Confronting Racism with Mindfulness
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Confronting Racism with Mindfulness Bhikkhu Anālayo 1
# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Racial oppression is a longstanding and widespread problem with significant repercussions and consequences for the health of those impacted. The roots of racial prejudice reach far back into the history of European culture. A contribution to the muchneeded change can be found in the cultivation of mindfulness, in particular in its external dimension. This emerges from considering the background provided by the early Buddhist dismissal of caste prerogatives in the ancient Indian setting, granting priority to ethical conduct over birth. Besides opening up a new dimension for mindfulness-related research, which has so far predominantly focused on the internal cultivation of mindfulness, exploring the early Buddhist perspective also shows that diversity work can become an integral part of the Buddhist path of practice. This holds in particular for white Buddhists, who need to confront their superiority conceit as an obstruction to their own progress to liberation. Keywords Caste . Diversity . Discrimination . External mindfulness . Racial oppression . Racism . Superiority conceit . White supremacy
A range of reviews and meta-studies converge on highlighting the injurious repercussions of racial oppression on mental health and consequently also on physical health (Brondolo et al. 2009; Carter et al. 2017; Cook et al. 2019; Lee and Ahn 2011; Lee and Ahn 2012; Lee and Ahn 2013; Paradies et al. 2015; Pieterse et al. 2012; Shavers et al. 2012; Williams and Mohammed 2009; see also Pascoe and Richman 2009 and Schmitt et al. 2014 in the context of discrimination in general). In the USA, in particular, members of groups suffering from racial oppression tend to have inadequate access to mental health care and are in general likely to receive lower quality health treatment. Racial oppression, which besides health care also impacts education, employment, daily life, and criminal justice processes, acts as a chronic stressor that manifests in a broad range of ways. Its repercussions even result in members of racially oppressed groups suffering from higher rates of premature mortality. The horrible reality of racism has become only too evident with the recent killing of Georg Floyd by Minneapolis police (on 25 May, 2020), being yet another
* Bhikkhu Anālayo
1
Barre Center for Buddhist Studies, 149 Lockwood Road, Barre, MA 01005, USA
instance in the unceasing series of killings of unarmed black men in the USA. The staggering amount of harm caused in this way calls for widespread and sustained systemic change. By way of attempting to offer a contribution to the much-needed change, this article will explore the potential role of mindfulness in this respect, viewed from the context of relevant early Buddhist teachings. Before exploring these topics further, however, a survey of antecedents to racism in European history is required in order to evaluate how far contemporary manifestatio
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