The Intent of Oppression

I understand Frye's definition of oppression as a "network of forces and barriers which are systematically related and which conspire to the immobilization, reduction, and molding of [the oppressed group] and the lives [the oppressed group] lives" (44); however, should we also include "to systematically privilege the oppressors"?

I believe intent is left out of Frye's original definition. (While she acknowledges that these systems exist to benefit the oppressor groups, she does not emphasize it). By including this clause, the superordinate majority's interests are brought to consciousness. An abstract structure no longer purposelessly subjects the subordinate minority. Sexism does not simply diminish women's influence -- it constructs the patriarchy. Racism is not limited to the violence against people of color -- it establishes white supremacy. Oppression creates white privilege, male privilege, cis privilege, etc. This promotes a more cogent analysis of oppression in which we recognize that oppression benefits oppressors and exists to benefit oppressors.

This argument is teleological. It asserts that racism exists because it provides whites with social, economic, and political resources. Not emphasizing this dilutes the relation of the oppressor to the system and undermines why the system perpetuates itself.

It also allows one to see an increased variety of ways to fight against systems of inequality, for explicitly recognizing beneficiaries promotes the visibility of privilege, which we are socialized against seeing.  For instance, when discussing race, focusing only on the oppression people of color face permits white people to remain ignorant on how race affects them. White peoples’ racial existence escapes unacknowledged.  Focusing on how racism establishes white supremacy, however, subverts that. The invisibility becomes revealed.  Locking car doors when a black man walks by not only positions the black man as dangerous but also connects the person who locks the car to the network that provides whites with additional social, political, and economic resources. Discussing this as an incidence contributing to white supremacy thus marks the unmarked category of white; White signals safe. Therefore, to effectively fight sexism, a male should both address the actions that marginalize women, such as public acts of sexual harassment, as well as actions that promote male privilege, such as men’s increased tendency to interrupt.
  
I do not mean that that people individually oppress with intent. For example, most people who commit microaggressions -- myself included -- do not call themselves racists, sexists, or homophobes. However, this states that all oppressors have a vested interest in not acknowledging systems of oppression. For example, a reason especially white folk do not want to acknowledge the fallacy of color blindness is that it promotes our interests in not acknowledging it. However, it is a systematic intent embedded in the oppression and not an individual intent. This hidden element of intent explains why even women perpetuate sexism, for example. Focusing then on this interest and how it creates privilege allows one to see this.