Social Construction & Ignorance

"For most Whites, to think about what it means to be White is itself a radical move" (Cooks, 2003).
How would you describe yourself? What are some important characteristics that you would list about yourself if you had to write them all down? Take a minute and think about this. Make your list. What did you come up with? Did you include your race in this list? If you're white, you probably didn't even consider it. In fact, you probably never consider your race unless something outwardly brings it to your attention. And a white person rarely considers what it means to be white in this country. Race, even though it is socially constructed, meaning that society decides what race means or stands for, plays a huge role in how we see people and treat them. Society puts the focus on whites as being the "better" race and the one's deserving of more than others. To not be white is to not be part of the norm. The unprivileged groups get largely ignored since this is a white centered nation. Black people get one month out of the year to focus on them and whites get the rest. The privilege that comes with being male, nondisabled, heterosexual, and white has nothing to do with these characteristics in and of themselves. It has everything to do with the way society views them through these social constructions. In order to understand inequality we must first see our own privilege and we must see privilege as an issue instead of hiding behind it. Whites hide behind this privilege whether consciously or not. Being able to ignore one's race is a privilege and the only time that whites usually consider their privilege or their race at all is when something happens to bring it to their attention. Something just like that happened last week at the Longwood Men's Basketball game. It was Greek night and a large crowd had gathered to cheer on the team. A player on the visiting team was being a bit obnoxious on the court and calling attention to himself but when he missed a foul shot the crowd decided to let him know that he was noticed. A group of young men began making sounds like monkeys in this player's direction and no one in the crowd or on the court did anything to stop this outright racism. Our silence added to this racist act because we did nothing. We chose to ignore this. But I'm willing to bet that the young man on the court wasn't able to ignore it. Our ignorance adds to the societal view that whites have privilege. I'm sure that everyone would agree that these men in the crowd were in the wrong and should not have done this, but why did they think they could in the first place? Because they knew they could get away with it? Because they knew they could hide behind their privilege and claim that they didn't mean anything by it? This is unacceptable behavior and I hate that myself, my peers, and everyone else in that building didn't do anything to stop it. That was inequality in our faces and we did nothing. Why?
"Although most scientists agree that race is socially constructed, people still act on race as if it were natural" (Cooks, 2003).

Cooks, L. (2003). Pedagogy, Performance, and Positionality: Teaching about Whiteness
in Interracial Communication. Communication Education, 52(3/4), 245-257. http://search.ebscohost.com, doi:10.1080/0363452032000156226