Convenient Fantasies

White superiority is killing America. More than the cult of selfishness, which New York Times columnist Paul Krugman blames for America’s catastrophic response to the pandemic, the ingrained self-delusion required by white supremacy has rendered the American public helpless when faced with unpalatable facts.

Institutions like the government, the education system and the media have perpetrated the lie that white people are innately superior. Once one acclimates to disavowing truth, embracing convenient fantasies suddenly becomes so much easier.

President Donald Trump is our fantasizer-in-chief. His followers would rather die, literally, than to challenge his coronavirus fables, which have included such “cures” as hydroxychloroquine, powerful light and injecting isinfectants, and such unbelievable assessments as the pandemic is “getting under control” and that “99%” of COVID-19 cases are “totally harmless.”

Since science has shown race to be a social construct, science can’t matter to those whose self-worth depends on denigrating others.

During this pandemic, over 150,000 Americans have already died. Isn’t it past time to allow truth to cure us?

*originally published as a Letter to the Editor, The Dallas Morning News, August 4th, 2020.