Comment by Eisenstein
1 day ago
I absolutely do not agree with public pile-ons, social media hysteria, or understandable mistakes leading to cancellation. Everyone should be able to make mistakes and learn from them -- that is incredibly important.
But shame is also incredibly important in that it causes self-policing of social norms. There is no way that society would work if everyone just did things that benefited them with no regard to others, in ways that weren't actively harmful but just annoying. That's why we have norms and enforce them with shame. If this gets broken down because people use shaming inappropriately then it will be used as a reason to do away with shaming completely. We see this trend happening and its continuation can only lead to bad outcomes.
Agreed. Additionally, negative sanctions have been part of human life since the beginning. Anyone who has raised a child or pet understands this.
This discussion of far more nuanced than many of the comments in this post address. It's true people are often swiftly found guilty in the public eye without due process - see most true crime - but it's also true such sanctions have their place.