Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Privilege
I've been giving a lot of thought lately to how a person's current circumstances are determined by the privilege that person has or has not had in life. And that privilege is, more often than not, pure luck. Sure, personal choices and temperament have something to do with where one ends up. But some people, regardless of decisions made or personality traits possessed, will never have the opportunity to make particular choices.
For example, a child born into poverty and barely scraping through life is likely never to have the opportunity to choose to go to college. This child, as he grows, will be forced to make choices about how to acquire food, shelter, and other basic life needs. If he does make a stab at getting a secondary education, he's likely to be put off by the need to work more than he can study. Lack of education will be one more thing to keep him in poverty.
A child born into a middle- or upper-class family is likely to be expected to go to college. And when he does, the majority of his expenses will be covered by parents, loans, and maybe a part-time job. Nevertheless, once he's finished, he's much more likely to have acquired the skills he needs to break even. He'll not be 90% focused on meeting basic survival needs.
This is just one of many examples. (And there are outliers; I won't deny that. But this is not about outliers.)
The point was illustrated by two cases I came across at work recently. One is a 12-year-old girl who lives in a group home for troubled teens who've been kicked out of their homes and/or schools. A staff member from the group home called to make a post-run appointment for this girl. A post-run appointment is made after someone has returned from running away from the facility. During that appointment there are toxicology and STI screenings done to see if they have done any illegal drugs or contracted any infections from unprotected sex with who-knows-who. It's heavy stuff -- especially for a 12-year-old.
I have a 12-year-old.
Wanna know what he's into? Legos. Minecraft. Nerf anything. His iPhone. Making goofy faces. Fart jokes. Building and programming robots. The farthest thing from his mind is running away from any where. Unless the farthest thing from his mind is doing something that would get him kicked out of his home in the first place.
Because I cannot fathom ever kicking him out of our home, I cannot fathom what circumstances this young girl has come across that have put her where she is. But things in her life are vastly different from the things in my son's life. Most of the decisions these two children will need to make in life will be the result of where and to whom they were born. There is almost no changing that.
The other case that demonstrates the pure luck of the draw was even more personal. I met a young mother with a newborn. She also has 3 other children, all 3 and younger. She is living in a safe house because her newborn child's father punched her in the face, leaving her with broken bones. She is younger than I was when I had my first child.
When I stopped to count up all the strikes she has against her, I might as well have been counting up all the things I have had going for me. But for a few differences, I could be her. I'm lucky that my grandparents paid for nursing school. I'm lucky I didn't get pregnant a fourth time. I'm lucky my ex-husband didn't physically abuse me. I'm lucky that when I finally gathered the guts to leave him, I had a supportive family. I'm lucky that when all of that came crashing down on me, I had a few years more of life experience and emotional maturity than she does.
I'm unbelievably lucky and so are my children. And that, folks, is the essence of privilege.
For example, a child born into poverty and barely scraping through life is likely never to have the opportunity to choose to go to college. This child, as he grows, will be forced to make choices about how to acquire food, shelter, and other basic life needs. If he does make a stab at getting a secondary education, he's likely to be put off by the need to work more than he can study. Lack of education will be one more thing to keep him in poverty.
A child born into a middle- or upper-class family is likely to be expected to go to college. And when he does, the majority of his expenses will be covered by parents, loans, and maybe a part-time job. Nevertheless, once he's finished, he's much more likely to have acquired the skills he needs to break even. He'll not be 90% focused on meeting basic survival needs.
This is just one of many examples. (And there are outliers; I won't deny that. But this is not about outliers.)
The point was illustrated by two cases I came across at work recently. One is a 12-year-old girl who lives in a group home for troubled teens who've been kicked out of their homes and/or schools. A staff member from the group home called to make a post-run appointment for this girl. A post-run appointment is made after someone has returned from running away from the facility. During that appointment there are toxicology and STI screenings done to see if they have done any illegal drugs or contracted any infections from unprotected sex with who-knows-who. It's heavy stuff -- especially for a 12-year-old.
I have a 12-year-old.
Wanna know what he's into? Legos. Minecraft. Nerf anything. His iPhone. Making goofy faces. Fart jokes. Building and programming robots. The farthest thing from his mind is running away from any where. Unless the farthest thing from his mind is doing something that would get him kicked out of his home in the first place.
Because I cannot fathom ever kicking him out of our home, I cannot fathom what circumstances this young girl has come across that have put her where she is. But things in her life are vastly different from the things in my son's life. Most of the decisions these two children will need to make in life will be the result of where and to whom they were born. There is almost no changing that.
The other case that demonstrates the pure luck of the draw was even more personal. I met a young mother with a newborn. She also has 3 other children, all 3 and younger. She is living in a safe house because her newborn child's father punched her in the face, leaving her with broken bones. She is younger than I was when I had my first child.
When I stopped to count up all the strikes she has against her, I might as well have been counting up all the things I have had going for me. But for a few differences, I could be her. I'm lucky that my grandparents paid for nursing school. I'm lucky I didn't get pregnant a fourth time. I'm lucky my ex-husband didn't physically abuse me. I'm lucky that when I finally gathered the guts to leave him, I had a supportive family. I'm lucky that when all of that came crashing down on me, I had a few years more of life experience and emotional maturity than she does.
I'm unbelievably lucky and so are my children. And that, folks, is the essence of privilege.
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