delusion is an active state.
october 2022.
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In the critical reflection White Delusion and Avidyā: A Buddhist Approach to Understanding and Deconstructing White Ignorance, Emily McRae puts her white delusion on display. She writes about the realization that her Black partner’s concern about appearance was not about vanity but about being a Black man in a white professional setting.
My husband is a physician, which is a field that has very few Black men (and is actually losing Black men). He has no Black male colleagues and never has. Although he is always well dressed, he has, more than once, been accused of lacking professionalism in his attire or “attitude” by white and Asian colleagues. As a Black man in a white professional setting, he has to manage his appearance. Because he explained all of this to me, I can see now that his concern about his appearance was not vanity or superficiality, nor was it motivated by a desire to conform to social conventions or a desire to control my appearance, as I sometimes suspected in my more cynical moments. It was, and is, a reasonable response to an impossible situation: being a Black male professional in a white profession. My confusion and bewilderment by this fairly obvious fact is a display of my white delusion.
Emily McRae, “White Delusion and Avidyā: A Buddhist Approach to Understanding and Deconstructing White Ignorance,” Buddhism and Whiteness: Critical Reflections
I am often taken aback when white folx in my ecosystem confess these sorts of revelations. I (and most Black people) am used to a certain level of discernment in my interactions. The assessment of my “otherness” in any given space is a way of gauging safety. It is a discernment that has not been actively cultivated in most white Americans. It can be painful to look at the discrepancy between your safety and mine, especially if you espouse to have progressive values.
White delusion lives in the space between these split realities. We are living two different stories: that American prosperity is a result of our founding values of freedom, liberty and equality (among other things) and that American wealth is built upon systems that relied (and continue to) on the exploitation and oppression of Black people (as well as Indigenous and immigrant communities).
James Baldwin writes about this in his essay “The White Problem”, insisting “The beginnings of this country have nothing whatever to do with the myth we have created about it” and “…part of the dilemma of this country is that it has managed to believe the myth it has created about its past”. The American myth leaves the nation in arrested development. This is the consequence of building a false story of self. While our sociopolitical systems thrive on the delusion of white supremacy, the path of true progress and liberation is continually obscured.
Baldwin urges us to look at cause and effect, reiterating in essays and interviews that their frequent contemplation is one of the antidotes to the poison of delusion. Left unexamined, these causes and effects lead to our suffering.
The Buddha urges us to do the same. The Buddhist teachings on delusion ask that we bring discernment to the inability to look. “Avidyā” (Sanskrit: ignorance, confusion, delusion) is understood as that which stands in opposition to knowledge. With Avidyā, not knowing a thing does not equal delusion. It is when we are presented with a fact and actively chose to not accept its truth that we are in delusion.
With less than two weeks before the midterm elections, my political dread is heightening. The delusion of white supremacy has been persistent during this election cycle. On Monday I watched President Biden deliver remarks to campaign staffers and volunteers at the Democratic National Committee Headquarters. He said, “nothing is beyond our capacity”. But there are many things beyond our capacity. Or, I should say there are many things that are not yet possible because of the systems that we operate under which were built on the delusion of white supremacy. On the other end of this spectrum of midterm white supremacy are insidious and incredulous things, like the “Big Lie” and Dr. Oz running for Pennsylvania Senate while living in New Jersey.
Despite all this, I’m still going to ask you to vote (more on this below). While I don’t have trust in institutions that are built on delusion, I do have trust in the power of organizing to cut through the delusion. In my case, this looks like working to elect progressive candidates who will apply clear-seeing in transforming our political systems. My gooey little heart believes that we can overcome the dysfunctional habit energy that this country was built upon through organizing people-powered movements. It is a bit of a romantic notion so here is one last Baldwin reference for you because he was on this heart tip too:
In one way or another, one is very much a prisoner of his time. But I know what I’ve seen and what I’ve seen makes me know I have to say, I know. I won’t say I believe, because I know that we can be better than we are. That’s the sum total of my wisdom in all these years. We can also be infinitely worse, but I know that the world we live in now is not necessarily the best world we can make. I can’t be entirely wrong. There’re two things we have to do - love each other and raise our children. We have to do that!
James Baldwin, “Reflections of a Maverick” with Julius Lester
Cut through the delusion! Keep on looking! Love each other! Organize! We have to do that!
xo Jessica
Bonus: read my Arena Journal entry on moving out of paralysis through organizing.
New York State: Vote Working Families Party
If you’re currently a resident of New York State, consider voting on the Working Families Party ballot line. The Working Families Party is a national grassroots political party building a multiracial movement outside of the two-party system.
By voting on the Working Families Party ballot line for Governor Hochul and down-ballot candidates, we can make it clear that New Yorkers want truly affordable housing, fully funded public schools, and taxes on the ultra-rich. For non-New Yorkers, the Working Families Party is national. You can find a breakdown of WFP candidates by state here.
Right now there are five congressional seats in New York that could flip Republican. This is the same amount of seats the Republicans need to win back the House of Representatives. In a midterm year, when turnout is typically about half that of a presidential election, your vote has a lot of impact. Remember that last year, New York lost a congressional seat after coming only 89 people short on the census. Your engagement right now matters.
Work with me.
You can find me weekly at Heal Haus, monthly at Inner Fields and five days a week at Arena.
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