Confrontational Tone Undermines Message of SCRAP Table Tents
By Micheal Owen
Opinions Editor

This week, table tents addressing the topic of racism appeared in several Claremont Colleges dining halls. They are attributed to Claremont Students Challenging Racism and (White) Privilege (SCRAP), they read, innocently enough, “Do you often think about race and racism?” and they are light blue. Other questions follow: “Do you ever find yourself wondering why, for example, Asian people sit together in the dining hall, but not why White people sit together?” A couple of inches below, the copy’s neutral tenor turns to the unpleasant. “IF SO,” the pamphlet reads boldly, “then you are aiding a system of racism that is supported by the normalization of Whiteness.” Presumably the members of Claremont SCRAP were aware of the bold ideological implications of their claim, but that claim is no less problematic or all their commitment to it.

Denying that white people enjoy privilege(s) denied other groups, particularly in but not limited to the United States, would be frivolous. The SCRAP table tent deftly illustrates several aspects of modern experience that embody that privilege; there are countless others that go unmentioned. Setting aside momentarily the problematic designation of “privilege” in this context, there is convincing evidence to illustrate an assumption of whiteness in the United States. Products are frequently marketed primarily or exclusively to white people; clothing in malls is displayed on light-skinned mannequins; in casual conversation (I speak here for my mostly white friends), the race of a non-white person is frequently included as an incidental descriptor. All of these things are damning. All of them suggest a need to educate and increase awareness among those who participate, knowingly or not, in the normalization of whiteness. The excuse that to assume the characteristics of a majority is natural human behavior is unconvincing; “natural human behavior” is the storied godparent of oppression. But the wording of the SCRAP message—that those who fail to question incidents of white normalization are “aiding a system of racism”—is likely to alienate the people who might benefit most from considering SCRAP’s questions.

The problem, then, is not with those questions, but with the endeavor to implicate in racism so broad a group as all of those who have for whatever reason left those questions unasked. To say that its audience is aiding a system of racism—as opposed to participating in or subject to or not resisting—is to suggest a deliberate misdeed on the part of that audience. Admittedly, it’s a subtle distinction. But if the intent of SCRAP’s message is to question assumptions among those most likely to hold them, a phrasing that might carry the implication of weakly founded hostility or even overt criticism toward the specific group SCRAP is addressing—those who have not asked these questions—is unlikely to have any substantial effect toward that end. No group is required to tailor its message to suit the existing sentiments of the intended audience; truth is harsh. But if the message itself is of dubious integrity, we owe it to ourselves to question why.

At Pomona, the use of the word “privilege” in this context all too often carries the implied modifier “white.” SCRAP illustrates this in its own name. Were it not to omit the parenthesized “White” from its acronym, “SCRA(W)P” might be, though less wieldy an acronym, more accurate an indicator of the organization’s apparent agenda. (Note that I speak here only on the basis of the table tent itself, and the way I would interpret it without prior knowledge; I stress that in examining the message, and its form, I do not seek to indict the people who are working for this cause.) Thus, at Pomona, “white privilege” has become almost synonymous with the world “privilege” itself. The consequences of that mistake are devastating for any sincerely motivated discussion of privilege, a word that denotes far more than racial inequity.

Every student at Pomona enjoys privilege in various forms. The vast majority of us are afforded the very opportunity of being here by what, on balance, have been favorable life circumstances, granting the reality of the setbacks for power and self-actualization suffered by minorities in a majority-dominated society. But to ignore the effects of privilege in each of our lives is to ignore the fundamental problem at work in white privilege, and to ignore that problem is, ironically, in fact to marginalize those minorities that fall prey to majority privilege as a result of non-racial factors. To address white privilege exclusively is to ignore the degree of privilege entailed in financial position, gender, sexuality and national origin, to name the most obvious examples.

Further, privilege is not exclusive to the majority. There is such a thing as gay privilege, for example; in some quarters of American society, homosexuality has been not only de-marginalized (albeit selectively), but turned into a form of celebrity. Presumably, there are qualities of experience exclusive to other minorities that are similarly denied to the majority. If privilege exists, then, it is not exclusively the province of whites. Minority privilege may be circumstantial, even tenuous or transient. But to suggest it does not exist is to deny a premise of the argument. And if solutions to power inequality are to be found, we cannot ignore the true consequences of inequality in the first place.

SCRAP’s message does not inherently discount the question of alternate forms of privilege. But to scandalize white normalization as an active form of racism is to make the question one of confrontation, to undermine the message before it can be properly conveyed. To challenge one’s audience is not only effective but necessary in addressing an issue of this nature. The motives for deconstructing normalization are legitimate, important, even pivotal considerations in the pursuit of reflective social progress. But if we seek resolution to the problems posed by racism in our society, we will find it only by inclusive means. To designate a specific group as a target for social improvement is to deny one’s own shortcomings; if privilege is universal, then as universal is the need for an extraordinary effort to combat it with sincerity and reason.