‘White Privilege’ Defanged: From Class War Analysis to Electoral Cynicismby Zach Sc
‘White Privilege’ Defanged: From Class War Analysis to Electoral Cynicism
by Zach Schwartz-Weinstein
Throughout the current election cycle, it has been striking to note the ways that privilege discourse has been deployed to demand loyalty to particular parties and candidates. “Either vote Clinton,” one widely-circulated tweet demands, “or admit you’re a privileged asshole.” Bernie Sanders refused to concede to Hillary Clinton because of privilege. Third party voters are privileged. “Ultraleftists” are privileged. Privilege has thus become central to a heavily moralizing language of civic responsibility which demands that the US electorate maintain a neoliberal bulwark against the far right for the putative good of the less fortunate. This use of the concept marks an appropriation, one which transforms privilege discourse fundamentally, from an analysis of white supremacy’s capillary and quotidian power into an individuating and deeply ideological mechanism of state discipline.
