Michael confronting his privilege up close and personal

Michael

It has been strange being confronted with my privilege here in Africa. In our class we talk about privileged in the area of socioeconomic status, race, country of origin, sex, gender, sexual orientation, religion. Talking about these things has not been difficult as I am pretty aware of what we cover in class and have thought of these things before. The difficult part has been seeing my privilege very blatantly put me above other people. For instance, at my internship I work at a newspaper and there are interns there as well. The other interns are blatantly more qualified than me, one has graduated from Northwestern's Journalism program, two have graduated form Rhodes University, and there is a group of 8 that qualified because they applied through a program that had over 1,000 applicants and they were chosen. I on the other hand am not even studying journalism right now, and have essentially no experience or qualifications. I have this opportunity based solely on the fact that I am an American (and of course the awesomeness of Vernon Rose). This is tough, how am I not suppose to not feel guilty about sailing over the heads of hundreds of more qualified individuals based solely on the country in which I was born?

Above all there is such immense poverty here, and a gap in wealth so defined by race that I cannot look around the fact that I “have” and others “have not” based solely because of my privilege. I don't think I really need to explain that, I assume you get what I am talking about.

But yeah, this is all just strange because in the states it is easier for me to look to those who are more privileged than me and call them spoiled rich assholes. Here, I cannot avoid the fact that I am the spoiled rich asshole with so much handed to me, and it is an uncomfortable position.  I guess I just don't really know what to do about it. Right now though, I have decided that the best I can do is take advantage of this privilege by making the most out of my opportunities, and not get cocky and think that somehow I have so much because I deserve it.