by ProfDave, ©2021
(Aug. 13, 2021) — Hate is never a good thing – even for good reason – but it has been around since the beginning. I renounce “white privilege,” but I am proud of American privilege and believe everyone is entitled to it. Most fundamental of all privileges – and the foundation of social justice – is the American belief that human rights come from the Creator Himself. Human privilege comes from God, not from a king, a congress or a supreme court. As Americans we recognize these rights as inalienable and rightly protest when they are denied by governments, corporations or mobs.
As Americans and human beings, 1776 declares, we are all entitled to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness [well-being].” Those are ideals, the American promise. Canadians are Americans, too, but they have these ideals from “the rights of Englishmen,” where US got them, too. In 1776 we had a problem with African captives in some states. We compromised for the sake of unity and nationhood. It took almost a century and our bloodiest war to resolve this moral blemish. How are we doing today?
Are “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” white privileges? The American charter, the Declaration of Independence, calls them “inalienable rights,” not given by any man (white or otherwise) or state but by God almighty. What God has given, let not man take away. If congress or courts had given these rights, congress or courts could take them away. The American privilege is inalienability.
Every American has the privilege of life as an inalienable right, a gift of God. American privilege is to take our life from God, from conception to natural death with the reasonable certainty that it will not be taken from us by anyone else without due process. We are among the safest people in the world from enemies foreign and domestic. Police and armed forces are there to protect us from violence. Our healthcare system is the envy of the world – even though it is expensive.
OK, it is true that life is not a privilege, but an inalienable, God given, right. As an American, I have the privilege to exercise that right with an unusual degree of security. Security of life is a privilege. Not everyone who lives in the USA enjoys this privilege to the same degree. The womb is the most dangerous place today and some neighborhoods are almost as bad. Euthanasia advocates seek to take this privilege from the elderly, depressed and handicapped. Indirectly effecting longevity are diet, life style, and the limits of medical care (either by cost or rationing). Some of us throw away our privilege by our life style, engaging in risky behavior. All this is an offense against God who gives life and who alone has the right to take it away.
It is wrong and un-American to deny the American privilege of security of life to anyone on the basis of ethnicity, gender, creed or handicap. Arguably, this is the purpose and special duty of the civil authorities in general and the police in particular. We depend on them to make our lives and possessions safe. In a moral, self-regulated neighborhood they are not much needed, but the more lawless our hearts, the more law-enforcement we need in order to walk down the street without fear.
Wrongdoers should fear police and police must be hyper-alert when they sense hostility. We all check our speedometers when we see a police car, but if the innocent – black, white or green – feel threatened by blue uniforms, something is very wrong. Likewise, if any segment of the population is hostile to lawful authority, something is very wrong. If the feeling is mutual, America is no more – at least locally. Is this what is happening in Minneapolis, Portland and Seattle? Are these cities in insurrection? Have they seceded or been expelled from civil society? We have work to do. We need to collectively repent and make amends.
The American creed promises “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness [well-being]” as rights given by God that cannot be taken away. The privilege of the secure exercise of the right to life is threatened by abortion, euthanasia, risky life styles, epidemics, poverty, crime and civil unrest. None of these threats are specific to skin color. The death rate for everyone is 100%. No one is doomed from birth (or conception) to an untimely death. However, demographics tell us that different ethnicities, religions, family types, incomes, educations, other distinctions are at differential risk. Ethnic discrimination is wrong and endemic – it must be addressed in every generation. But what compromises this American privilege is not just the color of your skin, but where you live, your family and your choices.
What privileges are associated with the inalienable right to liberty? God gave each of us moral autonomy: choices. No matter what our circumstances, we have the right to say “yes” or “no” – even to the Almighty Himself. You can take a bite out of the forbidden fruit. We may not choose the consequences of our choices, or even be able to act on them, but we are free to will the one or the other – and be responsible. It is the privilege of every American to rest his/her liberty on God alone, no matter what the government says. The First Amendment of the Constitution agrees. As a result, Americans – black or white, rich or poor – are just about the freest people on earth. That’s what I call privilege.
We take freedom of thought for granted. No one interrogated you about your opinions before registering you to vote or go to college. It was not always so elsewhere – nor today, in many lands. Until the 1830’s you had to subscribe to the 39 articles of the Church of England in order to attend Oxford or Cambridge. Civil rights depended on your opinions.
The most fundamental of all is the freedom of conscience, the freedom to do the right thing as we see it. Again, it is enshrined in the First Amendment of our Constitution: the free exercise of religion, of speech, of publishing, of assembling and of petitioning the government to do the right thing on our behalf. The difficulty is that we are not agreed on what the right thing is in all circumstances, yet liberty depends on the non-interference of the state. Today this liberty is threatened by those who do not acknowledge the Creator as the source and arbitrator of right and wrong and wish to assume that position for themselves. The more gods, the more conflict and the privilege of conscientious living, undisturbed by sanctions and persecution, is lost. Inalienable rights get alienated when the Endow-er is in question. The Little Sisters of the Poor get sued, interns get suspended and clerks get jailed for what they won’t do. But none of this has anything to do with skin color, does it? This is an American privilege. Although threatened by some, every American ought to have the privilege of living by his/her conscience, without being forced to do what they believe is wrong.
As Americans, regardless of ethnicity, sex, or class, we have the privilege of exercising our God-given right to the free exercise of religion. That doesn’t mean all religions are right. There can be only one almighty, infinite Creator of heaven and earth, but each of us is free to reject or counterfeit Him and to worship Him in whatever way we think best. We have no established church and the state is constitutionally pledged not to interfere.
As Americans we enjoy more religious freedom than most. We are secure in the right to attend – or not attend – the church of our choice. We can change churches and religions at will – unlike the Islamic and some other Asiatic nations. The free exercise clause is being challenged, however. Moral leadership is fundamental to ethical monotheism. In Judaism, Christianity and Islam the Almighty reveals the right way to live and the pulpit has a prophetic duty to instruct the state and the society as a whole. Likewise, parents have a pastoral duty for the moral instruction of their young. Americans have the privilege of not only hearing the Word of God, but they should also have the privilege of proclaiming and living it. The difficulty is in those who do not want to hear it or allow it. The privilege is granted for a diversity of unbelief and sin, but unbelief does not have the right to suppress belief or demand approval for what others regard as wrong. The sexual revolution has been threatening the privilege of living and expressing ethical monotheism without restriction, penalty or persecution. However, Americans are still privileged in comparison to much of the world.
In America, we have been promised the right of free speech and a free press. To an unusual extent we have enjoyed the privilege of exercising those rights without fear. We can pretty much say what we want, whether right or wrong, legally. And with the internet we can easily publish our opinions – as I am doing right now. Modern democracy relies on the free exchange of ideas on the assumption that the best ideas will emerge in the free market.
There have always been consequences for speech which harms others – you can be arrested for crying “fire” in a crowded theater or for inciting riot. But what is the definition of “harm?” Hate speech certainly is wrong – hatred it wrong – but putting the definition in the subjective hands of the hearer, without regard to the intent of the speaker has resulted in the loss of the American privilege of equal participation in the market of ideas.
Our post-modernist and critical theorist friends have moved beyond modern democracy to something else. They view free market assumptions as naïve and inherently oppressive. Ideas do not win by inherent merit but by the power of the interest group behind them. Measures of good and bad, true and false, right and wrong, are no longer anchored in the Creator and in created reality, but in a wrestling match of interest groups – without a referee. Truth depends on power. Alternative ideas are not to be compared but crushed. The biggest megaphone has the privilege, all other voices are stifled or “cancelled.” Even the fact-checkers are compromised and weaponized. So much for American privilege.
At least those of us with politically correct messages have the privilege of speaking and publishing our minds – and the rest of us can mutter under our breath. This privilege certainly does not depend on the color of your skin or the continent of your origin, but upon the party in power, politically, economically, or culturally. Power is everything in a post-truth world.
The promise of liberty in the American creed includes a lot more in practical terms. We enjoy the privilege of free movement. Unlike Communist regimes, our government takes no interest in our whereabouts. More of us than any other people in the world, can just hop in the car and go – permission is not needed and so many of us have personal transportation. We can move to Texas or Alaska or back. No permission needed. Housing discrimination is illegal in all 50 states.
Yes, there are economic limitations. You really shouldn’t pay more than a third of your income for housing, but housing stock in America, reinforced by zoning and construction standards, has pretty much moved so far up-scale as to eliminate a lot of us. At $12 an hour you can afford $667 a month, rent and utilities. Now I can afford $480 on Social Security. Try to find a room for that much in your town! Housing is a lot larger and fancier than it needs to be – and it is in the rest of the world. But if you can afford it, you can live here.
Economics is both a privilege and a limitation on privilege for Americans. It is easy to forget the significance of the economic freedom we enjoy. Economic freedom is the basis of capitalism. We are free to keep, enjoy and reinvest the fruits of our labor without fear of confiscation by those in power or by criminal activity. The industrial revolution would have come centuries earlier to China had not the aristocracy decided that it was not right for artisans and merchants to become wealthy.
Economic freedom means you have the privilege of purchasing, owning and disposing of property according to your means, pretty much without restriction. The socialist critique of capitalism points out that some people have obscene quantities of means while others have next to nothing. The economics of Moses makes means a sacred trust from God and helping the less fortunate a moral obligation. In America, though success is not guaranteed, we have freedom to pursue the job, the career, or the business of our choosing, according to our ability. Employment discrimination is illegal.
The real bottom line is that Americans – at all levels – are blessed with more wealth than any other nation on earth or in history. Before Covid-19 our store shelves were stuffed with more and more sophisticated products than the rest of the world could conceive. For a few months we have seen the empty shelves that are normal elsewhere, but this is, to us, a weird and temporary experience. We are of all peoples the most economically privileged. Are some more privileged than others? Yes, but we all have so much and the privilege of pursuing more.
David W. Heughins (“ProfDave”) is Adjunct Professor of History at Nazarene Bible College. He holds a BA from Eastern Nazarene College and a PhD in history from the University of Minnesota. He is the author of Holiness in 12 Steps (2020). He is a Vietnam veteran and is retired, living with his daughter and three grandchildren in Connecticut.