Interdisciplinary Book and Film Reviews

  PICKING COTTON      Our Memoir of Injustice and Redemption By   Jennifer Thompson-Cannino   & Ronald Cotton      With   Erin Torneo Reviewed By   Geoffrey W. Sutton   I was interested in Picking Cotton for several reasons. As a psychologist and researcher I have helped people deal with interpersonal offenses for over 45 years. My focus has been on forgiveness and reconciliation. But there are more lessons in this book. In view of recent events the book serves to illustrate social injustice and racism. In addition, we see the serious problem of faulty eyewitness testimony evident in the experiments of Elizabeth Loftus. So for these reasons, I recommend this book to a broad spectrum of readers. And would especially recommend it to my colleagues in counselling and mental health. The book opens with the horrible account of Jennifer’s rape. She’s a young white college student in bed in her own home. Somehow she concentrated on his features—then, when the opp

WHITE FRAGILITY:  Why It’s So Hard for White People  to Talk About Racism      By Robin DiAngelo     Reviewed by        Geoffrey W. Sutton   White Fragility is a best seller with a surge in interest during this 2020 springtime of protests against racism. The concept, white fragility , is now a part of everyday discourse—at least among those who endorse the concept. Even if you disagree with most or all of DiAngelo’s ideas, I think it worth reading or listening to if you live in, or are part of, the world where white people are, or were, oppressive in their actions toward black people. I listened to the AUDIBLE version on a trial.   The path to white fragility in America begins a few centuries ago. DiAngelo does not dwell on the past but draws back the curtain on the historic wasteland so we have a context.   “Claiming that the past was socially better than the present is also a hallmark of white supremacy. Consider any period in the past from the perspective of people