When those in power play the victim, they definitely put on some sort of display, but is it really one of mediocrity?

Seems to me that at least two sorts of white men invoke 'reverse racism' -

(1) those who are exceptionally elite, whose teams determine that referring to some perceived slight will help expand their pool of supporters, which can be converted into profit and/or power.

(2) those who are not elite - who realistically know their only chance to get the scraps off the table of the elites will be by adopting the words and manners so as to draw their attention.

Patterson is elite, sure. Did he intend to invoke reverse racism to grow his pool of supporters? To appeal to some new, untapped audience - say the people who enjoy conspiracy theories from Carlson, QAnon, et. al., - and might find his works scratched that same itch? When he refers to 'reverse racism,' he may be calculating how many new customers he would gain v. how many old customers he might lose. Or not.

But at the end of the day, everyone able to read at all is privileged, relative to those who could not. Privileged with time, money, education, and more - a world wealthy beyond the imagining of people a few centuries ago, where turning on the lights is seldom a luxury available only to a few. It's counterintuitive, but people quite often discover oppression not from equality, but from people trying to amass power by calling out how they are oppressed...