I didn’t mean to do this. This started out as a review of the English indie rock band Glass Animals’ album “How to be a Human Being.” It was perfectly innocent and perfectly pretentious. Where I live, the wind is getting colder and the leaves are getting redder, and my walk home from classes is getting a whole lot better. Last Thursday, I left my Feminist Gender and Sexuality Studies (FGSS) course and crossed the famous Cornell footbridge with headphones in my ears and the feeling of forgiveness that autumn grants resting on my shoulders. I was listening to the song “Life Itself” off the new album. A particular line struck me in that cool, fall air. Dave Bayley, lead singer of Glass Animals, cooed out truths that were both profoundly and wholly embarrassingly relatable:

“I can’t get a job, so I live with my mom /

I take her money but not quite enough /

I sit in the car, and I listen to static /

She said I look fat, but I look fantastic.”

It was this moment of fantastical interconnectedness that I felt with David Bayley that I realized a review of an album could wait, or at least share the spotlight. If hearing “Life Itself” gave me a weird sense of guilt, I think I have an obligation to comment on some of the advantages given to me by class, so I stay weary enough to never end up on my mom’s couch ever again. It’s time to talk about privilege. There are things I am told/tell myself/do every day that reinforce my subtle (and sometimes, admittedly, not so subtle) deeply ingrained privilege. The danger of subtle privilege is that it’s easy to ignore, easy to forget, and easy to silently and guiltlessly benefit from. So here I am, calling myself out.

This past year I have danced whimsically between different diets, trying to establish myself as a more sustainable and ethical human being. I went from being an herbivore, to a pescetarian, to a vegetarian, to a vegan, to a wegan (a weekday vegan), to a non-mammal eater, to a no-avocados-allowed-advocate, and on, and on, and on. I did a lot of research into the food industry and immediately became overwhelmed. How could we, as humans, be forgiven? Where was our salvation? When we weren’t killing innocent animals, we were destroying economies and ecosystems with increased demand for produce. My head began to spin. Why wasn’t everyone worried? Why wasn’t everyone a vegan? What were we doing? How dare we? No dinner table was free from my discussion. I was awful. I was passionately and, maybe, disillusioned with my own ability to alter a structure, and I wouldn’t stop talking about it. I didn’t mean to do this.

Every Tuesday, I take a bus to downtown Ithaca. It keeps me from getting too thoroughly sucked into the vortex that is higher education. Sometimes I forget that my classes aren’t my whole life. One of those Tuesdays, I strolled around, carrying my lunch bag that was loaded with overpriced and arguably over-hyped chia seeds, whey protein, and local apples. I was hungry, and when I’m hungry, I’m grumpy. The sidewalks were too narrow. The sun was too hot. Suddenly I was pulled out of my unappreciative body as I almost bonked right into a nearly-seven-foot-tall man. I didn’t mean to do this. Before I could fumble an apology, I noticed that he was holding a cane. He was blind. Behind him was an older woman with a walker. Behind her was a girl holding a crying baby. “It’s okay,” she whispered. “We’re okay.” I spun my out-of-place body around and read the sign hung on a church that at least fifty people were lined up outside of. “Free Food Pantry,” it read. When I reoriented myself, I scanned their faces—the blind man, the woman with a walker, the girl with a crying baby. “I’m so hungry,” they read.

I kept walking, sick like you couldn’t believe. “I feel so stupid,” I thought to myself. “I feel so stupid.” My concerns about food were valid, but to some, they would seem so small. Considering that we live in an era where food insecurity is a very real issue, I debated the morality of spending so much extra money on environmentally safe and ethical foods, while others were waiting in line on a too narrow sidewalk, under the too hot sun, wondering if they were going to be able to eat at all. If I returned to my normal diet, I would spend half the money I was currently investing, and I could send that money to the food pantry. But then I stopped myself. Maybe as a privileged, financially stable person, it was my responsibility to be as ethical and sustainable as possible, knowing that others couldn’t afford to do so. Should I, as a middle class person, work to improve the lives of lower class people through living a non-luxury lifestyle, or should I, as a middle class person, use my privilege to indirectly benefit them through helping the environment? Where did all these questions come from? Am I full-blown socialist now? What will my parents think? I couldn’t decide. I still don’t know. So many people were standing in line, while I was sitting and thinking. I know that today, they’re there again, while I sit and write this. That day I took the next bus back home. I think there was a part of me that didn’t mean to do this.

This might not be a revolutionary post. I don’t have the answers to this question of ethics, and I don’t know if there is a right one. I can’t look a starving family in the eye and tell them how much money I spend on organic, local vegan products. I simply can’t. But, I also can’t fall asleep at night with a clean conscience without purchasing free trade, organic, green, and humane food sources, given that it’s in my financial capability. There are a lot of moving parts when it comes to acknowledging and absolving class privilege. I'm starting to feel like I don't even know how to be a human being anymore. My FGSS professor once said, “Guilt is a good place to start but not a good place to stay.” I’m still looking for a safe place to stay, and I promise I’ll let you all know if I ever find it.