Ooh how interesting! I hadn’t thought about the white man’s burden in this way, but it makes sense and is interesting to consider how far away most white folks are from thinking of whiteness or white supremacy in these ways. Ethically speaking, I think this is what the white man’s burden ultimately means — he fucked things up, and now it’s his burden to fix it. The problem is that he (where “he” refers to those who embody white masculinity) doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong, that racism doesn’t exist, that we’re a colorblind society, etc. — probably because somewhere, deep down in the collective white unconscious, he knows that he’s done some very bad things, but if this were made conscious, then he’d not feel superior anymore… hence the toxic cycle of dominance/superiority.

And also, yes, I think that “superiority complex” is another way of saying “super inferiority,” because folks who try to act superior are ultimately those who feel inferior. I think a lot about what it means to perform lack, and this is a good example of how lack is performed… kind of like how bad people like to go out of their way to talk about how great they are, whereas good people don’t need to this because their actions already make their virtues clear.

Thank you for your comment, DD!