extra credit post on johnson ch 3

In chapter three of Privilege, Power, and Difference, by Allan Johnson, it is explained how capitalism has defined racism. He says that “white racism” did not exist until capitalism began. In capitalism, there is a large sum of money that can only be distributed to a small amount of people; therefore, a large sum of people will be earning small amounts of money. One fact listed by Johnson is that 60% of the people in the United States fight over 25% of the total income, which isn’t enough to make a fair living. Johnson also says that it isn’t very likely that someone will change their social class, and because of this people tend to marry within his or her class. Near the end of the chapter, Johnson says that whiteness was made up by white people to make themselves higher up in the class system in order to make more money. Johnson also gives an example of how all of the different classifications are intertwined. He says that each dominant characteristic is a point, while the recessive characteristic is a negative point, so that a white, heterosexual male with no disabilities would be positive 4 while a colored disabled lesbian would be a negative 4. In the middle of these would be disabled, black, straight men (0) or a white lesbian with no disabilities (0).
I feel that this chapter would be good for the bonus post because it has its good qualities and its bad ones. The part I disagree with is that each category should not be given a single point. There should be differences for the characteristics that are more dominant than the others. I do not have facts on which is looked down on more, being colored, or being female. Once an expert figures this out, the point system would be more realistic. Also, there are differences in the individual characteristics. For example, there are many different races and some may be looked down on more than others. White may not even be at the top since Asians are considered to be smarter, they might get the job before a white person. The job being interviewed for also needs to be taken into consideration. Stereotypically, one would think that a woman would have an advantage for a secretary position over a man because that is stereotypically a female job.