We Are Living in a Post-Shame World—And That’s Not a Good Thing

We Are Living in a Post-Shame World—And That’s Not a Good Thing
12/13/16

In 2015, Jon Ronson wrote an important and sobering book about the epidemic of public shaming brought on by social media.

It was a criticism of our cultural tendency to collectively gang up on and punish supposedly aberrant behavior like an offensive remark, a marital affair, an embarrassing photo, unacceptable beliefs or a lapse in judgment. It was undoubtedly a crisis for the last several years of social media—we were too strict, too united and too quick to enforce the social norms with disproportionately severe, life-altering punishments.

Does it not strike you, however, two years or so after publication, how quaint this criticism seems?

Because it occurs to me here on the cusp of 2017 that the idea of enough people in society agreeing on something being far enough ‘over the line’ to warrant real, shared outrage is more or less an impossibility. If a celebrity other than Alec Baldwin was caught calling a paparazzi photographer a ‘cocksucker,’ this afternoon, what are the chances that anyone would get that upset? Would we nearly drive them out of show business for being politically incorrect? If a young female PR executive was flying to South Africa next week and tweeted an offensive, poorly written joke about AIDS, I do not suspect that there would be life-changing consequences for her.

As absurd as those reactions were and as much as those impulses needed to be curbed, I’m not sure our new normal is any better. Because today we seem to be beyond shame—and beyond expressing joint opinions in even the clearest and most non-partisan of situations.

I’m no proponent of public shaming—I think the response to the Justine Sacco incident in 2013 was embarrassing and cruel. I’m just curious about what would transpire if the event happened today. Certainly, some people would find it in poor taste and be upset. But I also wonder whether a significant group of people, in response to those who tried to shame her, would take her remark literally and decide they actually support Sacco and. If she was so inclined, could she skip hiding out, fan the controversy and join the alt-right ranks? I half-suspect social media trolls might be floating theories about whether the photographer Alec Baldwin slandered really was a cocksucker or not. Instead of faux-outrage, we’d be looking at faux-intellectualizing—rationalizing, embracing the very thing that would have disgusted almost every reasonable person not long ago.

Other urls found in this thread:

archive.is/HEUKC
observer.com/2016/12/we-are-living-in-a-post-shame-world-and-thats-not-a-good-thing/
archive.is/Ejyw7
twitter.com/NSFWRedditGif

The embracing of all the things we ought to have previously and unequivocally said “nope” to is upon us: Think about the New York Giants re-signing a kicker who admitted to abusing his wife (and they stood by him and their decision making process after the scandal became public!) We just had an election where a candidate was caught on tape talking about grabbing women by the pussy, where a convention speech was plagiarized, and Gold Star parents were treated as fair political game. Try to wrap your head around the fact that there are serious allegations that this country’s election was tampered with by a foreign power and people just aren’t quite sure what to think about it.

Regardless of your politics, it’s impossible to honestly look at 2016 and not see that the old “line” was not only crossed, but obliterated.

Here’s an interesting experiment: If we exclude heinous crimes like murder or child abuse, can you think of any behavior or remarks that you could guarantee would be considered truly beyond the pale for a political or cultural figure right now? What’s the most offensive, career-ending, banished-from-society thing that someone could do in 2016? And are you positive it would actually have the effect you think?

If Bill O’Reilly called Barack Obama the n-word, is it still conceivable that there would be effective pressure to force him to resign? Would that be enough for Fox to push him out the door? If Steph Curry spit on a homeless person in the Mission District, would it last more than a day or two in the news cycle? If it was discovered that it was actually The Rock who killed Cecil the Lion, what would happen? If Mark Zuckerberg used the resources of the Chan Zuckerberg Foundation to stage a leftist coup in a small South American nation?

Honestly, is there anything we might all get mad about together anymore? While that might seem like a strange thing to be forlorn about, it is in fact frightening to imagine a society in which shame is no longer a governor on behavior.

My question is whether this is temporary or a sign of what is to come? Because the prospects for a world permanently without a concept of a ‘line’ is scary. Perhaps after living in media and social media environment where for several years outrage was deliberately provoked and then weaponized, the adrenal glands are tapped. The nerves are deadened. The shared moral standards which once transcended political and socioeconomic borders is temporarily missing.

We’re so fatigued about shame that we’ve apparently decided it serves no purpose whatsoever. We’ve become so exhausted policing and shouting down every uncouth weirdo who disagrees with us that we’ve decided to dispense with social law and order all together.

Instead of doing something about our public shaming problem, we’ve just balanced it out with trolling.

At least the paradigm of public shaming that Ronson captured and criticized so eloquently in his book relied on a set of shared beliefs. That some things weren’t OK. That there was a way to behave. That there were things people should not do. One shouldn’t give the middle finger at Arlington Cemetery. One shouldn’t run a prostitution ring out of a Zumba studio. One shouldn’t plagiarize or fabricate stories for attention or profit. One shouldn’t have an affair with the president (and one shouldn’t have an affair with a young intern). And as a general day-to-day rule, one should not berate other people in public, and then film it and post it online as though they’re some brave activist.

It’s hard to say that a visceral negative reaction to that kind of behavior is anything but natural and normal. The problem was what people did after. The problem was when journalists and mobs, desensitized by online tools, attacked the perpetrators without mercy until, in some cases, the victims nearly killed themselves. That’s not OK either. In fact, it was a punishment worse than the crime in many cases (especially since very little investigation or due process was involved in convicting the ‘criminals’ in the first place).

Today, I’m not sure that’s our problem. In 2007, internet audiences cruelly mocked Miss Teen South Carolina for her gibberish answer to a basic civics question. You could tell, even as it was happening, that she was embarrassed and knew it wasn’t going well—and later revealed that her time in the news cycle drove her to contemplate suicide. Last week, a sincere woman told a stunned CNN anchor that she believes millions of people voted illegally in California, which is laughably and demonstrably dumb. Like the Miss Teen USA moment, the clip went viral and and an alarming amount of people rudely mocked her. But the tone in that video feels distinctly different—the woman is almost smugly ignorant. She had little to fear in the way of embarrassment, because plenty of other people would and did rush to embrace the nonsense she spewed. Whether they were trolls or emboldened fellow idiots, the lack of any sort of consensus about the absurdity of an event that is a new development.

It’s a nihilistic post-shame world. It was bad enough when we bullied people for being stupid—but swinging back towards not even acknowledging what constitutes stupid might be even worse.

Or, it’s gone forever. And that’s why we can’t even stipulate basic facts anymore. Even in cases where we might otherwise be inclined to agree when it has been crossed, reality itself seems to be in dispute. Most people would not argue that trafficking in pedophilia would be anything but outrageous and disgusting. Yet here we are grappling with the so-called “Pizzagate” scandal. Where different people once may have come together in condemnation, in fact, they’re arguing again—not over whether it was wrong, but whether it even exists (in fact, there is zero evidence that it does). And course, the party who is convinced it happened is also convinced that the other side is so calloused that they’re ignoring the obvious (and in between are the trolls).

I always thought online mobs were scary and dangerous. But this new normal seems just as scary.

Ryan Holiday
archive.is/HEUKC
observer.com/2016/12/we-are-living-in-a-post-shame-world-and-thats-not-a-good-thing/

So Holla Forums, will you do your part in 2017 and make shaming great again?

Itt - another clickbait article about pissed off lying journos, that they must be ashamed of their lies about Trump.

Fuck. I meant to break The Observer link, pls no bully.

Not even a little as he continues the lies in the article.

At least one faggot will click on the longer link.

HUR DURRR I AM THAT FAGGOT, just clinked it.

After reading it a third time, it's now apparent it's actually a call for liberals to continue their indignant outrage on anyone that goes against their dogma.

I reported it. Hopefully the mods will correct my fuck ups.

tl;dr

t. Media shill

I never understood this principle of the left, that only certain publication may offer goodthink.

I used to be a leftist scum and held this very premise, if it wasn't kike approved, then I didn't even look at it. The odd thing is now I do the opposite and anything kike approved, goes into the trash.

I imagine it has to do with filtering the noise on the Internet.

Anti-niggerslide spam bump

Came about pretty strongly in the Bush years since they felt like Fox was acting like a cheerleader for Bush and his administration while other news groups were willing to be critical of him. Due to the internet, we could look up examples of all this easily.

When Obama came into power, they just all gave up the idea of being critical of the government and the reputation the media built up during the Bush years sustained them.

TL;DR for those of you don't feel like reading

Author is bootyblasted because (((they))) are no longer controlling the narrative onine. Whereas people used to be crucified for not expressing PC or SJW opinions online, now there is finally an avenue for it (he calls the Alt-Right by name) and not enough jews online to stop it. He calls these people "trolls" instead of admitting to what is really happening: the tides are finally fucking turning.

Fuck. I really like his book the Obstacle is the Way. What a fucking faggot tho.

How could Paul "Nipple Nibbler of Nuremburg" Nugnesser even get it up for that?

tl;dr the left used to be able to suppress freedom of speech via social shaming and is butthurt that we now have freedom of speech again

holy fuck, blood shot out of my eyes

They're still in shock that even the most casual observer has realized they are insufferable faggots who are now to be openly mocked and ridiculed. They honestly thought they were going to continue on non-stop with their new Cultural Revolution. Now the time has arrived for these Red Guards to be re-educated and they aren't liking it one bit, nosiree.

This is retardedly short-sighted on his part. Shame only works when you control the cultural norms, which we now have in the palm of our hands. We will have no problems with shaming the cucks and traitors. If he was smart he'd be advocating for compassion and the understanding of different viewpoints.

The rest of the world has learned from Trump's campaign.

If you are being shamed for something you have said or done.

Most of them barely even recognize that the Right has wrested control of the very same shaming and bullying tactics they invented from them, why would the average lefty be clever enough to go on the defensive now?

And we're about to be in a post-multicultural post-liberal world if you keep it up, faggot.

That is what leftists do and it makes them look retarded. Do not double down, do not retreat. Do not move one inch. Remember that their argumentative style relies on a synthesis of your opinion with theirs, allowing them to claim a half victory.

You should be ashamed

I always unbreak links in the developer console and click them out of spite

Oy Vey!
We spent the last thirty years destroying standards and morals. Why dose nobody have the same standards and morals anymore? Why is everything so divided and politicized? I don't understand! My world views crashing, help!

Pretty funny shit. They're wandering around in the smoldering wreckage with an bloodthirsty mob hot on their trail wondering why people seem angry and impatient with them.

Allow me to give you gentlemen a TL;DR

you're welcome. this is one gigantic hypocritical preach that goes around in a circle. They're basically saying shaming should be used against only things this person thinks should be discouraged. "It's okay when we do it", the article.

ty user, so I was right not to care enough to read it

EBIN

What the fuck is up with all these "post-" words I've been seeing lately?
Post-truth? Post-irony? Post-modern?
The fuck do any of these terms mean? Why have they only been popping up in the last few years?

I get that webm is a joke, but fuck does that statement make me mad.
Eva wasn't even about the mechs, they were a plot device, it's a great as a drama but awful as a mecha show.

They're just trying to erect some safe, trendy word-salad explanation as to why their assholes are being ripped to shreds on a regular basis by the newly elected power structure.

if you havent noticed, the left loves to use a pretty small collection of buzzwords in order to both virtue signal and attempt to sound more intellectual


etc etc

Might I also point out how, aside from peppering his headline with usual clickbaity bullshit as these faggots are wont to do, that he directly pushes a loaded presupposition before the reader even gets into the article? "Here is X and why this is a bad thing because i said so and I make sure to state that right out of the gate in an attempt to do the most to influence your opinion of it." I bet there are so many fucking shitlibs that read articles like this all day and consider themselves enlightened intellectual philosophers because of it. Fuck this shit.

stopping by to check these integers

ID dubs observed

What makes it even worse is that their are people to their right who might be willing to listen to their pleas were they to actually make an effort at coherently articulating a fair argument. Instead it's low effort clickbait. They deserve a good twenty years in the wilderness to figure out what they've done/are doing wrong.

Five of quints. Very nice.

No not anymore. The left has killed too many and more recently insulted half the population. They can all die now.

Part of the progressive nonsense, allows them to push a narrative that "modernism, tradition, facts, race, etc." are so yesterday, its fucking current year, goy. Basically discarding any societal quality, process, idea, or institution that inconveniences their hooknosed handlers and allows them to pretend to be intellectual while doing so. Anytime I hear "post-" I assume it is an even more pretentious form of le current year kikery.

I'm personally ready to see quite a few of them at the end of a rope. Call me a moderate but maybe some of the lesser tards will understand the message and get in line. We shall see…

the only post- I've used was post-truth because of the leftist echo chamber ensuring no truth interferes with their ideology.

Y'know what? Good. A post shame world will be a lot funnier.

You earned it, kikes. You wanted a world and a society where all our old ways were crushed, old social norms done away with, so that you could infuse your degeneracy more easily into society. Unfortunately for you, there are two sides to this coin - a people without shame are also more likely to go along with ideologies that you don't like, ideologies that were previously taboo.

You made your collective beds with what you did to society, now lie in them.

...

I'm fond of calling myself a post-conservative just because it causes a bit of confusion on how to label. I'm using leftist terminology to describe myself as right, so they can't immediately decide where to put me and have to wait until after I articulate my beliefs.

good post

damn bitch looks like Gollum with his precious, Kek.

Evil fucking shitlord! You'll pay for your hateful ways!

Good idea, I am fond of dismissal just because I am sick of their shit but appropriating the enemies words against them works too. Technically speaking, "post-modernism" could refer to traditionalism and hijacking might be a more productive route. "post-zionism" and "post-globalism" are good ones also.

Beautiful

Also anti-semitism can only exist where there is loxism and yet still this word is unknown.

You're autistic. The point of the statement is that it showed the types of things you can do in a genre show without it being about the genre. I fucked my words up there so you'll probably just autistically pick apart my sentence instead of trying to grok my point.

Does the author even understand why it got to this point? Oh, reading I guess he didn't learn. Naïve realism is a bitch.


Remember when the line "Go educate yourself" was one of their favorite things to throw around? Problem for them is enough people did just that.

archive.is/Ejyw7

I'm an expert in post-ironic intersectional shitposting with a focus in toxic and vitriolic subject matter over a digital medium.

Is this you?

FIVE FIVES, BURGERS & FRIES CONFIRMS OP = TL;DR

F I V E C O C K S
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F
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POST SHAME WORLD
YES!!!
This is awesome. One of the tactics I have posted here before. Have no shame
Look at how it scares them to have lost the ability to name and shame

When i'm called a racist, or sexist, i simply laugh at them and accuse them of using "buzzwords" that don't mean anything anymore.

This tactic works amazingly well.

Buzzwords coming from the BuzzFED

No, do not double down, you're more likely to make a grave error which will make you lose in an argument. This is what's happening to leftists, they always double down making people even more annoyed at them. Just be completely steadfast, don't rush recklessly into a possible trap when you have the advantage anyway.

Cause it's worked out so well for them before

What I like to do is pretend I'm even farther left than they are, because chances are they haven't even read any Marx or Engel. If they have, they likely don't even understand it very well, so it's definitely easy to make yourself appear even more obnoxiously communist than they are.

You guys give leftists way too much credit.

Leftists just argue, at least not modern ones. They just spew. The whole thing about sexism and racism and xenophobia and fear, fear, fear is just words, things they say. There's not even a real political belief structure beyond blind worship of non-concepts and the desperate, hopeless belief that what they want for the world is "normal". Because that's what they so desperately want to be.

Think of eight-year-olds desperately trying to join the in-crowd, but not actually knowing what the in-crowd is doing, and you'll understand every women's studies cultist on the planet.

*Leftists don't argue

shame is about thoughtfulness of one's wrongdoings and foolishness; feeling bad for doing bad things

shame is not about recoiling in fear of being accused of witchcraft racism and suffering the subsequent witch trial

I bet this guy is completely OK with fags, trannies, interracial relationships, and other things that should be shamed.

Maybe I'm missing the point of this thread, but SJWs, lefty politicians, the media, and every special snowflake that has made up some sort of victim status for themselves CONSTANTLY shames whites, straight males. They're whole culture is based on making people afraid to be shamed with arbitrary labels of racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, yadda, yadda.

Shame is alive and well as indicated by the number of self-hating white cucks pushing for their own extermination.

hear hear

These are good ideas to spread around. Make people believe that they were defeated, even though we will probably always have to counter globalists in this world from now on. Make people not care about them. Dismiss them.

Good God…Rabbi??…W-what are you doing?

I feel you bro, I'm partway through reading Ego is the Enemy. It's basically a low energy form of stoicism (Marcus Aurelius's Meditations is far better, for example), but it's quite a nice, condensed read.

I'm still going to finish reading it and maybe lend it to a couple of my normie friends and family who're too retarded to read the classics by themselves, but I won't be buying any of his other works.

Highschoolfag here, had to watch a documentary called The Hunting Ground and this carry the mattress shit was in there. I looked into the statistics and rape-claims, and when I brought up to my teacher that this stuff was bullshit, people in my class started flipping out at me. At one point, me and my friend started giggling at one of the comments someone supposedly made at one of the 'victims' because they looked so fucking fake.

SHAME SHAME SHAME SHAME

...

You people are faggots. Firstly, just read the primary sources in a good translation. You don't need secondary sources for the classics, especially from some fuckstick that can't even read and interpret classic languages. Secondly, Ryan Holiday is a massive piece of shit. Over ten years ago, I used to be on a set of forums where he got his start (he used to be part of a collective of "edgy" internet writers and bloggers that were "red pill" lite before "red pill" got big). He was a whiny, ego-centric fucktard back then, and it wouldn't surprise me if not much has changed. He was constantly looking to get ahead at any cost. Have an idea on the message boards that were a topic like something he wrote? You were plagiarizing. This is what he honestly thought. He comes across as a sociopathic, aggressive striver that will do anything to get what he needs while being excellent at managing his public perception (he is a PR guy, remember. He got his start begging for a PR job with Tucker Max). The OP story is likely just part of his personality. He is genuflecting to leftist power. They key to interpreting Holiday's personality is to remember that he is always looking to upgrade his social status by entry into other social networks.

That's an idea.

My mind nearly got whiplash from that sudden double reversal

Post-Aryan world

Those numbers make me happy.

Anyone got the pic where Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck or some shit are talking to each other, and one of them goes to the other "Life is ultimately meaningless!" to which the other replies "Coward, you trust the very chemicals in your brain to make up these conclusions…", something to that effect?

for the trips, why not

thanks user, it was meant to be

I don't even need to read this glorified and wrong opinion piece. If we lived in a "post-shame world," then Trump would have lost the election. Shaming of the Left and their antics brought those antics to the mainstream and shifted enough of the populace against them to aid our victory. We're not in a post-shame world, we just kicked open the gates and gave internet shaming real world effect. There's an entire genre of content spearheading a movement online that centers on shaming, and it's swaying consensus more and more by the day.

Considering the average lib's ability to use the internet and handle bantz, we're all fucking academic geniuses compared to them.

Yeah, but now that we on the Right have started using their shaming tactics (to greater affect since our points are grounded in truth and have evidence to support them), we suddenly live in a "post-shame world."They wish. Their shaming tactics no longer work. Our only just started working, and they'll crush them.

Slightly better quality is here
And nice fucking trips, man.

The most terrifying thing a young liberal could face, is an educated white male…

SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME
SHAME

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Why does every single fucking article start like that now? I immediately stop paying attention soon as I see that header because if the fucking title is copypasted from a billion other fucking articles then what about the rest of it? And it's a little weird how they spent so long destroying the concept of shame, while weaponizing against everyone else, but are now lamenting it's loss because they can't effectively use it as a weapon anymore

They what? They've been BEING nice? Last time that I checked, they've been telling anyone who is white (specifically the males) to fuck off and give up anything that they have for years.

Didn't mattress girl lie about being raped?

We can't keep doing this, Holla Forums. My countrymen, my fellows, we're being spammed now by third party sources that would wish to never be aligned with us in the first place because our limited power has been recognized by, weirdly, the international community. This has spurred some otherwise-14/88ers to go alt-right to address the situation in favor of ad revenue.
We can't have it here.
This shit that we're being bombarded with, on this board, NOW, is the dregs drudged up to wear us down. It's as much disinfo as it is propaganda. I saw too many anons fight – and some even succumb to the desire to gas themselves – to give in to this madness.
We are RWDS. We are DOTR. There is no second tier or middle ground.
We bought the ticket
We boarded the plane.

The thing is they have to appeal to sensibility and moderation because they're trying to negotiate with the majority, whites. Doubling down is the best possible thing they could do for the right-wing, that's what created SJWs in the first place.

Reducio ad absurdum is only a good strategy when the people you are trying to argue with aren't insane. There is nothing like arguing with a leftist who can't tell you're constructively mocking them.

...

What's with all the fucking blog-posts today?

...

Not only did she lie, she made a porno to document her non-rape where the guy chokes her and slaps her around a bit. I thought bringing her up was relevant to a no shame society.

xhamster.com/movies/4688290/emma_sulcowickz_mattress_girl_columbia_university.html


Fuck off nigger.

QUINTESSENTIAL QUINQUES FOR MENTAL PROTECTION
Beware of memetical hazards.

Course it is, they use shaming as a sword, and victimhood as a shield when their behavior is in question.
We need shaming brought back at the local level on a massive scale, that 14 year old posting herself naked and the dad slapping her is the tip of the iceberg of this generation.

The German dude should sue for defamation, look at the state of that fat fuck

Nice!
saved.

Well played.