Privilege. Some don’t get what it means, but 14-year-old Royce Mann sure does.
The 8th grader recently recited a poem titled “White Boy Privilege” during a contest at his school in Atlanta, Georgia, back in May. In the poem, he discusses the advantage white men have over women and other races, and that even though he didn’t create the system, he still benefits from it.
“I know it wasn’t us eighth grade white boys who created this system, but we profit from it every day. We don’t notice these privileges though, because they don’t come in the form of things we gain, but rather the lack of injustices that we endure.”
And he doesn’t feel bad for this resistant to change.
“Dear white boys: I’m not sorry. I don’t care if you think that the feminists are taking over the world, that the Black Lives Matter movement has gotten a little too strong, because that’s bullshit. I get that change can be scary, but equality shouldn’t be.”
“That was the first time I did slam poetry,” Mann told Fusion. “I wrote it because I became aware of white privilege this year. We have a class called Race, Class and Gender that everyone has to take, and I got really passionate about how unfair it is.”
Not only did the performance earn him first place, but it left viewers with a lasting impact.
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