Nearly a decade ago, the article ‘Explaining White Privilege to a Broke White Person’ appeared on Huffington Post. It dropped to much acclaim, especially among people dissatisfied by the classic Peggy McIntosh article ‘White Privilege and Male Privilege’.
The basic thought is simple enough: McIntosh comes up with lots of great examples of white privilege. But many of her examples speak more to class than race. Especially given her status as a professional at an elite private university (Wellesley) and the kinds of people she interacts with at that institution.
To the broke white person, such an article amounts to a farce. Who cares about finding a publisher (literally one of McIntosh’s examples) when you can’t even pay rent?
But let’s take a closer look.
