Education privilege
Feb. 22nd, 2026 12:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
livI want to talk about the education privilege meme that's been doing the rounds. On the one hand I love old-school memes that encourage lots of cool people on my d-roll to talk about their experiences growing up. But at the same time, I'm kind of frowning at this particular iteration.
First up, I hesitated to fill out this meme because I hardly need a checklist to tell me I have so much "educational privilege" I'm basically a millionaire. It seems rather like showing off to write a long post about how I attended academically competitive fee-paying schools from 5 to 18, and have a First from an internationally famous university, and a PhD and I'm halfway through training to be a rabbi (another five year post-graduate academic and professional qualification). Both my parents and two of my four grandparents and two of my three siblings (3/4 if you count my foster brother) have completed professional and academic post-graduate qualifications. And I'm neurotypical and physically and mentally abled and Jewish and basically everybody in my entire life has actively supported me getting as much education as possible. The only reason this meme is anything other than disgustingly rude is that this is the social media site built around long-form writing; most of us are over-educated. Even with that I've seen some posts from people who with mixed feelings about everybody else posting about all the advantages that they didn't benefit from. In short it couldn't be more obvious that I have all the educational privilege in the world, and I would have to be very blinkered indeed to have somehow failed to notice that these advantages aren't universal.
Second, wait up, why are we rehashing the privilege knapsack from 1988? (Take a seat if you need to, but that was in fact nearly 40 years ago.) One thing about having a massive amount of education is that I have the skills to think critically and look for original sources! Rather than just smugly answer all the questions, let me respond to this like an educated person. McIntosh's work was groundbreaking at the time, and she came up with a memorable way of communicating to white women that although we experience sexism, we also have racial privilege. But is it still useful to be working with tools developed in that context? I was thinking that since the Privilege Knapsack we have discovered intersectionality, but when I looked it up I found that in fact Crenshaw was an exact contemporary of McIntosh and coined the term in 1989. This only adds to my suspicion that there's some agenda behind getting everybody to pretend we're in a women's studies intro course in the 1980s.
Third, and probably least important: why is this an education privilege meme and not purely a social class meme? This may be one of those transatlantic divides, come to think of it. Like Americans famously don't like talking about class, whereas English people are obsessed with it. To me, 'where did you you go to school?' is pretty much a socially acceptable way of asking, what class are you? OK, there exist rich parents who are abusive or neglectful or for other reasons actively obstruct their children's access to education. But basically most of the meme seems to be, did you have adequate resources and live in a neighbourhood with adequate resources? And did your family's social circle include people from the professional world? Do Americans really believe these things are unconnected to class background?
The other thought is bullying. I've seen many many posts where people ticked almost every item on the list except feeling physically and emotionally safe at school, because pretty much all of us with our heaps of education privilege were bullied, possibly by people with less education privilege (if that's actually a thing). I have mixed feelings about that too; I was bullied at school, but not in the way that the typical American high school drama trope goes. I was bullied mainly when I was under 10, not as a teenager. And it was mainly instigated by teachers and mainly about antisemitism, not by other kids who were angry with me for being academically successful. Even though I was very very much a nerd, I never experienced the jocks v nerds thing, or popular v outcast thing. That's partly a consequence of education privilege; I attended schools where getting high marks across the board was admired, not despised. I certainly wasn't popular but the girls who cared about such things ignored me rather than tormenting me.
I say girls – I think being in a single sex environment actually helped. People often claim that girls' "relational aggression" is just as bad as boys' physical violence, and I don't deny that some people are badly traumatized by bullying instigated by girls, but my experience is that it's a lot easier to ignore not being invited to certain parties than being beaten up. And there was homophobia as you'd expect in 1990s England, but people didn't clock me as not straight and I had it much easier than my (actually straight but somewhat effeminate) brother in a boys' school. What I didn't experience was sexual assault or any other forms of gender based aggression. And I didn't have any problem with people assuming that girls can't succeed academically or "shouldn't" do maths and science. That is an aspect of education privilege also not really captured by the meme. In late 20th century England, "good" schools (mostly fee paying but some state funded) were almost all single sex. On the one hand, I am politically against gratuitous segregation, and I know that the data showing that girls do better in girls-only educational settings is heavily confounded by the fact that well resourced schools were single sex when the data was collected. But in my case I think having a 10 year break when I didn't have to deal with teenage boys or significant adult sexism was an aspect of my education privilege.
Anyway, hopefully this is an adequate substitute for the meme and you don't need me to tell you in detail how absurdly precocious I was in reading and maths.
First up, I hesitated to fill out this meme because I hardly need a checklist to tell me I have so much "educational privilege" I'm basically a millionaire. It seems rather like showing off to write a long post about how I attended academically competitive fee-paying schools from 5 to 18, and have a First from an internationally famous university, and a PhD and I'm halfway through training to be a rabbi (another five year post-graduate academic and professional qualification). Both my parents and two of my four grandparents and two of my three siblings (3/4 if you count my foster brother) have completed professional and academic post-graduate qualifications. And I'm neurotypical and physically and mentally abled and Jewish and basically everybody in my entire life has actively supported me getting as much education as possible. The only reason this meme is anything other than disgustingly rude is that this is the social media site built around long-form writing; most of us are over-educated. Even with that I've seen some posts from people who with mixed feelings about everybody else posting about all the advantages that they didn't benefit from. In short it couldn't be more obvious that I have all the educational privilege in the world, and I would have to be very blinkered indeed to have somehow failed to notice that these advantages aren't universal.
Second, wait up, why are we rehashing the privilege knapsack from 1988? (Take a seat if you need to, but that was in fact nearly 40 years ago.) One thing about having a massive amount of education is that I have the skills to think critically and look for original sources! Rather than just smugly answer all the questions, let me respond to this like an educated person. McIntosh's work was groundbreaking at the time, and she came up with a memorable way of communicating to white women that although we experience sexism, we also have racial privilege. But is it still useful to be working with tools developed in that context? I was thinking that since the Privilege Knapsack we have discovered intersectionality, but when I looked it up I found that in fact Crenshaw was an exact contemporary of McIntosh and coined the term in 1989. This only adds to my suspicion that there's some agenda behind getting everybody to pretend we're in a women's studies intro course in the 1980s.
Third, and probably least important: why is this an education privilege meme and not purely a social class meme? This may be one of those transatlantic divides, come to think of it. Like Americans famously don't like talking about class, whereas English people are obsessed with it. To me, 'where did you you go to school?' is pretty much a socially acceptable way of asking, what class are you? OK, there exist rich parents who are abusive or neglectful or for other reasons actively obstruct their children's access to education. But basically most of the meme seems to be, did you have adequate resources and live in a neighbourhood with adequate resources? And did your family's social circle include people from the professional world? Do Americans really believe these things are unconnected to class background?
The other thought is bullying. I've seen many many posts where people ticked almost every item on the list except feeling physically and emotionally safe at school, because pretty much all of us with our heaps of education privilege were bullied, possibly by people with less education privilege (if that's actually a thing). I have mixed feelings about that too; I was bullied at school, but not in the way that the typical American high school drama trope goes. I was bullied mainly when I was under 10, not as a teenager. And it was mainly instigated by teachers and mainly about antisemitism, not by other kids who were angry with me for being academically successful. Even though I was very very much a nerd, I never experienced the jocks v nerds thing, or popular v outcast thing. That's partly a consequence of education privilege; I attended schools where getting high marks across the board was admired, not despised. I certainly wasn't popular but the girls who cared about such things ignored me rather than tormenting me.
I say girls – I think being in a single sex environment actually helped. People often claim that girls' "relational aggression" is just as bad as boys' physical violence, and I don't deny that some people are badly traumatized by bullying instigated by girls, but my experience is that it's a lot easier to ignore not being invited to certain parties than being beaten up. And there was homophobia as you'd expect in 1990s England, but people didn't clock me as not straight and I had it much easier than my (actually straight but somewhat effeminate) brother in a boys' school. What I didn't experience was sexual assault or any other forms of gender based aggression. And I didn't have any problem with people assuming that girls can't succeed academically or "shouldn't" do maths and science. That is an aspect of education privilege also not really captured by the meme. In late 20th century England, "good" schools (mostly fee paying but some state funded) were almost all single sex. On the one hand, I am politically against gratuitous segregation, and I know that the data showing that girls do better in girls-only educational settings is heavily confounded by the fact that well resourced schools were single sex when the data was collected. But in my case I think having a 10 year break when I didn't have to deal with teenage boys or significant adult sexism was an aspect of my education privilege.
Anyway, hopefully this is an adequate substitute for the meme and you don't need me to tell you in detail how absurdly precocious I was in reading and maths.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 02:33 pm (UTC)As to bullying, it does, I believe, depend on location and the surrounding culture. I never saw any bullying when I went to school, and there was one case of bullying in my daughter's class, which was pretty much stopped by the joint actions of parents. So, by my experience, I still believe that bullying is what parents allow to happen.
But the rest is impressive. And I've observed two flavors of racism, in California, and in South Carolina. It's much worse in California. In South Carolina it's almost invisible (but still exists).
Sexism... I'd talk about sexism, but then I'll be called a racist.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 07:27 pm (UTC)Racism and sexism: this is why I referenced Crenshaw, if you try to analyse everything separately you often don't get sensible info. I experienced little direct sexism as a teenager because I was in an all-girls environment, though it didn't completely shield me from more general social attitudes towards girls and women. I didn't experience racism because I'm white; however the highly privileged school I went to really over-represented white people, both students and teachers. I don't recall anyone being deliberately racist but the very tiny numbers of visible ethnic minority kids had a very different experience from mine. Nowadays the most sought-after and usually most expensive schools have a lot of international students who are Asian-from-Asia as well as British kids from Asian backgrounds. But in the 80s and 90s "good" schools tended to skew white.
The view of class from the bottom up...
Date: 2026-02-22 02:49 pm (UTC)I think part of the reason people in the US don't talk about class is because the lines are not defined and there's this expectation that we can move classes due to the nature of our system..... our idea of our system haha. This meme points out though that getting a privileged/or not education can facilitate what class you enter as an adult. Still, both my parents came from higher classes than the one I grew up in. My dad's side was pretty middle class. Grandpa was a truck driver, but he made good money and could buy a house in a nice neighborhood. My mom's father was a college professor at one of the biggest colleges in Texas... but he got his education through being enlisted during WWII and getting on the G.I. bill which paid for his education. His parents were entrepreneurs and tried various occupations from shop owners to farmers. Back then you really could "pull up your bootstraps" and achieve a level of wealth way beyond what you came from. I feel like the G.I. bill had a lot to do with that though. The men (white men only) that came back from WWII were able to go to college on the government dime and that helped increase the middle class by a huge margin, but it didn't hold. The hippie movement could not have existed without a mass of young people that grew up in privilege and rejecting it. My parent fell into that category for sure. My dad read On The Road like it was a bible. He wanted to work with his hands rather than work as a scientist even though that's what he went to college to do. My mom just got sick and three kids so she wasn't able to pursue a higher career.
Still I didn't realize until I was an adult that one of the reasons I was ostracized as a kid was because I was poor. On the surface it was because I was neglected and had dirty clothes and hair and a "messy house". I don't think the other kids realized it either. I have this memory of a middle-class guy in my high school scrutinizing me one day. Just looking at me with a ponderous look and then asking me if I was one of those people that lived in a dirty house. He didn't get it, and I didn't get it. I pondered on my house and the houses of my peers and thought about the ones that were "dirty" and the ones that were not, and sheepishly answered, "Yes?" I mean my house wasn't dirty, but it was small and all the things were of low quality. There wasn't any interior decorating going on. It was in fact only part of a house that we rented. I often wonder if I understood things better and answered that guy with, "Yeah, I'm poor." how he would have reacted.
Despite all that, there is an implied shame put upon people who don't move up the classes here. At most of my jobs before the one I have now, customers would often ask me, "Are you the owner?" and I'd have to tell them that I was just a worker. As I got older there was this expectation that someone my age should have a better job. Like I should have tried harder to use our system to my advantage instead of remaining in my class. Moreso because I live in a very educated city.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 03:32 pm (UTC)(I haven't done the memem, but my educational privilege mostly comes from having two parents with Ph.D.s, one of them a stay-at-home mom who was willing to try homeschooling when my well-funded public elementary school wasn't working for me educationally or socially, and who put in the initiative to find and sometimes create external opportunities for me/my sister that would help us thrive.)
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 03:59 pm (UTC)But also different regions of the US fund things differently. The public and school libraries in the San Francisco Bay Area are an absolute shame, by my Minnesotan standards, they're tiny and shabby and poorly stocked--and, unsurprisingly, they can't afford outreach programs to let people know what resources the libraries have. And that's California, that's better than most of Nebraska for example. Meanwhile here in Minnesota we have libraries that lend not only books but tools, museum passes, etc.--and we have massive outreach programs to let our neighbors know that they're there and free to use even if they didn't come from "a library family."
You're still going to see a lot of clumping in answers, and I'm not surprised you have, but there are also places of surprising divergence that can make a lot of difference to people.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 05:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 05:38 pm (UTC)I have many, many relatives in places like this, for whom I am the Fancy Rich City Cousin (class mobility within families is A WHOLE OTHER TOPIC), and they can sort of see that I am not the same as the car dealership owner, but there's absolutely no sense of what they're seeing, how they can articulate it, whether it's actually a class or cultural difference or just a personality difference. Or regional! It gets very tangled.
But even in the places where the class distinctions have more fine gradations, it's just plain different from the US to the UK.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 04:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 06:04 pm (UTC)But they were also quite poor when I was a young child - not quite 'having to choose between heating and eating' poor, but clothes and furniture were second-hand, restaurant meals were a couple-of-times-a-year treat, annual summer holidays were a week in a self-catering cottage, that sort of thing - fee paying schools certainly weren't an option.
Fortunately I didn't directly encounter anyone like Toby Young when I arrived in Cambridge as a grammar school boy, but the fact that my Yorkshire accent is now barely detectable is not entirely unrelated to being concerned that I might.
And for me the intersectionality with neurotype was pretty significant. In theory I had a lot of educational privilege, but I was also locked in battle with my own brain in ways that I didn't understand that made it very difficult for me to take advantage of it to the full, to an extent that I'm only really beginning to understand now that I've come back to studying with diagnoses and drugs.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-02-22 06:42 pm (UTC)My parents came from families that didn't really value education - my father never got past Grade 9 and my mom was one of 3 kids in her age group that pushed through to finish Grade 12. She wanted to go to university - but when she moved from Saskatchewan to Alberta and tried to apply, she was told that her Grade 12 diploma from Saskatchewan wasn't good enough to get into university in Alberta - and it was too demoralizing to have to go *back* to high school at that point.
My mom was ADAMANT that all her kids were going to have the opportunity to go to university - saying that she would get a side job scrubbing floors if she had to, to make sure we could afford it. She always felt "less than" people who had university degrees - and when I (as the eldest kid) went to university, I was the first person in on my mom's side of the family to ever do so - and she had 5 siblings, who each had 2 kids, most of whom were older than me.
There were 4 kids in our family - and we all had very different experiences in school - so I found this meme interesting to think about how it applied to myself and my brothers - with the same mom (my dad did not involve himself in our education) having to navigate her way through supporting each kid differently to make sure we all succeeded to the best of each of our abilities.
That being said, even with all the desire in the world to support us - some of these questions made me realize that what would be considered "support" - we didn't get, due to money and time constraints - and probably also due to my mom not being educated and not really knowing "what to do" if that makes sense.
I find it interesting to read people's answers - acknowledging that it is a bit of a self-selecting group of people who are on DW/LJ and who are answering the questions :D
Thinky thoughts, indeed!