The Indifferent

The following is a portrait of indifference, a psychosocial analysis of middle class bystanding of social suffering. It arises as a way to tell a research story of colonially produced racism, classism and denial. Together, these ways of being produce a mode of perception that denies reality, an active erasure that makes the indifferent apathetic. It is based on research in (post)colonial Jamaica yet some of its features can be recognized elsewhere, where bystanders bury their witness, their insight, concealing their understanding of other’s pain. Because this portrait is based on what male and female research participants said, ‘he/she’ are used interchangeably throughout the portrait.