Privilege and oppression are known to be two sides of inequality in society that ought to be understood to achieve equity. Privilege can be defined as a system of advantage and oppression is a system of disadvantage by the social group one belongs. This article will focus on oppression and privilege experiences as a biracial female of African American origin. The life experiences, reflections on the use of self as well as ethical decision-making skills will be part of the reflection on my oppression and privileges.

Reflections on life experiences

As an African American female, I was raised by African American women. I was raised in a family that was extremely close, and family was important to us. We usually have many social gatherings in our biracial culture. The African American women that raised me were single but hard working and proud of whatever they did for themselves and their children. I was brought up in church, and hence I can say that I am a Christian and my family was extremely religious and strict in the matter concerning Christianity. Among the many social gatherings, I attended included church meetings where such issues such as love and care for your neighbor were the motto.

As I was growing up, I experienced oppression though I was not aware of the direct real-life experiences of oppression. My mother was very private and protected me so much from many things while I was growing up. The fact that I looked different from my African American peers caused me to be treated differently by my peers. After growing up old enough, I was now able to experience direct oppression, and at this time, I was so much aware of the oppression. I looked different, and my African American peers could openly ask me if I was adopted. I was white, and my hair was white while I was young and as a youth. I looked more of a white kid, and nobody could accept that I had African blood. Some could ask me questions as what are you? I could wonder if I were not a human being and more specifically a female. Their weird stare at me and numerous crazy questions made it difficult for me to associate with them. I could not even attend their parties though I could be invited. I felt lost and felt like I was an alien in the society I was brought up. I was the only white kid among my many African American peers, and at times I felt like my mom was hiding something from me regarding my ethnicity.  I spend most of the time with my mother or alone as I did not have friends. My peers neglected me most of the time, and I can say I never enjoyed my youth life. The only time I interacted with people was in the church where I found the only hope of facing tomorrow. I never experienced privilege as a child and youth. However, as I was working with the state agency in the Department of Social Services as a foster care worker, I experienced privilege. It was after graduating and at this time, I had some type of power over the clients that I served. It is when I can appreciate that my looks made me enjoy some privilege in my workplace.

I have never oppressed any person consciously. Maybe I could have done it unconsciously. I am a Christian, and I believe that oppressing other people is a sin. As a Christian, I need to treat other people well and appreciate every person as people are created in the image of God. In the church, I was raised to love all my neighbors unconditionally as we are all equal before the eyes of the Lord. Some of the internal and external blocks to power that I usually experience personally include the belief that Christians should act in the ways of God though at times I am tempted to revenge to all people that have ever subjected me to oppression. Sometimes I feel like acting like other people, but I realize that it will not be in the glory and honor of God. Moreover, I was brought up by a strict mother, and she ensured that each time I did good unto other people. My mother was ever watching and could not hesitate to correct my wrongdoing. Even up to date, I do not have the courage of wronging someone as I feel that her eyes are watching me from a distance. I do not have the power to oppress other people as my internal instincts cannot give me the peace of doing that. I still feel the same even up to today, and I think I will never try to ignore what my conscience feels and thinks about oppression. I know that neither gains nor fruits are arising from oppressing fellow humans just because of color, race, and origin.

Reflections on the use of self

The experiences of oppression and privilege have molded me into being a person that treats people of different color equally. I believe that despite the skin color, we are all human beings created by one God. We have blood with the same color, red. Life experiences of oppression are traumatizing and will never wish someone to be traumatized because of my oppression. I had a bad experience in my past and will not desire any human being to have the same experience. The experience of privilege made me think that I am special than others and this is not right. Of course, I enjoyed the moments I had the privilege, but I feel that all people need to get the same level of privilege and not one person. The theme of equity will need to be spread to all people in the world so as end discrimination.

I will need to work on establishing strategies involving as many people in ending life experiences in oppression and privileges. I will work on methods of promoting equity starting from my workplace. For instance, I will try to encourage people to be social to any individual despite the looks. I will discourage the acts of segregation among my colleagues. The act of finding African American collaborating with African American people will be highly discouraged. Let Americans share and collaborate with the African American people and any other race. The act of giving people of a given color or race some superior positions and high pay as compared to other races will need to be highly discouraged. Let every person be assigned duty as per the qualifications and not appearance. We all believe that we belong to the same God, why then do we tend to segregate ourselves as per appearance? Does it mean that this is what we will do when we get back to our creator? Despite the challenges that I may face, I will try to be professional in treating people equally without discrimination.

Ethical decision-making skills

Ethical dilemmas I most likely may navigate through are many. One, I will face the challenge of fighting for people I don’t resemble. Admittedly I do not look African American and will it work out if the African American people are the ones not accepting me as their own. The same people whom I consider as to belonging to the same lineage are behaving differently. Then how sure am I that they will listen and cooperate? The other dilemma is convincing the American people that we are all equal. Since the beginning, it has been so hard to convince them that we have the blood of the same color and the only difference is skin color. Will it be more comfortable this time? Will oppression end for good? Sometimes it is possible to find a brother oppressing a brother, what about people who are now not related?

I will try to solve ethical dilemmas outlined through a step-wise process. First, I will gather the relevant facts that will be required for making decisions. I will research for facts regarding oppression and privileges in real life experiences. Then I will make some possible predictions of the dilemmas that I am facing at the moment. The next step is identifying my feelings concerning ethical dilemmas. I will also try to figure out the possible outcomes of the possible decisions that I am most likely to make. Will I be comfortable with the choices? Finally, I will try to discuss my choices with other people in a moral conversation to get their views. The responses from these people will be used in evaluating my final decision.

References

Chan, C. D., Cor, D. N., & Band, M. P. (2018). Privilege and oppression in counselor education: An intersectionality framework. Journal of Multicultural Counseling and Development, 46(1), 58-73.

Fraser, H., & Taylor, N. (2016). Producing Marginalized Knowledge: Privilege and Oppression by Species, Class, and Gender. In Neoliberalization, Universities and the Public Intellectual (pp. 23-41). Palgrave Macmillan, London.

Macedo, E., & Araújo, H. C. (2016). Can the geographies of privilege and oppression combine?. Elite schools: Multiple geographies of privilege, 157.

 
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