Reality enforcement

Reality enforcement, in radical idealist theory, is the maintenance or promotion of belief in consensus reality, or any kind of action taken, or sanctions applied against, opponents of consensus reality.

The theory of reality enforcement is opposed by those who believers in the theory call "reality enforcers," who hold that since consensus reality would obviously exist without any sort of action or reinforcement on their part, there cannot be any such thing as "reality enforcement." The theory is open to criticism on the basis that "reality enforcement," on its face, cannot exist, as "enforcement" would play no part in a reality that exists a priori. (The term "reality" in the phrase "reality enforcement" is used loosely, as shorthand for "consensus reality".)

Believers in reality enforcement are typically sympathetic to anti-psychiatry and would describe involuntary commitment as often being a form of reality enforcement (as in the course of treatment the patient may be encouraged to abandon beliefs the psychiatrist considers to be delusions and thus to have his beliefs come into line with consenus reality).

"Reality enforcement" is also used in other, only loosely related senses.

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Reality Enforcement Commission is a comic by Neilson Nguyen, with artwork by Nora Summers.