DCentric

We wrote on what’s needed to have honest conversations about race, and a few readers tweeted that people should first acknowledge white privilege. That refers to the undue advantages white people receive in society because of their race.

Ta-Nehisi Coates at The Atlantic offers an interesting take on white privilege, noting that he doesn’t build his identity on the losing end of it. He responds to a white commenter, writing that “I can tell you how racism–indirectly and directly–affected my life. But you should also know that I truly believe that I had the best pair of parents in the world, that I had six brothers and sisters (sometimes more) who took care of me.”

What do you think it means to be privileged?

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• Source: Theatlantic
• Via: @tanehisi

In short–you need to know that I was privileged. I can run you all kinds of stats on the racial wealth gap and will gladly discuss its origins. But you can’t really buy two parents like I had. Money can buy experience and exposure–but it can’t make you want those things. It can’t make your parents curious about the world. It can’t make them moral, compassionate and caring. It can’t make them love their children. As I have moved on up, in that old Jeffersonian sense, I have seen families who allegedly were more privileged. But ultimately I find merit in who they are as humans. I am unconvinced that money trumps all of their flaws.

Read more at: www.theatlantic.com

The millennial generation is more racially diverse than the general population. But 46 percent of millennials think that the government pays too much attention to the problems of racial minorities, and 48 percent think that reverse racism against whites is a genuine problem. That’s according to results from a new survey by the Public Religion Research Institute, which asked 18 to 30 year-olds a series of questions on race, politics and religion. A majority of whites surveyed said that discrimination against whites has become as big of a problem as discrimination against blacks.

Writer Jamelle Bouie lays out his thoughts on why so many young, white people have these attitudes, touching upon everything from affirmative action at colleges to how schools teach history.

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• Source: Thenation
• Via: @jbouie

Second, we live in a culture where honest conversation about race is rare, especially among white people, where it’s surrounded by fear and anxiety. For many white kids, if not most, racial conversations are limited to a few units in elementary and middle school. Otherwise, they’re left to fend for themselves, which either leads to a sense of privileged obliviousness—i.e., you live and act as if this were a “colorblind” world, despite the fact that color matters for many people—or confusion and resentment.

Read more at: www.thenation.com

Predicting how long you’ll live has less to do with your race and where you live than it does with a set of socioeconomic factors, ranging from martial status to education level.

That’s according to new a study by Standford University researchers. They found the differences in life expectancy rates between black and white Americans all but disappear when taking into account a group of 22 variables, including income, education and work history. Geography also becomes irrelevant.

Still, a documented difference does exist: the average white man lives nearly seven years longer than the average black man. This new study points at the specific reasons explaining that gap.

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• Source: Eurekalert