Nobody has explicitly asked me to apologize for being white, but based on the rhetoric of many social justice advocates, that is implicitly what they would like. I’ve seen some writers and commenters on here grovel over their supposed responsibility for the problems of their non-white neighbors.

There is no systemic racism against blacks, except in well-intended forms such as affirmative action, in which race-based practices are tangibly established and codified in the system. People confuse racism against blacks occurring within the legal and law enforcement systems as being systemic when really it’s better described as interpersonal. There is no codified racism in these systems like the kind that existed in the segregation-era South.

Reparations may potentially create the disempowering dependency that often occurs with governmental assistance programs. Where would it end? We likely would not be able to pay reparations to descendants of slaves in a way that creates any foreseeable satisfaction. MLK Jr. himself acknowledged such a fact in the following passage:

“All of America's wealth today could not adequately compensate its Negroes for his centuries of exploitation and humiliation. It is an economic fact that a program such as I propose would certainly cost far less than any computation of two centuries of unpaid wages plus accumulated interest. In any case, I do not intend that this program of economic aid should apply only to the Negro; it should benefit the disadvantaged of all races."

So while he did feel that black descendants of those affected by slavery/segregation were deserving of compensation, in practice he does not appear to have advocated a program that would benefit only them.

When speaking of whites who wanted to assist formerly enslaved blacks, Frederick Douglass gave this advice:

“Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief with us. If the negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone!”

There is no widespread white supremacism in America. The fact that many people think there is is based on the illusion that because whites as a whole are better off than other races, particularly blacks and Hispanics, then there must be some racial hierarchy in place. It’s also based on a redefinition of the term “white supremacy” that was recently noted by the New York Times; instead of the ideology, a simple disparity in welfare between racial groups now constitutes white supremacy in the eyes of those who follow the so-called “woke” narrative on race. More likely, intergenerational wealth disparities based in historical oppression and geographic origin are the real factors behind said differences in welfare.

“White privilege” is a quite arguably racist phrase that judges people’s circumstances based on their skin color, the same way race-based equity - not to be confused with equality - does. You cannot point to any random white person and say that they have benefitted specifically from being white. It employs the same type of misguided generalization that people use when speaking of “black culture” and how it supposedly holds black Americans back from succeeding in society.

I don’t apologize for being “defensive” if it means pushing back against unfair accusations of racism and privilege, and also against race-based equity which, put simply, is discrimination.