Acknowledging Privilege

Conversations about privilege can be volatile. I feel an immediate contraction upon having my privilege called out. When Miranda points out a sexist statement or action I made, my reaction is to cover up my embarrassment by lashing out with anger “I’m not sexist! How dare you!”

This is an understandable reaction (right, Miranda?). After all, I don’t think sexism is okay and I don’t want to think that I participate in sexism. Basically, I’m embarrassed! But what I do is transfer my anger and make it the fault of the messenger. This is not very helpful. So one of my personal challenges is to move past the embarrassment and to listen to what Miranda is telling me about my actions.

I know when Miranda speaks with me about my privilege, she is not doing so to say that I am a “bad person,” but to let me know what I said hurt her so we can look at it together. Can I receive her feedback, not as a personal attack, but as one about my actions? At the same time, can I accept responsibility for my statements and actions and the harm they cause? And from there, what can I learn about myself and can this lead to personal growth and a deeper understanding of the issues?

Practicing communication with Miranda in this way helps me in the conversations we’re having at L.O.V.E. about speciesism. One challenge in speaking about speciesism is that we are speaking about ourselves. That is, each one of us holds speciesist views and human privilege. It’s inevitable given that we have grown up in and continue to live as humans in a human dominated world.

So for me, when we speak about speciesism, there is always the specter of that moment of contraction as I realize, “Whoa! You’re (or even I’m!) talking about me!” At that moment, my challenge is to not personalize the statement and to try to discern the content of the message to better understand my own human privilege and the larger society it emerges from.

I think this is an important role of being an ally to non-human animals. After all, it is only after recognizing and acknowledging my own speciesism that I can begin the work to end it in my own life and in the world.