People ask white guys to remember the privilege they experience because it is invisible to them.<p>No one walks around every day thinking, &quot;My whole life, I&#x27;ve never been attacked by a tiger. Thank god.&quot; But people who have been attacked by a tiger certainly remember it!<p>That&#x27;s an extreme example to illustrate what privilege means in this context. It&#x27;s the absence of challenges that other people face. In that respect it is indeed an assumption, in that it is an unexamined filter through which white guys perceive the world.<p>It doesn&#x27;t mean white guys don&#x27;t face challenges too. You&#x27;ve had your own tiger attacks, plenty of them it sounds like. So imagine sitting in a room with a guy the same age as you--but he was raised by healthy, wealthy, devoted parents, went to the best private schools, raised his first seed round from his dad&#x27;s friends. &quot;God, I&#x27;ve worked so hard to get where I am,&quot; he says. &quot;I can&#x27;t stand it when people say I haven&#x27;t earned everything I&#x27;ve got.&quot;<p>Wouldn&#x27;t you feel a bit resentful toward that person? Give me a break, right? He was born on 3rd base and thinks he hit a triple. That&#x27;s a form of privilege, really the original form of privilege, the one that defined the word.<p>What we are coming to understand now is that there are other forms of privilege. Just like that guy didn&#x27;t choose to be born to rich parents, he also didn&#x27;t choose to born a white guy. Neither did I. But there is ample evidence that being a white guy is an advantage, at least in U.S. society, and certainly in the tech field today. Call it: being born a little ways down the first base line. I&#x27;ve had an easier time beating the throw to first than someone born closer to home base--even if I don&#x27;t realize it, even if I still ran as fast as I can. (extended metaphor alert)<p>What would you want from that rich guy? Some awareness--a willingness to listen to other perspectives and life stories. Some introspection--a willingness to compare and integrate them with his own personal experiences. Some empathy--appreciation for others. And fairness--a willingness to consider people for partnerships, collaboration, work, ideas, even if they didn&#x27;t go to the same fancy schools, or wear expensive dress shirts every day. Even if they have a totally different life story. Even if they look different, talk different. And ideally advocacy--telling his rich buddies to think about these things, to not be so quick to hire folks who mostly look and talk just like themselves, to give people a chance and actively work on inclusiveness.<p>So I don&#x27;t think it&#x27;s an issue of trying to force feed anything. I&#x27;m asking you to consider that there is more to the situation than you might have experienced or thought about. If you&#x27;re in a position to deliver the things I list above, then some other person who is working hard might really appreciate it.<p>edit: crpatino puts it much better than I did:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=11572275" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=11572275</a>