Western Privilege Quotes

Developing good investments in Africa is by and large the best for the people of Africa that have a job, that have electricity, that might have clean water, that might have those things that we in the West take horribly for granted.

I must dress in costly materials. People scrutinize every article I wear with critical curiosity. The very fact of having grown up in the West, subjects me to more searching observation.

We need the children of Indonesia and the Philippines to manufacture our freedom of choice.

Those in the west who dismiss the repressiveness of laws against women in countries like Iran, no matter how benign their intentions, present a condescending view not just of the religion but also of women living in Muslim majority countries, as if the desire for choice and happiness is the monopoly of women in the west.

White guilt morally and culturally disarms the West. It makes the First World apologetic. And this, of course, only inflames the narcissism of the ineffectual.

Being a vegan is a first-world phenomenon, completely self-indulgent.

Climate experts say we should tell villagers in developing countries to reduce the amount of cooking smoke they generate to help fix global warming. You know, it's as if these people don't hate us enough already. I mean, they live in mud huts, they have thatch roofs, their clothes are made of straw. We pull up in a bunch of Humvees and SUVs going, 'Hey, you want to cut the smoke out of here?'

We in the west are seen as godless, as greedy and as uncaring about the suffering of those in the developing world.

A high standard of living cannot remain the exclusive possession of the West - and the sooner we can help other peoples to develop their resources, raise their living standards, and strengthen their national independence, the safer the world will be for us all.

Why do Angelina Jolie and Bono receive overwhelming attention for their work in Africa while Nwankwo Kanu or Dikembe Mutombo, Africans both, are hardly ever mentioned?

I am happy to accept that badge of ambivalence if that means some progress in dismantling this false opposition: writers boldly using their privileges of free speech in the morally superior West versus pathetic wimps in repressive countries we don't like.

The bottom line about the information possessed by non-Western peoples is that the information becomes valid only when offered by a white scholar recognized by the academic establishment; in effect, the color of the skin guarantees scientific objectivity.

Our generation in the west was lucky: we had readymade gateways. We had books, paper, teachers, schools and libraries. But many in the world lack these luxuries. How do you practice without such tryout venues?

People say that globalisation has negative aspects, but I don't believe globalisation is bad. It's criticised from a western perspective, but if you put yourself in the shoes of people in the developing world, it provides an unprecedented opportunity.

It seems very clear to me that we, in the West, cannot afford to continue assuming propriety over the world's resources in a careless, greedy way without paying for it - not only with the lives of our loved ones, but also with our souls.

Because Iranians have had to fight so long and painfully for political freedom, they have a deep appreciation for its value - perhaps deeper than many in the West who take their electoral rights for granted.

This is not a slow movement of change. It's a shift in the consciousness of each of us. It is a collective shift. It involves facing grief and trauma and undoing our numbness and our narcissism and our indulgence that we have in this privileged western society.

'Slumdog' was my first movie, and I had never been to India before - I was just a teenager in the U.K. with my headphones and my Nike shoes. What did I know about growing up in a slum?