You know those times when you're thinking very deeply about something and you come up with a brilliant idea that is so revolutionary, so unique, so groundbreaking it makes you believe you're the first to have ever thought it? Sometimes you very well might be the first and other times you discover that you are just behind on a current and popular discussion. The latter happened to me recently.
I do a lot of writing and research on issues concerning racism, sexism, and gendered violence and quite often find myself saying the following phrases in reference to awful incidents that result from these: "White supremacists are just crazy," "Patriarchy causes people to form delusions," "Bigots are unbalanced and insane." I found myself and people around me saying such things so often that I started to wonder if there was some truth in the statement - are people who truly believe that they are better than others based off their skin color, their chromosomes, their orientation actually unhinged? Are they actually suffering from delusions? Should we be thinking of ways to help them return to sanity? Could such things be related to serious mental illness? This is not to say that people who suffer from mental illness are crazy and delusional, their symptoms are very real, but others often view them as illogical which then worsens their conditions. Furthermore, this is most certainly not to de-legitimize the seriousness of mental illness but to think about the ways we discuss mental illness and the ways we discuss racism, sexism, and other isms.
Like I said, this is not a novel discussion, although for a second I thought I was on to something brand new. It is a debate that has been happening for many years. So here, I would like to share this question with anyone else who was unaware of it by offering some of the arguments around the topic and by putting in my two cents - because the view we each have of such extreme prejudices can greatly dictate what actions are taken before and after incidents of huge concern and loss occur. So for today, I will focus on one of the larger categories by discussing the case study of white supremacy. Should white supremacy be considered a mental illness?
Here were my immediate thoughts on the matter - Yes, white supremacists are absolutely insane. Like have you seen Trump rallies? These people obviously have some issues that need to be dealt with. Have you read the accounts of white police officers who have shot unarmed black men? They describe victims as monsters, the Tazmanian devil, zombies, demons, Hulk Hogan, and more. Isn't this a symptom of schizophrenia? Wouldn't it be kind of nice to say to someone who expresses feelings of superiority based on their race something like: "Oh no, it seems you're experiencing symptoms of white supremacy and I think you should see a specialist about this." Or, since we're trying to tighten gun laws by doing mental health screenings, people experiencing white supremacy would be unable to purchase a gun... Now you might be expecting me to say that they are so crazy they even commit terrible offenses against people of color by killing them and then justifying their actions, but here is where the debate gets more clouded and very tricky.
Do we want white people who kill other people to be able to get off more easily because they can claim that they were suffering from mental illness? As stated in this powerful article by Arthur Chu, saying '"the real issue is mental illness" is a goddamn cop-out." To add on, Julia Craven says the following through her writing: "Racism is not a mental illness. Unlike actual mental illnesses, it is taught and instilled." Furthermore, people with mental illness are more likely to be victimized than they are to victimize others. Finally, here is another useful quote to reflect on "combining white supremacy with mental illness, especially in the context of hate crimes and terrorist attacks, adds to the stigma surrounding mental illness," a stigma that is desperately in need of being eliminated.
For now, I have come to the conclusion that while categorizing acts of violence as results of illness can help some of us deal with the seeming lack of logic that comes with injustice, it is not actually a completely accurate assessment. Instead, things like white supremacy and patriarchy exist in a category of their own that is influenced by centuries of creating oppression, strategically putting evil laws and systems in place, cycles of control and anger that have now lead to an immense fear of retaliation. And this, the humongous nature of the isms and the problems they cause, is why they do still deserve extra attention and intervention. No, I now do not think that such things should be equated to mental illness but yes, I do think they require their own categorization, monitoring, and mediation.