The first section of the The Shame Machine by Cathy O’Neil deals with fat-shaming, addiction-shaming, and poverty-shaming and shows how shame is used to create a target market for cruel industries. However, it is the central section of the book on online shaming that is most anticipated. O’Neil has no qualms with networked shame machines punishing men. She describes shame as “another dimension of pain” that can be transformitive for those targeted. This is alleged to be a positive transformation even when those punished insist that they are inoccent. The targets of networked shaming are not given the chance to give an account of themselves or their actions to their accusers and executioners online. This lack of defence or representation is not discussed by O’Neill. There is no discussion of the justice of ‘retributive justice’, nor of the unaccountability of those running the machines, nor of a whole section of society being targeted as something shameful, toxic. In contrast to the previous chapters, the chapters on network shaming reveals someone who has suffered, justifying the desire to inflict pain and suffering on others.
Even a treatment of shame is conspicuously absent from the book. Apparently, O’Neil is unaware that what she calls shame in the book does not fit the common definition. Shame is commonly considered a self-accusation or self-condemnation. Thus shame affirms autonomy with a commitment to live by one’s own standards. Crucial to this transformative power is the idea of atonement and expiation, which is totally lacking in O’Neil’s book. In her chapter on networked shame, shame is forcefully imposed on men from the outside, unabated by the insistence on their innocence, on the bases of their sex. It seems like this dehumanizing treatment of men as men is what should invoke shame in themselves, a shame that is without atonement. In short, dehumanisation should invoke shame in a section of society as part of a political campaign. Those reader who run the network shame machines, and the victims of it, are given the impression that O’Neill knows more about the campaigns than she is letting on. That’s for the next Substack.
The section on network shaming begins with the example of Karen. Karen was shamed online for calling the police when a black man asked her to put her dog on a leash in a nature preserve in Central Park. She told the police that a black man was attacking her, but the man filmed the incident while explaining what was going on. He referred to the woman as ‘Karen’ and the racial incident gave birth to the Karen meme. The Karen meme refers to white women who exercise their privilege and power over black people by appealing to higher authorities. This touches upon something which is a sensitive point in the feminist world view. These women are caught using power and privilege to intimidate and harass black men, and while black men are more vulnerable to such harassment than white men, it also poses questions about men’s vulnerability to women.
O’Neil begins with examples of women vilified as racist online only to feign a fair treatment of the issue in relation the sexes. However, these women are chosen for the examples of victimhood. We are given the impression that these women were singled out unfairly as examples. Even when they had accepted that they done wrong, the abuse continued unabated. This might have led the author to examine the purported justice of online shame campaigns generally, and the motives of those participating in them, but she does not. The point being made is that the female author is herself being contrite and checking her privilege. She is claiming that women are no better than others. For the rest of the section on network shaming, all the examples are of men deserving of pain and punishment.
Rather than doubling down on men as the perennial wrong doers and racists, the videos of female racists abusing black men invites us to question gender stereotypes. We need to distinguish between different types of threats and degrees of vulnerability. We should not be so quick to consider the racist behaviour of the Karens as an anomaly. The Karen’s of this world might be physically less powerful than their male victims, but this does not prevent them from harassing, abusing and intimidating men. Women can make an appeal to authority. It is impossible to acknowledge the subtle forms of institutional racism without also acknowledging that women can wield these powers and privileges as well, if not better, than men. Much of the power and privilege that the Karens wield stem from the racial stereotype of black men being threatening and prone to violence. However, this stereotype of vulgar animality hangs over men generally, just as the stereotype of women as weak and vulnerable victims still hangs over women. Both prejudices can be used to harass and abuse men, not just black men.
It is important that women can be viewed as victims even when appearances suggest otherwise, and the Karen meme is case and point. The claim that women are just as bad as everyone else is a necessary feign for O’Neil’s argument that white men are deserving of abuse. The Karens are women contrite for doing wrong, but the punishment is never ending. Men however are without exception presented as denying the accusations made against them, and those denying accusations against them in the book are without exception men. Even the one apparent exception to this rule, that of Governor George Wallace’s volte face when he issued a public apology, is considered a disingenuous ploy to get re-elected. Other men are presented as using the shame campaigns to cast themselves as victims, when in fact they deserve to be shamed. All these men are shamed for wrongs that are more heinous than the Karens of the world. So, if you can excuse the binary here, it turns out women are better than everyone else. Women can make mistakes, but even women that err, err better. This is the conclusion that O’Neil wants us to draw from the phenomena of Karens being exposed and shamed online- white men are just the worst, and they deserve what they get.
O’Neil acknowledges that there is some performative grandstanding in shaming people online. Instead of examining the motives of those who harass, demean and abuse people online, O’Neil pivots to those who deserve abuse. O’Neil uses the words of the victim of the original Karen in Central Park, Christian Cooper, “They can scream for her head while leaving their own prejudice unexamined”. (p116). Cooper rightfully claims that focusing on the Karen’s of this world, “let’s white people of the hook”. However, O’Neil then tactfully turns to white fragility and men. White fragility is betrayed in the attempts of white men to claim they are innocent of racism, and thus they are the victims of a witch hunt. O’Neil writes off all such claims in the book and argues that they should be treated as a result of painful cognitive dissonance. The shaming networks are doing them a service to help them face up to their racial hatred and their guilt.
O’Neil quotes Eddi S. Glaude Jr., a Professor of African American Studies at Princton who argues that “the only chance for racial peace and progress is to convince white folks to… embrace a history that might set them free from being white”. If he takes whiteness to be synonymous with ‘ignorant of privileges wrought from oppression’, then I agree with the conclusion but not the premise, nor the reductive argument. This form of ignorance is a vice that should be overcome, but it is not a unique characteristic of white people, let alone men. However, we might not take the Professor’s words so literally, we might not care to subject ourselves to any more of his trolling either.
What Professor Glaude Jr. is doing is an elaborate form of “concern trolling”. Concern trolling is where the shamer defends herself by claiming they are worried about the victim’s health. So, “the shamer both denies and defends the tactic” p33. This patronizing and malicious form of shaming is based on the assumption that the victim has never considered whether they are implicated in wrong-doing. ”. O’Neil uses the fat-shaming of the singer, rapper, and flutist, Lizzo, as an example. Lizzo is asked if she has not considered going on a diet, by those who assume that she lacks the willpower and discipline to correct her behaviour. In the case of white heterosexual men, O’Neil implies that they are incapable of self-reflection, of taking responsibilities of wrongs done, and of controlling their desires and impulses. Which is to say, that they suffer from their own animality excessively, and to the detriment of the society around them.
Desperate times call for desperate measures. O’Neil sees no problem with anonymous shame networks dishing out retributive justice for problems with white heterosexual men. Shaming networks provide a service to the individual and society alike. “Shame presents another dimension of pain”, that can be transformative and even transcendent (p6). Pain must be inflicted on men so that they understand and accept that they are sexist and racist. The chapter ends with story of George Wallace who was elected governor of Alabama in 1963 with the call for ‘segregation, segregation, segregation’. In 1972 he was shot and paralyzed. As O’Neil notes, he recanted his views after this. Why is O’Neil telling us this story of a governor from the 1960’s in her chapter on the recent development of networked shaming? She is subtly celebrating the violence on men with self-righteous social progressives.
The sleight of hand in this book is to frame online shaming as a response to racism, and racism is presented as a problem with white heterosexual men and the patriarchy. The chapter begins with women racially abusing black men but succeeds in presenting racism as a problem with men. Online shaming then develops into a feminist strategy that maps over perfectly with defeating racism. Networked shaming of any white man is appropriate because it punches up against power, against racism and sexism. Men who deny any accusation made against them are, we are told, only suffering from cognitive dissonance. However online shaming does not target racist politicians from the 1960’s. So, who is being targeted? It was not online shaming that brought politicians and Hollywood producers to justice for sexual assaulting women, so what good is the violence doing?
You can easily make a case that the attacks on them [the Karens] serves a social function. Perhaps at this very moment is arguing with a Black neighbour. Recalling a much-publicized Karen scandal, he or she is resisting the temptation to call the cops. (p114)
O’Neil is not overly concerned about making an example of one person so that the spectacle of their pain and suffering acts as a deterrent to others. She asks whether any woman deserves to bear a scarlet letter for one mistake, but quickly redirects her readers to the real concern. While women are relatively innocent, online pile-ons where men are the victims might spark counter movements from guilty men who claim to be victimized. If you are part of the feminist shame machine the teaching is twofold: You need to consider whether your shaming could cause a backlash from men who claim to be victimized. Second, when men deny the accusations spread online, you need to double down and say they are in denial of their shame.
The problem here is not just that making an example of someone guilty to bring other guilty people in line is unjust. Rather the strategy will work as a deterrent to anyone from doing whatever you accuse the victim of, whether the victim is guilty or not. It is the demonstration of the power to cause pain, humiliation and dehumanization that is important. So, it is important to keep the machine running, and the women involved in the campaign thereby maintain their kudos. If they do not have a deserving victim, they need to create one, and O’Neil argues that any man will do. O’Neil’s message is that the more innocent men deny accusations, the more deserving of pain and suffering they are. More violence is needed for them to transcend their shameful existence. In the cases of the myth of ‘the black soul’ and ‘toxic masculinity’, the level of violence necessary demonstrates that the shaming machine is correct, because it demonstrates that the men are incapable of reflecting, adapting, and learning to be civilized. This was how the barbaric treatment of foreigners and slaves was justified during the Roman empire. As O’Neil put it,
“There’s no greater power than shame to bring people in line” (p155)
In my next Substack I show how O’Neil is trolling men who are targeted with coordinated and scripted violence: