Burning the Carte Blanche: White Privilege and Racism

by Candace Saunders

The term "carte blanche" is literally translated as "white card" but it has come to have a meaning beyond its original French. To have carte blanche is to have the power to make almost any choice and to have nearly whatever you desire.

A cold winter day found a group of white kids in Syracuse, New York, handing tangible cartes blanches to white passersby. The front of the cards held the word "carte blanche" in small, unassuming letters. The back read, "Congratulations! You have been selected to receive special, unearned privileges based solely on the color of your skin!" and listed various exciting benefits like the ability to see positive representations of members of the white race in the media; to find "nude" and "flesh"-colored stockings, make-up, and bandages to match white skin; and, perhaps most importantly, to ignore racism.

No, these white kids weren't junior Klansmen. We were just white activists trying to teach our fellow white people a little about "white privilege".

"White privilege" is commonly defined as the rights, advantages, favors, and immunities that white people enjoy, and which are fully or partially withheld from people of color. Although many poor white people are clearly victims of capitalism and classism, poor people of color experience oppression twofold - from both racism and classism. White privilege is, in its very essence, racism.

White people of all political affiliations are often hesitant to talk about white privilege. Despite evidence to the contrary - the entire injustice system, for instance - many white people believe that racism is gone for good, that we have at last achieved racial equality. The Civil Rights Movement came and went, right? Don't we live, at long last, in a colorblind society? Aren't people just, well, people?

Recently, the cover of Syracuse's New Times displayed photographs of black mayors of US-American cities. The photographs lay over a striped and star-spangled background. In the center of the page, a single word declared, "Colorblind" as if to suggest that the election of black mayors was evidence that "colorblindness" to race has prevailed.

Here we go again, I thought, with "colorblindness," with stupidity, with ignorance, with racism. I wondered how anyone could make such a statement when the evidence against supposed "colorblindness" is all around us. For example, there's a reason an above-ground sewage treatment plant is being built in Syracuse's Southside, in the 83% black, working class Midland community. And it's not because that's the only place it could have been built. The proposed plant is a clear-cut case of environmental racism dating back to when the pipes now directed towards the construction site were laid. The Partnership for Onondaga Creek (POC) has presented a viable, just alternative to the above-ground "swirler" plant, but is forced to fight an uphill battle because some white government officials like Nick Pirro use their privilege to ignore racism.

Racism has very real, material effects on the lives of people of color - with death, poverty, and imprisonment representing the worst of the worst. To ignore racial oppression is to be racist; it is exercising one's white privilege. Whites garner certain privileges (despite their socioeconomic class) simply because they are white, leaving people of color to bear the burden.

Today, most white people do not critically examine or even idly ponder their racial identity and their complicity in racism. If we are not overtly racist in word or action, we do not, for the most part, consider ourselves to be racist. We neglect to consider how our position as privileged whites is directly correlated to the underprivileged status of people of color. Whiteness is invisible to us because it has been normalized through the centuries in much the same way that masculinity has been normalized and femininity marginalized under patriarchy. "People of color," even in this very label, are exceptions to the white rule.

To stand on the street choosing just who deserves a carte blanche is to embody racism by bestowing white privilege. But the distribution of the cards is an act against racism. We hoped the cards would catalyze critical thinking and discussion about whiteness and white privilege amongst whites themselves. The Syracuse Peace Council's workshop entitled "White People Confronting White Racism" worked towards the same goal. If we are to dismantle racism, we must first look within ourselves, at the racism that has grown life-long under our skins.

Tackling racism and white privilege is one of the most important activist endeavors for progressive, peace-loving white folks. It is a process that sparks and blossoms over the years, a series of steps from education to acknowledgement to discussion and, finally, to concrete action in support of anti-racist movements led by people of color. It's difficult and it's confusing, but it must be done. After all, the only truly anti-racist act is an act against racism!

My journey has only just begun.

Candace is a community activist originally from Hockessin, Delaware. She is a member of Syracuse University/SUNY-ESF's Student Environmental Action Coalition and the Partnership for Onondaga Creek.