Book Review: Wilful Blindness
Book Review: Willful Blindness by Author Margaret Heffernan
Reviewed by: Faith Wood, Inspiring Minds Consulting
In spite of our protests to the contrary, we as individuals prefer the familiar to the unfamiliar. We prefer to surround ourselves by people who think like us and share our ideals and values. We crave conformity over critical thinking and individuality – heck our schools and industries are filled with examples of talented people ‘towing the party line’. This may allow us to construct a world around us that feels cozy and safe but it also blinds us to valuable information and behaviours that should alert or alarm us. We stay silent when we should speak out or question for fear of being ostracized or ousted by the group. This fear of not belonging primes us into becoming willfully blind.
The term of being willfully blind is a legal phrase that can be traced to the nineteenth century. It refers to a situation where – if an individual could have and should have known something, then the law treats it as if he knew it. The claim of not knowing isn’t a sufficient defense. Heffernan notes: “The law doesn’t care why you remain ignorant, only that you do.”
Examples of willful blindness are evident everywhere; from ignoring (or failing to read) your financial statements to delaying attending the doctor for a symptom that just won’t go away. We tell ourselves that ‘ignorance is bliss’. Unfortunately, this level of inattention can ultimately destroy us. After all, just because we don’t look at the statement doesn’t mean we don’t owe the money and won’t still lose the house. Author Margaret Heffernan poses that when capitalism is part of the equation, the tendency to be deliberately blind elevates exponentially. Corporate executives greedy for compensation, politicians who vote for legislation knowing it will never work and auditors who turn blind eyes to findings because they don’t want to lose their client’s business all make destructive blunders because of willful blindness. The conclusion Heffernan reaches is that fear of change and conflict can blind us to evidence. And so can the power of the almighty dollar.
Chapter by chapter, the author challenges readers to stop turning a blind eye. She points to historical evidence such as the days of the Hitler regime – so many people who turned away – who did not want to see what was happening right under their noses. Heffernan quotes a letter written to an Austrian concentration camp by a local woman during the Second World War in which the woman requests that “inhuman deeds be discontinued, or else be done where no one has to see them.” The fact that you don’t want to see that which makes you uncomfortable doesn’t change what’s happening or your culpability as a bystander.
As the pages turn, readers explore indisputable evidence of willful blindness. With research found across personal, corporate and political genres, we read about the dire effects of our decision to remain blind. From the BP refinery explosion in Texas and in the Gulf, to Enron, to hurricane Katrina, and the subprime mortgage meltdown, to tanning beds, Bernie Madoff and global warming – there are too many examples to ignore and yet our ability to do so is staggering.
Heffernan notes that “people are about twice as likely to seek information that supports their own point of view as they are to consider an opposing idea.” They’re particularly “resistant to changing what they know how to do, what they have expertise in and certainly what they have economic investment in.” We mostly admit the information that makes us feel great about ourselves, while conveniently filtering whatever unsettles our egos. A challenge to our big ideas feels life-threatening. And so we strive mightily to reduce the pain, either by ignoring the evidence that proves we are wrong, or by reinterpreting evidence to support us.
In today’s fast paced society, our demand for longer working hours and quest for multi-tasking regiments is only contributing to our vulnerability and putting us at even greater peril.
In her captivating book, Margaret Heffernan poses a few antidotes to Willful Blindness and implores us to stop being so comfortable (complacent). She warns that if a group is too comfortable with one another, it ought to sound alarm bells. For it is when we are most uncomfortable that we are able to avoid slipping into the mind-trap of “willful blindness”.
