Bring Back Shame: Does the Ethical Value of Shame Justify Shaming?

Undergraduate Highly Commended paper in the 2025 National Uehiro Oxford Essay Prize in Practical Ethics. By Nicole Chinenyenwa Oboko.

I  have always been told that if a person has nothing nice to say, they should say nothing at all. For most of my life, I’ve upheld this belief. A decent person, as part of a decent society, shouldn’t wish to utter the words which reject another from the family of man, intentionally making one the object of humiliation and ridicule (Margalit, 1996). By this logic, we may conclude right away that it is absolutely never okay to shame other people. This conclusion may appear attractive in an age where the banishing of ugly thoughts and emotions is widely accepted as the gateway to a healthier, more virtuous self (Thomason, 2018).

This essay, however, provides an alternative analysis. Shame may outwardly appear like a fiend, but it can, and often does, embody an essential moral force in our everyday lives of ethical blunders (Manion, 2002). If shame has ethical value, it could stand to reason that shaming (i.e. inviting others to feel ashamed) can be justified if its core purpose is to reform the moral character of those being shamed. By ethical value, I mean that the sentiment of shame can offer people a newfound calling to readjust their moral compass. To make my argument, I begin by firstly defining the complex ontological emotion. Second, I examine the ways individuals are driven to behave when overwhelmed by a feeling of shame, considering particularly the idea of shame as an impetus for positive moral change. And, lastly, I apply this to the case of shaming, arguing that it can sometimes be justified.

Presently, there is not one sweeping definition of shame which accounts for all the cases in which it is commonly felt. Shame is generally labelled as a moral emotion, yet it arises at times in circumstances where ethical concerns are not at stake (Thomason, 2018). One feels ashamed for being caught lying to their family, but one also feels ashamed for not being conventionally attractive. What we see here are the two seemingly irreconcilable faces of shame (Kurth, 2025). Social shame is typically felt when one fails miserably to live up to the prevailing social norms and expectations – like how one feels a surge of shame for presenting an outer appearance starkly at odds with society’s ideals of contemporary beauty. It is marked by a feeling of exposure, vulnerability and a perceived loss in one’s standing in a social hierarchy (Arneson, 2007). An agent thinks of himself as being viewed through the actual or imagined gaze of an audience, and this judgement elicits from him a desire to become smaller, less conspicuous and avoid the gaze (Sanchez, 2014; Arneson, 2007). There is a wealth of empirical findings to show that (social) shame evolved as a means to promote social conformity (Sznycer et al, 2016). Favourable valuation by others was a key resource during a time when the fate of successfully reproducing or dying prematurely partly depended on the extent to which others pedestalized an individual’s welfare over their own (Sznycer et al, 2016).

Moral shame, on the other hand, is an emotion of self-assessment – ‘the self reflects upon the self’ (Tangney et al, 2011). In the shameful act, one has found themselves short of who they believed or strove to be, and thus experiences a loss in their self-respect (Taylor, 1985). One is not necessarily ashamed for lying to their family because of their sensitivity to the opinions of others, but one is overcome by shame over the deceitful person they now see themselves as being. One’s shame is arguably born out of the anxiety that they have lost their better, more virtuous self to their lesser self (Dahlstrom, 2017). Their dishonesty has violated their own perception of what morality demands. Albeit to the extent that honesty is not a valued part of their moral identity, their lying ways will not bring them to shame. Some may say that shame, in so far as the values one embraces are morally good, can be an effective ‘emotional moral barometer’ (Tangney et al, 2011). This leads us to an important question:

What actions are people driven to take when struck by shame?

In answering this question, we must bear in mind shame’s two distinct faces. In 2014, a study was conducted to observe the manifestations of ‘image’ and ‘moral’ expressions of shame (Allpress et al, 2014). As defined by the study, image shame is triggered by a threatened social reputation, while moral shame stems from a perceived compromise of one’s moral essence (Allpress et al, 2014). Participants were tasked with reading a news article detailing their in-group’s (Britain) mistreatment of an out-group (Iraqi citizens in the Iraq war) and expressing how they were made to feel. Some reported feeling shame because of fear that the accounts of Britain’s manhandling would stain the public image of their country – they felt an urge to conceal their in-group’s misdeeds. Other participants also expressed deep shame because they believed their in-group had, in some way or another, compromised their moral standards. This group reported feeling a desire to make right the wrongs of their compatriots.

If we take shame to be a moral emotion, we can accept that it acts as a ‘motivating force’ behind a person’s drive to refine and tweak their moral character (Yu, 2023). The researchers in the study concluded that moral shame was closely aligned with positive outcomes and reparative action. On the other hand, image (or social) shame was associated with desires to conceal the wrongdoings which gave rise to the feelings of shame, in order to preserve a social image (Allpress et al, 2014). C. Kurth importantly noted that moral shame tended to repair shameful deficiencies, to which the social face of shame instead elicited a defensive response (Kurth, 2025). This can be observed in anger. Shame can provoke an individual to respond with anger and, what H.B. Lewis calls, humiliated fury (Lewis, 1971; Sznycer et al, 2016). Revisiting our earlier examples of lying, let us imagine X is caught red-handed in a lie. They may at first experience a surge of shame for being so openly called out, but such shame could morph into anger directed at the person accusing them of dishonesty. Anger, whether directed outward or inward, serves as a coping mechanism to regain a sense of control robbed by the paralysing experience of shame (Lewis, 1971).

Ultimately, the moral face of shame can be seen having ethical value – being that it is able to serve as a catalyst for positive moral reforms, as proven by the study. If the disposition to be ashamed in one’s actions is morally valuable, when (if ever) is shaming others justified? Surely, if we can accept that a person through shame is able to readjust their moral compass, we can see the benefit of others being made to feel the same emotion for the good of their own moral character. After all, a world entirely lacking any form of shame would be a morally impoverished one (Turnbull, 2012). With today’s ever-fading sense of sin, I believe there is a time and place for shaming: the challenge is in pinpointing them. The gulf between those who deny the effectiveness of shaming and those who affirm it is arguably large. R.J. Arneson asserted that shaming, in a decent society, can induce compliance to morally sound norms, practices and social standards, making its imposition ‘morally justifiable all things considered’ (Arneson, 2007). A parent should rebuke their child for acting in socially unacceptable and morally deprived ways, such as using foul disrespectful language or behaving with incivility towards those they deem as socially inferior. It may be otherwise ‘misguided’ for a parent, of the view that the disposition to feel shame is itself inherently undesirable, to allow for these traits in their child to go unchecked (Arneson, 2007).

L. Rankin, in her online post, adopts a different viewpoint to Arneson. Though feeling shame is intrinsically good, she admits, shaming other people is a weapon for abuse and manipulation. She recognises that it is healthy to feel bad for behaving in ways that are wrong and violate the boundaries other people have set, for example, refusing to cover your face with a mask during the COVID-19 pandemic or perpetuating the existence of white privilege. Albeit Rankin condemns shaming in all its forms, she asserts that when an agent behaves poorly, they ought to feel a dose of ‘healthy shame’. The implication here is that one should feel ashamed for what they have done, and this in itself can inadvertently count as shaming. Shaming does not have to involve viciously tearing someone down for their misdeeds; simply asserting that they should “feel ashamed of themselves” can be enough to evoke a sense of shame. There is an obvious distinction to be made between ordinary and extraordinary shaming. Very few people will endorse the kind of shaming which reduces the shamed person to subhuman status – observed, for example, in the tactics deployed by Ku Klux Klan mobs taunting black men awaiting lynching in the Deep South of America. Ordinary shaming, which I believe should have a place in society, is simply not horrific (Arneson, 2007). The vilification of shaming is largely based on the commonly held belief in literature that shaming simply does not work (Brown, 2013).

The fundamental focus on the person as the ‘bad self’ rather than simply the ‘bad behaviour’ they have displayed, is what spurs the person to deny, hide, or escape the intrapsychic pain caused by the emotion (Tangney et al, 2011). Such escapism sometimes manifests in other harmful and sinful practices, ultimately defeating the primary purpose of the shaming, which was to curb these behaviours (de Hooge et al, 2017). I don’t outright deny this claim, however, it is apparent to me that the psychology of shame operates quite differently in non-Western societies (White, 2023). I don’t believe the blanket statement that ‘shaming never works’ is true to all cultures. In collectivistic ‘shame cultures,’ where honour is highly regarded, shamelessness is viewed as its opposite, and shame, along with shaming, is valued (Liyanage et al, 2023). Growing up in a Nigerian household, I myself have at times been the target of shame. My subjection to shame affected me in two main ways. On the one hand, being shamed for not knowing how to prepare traditional Igbo dishes or speak in my mother’s tongue, felt like a painful attack on my identity. It encouraged me to withdraw from family and put up a defensive, stand-offish front. On the other hand, being shamed by my family for raising my voice at my mother and violating the expectation of ‘respecting my elders’ provided me with an essential foundation for developing my own moral compass.

To sum up, I have taken the position that ordinary shaming can sometimes be justifiably defended on the basis that it is done for an individual’s best moral interests. I have shown the multifaceted nature of shame to have, in some capacity, ethical value. Moral shame has been proven to incentivize an agent to seek positive, reparative action in the aftermath of their shameful act. I have then argued that the imposition of shame (i.e. shaming) on other people does have a rightful place in society, given that it is harnessed for good purposes: for example, in line with R.J. Arneson, to induce compliance to ethically sound societal practices. The counterargument that shaming is entirely ineffective and thus lacks ethical significance may be permissible when considered squarely within the context of an individualistic Western society – but the opposite appears true in collectivistic shame cultures.

References

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