Implicit Bias Topic: Privilege

Children’s books celebrating diversity and differences (click for more info):

Books for middle school and high school studies that broaden perspectives (source: Harvard Graduate School of Education):

Transcript for Podcast Lesson on Privilege with Andrew

Jenny Woo: Today we're sitting with Andrew Greenia here to talk about the topic of privilege. Andrew is the Manager of Programming at Education Pioneers in Oakland California where he focuses on the planning and implementation of learning programs. He is recent a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education where he studied Human Development and Psychology and was an Equity and Inclusion fellow. Originally from Detroit Michigan, Andrew received his B.A. in Sociology from Loyola University Chicago and most recently lived in Baltimore Maryland where he facilitated race dialogues at the University of Maryland. Welcome, Andrew.

Andrew Greenia: Thanks, Jenny. Thanks for having me.

Jenny Woo: What does privilege mean to you?

Andrew Greenia: To me, privilege means as so many writers like Peggy McIntosh and other scholars in the field, boils down to a set of unearned benefits or advantages that given someone's social identities are given particular advantages in society. 

Jenny Woo: Tell me more about what you mean when you say "unearned.".

Andrew Greenia: Unearned--I think incorporates the historical element there. I think I think of the word "inherited" and I think of how histories have provided opportunities and resources to some groups. Call that white people, call that men, heterosexual folk. And while people inherit these privileges or unearned assets, it means they haven't necessarily done something on their own to be granted that opportunity and just exist in our culture and our society.

Jenny Woo: It's such a heavy complicated topic. Why do we actually start the other way around where you can tell us what privilege is not. Because I know there tend to be some misconceptions around that. 

Andrew Greenia: Yeah thanks for asking that Jenny. I think sometimes it's conflated with privilege: to think that I am privileged, it means I'm rich. I'm privilege it means that I didn't work hard, or I'm privileged so therefore I ought to feel guilty for being a bad person. I feel like sometimes that obstructs us from really being able to talk about the different levels of which privilege comes up, both between us interpersonally, on an individual level, or even systemically more ideologically. So I think it's important to say if you're privilege it does not mean that you didn't work hard or your family doesn't work long hours and really care and put in work. It also doesn't mean that you're a bad person or doesn't mean that you necessarily have a lot of wealth or money. I feel like so often in this in this country, which is often so capitalistic and monetary driven, we think of privilege as often just being a being rich or wealthy and it's really more than that

Jenny Woo: It's hard to address that and I certainly feel this guilt. I can see that sometimes as parents when we address this with our children, it's almost like shaming them where "you should be feeling guilty and ashamed for what you have." And one example I think of is we tend to say "you know when I was your age I had to walk to school on a snowy day and I didn't get to do this or that..." Is that the right thing that we should be saying? 

Andrew Greenia: Having spent time in spaces of dialogue and of curiosity and how do we sort of approach these conversations have really been my own background, I would say no. I don't think the answer is necessarily one-up one another. Say if you came to me Jenny, and said you I felt this way or someone said this and I experienced it this way, I don't think my reaction is to invalidate that. Or is to say, "well I've also had it this way." I wonder about our ability to lean in and say "well tell me more about that right. I'm wondering when you say this word it sounds really hard for you. What was hard about that?" And maybe being able to find the points of entry to relate in on what was hard knowing that people's experiences are all very different, and how do we find points of synchronicity and connection, and just like really listening, which is harder said than done, harder said than done.

Jenny Woo: I love how you use that language: points of entry, connection, synchronicity. I know you've done a lot of work in terms of facilitating these types of dialogues for our children and parents of different grade levels. Can you give us an example around what you've done and what parents could think about depending on how the age of their children?

Andrew Greenia: So I've spent time working with a number of different groups most recently working with the Cambridge Ellis school here in Cambridge Massachusetts, doing work both with their teachers and with their parents. And so these are students who are three to five years old, very early on in their identity development and really trying to make meaning of the world around them. And I think oftentimes we myself included, really rushed to assumptions around what young people are observing about the world. I know for myself if I hear anyone no matter their age comment on somebody's skin color, a little bit of me erupts and I go "oh I feel like I need to drop knowledge on them about the systemic racism, I need to teach them all of this." And I think of that that framing of just curiosity in question asking and not in a way of "Jenny was your day good today?" But rather "how is your day?" And rather saying I think finding words to really just explore more. And I think really simplifying things. I think when we can often toss out words like equity and systemic oppression and privilege and I think are really important and I think of like the age range that we're talking about. As young kids think of words like fairness, I think of words like "was that fair when you saw that or when that happened?" I think of even other components like perspective-taking. I think is really important to say "well you felt this way. How might have so-and-so felt or what it might have they seen, or they thought about this?" I think I think perspective-taking, open-ended question asking without so much of our assumption attached to that is really hard. I think of tools like the Ladder of Inference as I know as we get older, we lose a lot of our art, sort of kinesthetic learning, we lose a lot of our ability to like really to engage in community and just like exploratory discovery-based learning and we get to the point of lectures. We get to point of slide decks, we get to the point of just reading a lot. There's not to say that that's wrong, right? But I think it's important to understand that our own learning styles also coupled with our privileges in some ways of if we do school well if we if our learning styles appeal to the way in which our schools are set up, people who may not be as auditory learners or appeals to certain ways that we promote learning in schools, may not be less smart but may just be left out of the equation at times.

Jenny Woo: It's really interesting this type of advantage that we have. Some are sort of who we are but others are very much molded by societal norms and being able to adapt to that or comply with it in some ways. You know, it's interesting how you answer that question because I think I do have a lot of assumptions now that I'm thinking back as a parent how do I respond to a simple question that my kid asks: "why is that kids skin darker than mine, it's so beautiful." And I am like trying to figure out...oh my gosh, I don't know enough about the historical context...how am I going to quote historical events so I get really intimidated when I have to approach these conversations because I feel like do I even have all the facts myself. Now when you say that we can explore these things, just break it down into that incident by asking questions--that points of entry--for dialogues, I think that makes me feel so much more at ease as a parent to be able to do that and feel confident about it instead of overthinking like you said and having that pile of assumptions.

Andrew Greenia: So the Ladder of Inference is a tool used to really look at how we make meaning of situations to how we lead to action. It literally is a picture of a ladder. Right at the very bottom of it is all the available data that could be received from any given situation. The first rung is the data that we choose to take from all of the observable data. What we choose to take is often built upon our experiences and what we've deemed as appropriate or valuable out of the data given. We then sift through that and say: "what assumptions am I making about this situation to then inform my action." And that's where I know how implicit bias might show up in our decision making and I think implicit bias and privilege are very connected. Those assumptions help inform our actions. It's a that's a self-perpetuating cycle: where our actions have been so informed by the data that we choose to take, the assumptions that we're making that are so informed by our identities, experiences, and privileges then inform how after the action we observe the response. And the Ladder of Inferences is allowing us to frame where our privilege comes from and what are the elements of our life that inform our perspectives. And then it's also enabling us to say well how do I go down these rungs of the ladder and check my assumptions and say "what data wasn't I seeing? What was I not considering." Which I think can just be an important question. I wanted to offer that.

Jenny Woo: Thank you for that. When you say working backward which is like climbing that down that ladder backward to really understand: "why did I say this? Why am I behaving this way? Why do I think this way?" I think like you said, really helpful drilling down to understand the foundational understanding of how we see the world. But it is interesting and when you're saying Ladder of Inference, I also think of the web of inference, just because so many things tie in together. 

Andrew Greenia: And to tie it to sort of parenting: when that shows up I think it's easy for me to sit here and say "ask questions. Be curious." I think how much in my own experience working with parents and particularly adults and working with young kids, how often our assumptions of what we hear inform how we respond, particularly if a young kid, let's say a young third grader or so, comments and says "why did they have darker skin than me? Or why are they in a wheelchair?" Making sort of observations of to your point what is not normal in society, what is considered to be different, and is not considered to be the standard. Privilege is not having to say you're privileged. I think it's being considered the norm. I think of how much work it takes on parents to do some of the self-work to be able to monitor this. Ex: when I hear my child comment on someone else's skin color, I might be terrified that they're going to become racist in society. And I know that that's a bad thing right. And I know that's not things that we ought to talk about or discuss or at least make assumptions about that. And so oftentimes I hear parents just say "shhh, let's not talk it." And what that does to the young kid is 1) it doesn't actually answer my question, and 2) now I just know that to comment on these sort of things and in our society I should not tell anyone that. I think there is of course time and place for those sorts of conversations and how to respond. But I also believe that it's important to at least recognize where someone at that young age might be coming from. And to be able to monitor my own reactions to that. To be able to ask a question that is more open-ended and not necessarily just saying "well that's because of this and let's keep it moving."

Jenny Woo: Speaking of that, this is something that I have been getting lately from my kids and I also hear adults say that, you know, in terms this sense of luck. Ex: "oh I I've had such bad luck this year." I hear from adults or from children I hear something like "this is the worst day of my life." It's such an unlucky day!" Tell us more about luck and privilege. What's the relationship between the two?

Andrew Greenia: I think luck is often used as a placeholder for privilege. It's a lot easier of a word to jump on board with and I think when we say luck, it's not to say that luck is not involved, but to a certain extent, it's a missed opportunity.

Andrew Greenia: I think when we talk about luck and don't talk about privilege, we're sitting in the mode of happenstance. The fortunate behavior, the one-offness of I just happened into this. And we lose some of the ability to break down the really important factors that might have contributed to your luck. To your question of when we say, "well this was the worst day ever or this was just really lucky of me." I think the responsive like "well what made it lucky? Why might it have been the worst day ever? How could it have been better?" And then not only getting to a place of taking stock of what made it lucky? Why was it the worst day ever We also move to a place of "well what would have made your day better? What would you have liked to have seen? What would you have liked that person to have said to you?" And then maybe, even more, to concretize it, to say, "well what can we do differently tomorrow or tonight to help get to a place where it may not be the worst day ever? It may not be the best day ever, but how can we make some improvement there." I think for young kids, I think luck is particularly the entry point. And I think you can evolve that conversation to be talking about privilege and in developmentally appropriate ways. I think luck is not a bad place to start. And I think that pivot or turn is also important.

Jenny Woo: I can also see it tying into what you've mentioned in that sense of fairness, which sometimes they feel lucky because they feel something happened that's unfair. But then probing deeper and really understanding where did that sense of unfairness comes from, breaking it down to actionable things you've mentioned in terms of what can you do differently or what can others do differently to how kids really learn to move on from the situation.

Andrew Greenia: And I think of who was not lucky and why may they have not been as lucky.

Jenny Woo: And I think another thing I've done with my own kids are the questions of well, what choices have you made that made you consider the day to be unlucky. Creating that sense of that they can do something about it, that sense of agency that also ties into it.

Jenny Woo: Another question is: as we're exploring these privilege concept with our children, I can't help but thinking that, you know, depending on how you phrased it and where your points are and maybe socioeconomically where you are, your children could feel either superior or victimized. How do you deal with these complex emotions?

Andrew Greenia: That's a hard question. I appreciate your framing of both. Not only we call it maybe internalized oppression where I'm looking at the world in which I'm just not really fitting into these boxes of the normalcy of privilege. And I think what's often lost is privilege is not only I don't have to deal with. For example, I don't have to deal with it for me as a white person having to deal with getting racially profiled by the cops. And privilege is also being as a white man often called on probably too much right in class or surfacing my opinions and that sort of overness, that more, I think is also an important aspect. Right. Not to say I not only don't have this, but I do have this. If I can just offer this point: I think privilege is often in the space of when people have privilege, I hear people say, "well I'm just a human being or I'm just I'm just a person." I think that's sort of not having to say you're privileged, and that normalcy is privilege showing up. And so I think to be able to have a conversation where we're normalizing that you can't opt-out of this conversation. We're in this together. And that's like a cheeky phrase. But I think to really understand that privileged or not, particularly around your identities and of course those identities intersect in all different interweaving ways, I think is to really understand myself as a person of privilege. You know me as a white man means that I have a race it is white. I have a gender. It is a man. I think we often think of those identity categories and often jump to the more marginalized or disadvantaged group. But I think also just sit and understand that the privilege also means that some people have more, and some people have not been given those same opportunities. I just appreciate that framing. If I'm hearing your question right, do you mean unpacking or exploring how I might see that within myself like how my privilege shows up?

Jenny Woo: Yeah and how you should be feeling about it.

Andrew Greenia: I think the differentiation there is separating the person from their actions. I go back to what we've just discussed about guilt. And I think guilt in some ways is maybe a very healthy or even normal reaction. I'll speak from my own experience. In my own household, I'm the first person to go to grad school my family. I'm the only person to go beyond bachelor’s. Actually, I didn't know what a graduate degree was until I was a junior in college. Could I say that I'm lucky to be here? Absolutely right. Am I also privileged to be sitting here across from you as a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education? Absolutely. Because we look at the sort of opportunities that I was afforded. I went to a private school in the city of Detroit. And I only went to that private school because I had a mother who didn't go to college but was I imagine on some level afforded white privilege to be able to have a job herself or she was able to pay for some of my tuition. My dad did go to college and I had that privilege of a degree. And of other identities that probably while one not all-encompassing, but definitely aided in their ability to provide me opportunities they didn't have, put me in spaces where I would have other mentors and people that were able to support me in getting to where I am today. And I think so much of that journey and sort of my own unpacking and exploration of my own privilege has really been through identifying mentors and particularly mentors who don't look like me. People who I think it is very much my own perfectionism and wanting to get things done that I would love to answer that question and just say we'll fill out this questionnaire see this person or ask this question right and then and then you can unpack it and then you know it. But for me, it's very much been years in process and I think of the particular components that have allowed me to explore and examine my own privilege and internalize superiority has been therapy. Has been finding training in which I can really make myself uncomfortable and I think has really put myself in spaces and have other people push and challenge me within loving ways. And oftentimes not of my own doing given my urge and wanting of comfort, wanting normalcy, wanting to stay in that privilege, it's nice. As a side tangent, I think that there is an importance of as people of privilege if you want to call it that, to be able to say that privilege is kind of nice at times. I think there's this need to name. As much as I love and strive to say and I want to dismantle systems of oppression and want to rearrange our society in a way that benefits all people, I think that there is a need to be able to say that privilege has gotten me in some in some pretty positions or at least positions that have a bench for me in ways that I wish all people had access to, people in my own family don't, people my own neighborhoods where I'm from don't. So, I think that's important to get across. But I think being able to identify and be in spaces where people who don't look like you are in authority.

Andrew Greenia: I think that was really been some of the catalyzing moments for me to be able to recognize and find myself in moments where I'm able to say oh what type of prejudice or assumption or bias did I have there that I think that that person was capable of. Being able to just create normal moments in which people who are not often depicted, and we're talking queer folk, people of color, we're talking people who have marginalized identities and be able to be in spaces where I'm not the one making decisions where I'm not the authority and I'm not just being fed this same sort of messages about who holds authority, who is powerful, and who's deserving of attention. Being able to be able to find those people in one-on-one mentorship roles, I think to be able to find those spaces like therapy for me in a sort of like digging out the interpersonal stuff and then also being able to have done some of that work, being able to have enough perspective to say "okay well that doesn't feel like jumping in the deep end of danger but that feels like putting my toe in the water of some discomfort." And I and I have enough data for me to say I've done that and I can continue to do that in small ways and I think for me the more that I've been able to expose myself to difference.

Andrew Greenia: And so when I think of parents and kids, I think privilege often shows up in what we ask is what's a good school. And I've done this sort of in training and working with folks and we just ask the question posed what's a good school you talk to parents. And you say a good school has these sorts of resources and it talks about these sorts of things. And it's oftentimes, not every time, falls along lines of race, particularly socioeconomic class is a big one. It's not to say those aren't good schools, but by saying what is a good school we oftentimes leave out the schools that we deem as not so good. These are schools "urban areas" or "disenfranchised areas" in places we look at who's teaching or what neighborhood it's in or what. You know the class of those students and we automatically are informed by those biases and say that's not as good a school. And so when I think of parents who might send...you know, I went to an all-white working-class grade school outside of Detroit Michigan for the first year my life. And while in many ways that school had resources, if we talk about what a good school is really being social-emotional learning, really being unpacking feelings and for me, other forms of masculinity, my schools at a young age really didn't do that. I subscribe to the norms of playing sports. I subscribe to the norms of getting good grades, being sociable, and personable. But we really didn't have any ability or capacity, or I guess wanting at that time to really say how are we feeling. How are we building a community here? And those are the really vacant qualities of what we on the outside looks like a good school. But in reality, was really selling our students and myself short and it's taken on the years to unlearn those sorts of behaviors. This is sterile. This is very individualistic, and we may not see those on the surface of what are good schools but I think important to also wrap it in the conversation as parents choose schools for their kids and they decide what is good and what students ought to be learning in those schools.

Andrew Greenia: It kind of reminds me of as I was listening, I was like well what concrete examples can we provide parents and I think I'll offer this and tie it to schools. One thing I can think of is traveling. Understanding different cultures and seeing how the norms work in different places really opening up your mind to in the United States, for example, we name our streets by names. But say in Japan, streets have no names. The street had numbers or blocks. Opening up to different ways of thinking and working and what is considered the norm is really helpful. To tie that into schools as you mentioned the good school: you mentioned the word sterile. Everybody is the same. There is that same sort of striving for grades and personable traits. The stereotypes don't quite offer you the "trip around the world" of understanding the diversity and challenging the thinking of the type of therapy that you're mentioning and to open your eyes. Another where that came to mind is humility--understanding that I'm not necessarily doing the right way and there isn't the right way anyway. So being humble and being open to other people how they are, who they are, and the way they work. And the third thing which I thought your takeaway is really neat is that sometimes you have to own it. You have this privilege. It's amazing. You don't have to discard it. It's given to you. I mean, that is luck in some sort. Own it and use it for the benefit of yourself and the world. And it's like putting on the oxygen mask. Obviously, you have this privilege of getting oxygen. You need to use it to survive to thrive but help others. I think a lot of the times as parents we feel this taboo around admitting to what we can do with the help of say money. And one example I don't know if you watch Ally Wong, the Baby Cobra. Her most recent special was: "people asked me how I'm able to do all this work and continue." She's like: "well I hire a nanny." "People don't want to talk about it but I have a nanny and that helps me." And as a mother myself I have witnessed and felt the sense of Taboo in that I have to show the world that I work really hard to take care of my children that I'm suffering instead of "I'm able to afford a nanny one to two days a week, and that really helped my sanity." We have this sense of expectation that because you don't want to show so much of your privilege, you avoid it by overcompensating either using words, actions, but those are incredibly misleading which perpetuates the societal pressure of you've got to do it all. It's so complex but you're right. It starts with adults as well.

Andrew Greenia: Yeah. I love that. And I think what brings up for me is thinking about how much of this conversation is really modeling vulnerability. I use the word vulnerability and I think in your example of "yeah I use a nanny one to two times a week." I think is really being able to normalize these conversations in a way that doesn't make it off-limits. And I think the more that we just examined the culture as it is, we get to a place where we can dream about what it could be like.

Andrew Greenia: The handy tools in these conversations is breaking down intention versus impact. How often do we think that if I say something then somebody might have a difficult adverse reaction to that, and I might go "oh what I meant by that was..." As opposed to "well how did you feel when I said that or what was it about what I said that made you feel this." To really being able to live in some of the impacts of my statements or my actions and not explaining away could be a really rich opportunity to understand how we relate to one another. It's important to be able to recognize whether you're a teacher or a parent, it's important to say those things and being able to really just talk about it.

Jenny Woo: I really appreciate our time together to talk about opening ourselves as being vulnerable and with that, thank you so much for your time.

Andrew Greenia: Thank you, Jenny.

Jenny Woo: And thank you for tuning in to 52 Essential Conversations.