privilege
Toxic_Kisses A poem for men who don't understand what we mean when we say that they have it.
.
privilege is simple:
going for a pleasant stroll after dark,
not checking the back of your car as you get in,
sleeping soundly,
speaking without interruption,
and not remembering
dreams of rape, that follow you all day.
that woke you up crying,
and privilege
is not seeing your stripped,
humiliated body
plastered in celebration
across every magazine rack,
privilege
is going to the movies
and not seeing yourself
terrorized,
defamed,
battered,
butchered
seeing something else.
privilege is
riding your bicycle across town
without being screamed at
or run off the road,
not needing an abortion,
taking off your shirt
on a hot day,
in a crowd,
not wishing you could type better
just in case
not shaving your legs,
having a good job
and
expecting to keep it,
not feeling the boss's hand up your crotch,
dozing off on late-night buses,
privilege is
being the hero in the TV show,
not the dumb broad,
living where your genitals are totemized not denied,
knowing your doctor won't rape you.
privilege is
being smiled at all day by nice, helpful women,
it is
the way you pass judgment
on their appearance with magisterial authority,
the way you face a judge of your own sex in court
and
are overrepresented in Congress
and are not assaulted by the police
or used as a dart board by your friendly mechanic,
privilege is
seeing your bearded face echo
through the history texts
not only of your high school days
but all of your life, not being
relegated to a paragraph
every other chapter,
the way you occupy
entire poetry books
and more than your share of the couch
unchallenged,
it is your mouthing smug,
atrocious insults at women
who blink and change the subject
politely
privilege is
how seldom the rapist's name appears in the papers
and the way you smirk over your Playboy
it's simple really.
privilege
means someone else's pain,
your wealth
is my terror,
your uniform
is a women raped to death
her or in Cambodia or wherever
wherever your obscene privilege
writes your name in my blood,
it's that simple,
you've always had it,
that's why it doesn't
seem to make you sick at stomach,
you have it, we pay for it
now do you understand?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A poem I stumbled onto a long time ago on the net, I wish it had an author so I could give her the credit she is due for writing this.
011013
...
. . 031004
...
misstree holy crapola.
i want to keep a copy in my pocket
for every time i start to hear the
"opressed_white_man" speech.
deep thanks for posting this, tk.
031004
...
tessa .


I was going to write about something else, but then I read this and had nothing to say.
050424
...
delial and if a ten-ton truck
kills the both of us
to die by your side, well
the pleasure - the privilege
is mine
050424
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H. L. Mencken "What men value in this world is not rights but privileges." 081201
...
REAListic optimIST privilege is one-sided freedom 120702
what's it to you?
who go
blather
from