The book version of We Are ALL Innocent by Reason of Insanity begins with an example of a common delusion in our culture: the belief that humans can be divided into different races. I assert that there is only one race, the human race, and that racial divisions exist only in our minds.
This statement has caused some comment among readers of the book. They are convinced that racial categories are based in reality, which just reinforces the point of the book: “insanity” is defined as confusing our mind-generated reality with actual reality.
Every culture creates a “consensus reality,” a collective version of reality that its members take for granted. This collective reality is made up of subjective beliefs and assumptions, many of which have no basis in fact, but it’s very hard to see that when you’re a member of the society because to you it’s just “reality.”
When we travel we perceive that other cultures have their own realities, and we call the experience “culture shock.” We look back in history and call an earlier society’s collective reality a myth.
But it’s very hard to question the assumptions of our own culture. As historian Nell Painter, wrote in her 2011 book The History of White People: “What we can see depends heavily on what our culture has trained us to look for.”
What basis do I have for questioning our cultural assumption that races exist?
This statement has caused some comment among readers of the book. They are convinced that racial categories are based in reality, which just reinforces the point of the book: “insanity” is defined as confusing our mind-generated reality with actual reality.
Every culture creates a “consensus reality,” a collective version of reality that its members take for granted. This collective reality is made up of subjective beliefs and assumptions, many of which have no basis in fact, but it’s very hard to see that when you’re a member of the society because to you it’s just “reality.”
When we travel we perceive that other cultures have their own realities, and we call the experience “culture shock.” We look back in history and call an earlier society’s collective reality a myth.
But it’s very hard to question the assumptions of our own culture. As historian Nell Painter, wrote in her 2011 book The History of White People: “What we can see depends heavily on what our culture has trained us to look for.”
What basis do I have for questioning our cultural assumption that races exist?
