No one is trying to make you feel bad for being white.

I have said this to white people about eleventy billion times in my life, and yet here I am saying it again.

You know who else has said this...  to me?  The most militant, angry black man you'd ever have the chance to meet, who is now dead, god rest his soul. He followed it up with something like this: 

You know why I'm not trying to make you feel bad for being white? Because that gets me nothing. If all you do is get all moany and feel guilty for being white, all I get is a moany-ass white girl who stares mournfully at the wall and reads a bunch of Maya Angelou to make herself feel better. I don't want you to feel bad. I don't even want to you stand around with a sign the rest of your life saying Racism Is Bad. I want you to be honest. To dig down deep in your soul and be honest about what you think and what you feel and where you think all that shit comes from. Be honest about what that lotto ticket at birth that said "caucasian" got you, and how it continues to pay off, and what it means. Be honest about how easy it would be for you to say, "Hey, that black man is scaring me" and have about a dozen people who look like you suddenly appear out of thin air like Newt Gingrich's Angels ready to sympathize with you and write articles about your troubles with that bad bad man. Look at history. Look at what's going on around you, and see it. Really see it for what it is. And stop participating when what you get is got by stepping on someone else. Stand up. Speak up. And start pulling those bricks down when they stand between the truth and your life. Here's a hammer.

...
The reason why white people need to be confronted with this stuff and talk it to death, even if it's scary and confrontational and makes people upset is because as far as I can tell, people of color have been talking it to death and putting their butts on the barricades for about a hundred years or more and getting pretty damn far but not far enough. Why? Because there are whole lot more white people, with a whole lot more power, that's why. And guess what? A whole lot of those white people have a hard time listening to Black and Native and Chicano voices without having another little voice chattering way in the back of their heads saying something like, "Oh, he must be exaggerating." or "Well, when I was in school, Marius beat the shit out of me and nobody did anything about it, and isn't that racism too?" or "If she would stop talking with that accent, then she'd have no problem getting a job." 

White people need to talk about this shit because it's about damn time. And if you think that talking about it is going to make people more racist, which I've been hearing a lot of, I just want to shake my head at you. I'll refrain from shaking my finger, because that would be condescending and begging for a fight, but hey, not like white ladies don't feel perfectly comfortable doing that at Important Black Men for disagreeing with them, so why not me.  (Oh yes, Jan Brewer, I see what you did there.) 

People, it's time. That is all. If you can't speak your mind without getting all bound up in defensive or offensive bullshit, then please take a walk on the Lakewalk and come on back when you're ready. I've been walking around my neighborhood every day, and muttering at the crows about it and how much I want to punch some of these assholes in the face, but I keep coming back to it after a breath or two and that's what counts. 

So, let's talk. Let's listen. Can y'all do that? Please?

For a minute there, DaVe, I thought you were saying it was an injustice that short fat bald men had never been enslaved. And I laughed. 

Ahem. 

I am sometimes a bad person who laughs at bad jokes. 

That Robert Jensen article is very well worth reading. Sam, thank you.

P.S. Joel, I'm sorry you face stereotyping that stands in your way. Remember though, no one is calling you a racist. They are pointing out that there are privileges that come with being white. Recognizing that fact does not mean that people are saying you don't get to complain about when things are unfair, or that you've got it easy. 

Tall fair thin people with a full head of hair are absolutely (and scientifically) proven to be favored in work environments. I support you in discussing this problem in the future. 

Right now, however, I'm going to be a pain in the ass and remind folks that deflecting from the topic at hand (racism and white privilege) makes you look like you're avoiding something.