So in that respect my opportunities were much lower than a lot of other people. I don't think that made me oppressed though. I don't think that word really has any meaning in Canada compared to the reality of the world.
I am somewhat in the same situation. I think I have done reasonably well for myself. I don't have a college degree, and I haven't benefited from family connections, but I have managed to obtain full time work, a home, a car, and relatively stable finances. I still don't know whether it's a result of privilege, or dumb luck, or hard work, or (most likely) a combination of all of the above.
Under the "privilege" heading:
-I have benefited from competent parenting. Mom is an abusive alcoholic, but dad is a level-headed person who taught me innumerable, immeasurably important things about how good people conduct themselves. I have no idea where I would have ended up if I didn't have someone like him to teach me.
-I am moderately good-looking, and can wear a tank-top and tight pants or short skirt, or a Little Black Dress. At this point in my life, that's not super-important, but when I was younger it meant a lot. When I first arrived in Kim City, it took me about 2 hours to find work. When I was younger, I was able to graduate from the crappy, low-paying work of fast-food, retail, and family restaurants, to working in bars and making a lot more money, while my friends were still in crappy low-paying jobs.
In high school I used to take the same bus home as a couple of girls from a nearby college. They were both very attractive, one was white, the other black, and they seemed to be inseparable besties, and I sometimes listened in on their conversations. One day White Girl was bemoaning her failure to land a summer job... Black Girl laughed and said "You're white. Go work at Earl's." They both laughed, but I knew there was an element of truth to what she said, and I put it into action later when I was old enough.
Meanwhile, under the "hard work" heading:
-I think I got ahead at least partly through aptitude and hard work. I started with my employer as a casual laborer, and advanced mostly just by being more reliable and more productive than the other casuals, and the owner took notice. But the thing that always gets me is... would the owner have taken the same notice if I was male? ...aboriginal? I'm not the only hard-working casual who ever worked for them... but the others didn't come in such an adorable package. I have a hunch that if I was male or unattractive, the owner might not have taken the same interest in my abilities.
The one time I was stopped as a young man by police wanting to know what I was doing in that alley I'd come out of at 2AM I stopped, answered his questions politely, and he moved on. I would suggest if I instead responded by telling him to go and F*ck himself, and it was none of his damn business and turned to walk away, I would have found myself arrested, regardless of my ivory skin.
I have said this a number of times before in previous discussions, but I think the race aspect of police misconduct is overblown... the real issue is, I think, class. I mean, obviously race is significantly intertwined with that as well, as poor-people are disproportionately non-white, and there's a tendency to suspect that if a black person has the trappings of success it was paid for by crime. Black guy driving a BMW... probably a drug-dealer, right?
But I live in one of the whitest communities in Canada... and the police treat people like crap here too. They don't treat me like crap, because I look like a completely non-threatening, upstanding citizen. But the streets are full of homeless people and hobos and panhandlers, and most of them are white or aboriginal, and the RCMP make sure to harass and intimidate and bully them as much as legally possible, white or not. If you look like you might be a drug-user or a criminal, the police are going to get up in your business. In some places, being black might be all it takes for the police to decide you look like a drug-user or a criminal. But here, most of the people who "fit the profile" are actually white, and the police don't give them a pass because of their skin color.
-k