Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT
WCDT Strips 3546 to 3550 (14th to 18th August 2017)
KnightRider007:
Yeah, that definition of 'privilege', and that USE of 'privilege' has always pissed me off. "You have privilege because you're white!" No. 'Privilege' is not some nebulous thing granted by your skin color. It's a concrete advantage, financial and social that *tends to correlate* with race, *on average*. You can't say "You have privilege because you're white", it's "If you're white, you're *more likely to be privileged*". You can't apply population averages to individuals.
brightwings00:
--- Quote from: neurocase on 18 Aug 2017, 02:43 ---Yes, the US prison system is absolute crap, and prisoner rehabilitation is practically non-existent. Does May deserve to be in a falling apart lemon of a chassis and working a dead end job? Not really. Did she put herself there? Yes, absolutely. She consciously chose to commit a crime in pursuit of her own ends. Any loss of "privilege" she's suffered compared to Winslow is entirely by her own hand. That's not bias, that's not "criminalizing" her. That's a straight up fact. The prison system is a wreck, but May is still the one who put herself there. If she was wrongfully accused/imprisoned, fine. But there's a far cry between a simple mistake, and willful subversion of the law for personal gain.
--- End quote ---
But May did jail time. She served her sentence. She's been punished. At what point is she allowed to be mad about her circumstances? Because that's part of a normal life--being pissed off because you have a crappy job, or a crappy home--and if she can't be mad about anything in her life without being constantly reminded that "well, it's your fault, so up yours", that is a psychological nightmare waiting to happen.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think she should've bitten his head off the way she did. Winslow was being insensitive, but he wasn't being deliberately dickish. But May's allowed to be pissed off, and hurt, and uncomfortable, because she's a human being worthy of respect. Not some sort of horrible monster.
brightwings00:
--- Quote from: KnightRider007 on 18 Aug 2017, 03:52 ---Yeah, that definition of 'privilege', and that USE of 'privilege' has always pissed me off. "You have privilege because you're white!" No. 'Privilege' is not some nebulous thing granted by your skin color. It's a concrete advantage, financial and social that *tends to correlate* with race, *on average*. You can't say "You have privilege because you're white", it's "If you're white, you're *more likely to be privileged*". You can't apply population averages to individuals.
--- End quote ---
Intersectionality is a thing.
If you're a white person in a wheelchair, you still benefit from being white. You just don't benefit from being able-bodied. There's a whole bunch of different forces at work, and it's silly to pretend that white women, for instance, don't have it better than black women, or a gay person with a disability has the exact same circumstances as a straight person with a disability.
Cornelius:
--- Quote from: brightwings00 on 18 Aug 2017, 04:23 ---But May did jail time. She served her sentence. She's been punished.
--- End quote ---
She is still on parole, unless somewhere off screen she did finish her time. The wiki suggests - not as canon as the comic, I know - that her current chassis may be the equivalent of an ankle bracelet for parolees.
Aside from that, yes, she's allowed her emotions, and she's worthy of respect, like anyone else. But like anyone else, she also needs to consider the feelings of other people. I suspect that that may be part of the rationale behind the virtual companionship program she participated in; a first step to rehabilitation and reintroduction to society.
Question; if we look at panel three; how often do you suppose Hannelore has been put in that position? She has become more confident and able to deal with the world, that is certain.
Also, on the following panel, I think it's nice how she is reassuring him, for a change.
--- Quote from: brightwings00 on 18 Aug 2017, 04:28 ---Intersectionality is a thing.
If you're a white person in a wheelchair, you still benefit from being white. You just don't benefit from being able-bodied. There's a whole bunch of different forces at work, and it's silly to pretend that white women, for instance, don't have it better than black women, or a gay person with a disability has the exact same circumstances as a straight person with a disability.
--- End quote ---
I agree, there are benefits, and as such, privilege is a thing. However, the argument that because you believe your interlocutor profits from a certain privilege, therefore their opinion is not worth hearing, and their feelings are invalid, is a very ugly argument. Helping each other understand their mutual bias, and working towards a solution is much more productive. Sadly, and again, in my experience, that is very seldomly the route taken.
swapna:
--- Quote from: KnightRider007 on 18 Aug 2017, 03:52 ---Yeah, that definition of 'privilege', and that USE of 'privilege' has always pissed me off. "You have privilege because you're white!" No. 'Privilege' is not some nebulous thing granted by your skin color. It's a concrete advantage, financial and social that *tends to correlate* with race, *on average*. You can't say "You have privilege because you're white", it's "If you're white, you're *more likely to be privileged*". You can't apply population averages to individuals.
--- End quote ---
Sometimes, privilege is the absence of something - say, harassment. It's hard to perceive by people who do have the advantage; and often it's hilariously frustrating to explain it to them.
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