At Princeton, Privilege Is: (a) Commonplace, (b) Misunderstood or (c) Frowned Upon
It is a familiar phrase on college campuses, often meant to serve as conversational kryptonite, the final word in an argument to which there is no response. “Check your privilege.” But Tal Fortgang, a Princeton freshman from Westchester County , had a response. After class recently, he was explaining to a classmate his views on welfare and his concern about the national debt , when he was told — not for the first time, he said — to check his privilege. He thought about the phrase, what it meant and last month penned a pointed essay in a conservative campus publication, The Tory. “The phrase, handed down by my moral superiors, descends recklessly, like an Obama-sanctioned drone, and aims laserlike at my pinkish-peach complexion, my maleness, and the nerve I displayed in offering an opinion rooted in a personal Weltanschauung ,” he wrote. His essay touched a nerve. He was hailed on the right, his piece used as evidence that America’s universities are hopelessly liberal.