#Class Privilege

[maxdibert]

Okay ill go with what you say and admit they did bad things but whys all thst class stuff relevant like okay you like to use that division but its..not everything its all about?

Talking about the relationship between James and Severus without addressing the issue of class is a mistake that perpetuates a partial and distorted view of their conflict. Too often, the bullying that James inflicted on Severus is minimized under the idea of a simple "rivalry," when in reality, the power structure between them was tainted from the start by the material and symbolic inequality that separated them. James Potter, the son of a wealthy pureblood family, raised in an environment of privilege and without economic worries, exercised violence over Severus Snape, a working-class child, abused at home, with evident economic hardships and no social capital to support him. This is not a simple fight between equals, but a clear example of how class structure influences dynamics of abuse and exclusion.

Bullying does not occur in a social vacuum; it responds to the same power structures that govern the adult world. Authors like Bourdieu have developed the concept of capital in its multiple forms: economic, social, and cultural. James Potter had access to all of them. Coming from a wealthy family, he possessed economic capital, which translated into a life without deprivation, new clothes, access to goods and resources, and the certainty that any misstep would not compromise his future. His social capital was even more decisive: he was the son of a respected family in the magical community, with a strong support network and a position of prestige at Hogwarts that protected him from any real consequences for his actions. His cultural capital, reinforced by his pureblood lineage and upbringing in an elitist environment, allowed him to navigate power spaces within the school with ease. None of this was available to Severus Snape.

Severus was a working-class child, the son of an abusive man and an impoverished witch. His patched-up clothing and unkempt appearance were not a choice but the result of his material position. He grew up in a depressing industrial neighborhood, a space marked by precariousness and lack of opportunities. Within the Marxist framework, Snape represented the exploited class: without his own resources, without a support network, and without access to the benefits of the upper class, he could only survive through his intelligence and individual effort. His mixed-blood lineage also placed him in an intermediate position within the magical world, always inferior to the purebloods who dominated Hogwarts' social sphere. This is why talking about a "rivalry" between James and Severus is a misrepresentation of the facts: there was no equality of conditions, no level playing field. What existed was a rich boy using his social and economic power to humiliate a poor boy who had no tools to defend himself.

James Potter's classism is reflected in the way he chooses his victim. He does not harass other students of his same social class; instead, he preys on Severus, who is in an absolute position of inferiority. James exercises his abuse in public spaces, under the gaze of other students, aware that his status protects him from any retaliation. It is no coincidence that he is always the one initiating the harassment and that he does so accompanied by his friends, while Snape is alone. This is a classic manifestation of violence exercised from a position of power: it is based on impunity, on the certainty that the system will not intervene in favor of the victim because the aggressor is a legitimized subject within the social structure. James, like any child born into the upper class, learned from an early age that he could do whatever he wanted without real consequences because the world was designed to favor him.

Goffman speaks of stigma as a social marker that defines who is accepted and who is marginalized in a community. Snape embodies the stigma of poverty, domestic violence, and lack of resources. In the Hogwarts imagination, he is someone who does not fit the model of success and prestige represented by children like James Potter. This is key to understanding their relationship: James' aggression is not just personal but structural. Severus is not just Severus; he is the poor boy, the dirty boy, the boy who has no allies, the boy who will never be part of the winners' circle. In this sense, the violence he receives is not an isolated phenomenon but the manifestation of a hierarchy that placed him at the bottom even before he set foot in Hogwarts.

The argument that James "matured" and "changed" over time does not nullify the fact that his youthful violence was possible thanks to his privileged position. Within the meritocratic logic often applied to his story, we are told that James became a better person and that, therefore, his past should be excused. But this ignores that the underlying problem was never just his attitude, but the system that allowed his abuse to occur without consequences. When James finally "grows up," he has already enjoyed years of prestige, power, and acceptance. His change is not the result of a struggle against the system but a smooth transition within the same structure that always benefited him. Meanwhile, Severus remains trapped in the logic of the dispossessed: still alone, still marginalized, still without the resources to rewrite his story.

From a Marxist perspective, the story of James and Severus is not just a story of two children in conflict. It is the story of how social class defines who has the right to dignity and who must fight for it every day. It is the story of how the violence of the privileged is treated as "youthful pranks" while the anger of the oppressed is seen as a threat. It is the story of how the impunity of power allows the victors to write history and how those who have been humiliated are the ones who must bear the weight of their own suffering.

For this reason, no, there can be no talk of rivalry between James Potter and Severus Snape. Not when one had everything and the other had nothing. Not when one could exercise violence without fear and the other had to endure it without hope for justice. Not when the story of one is remembered as that of a reformed hero and the other as that of a resentful man without redemption. Because history, as always, is written by the victors. And in the world of Harry Potter, as in our own, the victors are almost always those born with privilege.

[dispatchesfromtheclasswar]

[amandagr3]

[minervadashwood]

How often indeed has a reader been annoyed after purchasing a manual on some sport or amusement in which he is interested— let us say on shooting— to find that, to all appearance, it has been written by a millionaire for millionaires. -- H. Rider Haggard, A Farmer's Year

[cheers-mdears]

A while ago I made a post about how Stede giving up all his money to Mary was such a Rich Guy™ thing to do, and a lot of the responses were along the lines that it'll force him to learn how to work and find meaning in earning his keep. Thing is though, thing is--

📢 He didn't need to give up his money to do those things!!!!! 📢

He could have learned how to sail and do ""proper"" pirating while still providing a nest egg to make sure his crew won't ever go hungry

He can listen to his crew and learn to be more culturally competent around poverty without having to *go through the trauma of poverty* himself. I mean, he'll still never fully understand what it's like to *grow up* poor, for instance, so he'll still never be just like (most of) his crew. Basically, how is him having firsthand experience to help him be more sensitive BETTER than him being able to ~materially~ make sure his crew won't ever go hungry???

AND him leaving his money in the hands of Mary is leaving it in the hands of the ruling class! Versus if he took his share and redistributed it to his crew or to a shared crew nest egg

All of this of course would require him to be democratic with his money, but that's just learning solidarity and humility, which is what we're imagining him being broke is going to do for him anyways lol

Like I said in my original post, I get that the money is symbolic for him cutting all ties with his old life and fully committing to his new life. But I still stand by my opinion that it was suuuch a Rich Guy™ move and I really hope at least one crew member calls him an idiot for not taking easy money lmaoooo

[bleachandt]

The absolute state of things when the rich kids charity club has a better understanding of how class privilege relates to income than the majority of Tumblr users.

[arctic-hands]

Wonder if the people protesting BGE for installing new "unsightly" gas meters on their shiny marble façades ever protested BGE shutting off power to the poorer old people who couldn't afford to make their payments

Literally one middle aged white woman was on camera talking about having their gas cutoff for the installations as "this is something that happens in a third world country, not here!" And I'm like. Where, exactly, have you been living this entire time in your decades on Earth that you only just now care about this?

Yes, it probably is an example of BGE overreach, but damn these people are making it very hard to sympathize

[gwydionmisha]

A Trip to the Lake, Jet Ski Rich Asshole Crutch Thieves, and the Uncleaner Stole Some Stuff.

Sunday I took some of the Millennials for swimming/picnic at the Lake for the first time this season.  I got to watch New Millennial fall in love with the PNW landscape exactly the way I did more than thirty years ago.

You can really tell which of us grew up with cold Northern Ocean.  Me: wading steadily deeper and deeper once I'm far enough in to keep my balance by my self on the rocks and the bottom gets a little smoother, then slowly swimming out a little deeper in search of the warmer tide.  (It's a run off fed lake, and the mixing of the cold inflow with the water that's been in the lowlands long enough, makes these weird little temperature striations you can very much feel even after you cold adapt).  Everybody Else: Wading crotch deep and thinking for a while about whether they want to swim after all, then going way slower and stopping a lot to rethink.

I love my Millennials.  The other two each had one of the newest Millennial's arms to help them over the rocks because the rocks suck and I'd forgotten to warn them.  Me, urging them on:  Keep coming!  I found the warm current!  New Millennial: Looking concerned this might be hazing, followed by the moment of delight and surprise on finding I was not.  Look, it's only like ten or fifteen degrees on a good day, but it does make a difference and the activity of swimming or treading water and the adaptation once you go up to your neck and then duck your head, all add up.  You just need to get into a sweet spot.

I discovered on the way back that my fucked up arms really, really don;t want to do backstroke.  I managed a lopsided curve towards shore until I was far enough in to pull along the rocks with my hands and kick.  So Goth Millennial is hanging close on the way to the shallows, because I can't really get out safely by myself and need help getting up onto my feet and staying there until I'm reasonably sure they are working, at which point either Goth Millennial (or Techie Millennial, who couldn't come), would grab my crutch so I could use it and their arm to get out onto the "beach."

My crutch was not where I left it.  My crutch was not anywhere nearby where someone might have moved it if it were in the way of say launching a jet ski from the wrong stretch of "beach"  instead of the boat and jet ski launch area.  I mention jet skis as their were two anchored in the swimming area where they were not meant to be we we arrived, one of which way out past the swim buoys where it was meant to be, and the other parked on the "beach" where it emphatically should not be, surrounded by mostly kids, obscuring view of the corner where the "beach hits the cit off with the higher land and grass.  But I hadn't gone near that, and I needed the crutch to get out to look to see if the crutch was there.

I am still angry about that fad a decade or so ago when asshole able bodied art students would steal poor people's wheelchairs for shitty "art projects" and then brag about it on line as if stealing an expensive thing someone couldn't afford to replace and stranding them somewhere like a park or a bathroom or an inaccessible public building was something virtuous and clever instead of an incredibly cruel things to do to someone, as if their crap project was worth more than someone else's independence.  My crutch is basically one of my legs.  Someone's wheels are their legs.

Every time I go into the water anywhere, I know there is a chance someone will steal my crutch.  This is the PNW, and I think someone leaving a mobility aid next to the water makes sense to the ableds, whereas someone leaving a wheelchair on the pavement in a park doesn't for some asshole shitty lack of empathy and imagination neurotypical reason, I guess.

So I'm starting to get really upset and Goth Millennial is really worried and we are having a loud conversation along the lines of Me: shit!  I can you see my crutch anywhere?  I left it right there. I think someone may have stolen !it! Millennial standing up and going to look across the bad rock stretch craning their head around to see if some asshole maybe put it on the grassy bit above the cut:  I can't see it!  It's not there!"  Middle School age, glaring resentfully at one of the younger kids, stomps around to the other side of the illegal parked jet ski, where we had zero chance of seeing it, retrieves it and hands it to me.  Me: you're very kind!  Thank you!  Goth Millennial hoists me to my feet while I use their arm and the crutch to just barely get my balance.  This is a complicated and painful procedure, returning to gravity after freedom, and I need to stand their awhile like two or three feet away from Asshole Jet Ski Extended family.  These kids just stare at me the whole time we are doing this.  It is very, very obvious that my normally invisible disability is very, very real.  Grumpy teen in charge to a younger kid:  You better go apologize.  No one apologizes.  They keep staring at us hobble slowly and carefully up the shallow stairs.  After I went to pee and wash lake water off my hands before eating, I went to set my crutch down by my chair and all this water poured out of it.  I'd left it on dry land.  

Asshole Family who was too privileged to use the boat and jet ski launch who thus had to drive their jet skis through the swim area had stolen my fucking crutch to play with in the water and the missing adults and the grumpy teen in charge had let them, and then they hid it behind their angled jet ski so no one could see it afterwards.  They could have lost it in the lake.  They could have kept it.

We found out when our friends came out of the water that they’d also stolen and hid our blind friends flip flops, which they grudgingly had returned when it was clear they were hers.

Rich people are the worst.

So we go get dinner stuff at the grocery store and drop a Millennial off and I'm in my kitchen searching for my reusable straws, of which I own four.  I have one I was using for lemonade which I put in the refrigerator last night.  I had assumed the other three were in the wash or something up until now, but I searched the dishwasher and they weren't there.  All the flatware are in the dishwasher except the chopsticks and some specialty use items, since we didn't know which the Asshole Cleaner hadn't cleaned properly before putting back.  we’d emptied the trays.  I search there and around there anyway.  There are no reusable straws in the kitchen except the one I was drinking out of Friday when Asshole Stoner Cleaner was uncleaning the apartment.

The time she was here high as a kite she kept wiggling them and shouting "Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle!"  She was obsessed with them.  They were a gift from Goth Millennial.  I don't think they were that expensive, but they were cute and had a nice texture and are earth friendly.  (Some people can't use reuseable straws for a bunch of reasons and we have emergency plastic straws here.  This is not any sort of judgement on people who use single use.  Let's ban fishing industry plastics which are most of the ocean plastic pollution before going after disabled people's straws, okay?)

I think the only reason she didn't steal the forth straw was it was right next to me so I could poke it up under the mask for brief sips.  I'd left it and the cup in the fridge because I don't like to put them to wash until I see a new clean straw I can use in situations like this or when my arms are bad, and it's easier and safer to hold the cup low, or sometimes just because.  They are reusable!  It hurts nothing.  I wanted a straw because my body wasn't working and I wanted to drink the juice I'd bought for dinner while lying down and waiting for things to stop hurting so much. 

There is zero chance the other three are still here.

I had checked my bedroom right after she left for small, easily stealable things missing from the bookshelf where I put curios right after she left because the comment about my interesting things felt like something a person might say anyway, but also a things someone who might pocket once would say and I was already upset and wary of her because of everything.  There are things it would be hard to check, like my BPAL Collection, but odds are she wouldn't steal those.  She'd have had to climb on the bed and go through the little boxes and she was only unsupervised in there for a few minutes with the sweep and mop.  I will need to see if she stole the bottle where I keep a few tramadol in case I wake up unable to get out of bet or occasionally, even roll over without an hour or more of slow, excruciating effort.  While they clean, I'm sitting at my desk right next to the bottled meds collection that mostly feed assorted pill organizers, and the shelf above where the things I need to grab quick in an emergency are not surprisingly untouched.  If anything had been stolen when I got up to go to the bathroom the parent tramadol bottle would be easiest to raid and the only really attractive thing to steal except throat pearls, and you'd have to know what they were and they are not recreational, just a little expensive and perscription.  The altar and display shelf over the sofa seems fine, and she definitely didn't go in grabbing distance anyway.

When I went into the bathroom to bathe the lake water away, I noticed some small things missing.  One of them I'd assumed was in the wash, but I have done a bunch of laundry over the weekend since the Ajax tainted clothes get washed separately and I don't want the dye to be leached by cleanser by letting them sit unwashed, and we have to wash the mop head by itself between uses to get all the ajax out.  It's not in the wash.  It's gone, a small, very useful thing.  Nothing expensive is missing that I've noticed yet, but I haven't properly inventoried all the otc things and the prescription ointments and such, but I'm guessing those wouldn't be attractive.  I doubt she'd steal books.  She didn't strike me as a reader, but when I am in less pain and less exhausted, I'll inventory them better.

Asshole.  Fucking asshole.  

I know it could have been worse.  Every little curio and most of the art except some things in the bathroom that are there because of the risk of steam or water damage have a story.  They were given to me by friends or lovers or made by me when my hands still worked right or purchased at particular events or on particular occasions.  These are memories and irreplaceable regardless because they are mostly hand made or limited edition from conventions.

We don't have money for replacing straws right now.  They haven't paid Goth Millennial for a month and a half, not even for the supposedly paid training sessions.  I owe money to the Honest Mechanic for the third time in three months and am about to burn two thirds of my bill money tomorrow on that, because you never ever fuck over a small business, just like you never ever fuck over another poor person.  (I don’t steal, but I think ethically, stealing from a big chain to feed your kids is okay, and very much better than letting you kids starve, especially given the wage theft and lobbying against the social safety net and minimum wage those chains do.  They steal from the poor, particularly their workers and if they hadn’t paid politicians to do things that prevent people from having enough to eat, then which is the bigger evil?  Mom and pops?  Family Businesses? Little micro businesses and artists and what have you?  Never, ever okay.  Small businesses are the life blood of a community online and RL, and letting me defer payment is a major fucking favor, so they are next after housing, whatever happens to my other bills.  The other few things I spotted are replaceable if we had money for it.

I am so fucking angry anyway.  I already felt my home was desecrated by her uncleaning it and distressing Tavy and the all over fuckery of it, but this small thing, this thing that wouldn't matter if I were a little better off or they weren't a gift, but feel like a big thing when added to all the rest.  

It takes a lot to make me hate someone.  We are not there yet, but if I do find something important I overlooked gone, I will, much like I still hate the ex-friend from first college who took three important things with sentimental value that were/are irreplaceable when he dropped out.  This is how he became an ex-friend.  He knew that the plaque was the last thing the artist my first freshman lover bought it from made and that it had a bunch of layered meanings in what was written on it.  The things he stole from me and another friend were like that.  Very personal and chosen with surgical precision to cause the most distress.  (He did other, worse things, then made sure everyone thought, I’d done them and I was a monster.  none of this we found out until he’d gone and we none of us could figure out why.  Okay, the terrible things he needed someone to frame, but the rest... Sociopathy was the best guess for all of it really.  Last I checked he was still working with children and there was fuck all provable we can do about it, but he really, really shouldn’t have been working with children). These things the Uncleaner stole were small, replaceable things, not something where there is no other one even if memories weren’t attached. 

All the things missing I've looked for off and on since the time she was here high, under the belief they were misplaced or in the wash.  I wouldn't be surprised if that's when she took them and that's part of why she was so embarrassed the second time, but if she were really embarrassed she could have brought them back then and I'd never have known.  Like, she could have tossed them into one washer or the other, or tucked them around the sink, and I'd have just thought that was where they were.

I know the Asshole Agency will do fuck all, but I'm going to call them anyway.  Goth Millennial said before we knew about the theft that she was the one who was a class traitor, because you don't do shit like this to another poor person.  I have no idea when my apartment will actually be clean again.  I'm doubting that an extra two hours this week even if someone turns up will do it.

We are still baffled by the thought process.  

If she'd put the dishes into the dishwasher like I'd asked, it would have been fine and not tons of extra time and work cleaning everything.  I still need to sit on the kitchen floor in the Ajax to go through all the pots and pans in case the extra cleaner does come.  If she'd rinsed and dried them before putting them away, it would have been not ideal, but likely fine.  She did neither for no reason we can understand.  Putting them away wet and soapy was actually more work than racking them in the dishwasher like I asked.  

Not only was the bottle of liquid all purpose cleaner right in front when I opened the cabinet under the sink to hand it to Goth Millennial Saturday when they decided wet mopping wouldn't be enough, there was a literal second full bottle behind it because I hate running out of things so I tend to buy two at once if I have enough cash for it and the trip to get the one I like that is effective but doesn't make bad smells is annoying if I don't want a big mark up.  It was right there.  couldn't have missed it if she'd opened the compartment.  To get at the Ajax I use only for the toilet, she had to go past the dish soap for the sink and tub and the shampoo and conditioner I bought before the engine light went on last month.  She could have used the dish soap and it would have been not ideal, but fine except for all the extra water.  A wet mop after she left would have solved it.  She had to go on her hands and knees and move things to get the Ajax.  Following directions was Easier.  Asking me to get it if she somehow couldn't recognize it as a bottle of liquid cleaner was easier.  Getting about a third to a half of a big cylinder of Ajax out of those small holes was definitely harder than doing it properly.

WTF!?!

I get that stealing small stuff you don't need is actually a symptom of mental illness that requires therapy she likely can't afford, and given how high she was she really had no observable impulse control I could see, hence her repeatedly stopping work to pet a cat I'd warned her not to, and the 'wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, and all the many other things.  This is the only explicable part of it.  Like I get it.  If that's all she'd done I would have been mildly miffed and reported and blocked her because I don't like people stealing my stuff and she might take something from someone else they couldn't eventually replace, but I wouldn't be this kind of furious.  A compulsion to steal and/or walking away with something because one is borderline incoherent high and then going oops later are pretty easy to understand motivation wise.

Doing all this extra work to do so much damage to someone you barely know makes zero sense.  I was nice to her!  I sent her home with a big bag of food each time!  We none of us think this was malice.  It can't be laziness as this took so much extra work than not doing damage would.  so seriously WTF, with the dishes and the Ajax?  This question haunts us all.

[thehumanarkle]

Tumblr Leftist: "I'm on the Left because I have empathy."

Child of wealthy parents: *opens up about the abuse they suffered*

Tumblr Leftist: "LMAO, like I should care, shut the fuck up or face the guillotine!"

As a kid, when your parents are poor, you're poor. If they don't have money, that means none of you have money. But if someone's parents are rich, that doesn't necessarily mean the kid is. Sometimes rich peoples' kids aren't rich kids, they're just some rich freak's exotic pets that can talk but aren't allowed to.

[weirdkidexisting]

You're not edgy, You're just a dick.

I really don't understand how non-Black people find it so hard to restrain themselves from saying the N-word. It really is so simple, and it’s not a complex subject at all.

As someone who’s queer—meaning they're oppressed in one way—and also has class privilege, meaning they can be silent oppressors in other ways, I definitely get why this word is so triggering for some people, especially in the Black community. It’s a deeply inhumane thing to call someone if you’re not Black.

For example, as a queer person, many of us are called “fags,” you know, as an insult—“faggots,” “dykes.” That kind of language is unacceptable coming from straight or cis people. But as queers, when we use these words with each other, it’s a way of healing and reclaiming a part of our identity. It’s speaking up and resisting. It’s like saying, yeah, you call me a slur—but I won’t back down, and it doesn’t hurt me. Even if it did, reclaiming the word gives us power over it. If “faggot” means I’m a weird queer guy, then yeah, I own that. It’s not insulting.

However, if a straight person uses that word toward a queer person, they’re basically saying, “I don’t respect you as queer, and this is my way of insulting you.” It’s a shallow, hurtful attack.

Here’s another example: I have class privilege. I have domestic help in my house—labor in India is cheap, and the gap between my wealth and theirs is huge. I’m extremely sensitive to that. If I started calling them “poor” or “toilet cleaners” or something awful like that—which I would never do, but as an example—that would be deeply triggering and traumatizing for them.

If that happened repeatedly, maybe they would reclaim those words, saying, “Yes, we are poor, and we’re not ashamed. We do this work, and we’re not ashamed.” Using those words themselves could become an act of resistance, a rebellion against the system.

Similarly, when non-Black people—especially white people—started using the N-word toward Black people, because they were forcibly taken from Africa and enslaved in America, it became an extremely offensive and hateful slur. It’s deeply triggering to those who come from that history.

Now, when Black artists, rappers, or others reclaim that word, saying, “Yes, we’re from this heritage. We were enslaved, but we’re proud of who we are,” that’s different. Non-Black people haven’t lived those experiences or inherited that trauma. And since the slur was used only by non-Black oppressors, if a non-Black person says it now, it just shows disrespect and a desire to be offensive.

It’s not funny, edgy, cool, or quirky. It’s blatant racism, disrespect, and a form of silent oppression. The N-Word isn't a bad word you whisper when you're 5 and grow into when you're 12, it's fucking oppression.

[skjam]

Book Review: The Crossroads of Time | Mankind on the Run

Book Review: The Crossroads of Time | Mankind on the Run by Andre Norton | Gordon R. Dickson It’s time for another Ace Double, the classic paperback format of two novels printed upside down from each other. This time it’s two classic science fiction authors on tap. The Crossroads of Time by Andre Norton Blake Walker is a foundling. Somehow, he had arrived in a dark alley at approximately age…

[icedsodapop]

I think the most hilarious aspect of Saltburn is how director Emerald Fennell, who literally had her 18th birthday party photographed in Tatler complained about how her posh background is a burden on her, really thought that she could do serious class analysis.

Like girly really thought she could make an "Eat the rich" film and not realize that she and her people are who the masses want to eat. Just make your homoerotic movie silly and fun and go.

[howifeltabouthim]

Fergus's attributes, such as they were, came from money and the prestige that money brings; true, he had added to them by working hard. Fred had added to his, but they were inherent.

L.P. Hartley, from The Harness Room

[bleachandt]

This book/song/comedy show is shit, why are so many people obsessed with it?

Oh okay

[icedsodapop]

Specifically (White) upper-class privilege, to be more exact.

goodness gracious

[pendulouspuppyudders]

i think we'd do a lot better in collectively understanding privilege if we stopped thinking about it as some evil aura people have and start thinking about it as a resource that those of a privileged class or those who are accepted by that privileged class can gain access to by performing acts that reinforce the strength of that privilege i.e. bigotry