Rex Kerr
1 min readSep 1, 2024

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When I do that, the dominant thing I see--admittedly living in a quite left-leaning area--is "traditionally disadvantaged minority privilege". If a crime was committed by a white (or Asian) person, the race is mentioned. If a t.d.m., no. If hate crimes go up across the board, mention the numbers for t.d.m. only. And so on. They try so hard to avoid white privilege that it's almost comically the opposite--in this apparent but very shallow way.

However, this doesn't make neighborhoods any better. It doesn't fund schools. It doesn't build generational wealth. It doesn't reduce homelessness or crime. It does get a few more people with traditionally disadvantaged minority backgrounds into positions where they're qualified enough, but it doesn't give them the networks that their peers had.

It doesn't do the hard stuff.

If you want to help people thrive and realize more of their potential, hypersensitivity to subtle social signals is not the most effective way to go. Use the method of structural anti-racism: find a general problem, but one that disproportionately affects traditionally disadvantaged minorities (probably because of structural racism earlier), and fix it for everyone.

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Rex Kerr
Rex Kerr

Written by Rex Kerr

One who rejoices when everything is made as simple as possible, but no simpler. Sayer of things that may be wrong, but not so bad that they're not even wrong.

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