When I hear the term "white privilege," it is as if someone just scraped his fingernails down a chalkboard. My white family comes from the Appalachian coal regions of Pennsylvania and for generations never had "privilege."  My maternal grandfather immigrated from Ukraine when he was only fifteen years old, became a coal miner, and never went to high school.  He faced prejudice and bigotry for having an accent and for being of Slavic heritage.  He endured incredible hardship for decades and died at 62 from black lung disease.  Good health care was lacking, and two of his six children died in early childhood.  For much of his life, he went to work in the dark, worked all day in the dark, and then came home in the dark.  He befriended rats in the coal mines, since experience taught him how rat behavior could alert you to impending danger. My...(Read Full Post)