David Brooks, columnist for the New York Times, recently wrote an insightful article titled "The Shame Culture". In it, he cites an essay written by Andy Crouch in Christianity Today in which Crouch references the difference between a shame culture and a guilt culture. Brooks summarizes the difference as such:
"In a guilt culture you know you are good or bad by what your conscience feels. In a shame culture you know you are good or bad by what your community says about you, by whether it honors or excludes you. In a guilt culture people sometimes feel they do bad things; in a shame culture, social exclusion makes people feel they are bad.”
Brooks goes on to highlight the nature of this new shame culture by explaining the behaviors of its participants. Since social media is so prevalent, morality has easily become based upon going along with the crowd, or rather, upon fear of exclusion. This fear of exclusion encourages people to separate into groups, to have certain people who monitor others so that the subjective moral status quo is maintained, and to have people who demand that their ideas and rights be recognized and respected.
Unfortunately, examples abound.
At Yale this past October, Professor Erika Christakis, who lives with the students at one of the colleges, sent out an email to her students discussing the recent reminders from other administrators asking students to be mindful of the costumes they wear for Halloween and stay away from potentially offensive outfits. Christakis disagreed with these other administrators, and she suggested that perhaps it would better if the students themselves discuss and disagree amongst themselves rather than have adult administrators do it for them. In her email, she wrote, "American universities were once a safe space not only for maturation but also for a certain regressive, or even transgressive, experience; increasingly, it seems, they have become places of censure and prohibition. And the censure and prohibition come from above, not from yourselves! Are we all okay with this transfer of power?” This email was met with vitriol and bitter opposition from the students, eventually leading to a standoff between students and Nicholas Christakis, Erika’s husband and fellow professor, in which he was cursed out by the students, who demanded that he and his wife be fired. Effectively, this man was shamed by a group who demanded that their ideas and sensitivities be protected, not challenged — a complete and total reflection of shame culture.
The writer and filmmaker Jon Ronson gave a TED talk discussing this modern propensity for shaming. In it, he gave a very poignant example of how a woman, Justine Sacco, tweeted a race joke attempting the same humor that South Park or Colbert is known for. “Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just kidding. I’m white!” the quote read, attempting to make fun of white American’s tendencies to be ignorant of their privilege. Unfortunately for her, the tweet was not seen for the subpar attempt at comedy it was, but rather a horrible example of racism that should be shamed publicly. This woman and her tweet became the number one trending topic in the world on Twitter that night, and due to this incredibly widespread negative publicity, her public image was effectively ruined. Ronson summarized the reasons shaming is such a popular pastime, commenting that “Twitter is a mutual approval machine. We surround ourselves with people who feel the same way we do. We approve of each other and that’s a really good feeling. If somebody gets in the way, we scream them out.”
For me, the best way to understand just how entrenched in this culture I am is to ask myself this question: when was the last time I considered that something I believe in may actually be wrong? If my answer leaves me feeling a bit guilty, a feeling of regret for being so narrow-minded, then good! By no means, however, do I feel ashamed.
