Is Racism a Form of Mental Illness?
The answer is complicated.
Have you ever talked to a racist? Really talk to them. If you have, then you know that feeling of utter confusion and disbelief you have when listening. They just make no sense. They refuse to listen to facts. They become incensed when they are told they are wrong. They may look maniacal. They just seem off. Something is not right. You walk away thinking they are not quite right. You may even call them crazy because they just don’t make sense. Have you felt that they may even be a danger to themselves or others?
I don’t like to use the word crazy because mental illness is just that an illness, but is racism an illness that can be cured with therapy and perhaps medication? Mental illness is defined by the American Psychological Association as “health conditions involving changes in emotion, thinking, or behavior (or a combination of these)”. The way we feel, think or behave towards something, someone, or someplace can be defined as a mental illness if it falls outside of “normal” behavior as defined by social norms.
Let’s think about that for a minute. One could say that racism for many centuries was the norm in America, but we must balance that with the knowledge that only one group engages in this behavior. So, can we really say it was the norm if only one specific group is engaging in a way of feeling, thinking, and behaving that results in the oppression, marginalization, and often death of everyone else?
Is it normal to engage in racism?
Merriam-Webster defines racism as “a belief that race is a fundamental determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race. It is a behavior or attitudes that reflect and foster this belief through racial discrimination or prejudice”. The definition of racism incorporates many of the keywords in the definition of mental illness, emotion/attitude, thinking/belief, behavior. Clearly, individuals that engage in racism have a change in the way they feel, think, and behave towards others that results in the harm of others. We cannot begin to calculate the harm of racism.
The damage, suffering, trauma, anguish, and distress of racism.
The toll of racism in America and around the world is astronomical. People have justified enslavement with racism. Our criminal justice system was designed around racism. Our health care system is rife with racism. Our educational system regularly miseducates black children. Discrimination in housing. Health disparities. Economic disparities. Environmental racism. Suicides. Depression. The list goes on. Study after study has demonstrated the harm of racism. Yet, racism has never been declared a crime nor formally classified as a mental illness. Rather racism, particularly negligent racism has been largely ignored in America.
Hold on, I can hear you now asking “What about the Civil Rights Act?” Doesn’t that protect people from racism? Yes and No. The Civil Rights Act protects individuals against State Actors. In other words, the poll person cannot ask you to count jelly beans before you can vote. Additionally, the Civil Rights Act only protects individuals against private businesses and other individuals if it involves interstate commerce. In terms of day-to-day racism, also known as negligent racism, as individuals, we are completely unprotected.
If racism is a form of mental illness why hasn’t the American Psychological Association classified racism as a mental illness in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)? The DSM does not include racism, prejudice, or bigotry in either its text or index and there is no support to do so. This leads psychiatrists to believe that they should not and cannot treat racism as well as perceive racism as normative and not pathological. In other words, it legitimizes racism.
The question is, why would the American Psychological Association see individuals that target entire groups of people for elimination to resolve conflicts as normative and not delusional? We don’t need to look further than the American Psychological Association to understand why. Last year the American Psychological Association apologized to Black people, Indigenous People, and People of Color for structural racism in psychiatry. The American Psychological Association, like the rest of the healthcare system in America, is not only rife with racism, but the system is rife with racists. Instead, we had a psychiatrist diagnosing the desire to be free as a mental illness. During Slavery Dr. Samuel Cartwright promoted the idea that enslaved Black people (he did not call them Black people) who experienced an “unyielding” desire to be free were in the midst of a mental illness called “Drapetomania”.
Drapetomania is a mental illness that causes Negroes to run away, as defined by Dr. Cartwright. This was just one of the many mental illnesses Black people were diagnosed with for desiring things like not wanting to be a Slave or enduring the indignities and torture of Slavery.
So. A Black person who fails to submit and obey White Supremacy is mentally ill, but a racist is normal. Hmmm. If you think that this nonsense has not been transferred into the treatment that Black people receive in healthcare today, you would be wrong.
Despite many Black psychiatrists lobbying over the years to have racism included as a mental illness, the American Psychological Association has patently refused to do so. Yet they apologize for being racist all these years.
What would it mean to have racism declared a mental illness?
Many believe that doing so would be a get out of racism jail-free card, but it could be just the opposite. When you go outside, are you naked, screaming, and talking about hearing or seeing things that are not there. No, because the American Psychological Association declared that this type of behavior may be indicative of psychosis and land you on a psychiatric hold for evaluation and even committed for a prolonged period of time. Instead, you control your behavior, unless you are unable to due to a mental illness. In terms of racism, an individual engaging in negligent racism because we live in a system of no harm, no foul in regards to racism will stop because they understand this type of behavior is not within the normal range of behavior and could land them in a psychiatric hold. It would be a deterrent. For those that engage in racism because they cannot control the delusion of racism, they would be committed until their behavior could become modified because they are a danger to themselves and others. Individuals suffering under the delusion of racism would still be liable for criminal violations, as in any other mental illness.
Why this is important?
Our society is controlled in many sectors by racist people, who make racist policies. Racism doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Racist individuals are the creators of systemic and institutionalized racism. It is time to address the core of racism and stop attempting to solve this racism through DEI training.
