For me it's not a race issue, it's an observation that I've only ever seen white people call themselves expats. I had guessed given the silicon valley, wealth background and posting on HN, that the author was white, and a quick image search confirms my assumption.

Since I don't want to derail the discussion I'll leave it at this and here this food for thought if you haven't confronted the topic give it a chance. A compelling definition of privilege is "Not having to think about X". Not having to think about the price of groceries is or more clearly the inverse of having to is symptomatic of poverty. Similarly, not having to think about one's skin color is a form of privilege. That's why many find it offensive to bring up, because normally they aren't confronted with it. How many times did we get suspicious looks because we are white? s/white/black and hopefully you see the point.