Moving Past Privilege Guilt Analysis

The pieces, “Feeling for the Edge of Your Imagination: finding ways not to call the police” and, “True Solidarity: Moving Past Privilege Guilt” work together and share common themes, but still manage to challenge and conflict with each other. Each article discusses the same issue of race in today’s society, challenging different aspects of the issue. Society nowadays frequently deals with the issue of the whiteness of police as well as, white supremacy. “Finding Ways not to Call the Police”, is written in the form of a letter addressed to anybody who has access to the internet, and cares to take the time to read it. “Moving Past Privilege Guilt”, is written in short paragraphs, almost bullet point like, which caters to people with little spare …show more content…
The structure of this article includes short paragraphs with the parts Utt thinks are most important, bolded to get the point across. Jamie Utt gave detail through first hand experiences he went through in college, when he was first faced with real diversity. He then goes on to explain how his experiences have shaped his opinions and outlook on life. Discussing his privileges that he never before realized were apparent in his life. Much like many middle class white college age individuals he thought he couldn’t be privileged because he worked hard to be where he was, when people who were not as lucky to be born into as much privilege as he had to work much harder to get to the same place in life …show more content…
It explained to me how I can fix myself to stop oppression. Utt discusses, steps to move through or past an individuals privilege guilt. The steps include self reflection, understanding and accepting ones role in oppression, recognizing that knowledge of privilege is not enough, participating in community acts for justice, and staying in touch with why one feels guilty (Utt). Both these articles touch on sensitive topics but effectively get the message across, one in brief statements and the other in long paragraphs. Working through and getting past white supremacy and privilege is something that most white middle-class individuals do not work on. It is something that they should take into consideration because “..if privilege guilt prevents us from acting against oppression, then it's simply another tool of