Does shame exist?

[Pure]

RS: "I just love watching people tell each other how they really feel. Lords know we're all too stupid to speak for ourselves on such subjects, n'est-ce pas?

Psychological bullshit: it's what's for dinner."

Funny I see hardly any of that at all. But I suppose right now I've told you how you really feel. Damn! And in disagreeing told you how stupid you are. Damn (bangs head on the wall).



PS Nice to see ya.!

 

[catalina_francisco]

So are we going to get back to the discussion topic, or is it all too much bother...if so there are plenty of threads designed for play.

Catalina

 

[RisiaSkye]

Does the topic exist?

 

[catalina_francisco]

Does the topic exist?

So good to see your brand of humour back here, but I thought you also had more than just humour and sarcasm to offer?

C

 

[AngelicAssassin]

So are we going to get back to the discussion topic ...

i believe the topic was being discussed.

It's a shame some can't feel guilty, or ashamed, when telling others what their thoughts on shame should have been.

But then, that would require a little humility wouldn't it?

i'll just ditto the following and get out of the conversation.

I have to agree with s'lara
It's perceptional
depends on the person and the situation
But yes, it exists

 

[catalina_francisco]

i believe the topic was being discussed.

It's a shame some can't feel guilty, or ashamed, when telling others what their thoughts on shame should have been.

But then, that would require a little humility wouldn't it?

i'll just ditto the following and get out of the conversation.

Guess that depends what level of conversation you enjoy...for me I like to do a little more than paraphrase the words associated with a topic and hope that fools people into thinking I am saying something worth the time of reading. No offence, but I am a little more than tired of every thread of any serious content being hijacked by the board comedians to make them feel good or whatever. If people are not interested in a topic, I can appreciate that, but no-one is about to force those people to contribute, while others that want to contribute or follow the topic get put off by the continual disruptions that seem to go on and on. As more than a few have noted, the Cafe is the place that was set up for those who wanted to have a place where they could joke and play without disturbing others. Of course there is also the theory that those who continually feel the need to turn everything into humour are doing so in an effort to avoid dealing with their reality....maybe so, but I doubt that is the problem here for all those who hijack.

Catalina

 

[AngelicAssassin]

Guess that depends what level of conversation you enjoy...
Catalina

i enjoy conversations on all levels, and made that clear at the beginning of this thread.

i asked for your definitions to make sure i understood how to answer.

Let's have your definition of shame and then embarrassment first.

i took Never's

These are the definitions I’m working off of -
Shame:
1. A painful emotion resulting from an awareness of guilt
2. A state of dishonor.

and answered.

Yep ... painfully aware of this one.

You stated yours a bit later and they seemed close enough for both sets to work, so why argue over semantics?

 

[catalina_francisco]

i enjoy conversations on all levels, and made that clear at the beginning of this thread.

. You stated yours a bit later and they seemed close enough for both sets to work, so why argue over semantics?

Wasn't aware I was, but it did seem to me the signs were there that a good old chat and let's get stupid'and/or sarcastic' mood was moving in. Just figured on past experience of late, I would pull the topic back into focus before it became another chat thread as seems to be the recent pattern. Have no problem with humour, but there is a time and place and level before it becomes obvious the topic no longer is in existence

C

 

[catalina_francisco]

"When in doubt, empty the magazine." --- AA

Would I be wrong in seeing this as anything but serious? Nothing personal, as you are not the only one, but this is what I am referring to in this particular thread straying.

C

 

[AngelicAssassin]

Wasn't aware I was ...
C

You weren't, but others were. You may not like a topic that strays. i get a little tired of going into an interesting thread where folks have to get out their version of a dictionary so the topic turns into a quagmire of whose definition is correct.

Would I be wrong in seeing this as anything but serious? Nothing personal, as you are not the only one, but this is what I am referring to in this particular thread straying.

C

i meant that comment seriously.

It's perceptional
depends on the person and the situation
But yes, it exists

i'll just stick with James on this one.

What happens inside someone's head ultimately determines whether they feel shame, guilt, embarassment, or any other of the feelings mentioned here.

 

[Netzach]

Hmmm....

I think we are all supposed to agree that in this permissive and morally corrupt society shame no longer exists, and this is a bad thing?

I don't. I've stated that and my reasoning why. I also think that a person's ability to *live with a certain degree of shame* or *rise above it* is worth noting. There are mistakes made for which no reparations are feasible. Shall we all jump off bridges, make pathetic attempts at apology, stop going outside anymore? Or just be big enough to get through our day as morally imperfect people in a very morally imperfect world.

For people to cite the class difference example and dismiss the potential of shame in that situation, to me, is ludicrous. That's probably one of the key defining examples of shame that I can come up with.

Shame can be a way to keep a social majority culture in check, but it can also be a debilitating, crippling, excruciating handicap on an individual and his/her potential if they *exist outside that culture*

I don't see our culture as slipping, sliding, bankrupt or bad. I think that a center more like *my* center is becoming a norm. For other people with other values, yes the world *is* going to hell in a handbasket.

So sorry to hear.

 

[Pure]

Hi Netzach,

It's unfortunate some of your main points did not get full attention.

First,

While we might not chalk people with scarlet letters and while we might, as a society insist that it's really *okay* to be gay or poor...talk to any person in any marginalized group and you are probably going to hear a narrative of self-hatred or self-hatred *at* one's self hatred. You are going to deal with a person who has heard that they are NOT "ok" at some very fundamental levels. This is more than "gee I feel naughty when I masturbate", it's fundamental and debilitating.
====

I don't have a problem with this, but I have little direct data, and except for the Black people, and some of the very 'out' sexual minorities, I don't think there are many (>2%) 'marginalized' people here at lit. to contribute.

I can rely on certain autobiographies, like Loving in War Years (Cherrie Moraga, a lesbian chicana) to some extent. I acknowledged the issue in passing [[{I said:}I suppose really poor people do feel shame, I remember reading about towns in Appalachia being scouted for 'rural' persons to be used for a re-newed 'Beverly Hillbillies'; some were upset, felt rather embarrassed, and CBS is under pressure to withdraw.**]]



I think we are all supposed to agree that in this permissive and morally corrupt society shame no longer exists, and this is a bad thing?

Well, present day corruption has a way of looking bigger than other corruptions. I see how my enumeration of presidential and corporate directors' lack of shame could be read in the way you suggest. But I think smaller scale law breaking, and my example of how schools avoid shaming raises larger issues. In any case,
"this is a bad thing" is not my opinion, in the sense that things are how they are. There have always been very public hypocrites, some shameless. Hurray for corruption. (Though it's a little dangerous if there are two many psychopaths running around.)


I don't. I've stated that and my reasoning why. I also think that a person's ability to *live with a certain degree of shame* or *rise above it* is worth noting. There are mistakes made for which no reparations are feasible. Shall we all jump off bridges, make pathetic attempts at apology, stop going outside anymore? Or just be big enough to get through our day as morally imperfect people in a very morally imperfect world.

Point taken.


For people to cite the class difference example and dismiss the potential of shame in that situation, to me, is ludicrous. That's probably one of the key defining examples of shame that I can come up with.

Not sure who this was, but it wasn't me.


Shame can be a way to keep a social majority culture in check, but it can also be a debilitating, crippling, excruciating handicap on an individual and his/her potential if they *exist outside that culture*

This is a reiteration of the point about outsiders' shame. It does seem correct. Will you acknowledge, however, that the lessening of 'insiders' shame, is a fact? Is anything likely to shame the customers at your store?

If 'outsiders' are your main example, what does this say about shame and SM? They wouldn't have much to do with one another in most cases talked about around here. I do remember one Black woman who was into racially degrading remarks from a white dom.

That sort of thing would be the main way that shame and sexual kink would connect, it would seem (when one partner is from one of your 'marginalized' groups). How have or could you (or your 'bottoms') be shamed, -- those who weren't Black, or from appalachia, or daughters of second generation crack ho's.?

J.

**refs:

http://www.oakridger.com/stories/092002/stt_0920020075.html

http://www.medialifemagazine.com/news2003/jan03/jan06/2_tues/news3tuesday.html

http://scout.wisc.edu/Reports/ScoutReport/2003/scout-030411-inthenews.html

 

[catalina_francisco]

Hmmm....

I think we are all supposed to agree that in this permissive and morally corrupt society shame no longer exists, and this is a bad thing?

I don't.

Netzach, I for one don't look for anyone, including you, to agree with anything they are not in agreement with when discussing an issue or topic. That is the whole point of open discussion....to share various viewpoints which either in the end reinforce your own, or perhaps get you thinking in a way you previously hadn't, and at times manage to change the original view of another person. Is all about evolving to me, and though I think and analyse most things a lot, I am forever challenging those perceptions and seeking new thoughts and ways of seeing life.

Catalina

 

[MissTaken]

For me, shame does exist.
It is a very different emotional entity from embarrassment or humiliation.

If I feel shame, it is entirely personal. I am disappointed in me, things I have done, thought or didn't do. My feeling of shame has nothing to do with outward appearances or how other's view my behavior, but is based upon my own morals, ethics and values and seeps in when I fail to live up to my own standards.

I suspect that depending on the situation, I may also feel embarrassment if it is something others view and pass judgement upon. However, even in these situations, my feelings of shame are separate from my feelings of embarrassment.

Embarrassment is something I can deal with, get over and move on. Shame is completely internal and is difficult to move away from and perhaps, real and intense shame is something we carry with us.

Hester was embarrassed by wearing the scarlet "A", but did she feel shame for her acts or simply for being caught and identified as doing something the community didn't approve of?

Edited to add, was it even an "A?" So much for my literary prowess?

 

[AngelicAssassin]

Edited to add, was it even an "A?" So much for my literary prowess?

Yes, for adulteress.

 

[Pure]

Shaming, old style, for those interested; Miss T; Ah for the good old days!

Text from

http://www.bartleby.com/83/2.html

"The Scarlet Letter" by N.Hawthorne.


[Released from jail, she's put on public display, on a scaffold]

[the reader's general impression is of Hester's strength and resistance to the shaming, but it clearly reaches her to some extent]


The unhappy culprit sustained herself as best a woman might, under the heavy weight of a thousand unrelenting eyes, all fastened upon her, and concentrated at her bosom. It was almost intolerable to be borne. Of an impulsive and passionate nature, she had fortified herself to encounter the stings and venomous stabs of public contumely, wreaking itself in every variety of insult; but there was a quality so much more terrible in the solemn mood of the popular mind, that she longed rather to behold all those rigid countenances contorted with scornful merriment, and herself the object.

Had a roar of laughter burst from the multitude,—each man, each woman, each little shrill-voiced child, contributing their individual parts,—Hester Prynne might have repaid them all with a bitter and disdainful smile. But, under the leaden infliction which it was her doom to endure, she felt, at moments, as if she must needs shriek out with the full power of her lungs, and cast herself from the scaffold down upon the ground, or else go mad at once.

------

Lastly, in lieu of these shifting scenes, came back the rude market-place of the Puritan settlement, with all the townspeople assembled and levelling their stern regards at Hester Prynne,—yes, at herself,—who stood on the scaffold of the pillory, an infant on her arm, and the letter A, in scarlet, fantastically embroidered with gold thread, upon her bosom!

--------------

Could it be true? She clutched the child so fiercely to her breast, that it sent forth a cry; she turned her eyes downward at the scarlet letter, and even touched it with her finger, to assure herself that the infant and the shame were real. Yes!—these were her realities,—all else had vanished!

===

While this passed, Hester Prynne had been standing on her pedestal, still with a fixed gaze towards the stranger; so fixed a gaze, that, at moments of intense absorption, all other objects in the visible world seemed to vanish, leaving only him and her.

Such an interview, perhaps, would have been more terrible than even to meet him as she now did, with the hot, mid-day sun burning down upon her face, and lighting up its shame; with the scarlet token of infamy on her breast; with the sin-born infant in her arms; with a whole people, drawn forth as to a festival, staring at the features that should have been seen only in the quiet gleam of the fireside, in the happy shadow of a home, or beneath a matronly veil, at church.

--------

[Later, as she lives with the letter, has to walk about town]

She grew to have a dread of children; for they had imbibed from their parents a vague idea of something horrible in this dreary woman, gliding silently through the town, with never any companion but one only child. Therefore, first allowing her to pass, they pursued her at a distance with shrill cries, and the utterance of a word that had no distinct purport to their own minds, but was none the less terrible to her, as proceeding from lips that babbled it unconsciously. It seemed to argue so wide a diffusion of her shame, that all nature knew of it; it could have caused her no deeper pang, had the leaves of the trees whispered the dark story among themselves,—had the summer breeze murmured about it,—had the wintry blast shrieked it aloud!

Another peculiar torture was felt in the gaze of a new eye. When strangers looked curiously at the scarlet letter,—and none ever failed to do so,—they branded it afresh into Hester’s soul; so that, oftentimes, she could scarcely refrain, yet always did refrain, from covering the symbol with her hand.


[end excerpts]

 

[MissTaken]

Thank you, Pure.

Great google work.

I do wonder though, was Hester ashamed at having fallen in love and screwing the man of the clothe, or at the town's people's scorn?

Was her shame her own to bear or was it the result of having an ego that was mirrored by those around her? In the time of the story, of course, women were identified by their circumstances, lovers, husbands and money, not by who they were....so perhaps, in that situation, your reference to "Shaming, old style" is quite accurate.

What if she had stood tall on the scaffold and spat at the crowd? Now, that would have clearly indicated that no matter how embarrassed she was, she did not feel shame for her acts.

 

[catalina_francisco]

Thank you, Pure.

Great google work.

I do wonder though, was Hester ashamed at having fallen in love and screwing the man of the clothe, or at the town's people's scorn?

Was her shame her own to bear or was it the result of having an ego that was mirrored by those around her? In the time of the story, of course, women were identified by their circumstances, lovers, husbands and money, not by who they were....so perhaps, in that situation, your reference to "Shaming, old style" is quite accurate.

What if she had stood tall on the scaffold and spat at the crowd? Now, that would have clearly indicated that no matter how embarrassed she was, she did not feel shame for her acts.

Your views closely reflect my own Miss T., as do your questions as to whether it is shame within oneself, or the embarrassment of being caught and thus revealed for who you are, or what you have done as judged by others. It is a difficult one to answer, but I tend to think often it is the latter, more so than a shame that exists without the observations of anyone.

C

 

[Ms_Kat]

Shame v Embarrassment

I think the difference is that embarrassment is an emotion, therefore temporary, and is generally connected to a specific event. Shame, however, is a frame of reference towards one's self, is much more permanent, and is rather free-floating and vague. From a mental health view, embarrassment is natural and there is nothing wrong with it. Shame, however, is not natural and is mentally unhealthy.


Hugs,



Kat

 

[Pure]

Hi Ms Kat,

In general, I think you make some good points.

One area that puzzles me, though, is

you said in part

"Shame, however, is not natural and is mentally unhealthy."

Well, 'natural' is a funny word. Wearing clothes probably isn't natural either, at least on warm days. Shame is found is lotsa human societies, no?

'unhealthy.' i think maybe (?) you mean 'shame about natural functions'-- for example shame over sex with ones spouse? Or do you mean 'unpleasant'--- that is, a state 'we'-- non masochists-- wish to avoid?

Thanks for joining in.

J.

 

[Ms_Kat]

Replies to Pure's Questions

Shame is un-natural in the sense that it is a learned response. It is a pervasive viewpoint where a person sees their value as being lower than those around them. It is a subjective measurement, of course, but one that is felt intensely. In psychological terms, it has been internalized to the point where it becomes part of the person's view of their place in the world.

No one culture has a monopoly on shame. However, the levels of shame tend to rise as the structure of a society becomes more rigid, rule-oriented, and specific vaule-based. I'm not an expert on cross-cultural studies of this matter, but that is the best of my recollection.

Does the fact that it occurs often make it more natural? That, of course, depends on how you define your terms. For example, violence has been used in almost every society ever known to limit the ability to govern to a small group (at least at times). Does this mean it is natural to use violence in order to protect that ability? If it is a natural response, does that then mean that there is no problem doing so?

In response to your second question concerning "shame over natural functions" or "shame about sex", I think you miss my point. Shame, from my viewpoint, isn't directed at any specific action or group of actions. It is a judgement about one's core view of one's place in the world.

The difference is between thinking "I have done something bad" and thinking "I am bad". It is a small, but very significant difference. When I say that shame is mentally unhealthy, I mean that it leads to a mental status that is self-damaging, such as depression.

I hope that clears things up a bit.


Hugs,


Kat

 

[PinkOrchid]

 

[catalina_francisco]

I'm going to go with Never's definitions, but perhaps add that shame is an awareness of inadequacy OR a perception of inadequacy.

I'd like to throw into the conversation an opinion from a friend of mine who is a sociology professor that shame is the root cause of violence. Any thoughts on that one?

Will have to give it some thought myself, but I would think there are many causes for violence depending on the context, amongst them low self esteem, guilt, hatred, and in the issue of DV, power and control.

Catalina

 

[PinkOrchid]

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Re: Re: Re: Does shame exist?

Guess the understanding I have of both words in relation to this are:

Embarrassment: feeling disturbed or self conscious.

Shame: a state of disgrace or intense regret; a feeling of distress or humiliation caused by consciousness of guilt.

[----snipped----]

The way I think of it is, embarrassment is something we feel when other people see us in compromising situations. Shame is something you feel towards yourself in the same circumstances.

A shrink once told me that embarrassment is what we feel when our private fantasies become public. I think that's sometimes true, but not always. Maybe the after-dinner speaker who gets up with the tablecloth stuck in his zipper really wants to act like a clown, but I doubt it.

I think that having our secret desires known may be part of embarrassment, but I also think we have a built-in aversion to being the center of attention when we don't want to be. You find this in other animal species as well: they don't like being stared at and interpret it as a hostile and threatening gesture.

Then there is our natural dislike of lowering our stature in others' eyes by making a fool of ourselves. That's a very powerful and understandable fear, and I'm sure that's the cause of the surge of adrenaline we fee when we embarrass ourselves in public.

I heard once that death can't be the most frightening thing in the world, or people would never kill themselves. One of the most frequent motives for suicide, besides depression, is humiliation. And humiliation is just another word for embarrassment, right?

---dr.M.