Lack of knowledge about other countries is very common in the West. Distorted perspectives often serve domestic political purposes — also psychological purposes. The portrayal of white Zimbabweans as self-indulgent racists who lived high on the hog has a powerful psychological benefit for most Westerners, in that it makes them, as other beneficiaries of Western imperialism, seem more tolerant and less racist in their own eyes. After all, they never left the shores of Western countries to exploit any blacks. The lie entailed in this sentence should already be evident. However, projective identification is an extremely intense psychological mechanism that overrides empirical fact and reason. If one has the need to believe that others are more evil than you are, so you can diffuse your guilt, you will believe this no matter what.
Evidence is not so important. The need to get rid of an intolerable psychological burden is what counts. Hence, most Westerners have illusions about their identities — and about their morality.
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