Re: Thoughts on Shoehorning unrelated content into works of entertainment.
Dark, let me clarify something here.
Privilege in and of itself is not bad or good. it just is.
If you experience or enjoy privilege, you should not be demonized for it. You aren't a bad person and shouldn't have a stone tied round your neck. But refusing to accept said privilege is an issue for any of us who won't do it.
Most of us have it to some degree. I am white, and male, and heterosexual. It is lucky for me that I am these things because, while I've experienced plenty of adversity from other angles, I've never been harassed or demonized due to the colour of my skin, my gender or my sexual orientation. I suspect that you can say much the same.
This means that in a few ways, Dark, we experience privilege. This is the word we ascribe to unearned advantages or preferential treatment in society due to factors that are beyond our control. And like it or not, largely in our society, white males tend to have an easy time of it. Or an easier time, anyway, as this world can be pretty broken sometimes.
Now, of course, by comparison, someone who is fully able-bodied has privilege that we do not. Someone who grew up wealthy has privilege that I, in particular, do not. Things like that abound, and the interplay is referred to as intersectionality. And there are forms of privilege which apply to those in minorities in certain instances, as well, though there tends not to be the negative stigma attached nearly so often.
You might be stopped in an airport because someone wants to pet your dog, or thinks you need help, or because you "look lost" while a sighted person will not.
However, you will very likely -not be stopped in an airport, or on the street, due to the colour of your skin.
You are married to a woman, and most people probably haven't batted an eye about that. My partner also happens to be female, by the way. Someone who is non-hetero has worries that we, as heterosexual people, simply don't have. If they have a same-sex partner, they have greater worries about what their family and friends will think. They may have to worry about persecution in stores (yes, this does happen sometimes). They may even feel physically at risk because some people don't just let their dislike show on their face; violence against LGBTQ individuals is still very real. So because of your heterosexual relationship, and mine, there are things we just generally don't have to worry about.
And the list goes on.
So you are not a worse human being because you possess some unearned advantages that others do not have. Neither am I. But the first wrong step you can make is to deny that you have these advantages.
And please, please don't respond with "yeah but", either. Any of you. Because here's the thing. I know that each and every one of us also experiences some adversity too. This does not wipe away your privilege, it just exists in a different space from it. I am fairly poor, and that makes life harder. I'm blind, and that also makes life harder. I have more than your average level of anxiety, enough so that I'm enrolled in CBT (and it's helping, thankfully), and this, too, presents problems. But I don't get to conveniently ignore all the benefits I get from being white, male and heterosexual in a society which still values that as the norm. To do that is a problem, in my opinion.
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