“Whiteness” a social construct

• A woman whose mother passed as White on the Today show with Megyn Kelly shares how her mother had a lifelong secret.  In the discussion with Megyn, Gail Lukasik reveals the truth to her mother’s secret past. In search for answers about her mother’s heritage, unbeknown to her father, Gail made a startling unpredictable discovery. The story begins when Gail’s parents who married in 1944 shortly after World War II.  Two years later, her parents had their daughter Gail. Gail remembers how her mother mystified herself.  She never talked about her father, Ozimar Frederick.  So Gail took it upon herself and searched the Louisiana Census.  To her amazement next to his name he was labeled as being Black. Upon further investigation, she found her mother’s birth certificate and requested an official letter which explained the abbreviated COL on her mother’s birth certificate. https://youtu.be/oNiEBnOzgVw
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• In her book, White like Her, the author Gail Lukasik explains race as a social construct. Even though she has a mixed race heritage, she identifies as a White woman because she was socialized as a white woman.  Her mother who is Colored passed for White. 
• In Stephanie’s documentary Light Girls she talks about racial passing.  Unfortunately, in this society, the women of color are well aware of the disadvantages and the advantages associated with race.  Therefore, racial passing for Light Girls is an option they chose like Gail Lukasik’s mother. When racial passing for the White race is an option to light girls, the cost of being your true self is sacrificed.  Consequently, the privileges of Whiteness are far greater and outweigh the cost of not being ones’ true self.  This documentary explores the cost of what passing for “whiteness” privilege means. On the down side, passing meant, separation from family, ultimately negating your blackness. On the positive side, it meant having white privilege “unearned assets” that can be cashed in. https://youtu.be/PDns0nLvHW4
• According to the author, Jacqueline Battalora in her book, Birth of a White Nation, she purports that Whiteness did not exist until the end of the 17th century when laws were designed to keep Blacks and Whites separate. Whiteness grew and has evolved to what it is today.  The author Emily Chiarello suggests, the Physical characteristics we now associate with whiteness have been artificially linked to power and privilege for the purpose of maintaining an unjust social hierarchy
• The built in inherited advantage of White privilege “Whiteness” has been recognized by people of color for generations. As the author suggests, the “Real” work needs to be done by White people first recognizing this privilege and identifying how the multiple systems of oppression work, but most importantly responding to the biases of other whites.  By doing the work to dismantle racist institutions, they are creating equity. 
• The pure denial of the privilege continues to protect the very systems of racial injustice.