The Definition of Privilege

In a Platonic ideal of the situation every derisive "call the whaambulance" gif was ever made for, I present the apotheosis of straight white guy whining.

The whole rambling letter is totally worth a read, but the short version is that a TA at the University of Wisconsin-Madison had to take a mandatory diversity training and was horrified at the implication that racism exists, and even worse, that trans people exist. The letter hits all the classic "colleges are just liberal indoctrination machines!" notes that conservatives love so much, but is written is such an hilarious unselfconscious manner that you can't help but feel kind of bad for the guy.

Amongst the many crimes he was forced to suffer through, here's some highlights:

Our facilitator spoke openly of politicizing her classrooms in order to right (take revenge for?) past wrongs.

This shit just confuses the hell out of me -- I thought conservatives were all about revenge. And besides, if there never were these past wrongs (as he claims), then what would people be taking revenge for?

We opened the session with chapter-and-verse quotes from diversity theorists who rehearsed the same tired “power and privilege” cant that so dominates seminar readings and official university hand-wringing over unmet race quotas 

That's exactly it -- no one alive genuinely cares about racial equality. Any and all concerns about the fact that, say, one race of people was enslaved in horribly brutal conditions for multiple centuries is really just a ruse so that we can force unqualified Black people into college at the expense of long-suffering white people. But wait, it kind of sounds like this guy wants to take revenge for what he perceives to be past wrongs, but that can't be it, because we know he thinks that's bad.

were forced to share our collective guilt with those from continents far across the wine-dark sea

Pro tip: when trying to say you're not racist, maybe don't refer to people of color as coming from across the sea.

On having to defile his poor, sensitive ears with the notion that queer and trans people exist:

It is most certainly not my job, though, to cheer along anyone, student or otherwise, in their psychological confusion. I am not in graduate school to learn how to encourage poor souls in their sexual experimentation, nor am I receiving generous stipends of taxpayer monies from the good people of the Great State of Wisconsin to play along with fantasies or accommodate public cross-dressing.

Wow! Way to nail it right on the head! Any and all gay people, or simply any people that don't fit his definition of straight, are simply either playing games or psychologically confused. Glad we cleared that up before anyone was tempted to treat them as human beings.

One grows used to being thought a snarling racist

Really? I've never grown used to that. Maybe because people aren't constantly telling me I'm racist. Another handy pro-tip: if large numbers of people continually tell you you're being racist, maybe, juuuuuust maybe, you might actually be a little racist.


Of course, since irony is dead, I can't point out the humorous irony that if a person of color wrote this about, well, literally anything, this guy would talk about how that so-and-so is just a whiner who can't accept the world the way it is, and hey, if they don't like it, no one's forcing them to go to school there. But that wouldn't be because this asshole is a hypocrite, it would be because the entire world is supposed to cater to him.