Rather than informing an appropriate course of action, the more immediate, visceral, intensely powerful, emotional - possibly blunter - response can overwhelm the slower, more elaborately calibrated, evaluative system. We become paralysed by fear. We lose a sense of control and panic ensues. Our thoughts are distorted and we become disorganised by fear. In this frenzied state of mind we cannot respond to reason.

The outsized affective component involved in these performances constitutes one of the hallmarks of the unconscious reaction formation. The desire for whiteness - which is unconscious - is so threatening that it must be defended at all costs. The conscious mind responds, therefore, with an emotional discharge that, while ostensibly an overreaction, is in fact directly proportional to this unconscious sense of threat.

When I was a boy, I wasn’t often seen. I was looked after, cared for. I was held and comforted, especially after some painful experience. But I wasn’t often seen. I was a good boy when inside I wanted to rage. I tried hard, all the time, when inside I wanted not to care. I was compliant, and therefore complicit, in not being fully appreciated.

A serious problem with reactive language is that it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. People become reinforced in the paradigm that they are determined, and they produce evidence to support the belief. They feel increasingly victimized and out of control, not in charge of their life or their destiny. They blame outside forces—other people, circumstances, even the stars—for their own situation.

If you pay attention to chronic victims, you’ll notice how fragile they are— how dependent their attitudes and feelings are on things they don’t control. When things go their way, they’re happy; when things don’t, they’re defensive, passive-aggressive, and occasionally aggressive-aggressive. If their spouse is in a bad mood, they’re in a bad mood too. If they hit traffic on the way to work, they bring their anger and frustration to work with them. If a project they’re leading isn’t on track, they blame someone on their team.