Preview

Conflicting Privilege By Anna Le Pree Analysis

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
821 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Conflicting Privilege By Anna Le Pree Analysis
Conflicting Privilege by: De Anna Le Pree
It was a hot summer day, just a couple of months into my service in Kyrgyzstan; I was walking to catch the bus that would take me to work at the reproductive health NGO in town. I had a long flowing skirt on paired with a tank top, walking the dirt road to the bus stop, I heard the sound of bicycle wheels coming up from behind me, thinking nothing of it I just kept along my way. All of a sudden, I’m hit with such shocking force on my backside I let out a little scream. I could not believe that this boy on his bike just smacked my ass! As he rode off I tried running after him yelling, “Fuck you!”, “How dare you!”, “You asshole!” and watched as he looked back at me, laughing and sneering.
I found myself
…show more content…
A young girl screaming while two men grabbed at her arms and legs dragging her into their car. Peace Corps told us if we were in this situation we were not to interfere. So I watched, and I tried to get attention from a near by police, who just walked a different direction. It was painful for me, and it was obviously painful for the girl, being humiliated in the middle of town, as she was hauled away to her fate. Sometimes I wish I had started screaming at them like I did to the boy on the bike. Would it be worth putting myself in danger to save her from being taken, raped, and married off? Whose reputation was I saving? I can see the Russian news now, “Americans ruining Kyrgyz Traditions”. The term “do no harm” is like a sick oxymoronic problem that I cannot solve. I wanting to help but not interfere. In the end I think I did the “right” thing. I wanted to help but not interfere, so I searched for local organization to interfere for me. Maana Crisis Center wanted to stop bride kidnapping and end violence against women, I set up a meeting for the my NGO to meet Maana where the two organizations became partners and advocates of autonomy and …show more content…
I got an opportunity to learn and experience life in a different way and experience pain, harassment and violence in a different way. I sometimes think teaching about autonomy and choice was for my own self-fulfillment. I believe Kyrgyzstan gave me more than I could ever return, and I was so happy to meet local organizations and women with shared values that could do the interfering and yelling, was I ever “needed” at all? I hate that my time in Kyrgyzstan has become a couple of lines in my résumé, when no one will ever know the one million and one stories that I have, no one will ever know all the life-long relationships I’ve built, and no one will ever know how many times I used the f-word over twenty-seven months, but maybe that's a good

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    In this Tim Wise discusses how the so called white privilege came about in the United States and how it was a big joke. He talks about how especially back during the Civil War that the world was off balance. White people were clearly more privileged and they may not have realized it until slavery came about. He mentions that the middle class people were fooled by those of the Elite class. The Elite class made them feel as though they were more important than there servants, which were normally African Americans, even though, the Elite did not care what everyone thought, they just wanted to stay on top. They felt that to stay on top they must create a class system. Elite was better than the Middle and Lower class, the Middle class was better than the Lower class, and if you were in the lower class you were nothing. Whites tended to be in both the Elite class and the Middle class while the African Americans fell in the Lower class, thus creating privilege.…

    • 889 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Peggy McIntosh creates an interesting opinion on the invisible impact on the white privileged in the United States in her article, White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack. Given that Peggy is also from the same race what she writes about brings a very interesting perspective to what she says. McIntosh claims there are white people who refuse to see that their color puts them at an advantage even though they agree others are at a disadvantage. I agree that people with privileges can be oblivious to it, but I do not agree that lessing or taking away the privileges of the privileged is the only solution to making it more equal to the unprivileged. An increase of opportunity to the unprivileged is a solution also.…

    • 865 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Tal Fortgang “checking my privilege”, he describes what checking your privilege is and how it works against what it is trying to achieve: equality for all and realize the mistakes of the past. In it he also described the hardships his family has gone through to get to where it is today. After reading it I started to view the similarities between his family and mine.…

    • 599 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    White Privilege Analysis

    • 390 Words
    • 2 Pages

    These White Privilege readings engage popular culture by defining white privilege through concrete evidence. Texts such as “White Privilege: Unpacking the Knapsack” ask the reader is to view a list of items that define white privilege. The reader is then asked to confirm whether or not the privileges are applicable to how he or she lives. As most white people realize just how applicable white privileges are to them, they can see that the problem is not just skin deep. The privileges white people have today are because of the white privileges available throughout history. In “The History of White People” the author unveils that most of what we study is a white man’s version of history, and therefore discredits other race’s contribution to history.…

    • 390 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Throughout history, it is seen that the white race has always been inferior, which entitles them to different advantages. These advantages have become customary to everyday life. Peggy McIntosh’s essay White Privileges: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack explores the ideas of the white privilege and the need to abate it.…

    • 627 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Reclaiming Family Privilege talks about most of what these kids are going through. Family Privilege is the concept Family Privilege was introduced to emphasize the power that family plays in determining a child's developmental pathway. Family Privilege was defined as "the abundance of benefits, mostly invisible, that accrue from membership in a stable family" (Seita & Brendtro, 2005). Belonging is one thing that every kid needs feel like they are important for someone to see they really exist. Like Urie Bronfenbrenner noted “that each child needs at least one person who is irrationally crazy about him or her. This value of belonging is practiced in healthy families, but when that is not possible, belonging can come from many surrogate mothers,…

    • 176 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Thinking through unacknowledged male privilege as a phenomenon, I realized that, since hierarchies in our society are interlocking, there was most likely a phenomenon of while privilege that was similarly denied and protected. As a white person, I realized I had been taught about racism as something that puts others at a disadvantage, but had been taught not to see one of its corollary aspects, white privilege, which puts me at an advantage.…

    • 503 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    It was 115 degrees; the platoon was walking through the middle of the desert each of them with 40 pounds of gear on and an M16A2 rifle. It was summer time in the country of Afghanistan and the temperature was rising. At this point I asked myself what the hell I am doing here and why did I join the United States Army? Right when I was thinking that I felt a tug on my leg and there stood a young boy about 7 years old with only one arm, “Candy,Candy” he asked. Upon speaking with the local villagers we found out that his arm was taken from an improvised explosive device (IED) planted there by the rebeles that wanted to “rid their country of the weak”. That is when it occurred to me that I was here to protect my country from those that think that we are weak.…

    • 1911 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Peddy McIntosh highlighted various unearned white privileges in her autobiographical article “White Privilege, Color and Crime: A Personal Account.” She illustrated the white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that one white person could count on cashing in each day. White people have these privileges given to them by the society in which they live in. The same society taught them to be ignorant and unawareness of these privileges. This system of unearned privileges established by white individuals made people of color feel oppressed. In this system being white is a norm and dominant power. Caucasians, who benefit most from the white privilege system in the United States, are more likely to be blinded to the existence of privilege system and take these privileges for granted it. In this reflection analysis, I will elaborate on most common white privileges mentioned by Peddy McIntosh through my personal experiences.…

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In his book, Privilege: The Making of an Adolescent Elite at St. Paul’s School, Shamus Khan provides an ethnographic perspective to the world of elite boarding schools through his experience both as a student and as a full-time faculty member at St. Paul’s School. To preface the book, Khan reflects on his experience at St. Paul’s as a teenager– specifically the factors that led to his enrollment as well as his experience as a minority in the community. A product of two immigrant parents, one from South Asia and the other from Ireland, Khan was provided unique experiences amongst the traditionally WASP students matriculating at St. Paul’s. Because his parents had to perform a “cultural catch-up,” as well as being physically identifiable as non-white,…

    • 808 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    We were sent into the ghettos and people were arguing whether he ghettos were good as they were at least safe, but it could still be better. A few days after the Nazis started running into the ghettos and killing people, almost every one was sent to work camps. I was able to hide and get away by running into the sewers but i had to leave my beloved behind. When I went back to try to convince her to come with me but by the time I was there she was gone. When I went back on the streets to escape I saw a group of nazi soldiers i started to move all the luggage and bags in the street aside. I said that I was ordered to do this so they wouldn't trip they laughed at me and continued to march along.…

    • 144 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    I know since I am in America, I have rights and no man can’t tell me what to do. Sometimes it’s hard to read the stories in the newspaper of women being hurt in Haiti. When I was living in Haiti before 2011, I used to have a neighbor and her husband used to beat her. She was ashamed, and her other neighbors talked behind her back. She stayed inside until the scars on her face were all gone. Sometimes I talked to her, but I didn’t want to ask any questions because I didn’t want her to feel sad. I did not want to make her feel more ashamed, and I wasn’t sure whether I could talk to her about it. Talking about other topics is a good idea. When a person is going to this kind of problem try to make them feel comfortable. Tell them their life is worth a lot more they can ever imagine and to try to stand up for…

    • 539 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Affirmative Action is any effort taken to expand opportunity for women or racial, ethnic and national origin minorities by using membership in those groups that have been subject to discrimination as a consideration. The Fourteenth Amendment states that no person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance. As a result, Affirmative action is not consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment. In this essay, I will first discuss the violation of Affirmative Action against the Fourteenth Amendment. Second, how Affirmative Action helps one group of people while leaving out the other groups of people.…

    • 1025 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Gender roles

    • 2242 Words
    • 9 Pages

    WS 100 is a multidisciplinary course that examines issues around gender with a particular emphasis on how women’s lives have been shaped by the definitions of femininity and masculinity as well as race, class and sexual identity. We begin and end this course by looking at the conditions and actions of women at pivotal moments in history. While our primary focus is on women and understanding why it is they experience for example violence, poverty and employment inequity, we only have a small portion of the picture unless we also seek to understand masculinity and how it functions within our culture. Throughout this course, we pay considerable attention to the complexity of oppression by drawing on race, class and sexual identity to see how women and men inhabit varying positions of power and subordination. We draw on the work of feminists and feminisms that span a wide range of key theoretical and practice that is fundamental to the understanding of oppression. Of course our thinking would be incomplete if we failed to consider and honour what people have done to combat injustice.…

    • 2242 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Brave Incident

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages

    I went to high school in Vietnam; my cousin who I call brother went to the same high school with me. The high school I attended was also the school that many gang members attended. Those gang members always abused other students and took their lunch money as well as many of their valuables such as their wallets, cell phone and laptops. Our school principal always tried to inform the police about this behavior, but unfortunately that did not help. One day my class mate ran into the class room where I was spending my break, since I did not like to hang out in the play ground because of the gang members that were there, and he told me that my cousin was being harassed by a couple of those gang members and that they threatened to beat him to death if he does not give them all his money. My cousin was very stubborn much more like Victoriano. The two gang members had my cousin against the wall and were trying to steal his wallet and belonging while he fought them as much as he could. I had nothing on my mind at that moment but to save my cousin and help him run away from those gang members. I looked for small pieces or rocks and a wooden stick and immediately ran towards my cousin screaming loudly so that I can distract them from him. As I started throwing the rocks on them they let go of my cousin and paid attention to where I was heading which was directly towards them. I screamed loudly telling my cousin to run away and go to the principal’s office just like when Dona Guadalupe told her cousin “I am not cutting you free so you can be brave and get killed. I want you running so you can live” I wanted my cousin to run and not try to fight the gang members when they let go of him. My cousin ran to the principal’s office while I threw the stick of wood towards them. I immediately changed my direction and ran towards the principal’s office as well. The Principal called the police and they arrested the gang members and I was able to save my…

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays