This is your brain on privilege…

Several of you asked that I link to the blog post that pissed me off yesterday. I’ll admit that I was tempted but, after some thought, a bitch as decided not to. Trust that the post itself is not worthy even if the societal diseases it displays are worth exploring.

I’ve tackled the reflex to challenge race whenever someone fails to fit The Man’s mold, but the motherfucker in question actually articulated another more alarming opinion that a bitch would like to delve into today.

Specifically, the writer who shall not be linked questioned both my veracity and authority to write about the things I write about.

Pause…roll up sleeves…continue.

I suspect that said writer has invested a lot of time, money and intellectual energy in pursuit of some manner of degree or degrees. I also believe that he is dangerous because of the underlying message threaded through his sorta-post.

The person in question is an educator (shudder) and I can say from personal experience that an educator who questions the “right” of others to express opinion or the veracity of the opinions expressed simply because an alphabet doesn’t follow their last name is dangerous as hell.

Having said that…

This is your brain on privilege…
I actually understand people who think truth and authority come with multiple degrees. I sure as shit don’t intend to let someone without them cut me open on an operating table and there are clearly fields where training matters.

But I’m a product of a liberal education (go Judges!) where value was also put on what we learn by doing.

I could list off the various forms of training I’ve had, my major courses of study at college, the organizations I’ve chaired committees in and blah followed by blah followed by blah. I could do that, but it’d just be a partial resume.

I’m an activist. My feminism wasn’t just learned in a classroom but also through the art of living. I certainly took classes, wrote papers and attended lectures all of which expanded my potential. But this bitch didn’t actualize a damn thing until I took my intellectual authority out for a spin that challenged the veracity of all that theory right down to the bone.

I’m a militant (wink) and I reject the argument that the masses lack the authority to debate our government and its policies. That’s the very definition of wrong in my book. Give me the voice of the people, loud and skeptical, any day over the voice of some self anointed political overseer pontificating about authority and questioning folk’s veracity to maintain it.

Many a brain is on privilege and, borrow a phrase from my grandmother (who was an amazing educator), not just those full of book learning. People of color have internalized the lie, which is why we too often abdicate our voice to The Man.

We think someone else has to know more or understand shit better.

Someone with more authority or who speaks in such a way that you would never think to question the veracity of their arguments.

Yeah...The Man.

That’s why I wrote this post, because the masses have some serious inner work to do so that we can speak truth to power and resist those who feel entitled to our power.

I’m not knocking the shit I learned in college but don’t dare devalue the shit I learn through activism.

The Man, whatever form that motherfucker takes, fears the militant empowered voice of the people because that is a voice he will have to answer to.

Empowerment lives in a lot of places, but last time I checked it didn't hold an exclusive lease behind ivy covered walls.

Viva la bitchitude!