I’ve got about as much privilege as anyone can possibly have, and I know as many comfortable-ass people as you do — all of them white. They have no internal compass, and drift wherever social pressures take them. They party their way through school, and get just good enough grades to get by. The only difference between them and the people you describe is that the social pressures around them naturally guide them into comfortable middle-class and upper middle class jobs.

For example, if I had followed the social pressures in my life, I would’ve let my parents pay for law or medical school. If my grades had ever slipped, the possibility of flunking out would have so horrified my friends and family that I would reflexively brought them back up again. When you grow up in that kind of middle-class social network, not studying requires more willpower than studying.

Consequently, A privileged person can end up with a degree from a good school without ever really thinking about it. Then their father can make a few phone calls and they discover that they have acquired a comfortable middle class job just by going with the flow. George W. Bush and Dan Quayle followed a similar flow to to become president and vice president of the United States. Unfortunately, when your comfortable-ass African Americans follow that strategy, they get a very different result. When you’re born in the gutter, and go with the flow, the only place you can end up is in the sewer.