Institutional Gaslighting and Knowledge Suppression

When Church authorities questioned Sor Juana's right to engage theological inquiry, they deployed gaslighting: suggesting her education was inappropriate, her conclusions suspect, her authority questionable. This institutional denial of her epistemic standing—her right to know and speak about knowledge—exemplifies how fairness gets undermined at the level of who gets recognized as a knower. Civilizations achieve apparent harmony by convincing excluded groups that their exclusion results from inability rather than prejudice. Sor Juana's 'Response to Sister Philotea' directly countered this by asserting: I have read, reasoned, and achieved; your denial of my capacity changes nothing. Fair systems must include mechanisms for individuals and groups to contest institutional denials of their competence and claim recognition for their actual intellectual contributions.