Modern media portrayals of race relations in the United States paint a picture of a relatively successful social and economic climb for people of color. These portrayals may suggest an integrated, equal society, but frequently are far from the truth. While middle-class people of color certainly exist, these portrayals hide the insidious nature of the normalization of “whiteness” and the racial stratification and inequality from which results. The privilege attributed to being white and the resulting inequalities for all others have created tangible racial boundaries in the sectors of opportunity, wealth, and mobility. Though personal and public opinions on race and racism have changed dramatically over the past century, the focus on creating
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The normalization of whiteness privileges intersectional groups within whites to varying degrees, and thus people of color too experience that lack of privilege unequally. White women receive privilege for their whiteness, most prominently the privilege of being able to see themselves as “race-less” because their race does not affect their everyday lives in negative ways. However, they simultaneously are disadvantaged for their gender, just as those in the LGBTQ community, the disabled, and the poor are disadvantaged. When looking at institutional racism and its effects on opportunities it is important to put a heavy focus on intersectionality and how combinations of privileges or disadvantages seriously affect racialized outcomes. When social stratification and tensions occur over issues of gender equality or poverty, those individuals who lack white privilege have their race mixed into the issue. Bonilla-Silva gives examples of this in black women’s exclusion from many facets of the women’s suffrage movement of the early 20th century and South Africa’s Apprentice Act of 1922 that barred Black workers from becoming apprentices, effectively shutting the working class from the workforce. Political power and representation in law-making bodies is a chronic issue facing …show more content…
Race: The Power of an Illusion comments on racialized citizenship through the examples of Ozawa v. United States and the resulting case United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind. Ozawa’s petition for citizenship was denied on the basis of him being “white” but not “Caucasian” while Thind’s was denied for the reverse, his race being “caucasian” but his skin being too dark to qualify as white. The court cases together illustrate how the law can be interpreted for the benefit of those in power by not defining their own inclusive group, but rather defining who is an “other.” “Whiteness” was thus left up to the interpretation of whites, allowing for an exercise of privilege by being able to arbitrarily decide who is non-white and thus undeserving of citizenship and, in effect,
The normalization of whiteness privileges intersectional groups within whites to varying degrees, and thus people of color too experience that lack of privilege unequally. White women receive privilege for their whiteness, most prominently the privilege of being able to see themselves as “race-less” because their race does not affect their everyday lives in negative ways. However, they simultaneously are disadvantaged for their gender, just as those in the LGBTQ community, the disabled, and the poor are disadvantaged. When looking at institutional racism and its effects on opportunities it is important to put a heavy focus on intersectionality and how combinations of privileges or disadvantages seriously affect racialized outcomes. When social stratification and tensions occur over issues of gender equality or poverty, those individuals who lack white privilege have their race mixed into the issue. Bonilla-Silva gives examples of this in black women’s exclusion from many facets of the women’s suffrage movement of the early 20th century and South Africa’s Apprentice Act of 1922 that barred Black workers from becoming apprentices, effectively shutting the working class from the workforce. Political power and representation in law-making bodies is a chronic issue facing …show more content…
Race: The Power of an Illusion comments on racialized citizenship through the examples of Ozawa v. United States and the resulting case United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind. Ozawa’s petition for citizenship was denied on the basis of him being “white” but not “Caucasian” while Thind’s was denied for the reverse, his race being “caucasian” but his skin being too dark to qualify as white. The court cases together illustrate how the law can be interpreted for the benefit of those in power by not defining their own inclusive group, but rather defining who is an “other.” “Whiteness” was thus left up to the interpretation of whites, allowing for an exercise of privilege by being able to arbitrarily decide who is non-white and thus undeserving of citizenship and, in effect,