Let it be said that I am no stranger to shame. Truthfully, I suspect most people aren’t strangers either. But there are those like me who often find themselves cohabitating with shame, a ballsy roommate who raids your refrigerator and refuses to give up the remote, subjecting you to a curated set of films, programs, and videos designed to bring your shame into even sharper focus. Once shame has moved in and claimed squatter’s rights, you can forget about eviction. And just when you think you might vacate and move on to a new place, you find that shame has already loaded her suitcase into the back of your car, that she has buckled herself into the passenger’s seat and reminded you: Whither you go, I will go.

I admit that much of my shame has been self-imposed, thus making me both landlord and tenant of the psychological, emotional, and spiritual house I inhabit. I’ve thought a lot about why I so willingly host shame and have often seemed powerless to evict her. Licensed clinical psychologist and author Marilyn J. Sorensen writes that [u]nlike guilt, which is the feeling of doing something wrong, shame is the feeling of being something wrong. I think this comes closest to explaining my landlord status. I give shame permission to take partial possession of my house because I fear that I am something wrong.  I’m something wrong because of what I believe, what I don’t believe, what I’ve felt, what I haven’t felt, what I’ve dreamt, what I’ve failed to dream–the list goes on. In short, there have been many times in my life when I looked at who I thought I was and found myself sorely lacking, at times enough so that I felt paralyzed by and powerless in the face of shame.

And so, given my familiarity with shame–self-imposed and otherwise–I should have some expertise navigating the current climate of shame. That’s what I thought, but I was wrong. My boat has capsized, and I’m struggling to even tread water. I’m in trouble.

After weeks of furious treading, I’ve decided that my real problem lies fundamentally in my confusion about shaming. That is, is shaming generally a necessary means to a desired end? Or is shaming rarely, if ever, a necessary means to any end? Is shaming primarily a whole group rather than individual act? Or is shaming–if used at all–generally more appropriate and effective on the individual level? Is shaming a natural and acceptable consequence of all sorts of moral and social evils? Or perhaps is shaming a natural consequence of all sorts of evils but one that shouldn’t be condoned? The bottom line: Is shaming necessary and “good” or not?

When I’ve turned to those who have studied and written about shame, I’ve discovered that–suprise, surprise–they don’t always agree. Author, speaker, and licensed social worker Brene Brown is one of these authorities. Consider her words:

—Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change.

—We cannot grow when we are in shame, and we can’t use shame to change ourselves or others.

—You cannot talk about race without talking about privilege. And when people start talking about privilege, they get paralyzed by shame.

—Guilt is just as powerful, but its influence is positive, while shame’s is destructive. Shame erodes our courage and fuels disengagement. 

Brown is perhaps best known for her research on and willingness to talk openly about shame and its effects. She contends we can all agree that feeling shame is an incredibly painful experience, and that even if those who’ve shamed us apologize, the truth is that those shaming comments leave marks.

Or consider these words from Joseph Burgo who wrote “Challenging the Anti-Shame Zeitgeist” for Atlantic:

The consensus within our culture is clear: shame is a uniquely destructive force, and one to be resisted. Movie stars, educators, pop icons, psychologists, and spokespeople for the pride movements will all tell you the same thing — shame is the enemy. It drives those individuals who are different into the shadows. It causes us to hide our vulnerability, distancing us from those we love. It enforces conformity and stifles the creative or dissident individual. It kills the spirit.

Or consider the claims of Willard Gaylin, writer and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry Emeritus at Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons:

—Shame and guilt are noble emotions essential in the maintenance of civilized society, and vital for the development of some of the most refined and elegant qualities of human potential.     

—But, like other aversive emotions such as fear, shame is functional to the extent that it encourages goal-directed behavior and survival. There is now substantial psychological evidence – including physiological, cross cultural, social, and evolutionary – to suggest that shame helps us to negotiate group life by alerting us to when our membership of, or status within, groups is at risk.

Or Kara Alaimo, a global public relations consultant, professor and writer for Bloomberg (2017):

But shaming can also be good for society, because it allows us to hold people and organizations responsible for bad behavior. Witness the ad Dove posted in October showing a black woman turning into a white woman with its product. The picture immediately generated lots of criticism online, and rightly so. The company apologized. Similarly, in January, activists exposed the identity of Mike Enoch, a prolific podcaster who founded the website The Right Stuff. Enoch, who peddles in horrific racism and anti-Semitism, deserved to be called out for his abuse. He was fired by his employer.

Or John Amodeo, Ph.D. and author of “The Power of Healthy Shame” (Psychology Today):

—A positive aspect of shame is that it tells us when we’ve hurt someone, when we’ve crossed a boundary that violates a person’s dignity.

—Shame grabs our attention. If we can pause and notice it rather than plow forward, we have an opportunity to correct our behavior.

—Being mindful of our shame offers an option to apologize as a way to rebuild trust.

I could go on and on quoting writers, authorities, commentators, and ordinary people who hold very different views on shame and effects on behaviors and beliefs. And I could provide even more diverse views on if and when there are conditions or situations in which we should use shame as a primary tool for change.

Before I go futher, however, I want to concede the following:

1. Our nation, like many of the world’s nations, has a history of systemic racism. Tragically, this continues.
2. Blacks deserve opportunities to thrive in safe environments, as well as laws and practices that guarantee this.
3. The institution of American law enforcement sorely needs reform, including better and more training involving deescalation strategies, increased accountability, and serious consideration and redefinition of the responsibilities of law enforcement officers.
4. As a white woman, I have privileges that many blacks do not have.
5. The right to peacefully protest has always been, and continues to be, a valuable, poweful, and legal way to affect change.

For the past few weeks, I’ve read, heard, and watched others who have argued that I should be ashamed, truly ashamed, of the fact that I am a privileged white woman. I should be ashamed of who I am because being white is the real problem, more aggregious even than what I’ve done/said or haven’t done/said. Honestly, I admit that I haven’t done enough to help end systemic racism, to change the institutions and laws that need changing, to listen and consider closely enough. And I accept guilt for this.

As a human being, however, I’m struggling with whether or not accepting shame for the skin color I was born with and can’t change, will serve as a positive catalyst for change in my own life. Right now, more than anything I feel shame’s destructive nature, how, as Brown writes, it erodes our courage and fuels disengagement. That’s why I’m furiously treading water instead of truly engaging. That’s why I feel that, at any given moment, I might just stop treading and let myself sink to the quiet depths of despair– even though I’m painfully aware that many will regard all of this treading and disengaging as even more cause for shame.

If you listen or read enough, you soon realize that there are many voices vying to be recognized. It appears to me that some of these voices matter a lot, and others, not so much, if at all. This appears to be true even within the same race–black or white. The shaming may occur even when you acknowledge a voice that matters, but you also acknowledge a voice that one group has claimed doesn’t matter. The shaming occurs when you’re not on the right side, when you don’t hold the right view, say the right things, feel the right things. And this shaming is an equal opportunity force. There’s a tsunami of shaming sweeping through every ideological camp. And for those of us who have lived with a fair amount of our own shame for years, this storm threatens to drown rather than motivate us.

I have more questions and more heartfelt concerns than answers. Still, I’m plagued with what legacies I will leave my black son and my white grandchildren. I fiercely love my son and have done what I could to help him understand that he should never be ashamed of his skin color, of who he was born to be. And I fiercely love my granddaughter and grandson. But what should I help them understand about their race? That it’s not enough to acknowledge and accept guilt for what their race has done and continues to do, that it’s not enough to be a catalyst for real systemic change in their own lives, but that for any of this to matter, they must denounce their race and embrace the shame of their whiteness? Am I to help them understand that although I want their uncle to be proud of his black heritage, they should be ashamed of their white one? If I listen to many voices today, the answer would be yes to all of the above. As I wrote in a previous post, I find that I can only weep.

In Till We Have Faces, Christian theologian and writer, C. S. Lewis writes:

“I felt ashamed.”

“But of what? Psyche, they hadn’t stripped you naked or anything?”

“No, no, Maia. Ashamed of looking like a mortal — of being a mortal.”

“But how could you help that?”

“Don’t you think the things people are most ashamed of are things they can’t help?”

This is where I am right now. Perhaps more than anything, I’m ashamed of being a mortal. And because I’m a mere mortal, I’m struggling with the notion of whether or not I should feel shame for the things I can’t help. Still, I’m hopeful that, even as a mortal–albeit a white mortal– I will soon stop treading water and have the courage and conviction to begin the slow swim towards a better somewhere. And I’m hopeful that once I get there, I will find it to be a place where my son and my grandchildren–where all mere mortals–are safe, valued, and flourishing.

End Note:

British Indian novelist Salman Rushdie wrote that [s]hame is like everything else; live with it for long enough and it becomes part of the furniture.  I’m quite confident that there will be those who will read my words here and argue that I should be ashamed for who I am or who I’m not, for what I’ve done or what I’ve failed to do. And so, I’m just as confident that I’ll soon find myself sharing a sofa and bowl of popcorn again with the roomate who has become just like another part of the furniture, a persistent and permanent fixture.