What’s the first thing all white people need to do when it comes to racial inequality? Own their white privilege. Of course, being a good ally is about a lot more than just acknowledging that your own whiteness has afforded you countless protections and advantages, but it’s a core starting point to breaking down the very real structural and system barriers put in place against people of color.
Who isn’t afraid to talk about white privilege? New York Senator and 2020 hopeful Kirsten Gillibrand. As you can catch in the video embed below, the senator isn’t shy about owning up to how her whiteness has helped her. And broke down how exactly white privilege protects people, again, and again...and again.
Of course, this isn’t the first time the senator from New York has taken on white privilege. In a now-viral video, she talked to a fellow white woman in Youngstown, Ohio and broke down what white privilege means in today’s world. She answered what seems to be a familiar sticking point: I’m white, but my lie is still hard. How can I be privileged? She also talked about white privilege and reparations at Netroots Nation in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania just earlier this month.
And on tonight’s debate stage, she circled back to the same theme and brought it home even harder. Let’s check out the clip below.
Here’s what she said, for those who can’t follow the video above.
“I don’t believe that it’s the responsibility of Cory and Kamala to be the only voice that takes on these issues of institutional racism in this country. I think that as a white woman of privilege that is a U.S. Senator running for President of the United States, it is also my responsibility to lift up those voices that aren’t being listened to.
And I can talk to those white women in the suburbs that voted for Trump and explain to them what white privilege actually is. That when their son is walking down the street with a bag of M&Ms in his pocket, wearing a hoodie, his whiteness is what protects him from not being shot.
When their child has a car that breaks down, and he knocks on someone’s door for help, and the door opens, and the help is given… That’s his whiteness that protects him from being shot.
That is what white privilege in America is today. And so my responsibility is to not only lift up those stories, but explain to communities across America, like I did in Youngstown, Ohio, to a young mother. That this is all of our responsibilities. and that together, we can make our communities stronger. “
Here’s our exclusive video interview with Gillibrand, as part of Making Progress:
What do you think about her take on white privilege?