Privilege is an activity in which something is given without merit, and often out of preference;
We call privileged the status of being preferred.
Privilege and its derivatives are preferred terms in the vocabulary of deconstructivists and postmodernists.
The purpose of these thoughts is to question a traditionally privileged term from some strict hierarchy. For example, reason versus emotion. Where the reason (the mind) has been traditionally perceived as more important.
In order to understand the power games that are being played on the field of language, it is key to understand that most often than not “privilege” is not given for the sake of it. People tend to prefer first and foremost the things that they understand. Therefore, as the mind is able to more or less understand itself (certainly more than it is able to understand the emotions), and it is the mind that is building these constructs of the preferability of one over the other, it is only natural that the mind will “privilege” itself over the emotions.
Nowadays, postmodernists (the so-called “modern left”) are talking a lot about male privilege and white privilege. This is another key element of their metanarrative. As one of the most important concepts in their rhetoric is the margin and marginalized it is to be expected that they’ll need something in opposition to that. The natural opposition of the marginalized is the so-called privileged. But while privileges exist, it is quite the hypocrisy to say that all white males are privileged just because of the fact that they are males and white.
On the one hand, not all white people are rich. It just so happens that America is not the world. People are white in the whole of Europe, as well as in Russia. What is more, even in America only a tiny minority of the white population are actually rich. One could argue that from those who are rich, most are white. And probably there is a truth to such a statement. But in a country that is predominantly white, it is only natural for most if not all rich (and/or powerful) people to be white. In China for example, (almost) all the rich people are Chinese, whereas, in African countries, the rich people are black. Therefore, one oughtn’t be surprised by the fact that in a country built by white people, they are at the top of the hierarchy. On top of that it is key to remember the fact that in China, there are probably zero rich black people, nor Latino, nor Europeans. And China is a 1.4 billion (2020) people country.
If a privilege exists (and it certainly does) it is the Americans who are privileged to every other person on the planet.
And for the so-called “male privilege” one mustn’t look further than the universities where more than 70% of the students are female, and the bricklayers of whom probably 99.99999999% are male to refute such a claim as nonsensical. Males are far more likely to be murdered on the streets, far more likely to drop out of school, to die while working, to work outside, to work longer hours, to be killed on the battlefield, to commit suicide, to experience (severe) depression and other (serious) mental issues. Virtually all people in prison are male.
On top of that, the postmodernists are making a lot of companies and positions in the country administrations be filled by quota. Therefore, the postmodernists privilege women (on the basis of being women) by securing them positions, based not on merits but on sex. Which is the precise definition of “privilege” as they, themselves define it.
It is just a power game, based on hypocrisy.
