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Giving Up Privilege: How "White Privilege" Keeps White Supremacy in Place

Since Peggy McIntosh introduced the "invisible knapsack of white privilege” into the racial justice lexicon, it has become a way to describe White people's relationship to unearned power as well as a catchall phrase for experiences which are not privilege at all. The misunderstanding and misuse of "privilege" sows separation, breeds guilt and defensiveness, and maintains White dominance. In our 2023 Fall Healing Together Series, you will learn to differentiate between three distinct phenomena that have been lumped into “White Privilege”: 1) Human Rights, 2) Systemic Obliviousness, and, 3) Entitlement. We will understand how “benefit” and “advantage” narratives of “privilege” undermine solidarity, reinforce White supremacy, encourage assimilation, and perpetuate paternalism. We will also explore how “privilege” denies the costs to White people as non-targets of racism: loss of humanity, connection, culture, and belonging.

Desired Outcomes

  • Understood how the “White Privilege Narrative” encourages assimilation, breeds guilt and defensiveness, and keeps White supremacy and systemic racism in place
  • Recognized and named patterns of internalized dominance and entitlement, systemic, non-target obliviousness, and human rights as distinct concepts
  • Shifted from experiencing non-target identity as one of “privilege” to one of “loss” as we recognize the costs of oppression to and as non-targets
  • Experienced the power of healing in community using LJIST’s core listening practice
  • Deepened our understanding of LJIST’s core theory of social transformation and its application to ending racism

Benefits

  • Move beyond the traps and limitations of the “privilege” narrative that prevent us from ending oppression
  • Gain a language for describing systemic inequities that does not increase defensiveness
  • Give up paternalism and guilt as the motivation for our social justice work
  • Heal from the loss we’ve experienced on the non-target side of oppression in community, with permission and responsibly

Who Is This For?

  • White People and Mixed Heritage people who Identify as White who are committed to being transformed by doing their own healing to end internalized White supremacy, separation, and finally come “home”
  • BIPOC who are committed to being transformed by a healing-based approach that requires White people give up dominance and become true allies in the struggle to end racism and White supremacy
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"As long as we continue to use the language of ‘privilege’ to connote ‘advantages,’ we reinforce the very system of White supremacy that created racism in the first place and deny the healing White people must do.”

– Nanci E. Luna Jiménez

Format

  • Each virtual workshop includes 9 hours of live facilitated content, 3+ hours of asynchronistic learning materials (videos, handouts, and reflection activities), and access to LJIST team via Slack for 2 weeks prior to and 1 week after the workshop. 
  • Up to 32 participants.  
  • This workshop is only available virtually.
  • Workshops are delivered Tuesday through Thursday, 10:00 am – 1:00 pm Pacific / 1:00 pm - 4:00 pm Eastern Each Day.*  

*Contact us to book outside of these hours. An “After Hours” fee may apply for workshops scheduled outside of Monday – Thursday 10 am – 4 pm Pacific. 

Requirements

  • Attend the workshop in its entirety: all three hours on all three days of the workshop.
  • Complete approximately 2-3 hours of pre-work: watching short videos, reviewing handouts, completing reflections, printing or downloading workshop worksheets. This pre-work will be shared no later than 10 days before the workshop begins.
  • Complete approximately 30 minutes of homework on the first and second days of the workshop.
  • Join the Zoom meeting with video and audio capabilities and do not share the Zoom link with others.
  • Agree to our LJIST Limited Media and Liability Waiver in the checkout form.

Client host commitments can be found by clicking here. Client co-host commitments can be found by clicking here.

Prerequisites

The following prerequisites are highly recommended: 

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We cannot dismantle the system of white dominance with knowledge or policies or data...which are more comfortable for the white anti-racist elite but that I see as less effective. For a while now, my own personal walk has been going to the places I had avoided...or that were more unknown...less sure...and in some ways, felt a little less acceptable. I'm appreciating that this workshop landed precisely at the place of avoidance.

Finally! I am so glad someone has brought up the lost identity in “whiteness” and while the exercise was extremely uncomfortable, the exposure to this concept was very valuable.

I've gained so much self-awareness and insight into the lives and experiences of those in the workshop and of the people I work and live with. I always come away from your workshops more enlightened and with more tools to end oppression within myself. I cannot wait to learn more! Thank you!

Related Resources

Ending Racism Together: Committing to a Body of Work On and For Ourselves

Nanci Joins Strong Feelings Podcast

Ricky’s Legacy

Lillian’s Legacy