They let me pick. Did I ever tell you that? Choose whichever Spartan I wanted. I watched as you became the soldier we needed you to be. Like the others, you were strong and swift and brave. A natural leader. But you had something they didn’t. Something no one saw but me. Can you guess? Luck.

- Cortana, Halo 3

Ask any successful person about the secret to their success, and you’ll likely hear words like passion, hard work, skill, focus, and having great ideas. Very few people, if any, would say “privilege and luck.” Only losers blame their results on luck, right? Wrong!

While personal effort and determination are crucial for achieving goals, this story often overlooks two significant elements that shape our lives: luck and privilege. I think it’s important to talk about these things because they play a big role in our lives, even if we don’t always see it.

The Lottery of Birth

From the moment we’re born, factors beyond our control begin to influence our life path. The country, economic status, gender, and family we’re born into play big roles in shaping our opportunities and challenges.

I’ve often thought about how different my life might be if I was born in a different place or to different parents. It’s a bit like a lottery, isn’t it? We don’t choose where or to whom we’re born, but it affects so much of our lives.

Many people mix up luck with privilege. I like to think of it this way: being lucky is winning a lottery; privilege is having your name in the lottery pool in the first place. It’s a small difference, but an important one.

Why is it a Heated Topic?

In my experience, people get defensive about privilege because it’s based on having a special status that not everyone has. Privileges feel good, and it’s hard to admit we might have unfair advantages.

I’ve found that if we replace the word privilege with advantage, it sounds less intense. But there’s a catch! Let me explain with an example:

A poor farmer from a respected social group might lack money but still have social advantages. On the flip side, a wealthy businessperson from a less respected group might have money advantages but face social barriers. The farmer will always have their social status, while the businessperson’s wealth could change.

Research on Privilege and Luck

I’ve read a lot about this topic. There’s interesting research that explains how being part of a respected group affects how others view you. It can create a snowball effect where people who are already seen as successful keep getting more opportunities.

Here’s the abstract to one of the papers which I read on this subject:

One of the major benefits of belonging to a prestigious group is that it affects the way you are viewed by others. Here I use a simple mathematical model to explore the implications of this “prestige bias” when candidates undergo repeated rounds of evaluation. In the model, candidates who are evaluated most highly are admitted to a “prestige class”, and their membership biases future rounds of evaluation in their favor. I use the language of Bayesian inference to describe this bias, and show that it can lead to a runaway effect in which the weight given to the prior expectation associated with a candidate’s class becomes stronger with each round. Most dramatically, the strength of the prestige bias after many rounds undergoes a first-order transition as a function of the precision of the examination on which the evaluation is based.

arXiv: 1910.05813

This research really opened my eyes to how privilege can compound over time, creating even larger disparities in opportunities and outcomes.

A Real-Life Incident

Let me share a personal story. When I was in 6th grade, there were auditions for a group dance. I was selected, but I wasn’t chosen to be the lead dancer. Instead, they put me in the background. During practice, the instructor noticed that the one chosen to be in the center didn’t dance as well as I did, so they replaced him with me.

It then hit me that the one in the center was first chosen because of his skin color (he was fair, and I’m dusky) and not because of his skills. This was an eye-opening moment for me about how unfair advantages work in real life.

I also have personal stories about caste discrimination, but that’s a topic for another day. The point is, these experiences made me think a lot about how privilege works in our everyday lives.

Discussing Privilege Without Guilt

I’ve found that talking about privilege can be uncomfortable. Even people with lots of advantages want recognition for their hardships. They want others to understand the challenges they’ve faced.

One way I’ve learned to have an open talk about privilege is to first acknowledge how the person doesn’t have certain advantages. Then, I share my own privileges. This way, the conversation can go ahead with more understanding on both sides.

I believe guilt is a useless emotion. It doesn’t bring change. I’ve seen people often respond with defensiveness or guilt when talking about privilege. But I think by thinking about our advantages and working to change unfair systems through honest talk, we can help make things better.

Unfair Systems are Bad for Everyone

Let’s start with how men often have social and economic advantages over women, coming from old-fashioned ideas about gender roles. But these male advantages aren’t helping anyone in the long run. They can cause problems in marriages where the wife earns more than the husband, and they make it harder for women to advance in science and tech fields. We all lose when people are treated unfairly and not based on their skills and hard work.

The Curious Case of Brain Drain

I’ve noticed that people who defend their social advantages in India often point to the “brain drain” of talented people moving to other countries. But they don’t see that even to move abroad, you need some advantages to begin with. A person from a very poor or socially disadvantaged background usually can’t move abroad for college education. It’s just not possible for them.

I’ve actually seen how this unfolds in real life. When one of my friend was preparing to study abroad, he realized how many hidden costs and barriers there were. From standardized test fees to visa application costs, it all adds up. And that’s not even considering the cultural capital needed to navigate the application process. It made me realize how many talented people might never get the chance simply because they lack these initial advantages.

We Only See Our Own Struggles

While writing this article, I realized something important. I had completely left out the struggles experienced by LGBTQ+ folks. And do you know why it didn’t cross my mind at first? Because I’ve never felt what they go through every single day. Even after centuries of struggle, it’s still taboo to be LGBTQ+ in many places.

I remember during my college years, there was a guy who kept his identity secret because he thought other boys would pick on him if they knew. He only told me about his situation after I posted a story supporting LGBTQ+ rights during pride month last year. This made me realize how easy it is to overlook struggles we don’t personally experience.

This experience taught me the importance of listening to and amplifying voices from all backgrounds. It’s not enough to just recognize our own privileges; we need to actively seek out and understand the experiences of those who face different challenges.

Conclusion

In the end, I believe it’s important to understand that having privileges doesn’t mean a person’s life is free from hardships. It just means having some unearned benefits in society because of who they are. Recognizing our own advantages and the challenges others face can help us work towards a fairer world for everyone. It’s not about feeling guilty, but about being aware and using that awareness to make positive changes.

By acknowledging the role of luck and privilege in our lives, we can approach success with humility and empathy. We can celebrate our achievements while also recognizing the factors that contributed to them beyond just our individual efforts. And most importantly, we can work towards creating a society where opportunities are more equally distributed, and success is truly based on merit rather than circumstance.

This journey of understanding privilege has been eye-opening for me. It’s changed how I view my own successes and challenges, and it’s made me more committed to creating a more equitable world. I hope that by sharing these thoughts, I can encourage others to reflect on their own experiences and privileges, and to join in the work of building a fairer society for all.