Part Of The Population Descends Fully Into Denial
I know I’m getting a bit redundant here, but denial is a huge and common issue: It can and does regularly lead to deaths and abuse. And it is ALWAYS employed by intentional bigots and authoritarians. So it’s worth it to really understand what is going on with people in denial.
When denial is in use, people are at least partially blind to the extent and impact of whatever they are in denial about. Denial is not “just” hardheaded stubbornness: it is dangerously impaired thinking. Active alcoholics really don’t believe they have problems. Despite that fourth DWI. Really.
Denial distorts thinking. People will minimize, distort, overstate, over generalize, make false equivalences, lie by omission, project their motivations onto others, rationalize their beliefs using ridiculous bits of anecdotal evidence and/or just make shit up.
The same dynamic of denial applies to intentional* bigots. If you’ve ever tried to engage in real debate with an intentional* bigot, you know this is true. They are simply impervious to reasonable arguments.
The alcoholic in denial who will dismiss mountains of reasonable evidence that prove his alcoholism. Bigots and authoritarians will repeatedly and emphatically deny they are racist or sexist and then turn around and do things that are exceedingly racist or sexist. This confuses people and is often thought of as gaslighting. And it is. but isn’t even sadder still to know that anyone that will lie to your face about their obvious actions -is unable- to even recognize, much less healthily process their own motivations?
So denial, produces (by definition, really) totally shitty judgement about the topic the person or group is in denial about. That’s the bottom line. People in denial should not be in charge of a box of crayons, much less be in any decision making positions anywhere near related to the topic they are in denial about. Yet they will often be drawn to wanting control OVER those very issues. And that can easily become very dangerous. It really can’t be over emphasized: People in denial will use any means available to them to justify their false beliefs (whether about their drinking, their bigotry, or any number of other issues) no matter how strained, unreasonable, narrow, or illogical. This true of all people who are in denial. And, not coincidentally, denial is a common way for people to avoid very difficult facts,which is exactly what Cultural PTSD theory indicates people will do on both the personal and cultural levels.