and asked, "What kind of people live in this town?"

The man responded, "What kind of people lived in the town you came from?"

"Oh, they were the warmest, kindest people I have ever known," the traveler voiced, "I hated to leave that place." 

"That's what kind of people live in this town, too," the man replied.

Physics tells us that if you conduct an experiment to see if light is a particle, it will act like a particle. If you test to see if it is energy, it will act like energy.

If you spend your entire life digging a hole to stand in, 

you shouldn't complain when you can't see the sun. - dlm

We each have the ability to change or remain as we are. Neither prisons, enemies, friends nor family can prevent us from becoming what we truly believe and want to become.

We will always see in others what we are looking for. Look for the good, look for their potential. Most of those who don't succeed, have never been taught that they could. We seldom realize how the small acts of kindness and approbation we give away each day, change the lives of so many of those we associate with.

Be the mentor, love without reservation. Follow the example of the greatest mentor ever, who said, "Love one another as I have loved you."

What if Everyone Was on Welfare?

When my son was a Missionary in Boston, Massachusetts, he spent 2 years contacting and teaching people about the Mormon Church. He had the opportunity to work with many people in the Boston Housing Projects. 

While there, he noticed a peculiar thing; each of the project buildings housed hundreds of families and yet, building after building had no one that held a job. Everyone lived of welfare, food stamps, disability, or some other form of assistance. 

The most ironic discovery was that neighbors would meet together to teach other residents how to best utilize the welfare system to receive as much as possible.

So, the questions arises, What if everyone was on welfare?

Except for a few altruistic individuals who have to be productive to remain sane:

• There would be no one would grow any food.
• There would be no one to make food.
• There would be no one to build homes.
• There would be no one to sell food.
• There would be no one to rent an apartment from.
• There would be no one to sell you a home.
• There would be no one to teach our children.
• There would be no taxes for the Government to re-distribute.
• There would be no convenience stores to rob.

The only remaining option would be for the Government to step in and assign everyone a task so that;

• Food would be produced.
• Food would be processed.
• Food would be sold.
• Homes and apartments would be sold and rented.
• There would be taxes to re-distribute.
• There would be convenience stores to rob.

Question: Which country today does this sound like?

1. Russia
2. China
3. Cuba
4. All of the above

Reminds me of a story in the Reader's Digest years ago.

“In our friendly neighbor city of St. Augustine, (Florida), great flocks of sea gulls are starving amid plenty. Fishing is still good, but the gulls don’t know how to fish. For generations they have depended on the shrimp fleet to toss them scraps from the nets. Now the fleet has moved. …

“The shrimpers had created a Welfare State for the … sea gulls. The big birds never bothered to learn how to fish for themselves and they never taught their children to fish. Instead they led their little ones to the shrimp nets.

“Now the sea gulls, the fine free birds that almost symbolize liberty itself, are starving to death because they gave in to the ‘something for nothing’ lure! They sacrificed their independence for a hand-out.

“A lot of people are like that, too. They see nothing wrong in picking delectable scraps from the tax nets of the U.S. Government’s ‘shrimp fleet.’ But what will happen when the Government runs out of goods? What about our children of generations to come?

“Let’s not be gullible gulls. We … must preserve our talents of self-sufficiency, our genius for creating things for ourselves, our sense of thrift and our true love of independence.” (“Fable of the Gullible Gull,”Reader’s Digest, Oct. 1950, p. 32.)

Courtesy of RI Future

Lest you think the St Augustine story is an anomaly, another article a few years ago from Houma, Louisiana, explains how another group of these Welfare Gulls move from one gravy train to another:

Gulls head inland as spill curbs easy meals

HOUMA — In his four decades of business on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, Mike Voisin says he’s never seen a seagull at Motivatit Seafood’s Palm Avenue oyster-processing plant. But today they’re taking over.

The scavenging gulls are on the plant’s roof and in the plant’s trucks, which carry discarded oyster shells from the high-pressure shucking operation. They ride a conveyor belt carrying shucking remains out of the plant while pecking hungrily at the barnacled shells.

They’ve been scavenging at his oyster shells for the last month.

“It’s the darnedest thing because we’ve never seen a seagull here since, well, I don’t even remember,” Voisin said. “Not in the 40 years I’ve been here. They must be really hungry.”

Voisin said he believes closures of bayou seafood-processing plants and the docking of commercial-fishing vessels that would normally attract flocks of hungry gulls have sent them elsewhere for their meals.

Melanie Driscoll, director of bird conservation for the Audubon Society’s Louisiana Coastal Initiative, said she has received reports of more and more gulls heading inland, prowling around restaurants where they haven’t been seen before.

“I’ve heard a lot from locals,” Driscoll said. “There’s a sense that the gulls may be hungry because they basically had a buffet, and now it’s no longer there.”

Photo courtesy of  Daily Mail.com

Welfare parasites begin to think that anything the want is theirs, as this lady in South Shields, England found out recently. 

So, What if everyone was on welfare?

Now you know.