I think that would be guilt and that’s the problem-- shame isn’t guilt. People feel shame when they feel intrinsically worthless because society says they are so far as they can tell and there’s nothing to be done about it. Guilt is when you think you made a mistake and you feel bad about the effect of it.
People think shame is a more strong motivator than guilt and it is but not for the good of other people because shame is all about accepting or not accepting basically the message that the best thing you could do for others is kill yourself now. Some people do, some people don’t, and some people just get angry. But a person doesn’t feel guilt because they are ashamed even if they did something wrong, and a person can be shamed to oblivion while doing nothing wrong because shame is about self-worth and guilt is about realizing one has hurt or failed others. Some people have developed a lot of defense to deal with shame though so we think people just need more of it. IMO it often seems that the only survivors/winners of shame culture are narcissists who refuse to feel shame over anything they do…
You can’t totally control whether a person feels guilt or shame but the kind of “let’s all get together and talk about how this piece of trash shouldn’t live” breeds shame every time, not even in the intended target. In order for guilt to work the way people think it does there has to be a path back into integration with society and the person has to want that. Shame does not get you there, not even close.
People aren’t going to change though… the most fun human activity for humans older than two or three is circling a falling human “enemy” no matter how weak that person is or whether they deserve it. Show me a group of humans who don’t do this. Glad it’s getting call outs at least though, we all should share in the … guilt. Buuut we probably won’t.
