Whiteness
Shoplifting as White Privilege
Permission to screw up granted
When I was a teenager, I was a thief. My naughty best friend and I used to steal clothes, makeup, and sunglasses from department stores. We knew just how to remove that security clip from the clothes and wear them out of the store. We wore big coats to conceal our non-purchases.
Turns out we got away with it because we were white. We didn’t know that. We thought we were master shoplifters. We were skilled, yes, but at entitlement. We were afraid of getting caught, but we weren’t afraid of getting killed or punished severely.
When we talk about white privilege, this is another aspect of it. We, white people, walk through the world doing whatever the hell we want without a lot of fear. The stakes are pretty low for us.
When I was young, I couldn’t walk through those security doors without feeling like I was finally going to get arrested for everything I ever stole. I waited to set off the beeping security alarm, but I wasn’t scared to death, because death was unlikely.
I imagined getting arrested, but then what? Probably nothing. Maybe a slap on the wrist, a warning? A judge looking down at me, in a protective fatherly way, and saying, “Don’t waste your life. Don’t quash your opportunities.” That’s white privilege. I’m protected. Society’s got my back.
Being a teenage shoplifter was me being young and stupid and testing the limits. I can't imagine stealing now. I can’t even lie now. I’m like a monk. But the main thing is because I’m white, I’m allowed to be on the other side of my youthful missteps. I survived my youthful adventures.
I always thought my shoplifting past was about me, and part of my growing up. Now, I see it was more than that. White people are allowed so many missteps. I fell. I got picked up. I fell again and was encouraged to go on. But mainly, when I fell, I got back up. I lived through it.
I look back at my whole life now and see how many times the world ignored my youthful indiscretions because I was white. How my privilege protected me every time I left my house for half a century. And then I think about what would have happened to me if I’d been Black.