Another Gambling Loss

At grad class today, we watched an uninspiring clip about students and privilege. The point was that some students come to us with loads of advantages, while others enter our classrooms with essentially nothing. Illustrating this point with an extended metaphor, the narrator compares student advantages to poker chips. For five minutes, this metaphor was ran into the ground as we heard about how those with loads of chips can gamble recklessly, while those with just a few poker chips are timid as they can't afford to lose chips. At the conclusion of the clip, someone approached me with a plate of poker chips. "Here," ey said. As the first and only person approached with this offering, and with plenty of people watching, I figured I was being made part of some kind of test following the video. Knowing I didn't want to have too few chips, I proceeded to scoop up a handful. "No, just one per person," ey said, irritated, adding, "Geez." Ouch. Those around me gave me awkward smiles as I guiltily tried to flash one back. I looked like a selfish doofus who had tried to take everyone else's chips. Sometimes you can't win. I have no poker chips. : (