In the West, ‘shame’ is often associated with other cultures and another time.
But social media is giving rise to a resurgence of shame and honour as significant social drivers.
How many times this year have you seen a news story about someone posting something foolish which then fuels viral, self-righteous, indignation and scoffs from the online ‘community’? Sometimes it’s a celebrity’s old post dredged up from the past. Sometimes it’s a post from an everyday person that in a pre-social-media era would have barely got a comment but now becomes fodder for mob-justice and doxing (where personal details of the offender are posted online such as home address, email, phone number, etc.).
Internet shaming
The examples you may know about are just the tip of an iceberg. In a 2015 survey by Vodafone 43% of teens said that cyberbullying is a bigger problem than drug abuse, 18% experienced suicidal thoughts as a result and 38% don’t tell their parents they are being harassed online.
In fact, this has become so commonplace (in such a short space of time) that there are now well-identified stages of an Internet shaming.
• Step 1: The call out – the unfortunate offender wakes up to hundreds of notifications as they realise their intemperate post has been noticed.
• Step 2: The storm – retweets and reposts abound, scoffing replies flood in, notifications stack up, they are in the eye of an Internet storm.
• Step 3: The disappearance – unable to cope with the storm’s intensity they pull all their accounts offline.
• Step 4: The statement – carefully worded, appropriately contrite, sometimes pointing out mistaken identity, often endorsed by friends who know ‘this is not what they are really like’.
• Step 5: The legacy – will they ever recover or will they forever be known as the shamed bigot of September 2017?
Anthropologist’s eye view
Interestingly these steps almost exactly follow the path anthropologists have documented of dishonouring in a traditional society: the shameful act is noticed, the community respond and the offender is shamed, community justice is inflicted and the offender is cut off. If there is to be a measure of restoration, contrition is accompanied by advocates pleading the offender’s cause. The question then remains: will the dishonour ever be truly forgotten?
The problem we are seeing is that an individualistic society does not have the resources to cope with this sudden rise in shaming. In contrast the gospel, which was written into a far less individualistic context where shame and honour had much greater currency, is uniquely able to help us navigate these challenges.
How the gospel helps
First, we need to see that, while guilt is about my status before God, so shame is about my reputation within community. The gospel always works on both a vertical and horizontal level. Individualism has too long obscured for us the communal dynamics in the gospel. Those in pastoral ministry, engaged particularly with young people, need to recapture the shame/honour dynamics that are too often missed.
Secondly, our society’s antidote to shame is fame, but the gospel’s antidote is honour (which is often tied to glory). Fame is a thin and temporary concept where people know about you; honour is a thick and enduring idea of worth and dignity. We need to show people how the gospel challenges and properly fulfils the distorted desire for fame.
Thirdly, real restoration both in terms of forgiveness and honour must be worked out in community. Someone who has been shamed online will only truly realise restoration offline in a gathered community of believers where they are loved and accepted. Having churches where such restoration and acceptance is commonplace will be a vital apologetic to our society.
