Not that anybody asked, but I think it's important to understand how shame and guilt actually work before you try to use it for good.

It's a necessary emotion. There are reasons we have it. It makes everything so. much. worse. when you use it wrong.

Shame and guilt are DE-motivators. They are meant to stop behavior, not promote it. You cannot, ever, in any meaningful way, guilt someone into doing good. You can only shame them into not doing bad.

Let's say you're a parent and your kid is having issues.

Swearing in class? Shame could work. You want them to stop it. Keep it in proportion, and it might help. (KEEP IT IN PROPORTION!!!)

Not doing their homework? NO! STOP! NO NOT DO THAT! EVER! EVER! EVER! You want them to start to do their homework. Shaming them will have to opposite effect! You have demotivated them! They will double down on NOT doing it. Not because they are being oppositional, but because that's what shame does!

You can't guilt people into building better habits, being more successful, or getting more involved. That requires encouragement. You need to motivate for that stuff!

If you want it in a simple phrase:

You can shame someone out of being a bad person, but you can't shame them into being a good person.

It was nice to see this put so clearly. This election cycle has left me exhausted and demotivated, and this hits it square on the head.

stolen from https://grungekitty-77.tumblr.com/post/754482938951892992/fun-fact-that-was-literally-what-inspired-me-to

  • crosswind [they/them]
    ·
    4 months ago

    Yeah, I think this is a topic that has room for and is worth a lot of discussion. With this issue, what someone means by ‘using guilt’ can be anything from explaining the consequences of someone’s actions and letting them draw their own conclusions, to ‘bringing down a mountain of Divine Shame’. And sometime people will argue those back and forth as if they’re talking about the same thing.

    I wanted to defend the post as having a good point, while definitely having to be incomplete to fit into a short tumblr post. I was glad to be a part of expanding on it in this thread.