In particular, we all need to read and absorb the analysis of Michael Hogg, professor and chair of social psychology at Claremont Graduate University (see Scientific American, September 2019, pp. 79–81). He shows that a state of ‘self-uncertainty social identity’ is fodder for the internet ‘information nodes’ like Twitter and Facebook. These ‘I-do-belong-here’ platforms keep participants feeding on the amplified disinformation that everyone inside the group is better than everyone outside it, and that only inside are we safe. This repetitive, stupefying experience is its own kind of interruption of independent thinking, if not a killer of it.

Similarly, there is an understanding of schools, workplaces, and public spaces of our society that we would like people to trust— that they are basically fair places that offer genuine and equal opportunity. But for people like George Floyd, and others whose families and communities have experienced identity-based disadvantages, this proposition can be difficult to trust. Saying that these places are now color-blind doesn’t help much. People remember. They know that the inequalities that stem from those disadvantages have not been remedied.

Our society has an inherent challenge: Many of its settings still have features that reflect our identity-stratified history and organization. Our schools, workplaces, churches, classrooms, civic organizations, and boardrooms have features that can make it harder for some identities to trust that they are a part of the “we” in the setting. Identity-blindness implies that, along with identity itself, these features don’t matter much— they can, or should, be ignored. But they do matter— to all of us. Think of being the “only one” or “one of only a few” in any important setting— as my hands reminded me, for example: one of only a few whites in a Black History seminar, one of only a few Blacks in a symphony orchestra, or one of only a few women in an advanced math course on Riemann surfaces. But there’s good news: as the Stephens experiment and the 3M company show, when these features are addressed, improvements can happen, sometimes without much effort or cost.

The actor’s perspective is different. The actor— the person in the setting coping with, among other things, the possibility of being stereotyped— is not looking at himself. He’s looking out at the circumstances he’s dealing with. It’s those circumstances that stand out to him, not himself. He’s likely, then, at least in large part, to see the effects of stereotypes differently than an observer: not as an idea about his group that he comes to believe at the expense of his own confidence and life outcomes but more simply as a threat posed by other people in the setting. He sees their stereotype-driven judgments and treatment of him that could disadvantage him in important settings like school, a business situation, or a traffic stop.

So, to the question of how to build trust in diverse settings, Churn recommends taking the actor’s perspective. It’s a mindset that searches for what people in the setting are contending with, including what they are contending with because of their identities.

Lerner argued as follows: To feel comfortable in the world, we need to believe the world is basically just— that generally people get what they deserve. Thus when we see a person suffering for little reason, it upsets us by implying that maybe the world isn’t just. And to restore that injured image, we might actually derogate such a victim— blame them for their suffering— as a way of restoring our needed belief that the world is just, and that people do in fact get what they deserve.

In one of the most surprising findings in the history of social psychology, this is just what happened. Subjects derogated the victim, downgrading her personality and character.