{"id":17695,"date":"2025-11-06T16:41:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T16:41:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/?p=17695"},"modified":"2025-11-06T16:41:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T16:41:09","slug":"how-i-know-white-people-are-crazy-and-other-stories-by-dr-jonathan-mathias-lassiter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/2025\/11\/06\/how-i-know-white-people-are-crazy-and-other-stories-by-dr-jonathan-mathias-lassiter\/","title":{"rendered":"How I Know White People are Crazy and Other Stories by Dr. Jonathan Mathias Lassiter"},"content":{"rendered":"

c.2025, Legacy Lit\u00a0 <\/em>
\n$30.00\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 <\/em>
\n\u00a0320 pages<\/em><\/p>\n

By Terri Schlichenmeyer<\/em>
\nThe Truth Contributor<\/em><\/p>\n

It\u2019s enough to make you lose your mind.<\/p>\n

You see your goal, but there\u2019s a barrier in front of it, a barrier that makes no sense. Other people don\u2019t have to jump through hoops or over walls to succeed, feel safe, or get help so why do you?\u00a0 In How I Know White People are Crazy and Other Stories<\/em> by Dr. Jonathan Mathias Lassiter, <\/strong>you\u2019ll see that an old nemesis has a new name.<\/p>\n

He says he is not angry.<\/p>\n

Dr. Lassiter is just really, really frustrated and for good reason: throughout most of his life, his father\u2019s life and his grandfather\u2019s, through his college years and his career, Dr. Lassiter says that \u201cwhiteness mindset\u201d \u2013 defined as a condition that causes people of any race (but most often white people) to assume that their lives are more important than others, which allows them to justify oppressing those who are different – has never been far away.<\/p>\n

Sadly, Lassiter says, anyone can be on the receiving end of whiteness mindset, but it happens most often to the majority-minority including Black people, Asians, woman, and to gay people like him.<\/p>\n

He says that his grandfather lived under racism and it showed: he loved his children, but didn\u2019t feel that he could demonstrate it. Lassiter\u2019s father parented similarly because that\u2019s all he knew. Living low-income also affected Lassiter\u2019s mental health, as did the barriers he was forced to overcome in college due to racism and the oppression he felt because of his sexuality. Seeing what could be, if there were no such things as racism and oppression, didn\u2019t help.<\/p>\n

Through his work as a licensed clinical psychologist and the patients he\u2019s treated, he knows his experiences are not unique. He also knows that whiteness mindset is not limited to higher education or the workplace and to combat it, we first have to admit that whiteness<\/em> is not the\u00a0 concern. The mindset itself and what it does to mental health are bigger issues, and becoming educated is a great way to combat them.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t be surprised if you\u2019re a little confused at the outset of How I Know White People are Crazy and Other Stories<\/em>. It is confusing; Dr. Jonathan Mathias Lassiter writes quickly with a whirlwind of ideas that circle back to one another like ripples in a pond on a windy day. It might make you want to just back away.<\/p>\n

Instead, stick around and trust that the meat of the book is coming through stories of real-life counseling and of Lassiter\u2019s own life, experiences, and family history. These tales eventually settle the chaos down, offering the clarity missing in the opening pages and allowing readers to see \u201cwhiteness mindset\u201d in action and to understand the conflicts within it. You\u2019ll be able to cleanly see where Lassiter\u2019s frustration lies, and what can be done about it.<\/p>\n

Just know that to get there will take some doing and patience with How I Know White People Are Crazy and Other Stories<\/em>. Try it, though. Persevere, and you might not mind.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

c.2025, Legacy Lit\u00a0 $30.00\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0320 pages By Terri Schlichenmeyer The Truth Contributor It\u2019s enough to make you lose your mind. You see your goal, but there\u2019s a barrier in front of it, a barrier that makes no sense. Other people don\u2019t have to jump through hoops or over […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17696,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"wf_post_folders":[20],"class_list":["post-17695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book_review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17695"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17697,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17695\/revisions\/17697"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17695"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=17695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}