ID: Is this a pigeon meme where the person is tagged “cis society”, the butterfly in their hand is tagged “trans people having a backbone about anything at all”, and they are asking “is this destroying my free speech?”
ID: Is this a pigeon meme where the person is tagged “cis society”, the butterfly in their hand is tagged “trans people having a backbone about anything at all”, and they are asking “is this destroying my free speech?”
Paulo Friere coined the phrase “to the oppressor, equality feels like oppression.” But at some point in the last 10 or 20 years, “oppressor” has changed to “privileged,” and while I understand the sentiment I’m afraid it leads to some misconceptions about privilege and oppression. Friere carefully constructed a long and detailed basis for his statement, carefully explaining the dynamics of oppressor/oppressed dynamics, but he was speaking pretty specifically about peasants in neo colonies in the global south, like Brazil.
I think you will definitely find many people of privilege among the oppressor class(es), and privilege functions within society to justify different kinds of oppression. But you’ll also find people of privilege set against injustice in every way they possibly can. Because of the way privilege is bestowed upon some people but not others, contrary to how oppression is more like an organized effort by some political interest, be it national, economic, etc., to keep many people poor and wretched so that only the few can prosper. The privilege, IMO is a function of the oppression. I guess I think privilege is a personal thing whereas oppression is a much wider problem, as many individuals come together in order to dominate an other. The social factors that might drive this are all too abundant.
I see the “privilege” quote everywhere, but I never see the “oppressor” quote brought up, even though I’m pretty sure its the source. It gives me sort of an icky feeling too, like it may be saying something much different than the original. Our ruling classes love to tweak little details like this, and really its usually to claim the work of some oppressed workers as their own.
But in order for change to occur, privileged people would have to come over to, and fight for, the side of change. This would not affect their status as privileged, but it would affect whether or not they were an oppressor.
I can’t find a source indicating he said that phrase. Where did you get the information from? The one I always hear is “When you’re accustomed to privilege”, etc. In that form, it would be better phrased as “equality can feel like oppression”, because obviously not everyone who benefits from the privilege agrees it’s right.
Its from pedagogy of the oppressed
Keep in mind, this comes after a long section explaining that “it is the historic mission of the oppressed to restore the humanity of the oppressors,” so he’s not just chastising people for being bad here, he’s explaining (in part) why the oppressor can never free the oppressed; the oppressed liberates them both and creates a new kind of person.
Sorry for my paraphrase, I haven’t read it for a little over a year, although I think about it a lot
(I made an edit where I fixed a typo that like completely changed the meaning in the last paragraph)
Ah, okay, so it’s the same general idea, but not expressed with those exact words.
Yeah its funny though I thought it was more or less a direct quote, so thanks for calling it out. It is different enough to make me reconsider some of what I said
I think that privileged works better. It feels like oppressor implies an active role, while privileged is passive. To be harmful, those of the privileged group need to do nothing but exist. Whereas members of an oppressor class would need to enforce the oppression.
Since MLK saw the moderate liberal as a bigger obstacle than the Klansman, I think privileged is the ticket.
It also makes sense as an ally has to take an active role to be an ally, not just passively not participate.