Of course, it’s usually unhelpful and abusive to call people names, curse at them, and engage substance-less emotional attacks. This is unhelpful shame.
But accusing others of shaming us when we are simply being called in to notice when we are dangerously unconscious, wrong, or hurtful is a defense strategy.
When we defend and deflect on social media by “pulling the shame card,” it’s also a form of covert virtue signaling that draws sympathy from others to build confirmation bias to remain in denial. But that’s not the juiciest denial “gain” for pulling the shame card: avoiding accountability is (and ultimately, the discomfort and/or pain of realizing error and making a change).
By accusing another of shaming us, we don’t have to pay attention to what they are saying or feel what might be our own healthy shame for a shortcoming or way to do better. Pulling the shame card is therefore also a form of arrogance.
Accusing others of shaming us when they call us out is also gaslighting—making someone else the problem when, in fact, we are. In this sense, it’s also hypocritical to pull the shame card. And come to think of it, manipulative.
So, before you pull the shame card, consider humility. Honestly consider hearing what’s being shared with you and if your accuser is truly shaming you. If they aren’t merely making empty attacks and offering false information, chances are it’s healthy shame you’re being called to feel, in order to do better—if being a person of greater integrity is important to you.
PS: this post was inspired first by a former FB friend who espoused conspiracy theories and each time anyone tried to call her out, she would accuse them of shaming her, around which all her conspiracy friends would gather to support her (of course, to deny their own reckoning as well). Secondly, I noticed a similar pattern in a friend who criticized me of shaming others into taking climate action. There was no shame in my post, and even if there were, I would not engage in unhelpful shame, but the healthy version.
Denial is a pernicious thing and clever people get more and more clever about their denial. It’s part of why I called out Charles Eisenstein last year. Personally, I fend off my own propensity to be in denial (a human condition default unless we work hard against it) by exercising emotional and intellectual honesty.
