Sorry, I still don't buy that.
Like most things, for me it's a matter of defaults. The default when someone enters a store is that he is a customer, not a thief. He is assumed to be a customer. If he is treated as a customer, that's normal, standard, de rigueur, not privilege.
If, rather than a customer, he is presumed to be a thief prior to having acted as one, that is mistreatment, not absence of privilege.
If a person enters a store and the staff, recognizing him for wealth or prominence, fawns over him and gives him special treatment, that's privilege. An ordinary White person being assumed by the staff to be an customer rather than a thief cannot be said to be privileged, merely ordinary.
That there may be store proprietors who operate, instead, off bias doesn't alter the basic concept.
Your default may vary. |
