In one of his “Watch” books, Sergey Lukyanenko puts forth the argument that embarrassment is a better way of effecting behavioural change than fear. Fear, he says — or rather, his protagonist — can make people change their behaviour but they would do it grudgingly and the results wouldn’t be as good as they would be if you embarrassed people into changing their behaviour. Embarrassment, in other words, is a much better motivator for change than fear.
This may sound eccentric from a contemporary perspective but take a look at the not so distant past. In the olden days of my youth some 30 years ago embarrassment was a standard parental tool — and a very effective one, up to and including the actual words “You should be ashamed of yourself.”
Come to think of it, embarrassment may well have been the oldest parental tool ever because some things we know — and use — instinctively. And this applies as much to the sense of social norms as to the desire, or possibly need, to enforce them. Yet with frequent use, abuse is not far behind and embarrassment gradually stopped working as intended.
Social media was instrumental in helping people shake off the shackles of being ashamed. It flipped a switch in our minds that went from “Embarrassment” to “Fame at all costs” and now we are at a point where, it seems, nobody get embarrassed about anything they do, outrageous or even disgusting as these behaviours may be. On the contrary, people are willingly putting themselves in embarrassing situations to score likes with strangers on the internet. We have truly turned the tables on embarrassment — and external validation.
Blatant lies from politicians, obvious disinformation from previously reputable media, data manipulation by scientists — the list of things that once upon a time would have embarrassed most of the people doing them is long. Yet they no longer fear embarrassment. Because many if not most of them genuinely believe what they say and do is the right thing to say and do, even if it is not exactly, well, moral.
This belief appears to be so strong, there is no space in these people’s heads for the possibility of being wrong. And that’s because the belief takes up all available space — except for the deepest recesses of the mind where embarrassment, shunned everywhere else, has been caged.
It is a truly remarkable development that took less than two decades, too, so it was also remarkably fast. These days we lie without shame, we mislead others without shame, and we mislead ourselves, also without shame — because we believe we are doing the right thing. It is easy to do this because “the right thing” has come to mean “whatever I believe is right”. If whatever I believe is right because I believe it, I cannot be shamed for it because it is right and the right thing cannot be embarrassing.
It’s a tiny little self-perpetuating cycle of gratification on a pedestal of non-accountability. We lie, manipulate and mislead without fear of embarrassment because what we believe is right cannot be wrong. But here’s the twist. What we believe is right cannot be wrong because if it is, we would be greatly embarrassed. The beast has been caged but it is alive and it is strong. And we are afraid of it, even if we don’t consciously realise it.
We are, in fact, more afraid of embarrassment in the post-embarrassment age than we were before it and I blame so-called liberal parenting for it from the position of someone was was, in fact, raised by parents who by 1980s standards were very liberal. From the perspective of today’s standards, they would be considered ultra-conservative. In the past, we could be shamed into doing the right thing or taking responsibility for doing the wrong thing. Now, right and wrong is what we say they are because we cannot handle the trauma of embarrassment.
It is for this reason that so many of us lie, manipulate and mislead without fear of repercussions — if what we do is right, and it is right because we believe it is, there could be no repercussions because nobody penalises The Right Thing. How could they, if it is The Right Thing? This is extremely flimsy, vicious-circle logic, for sure, and yet it is the logic being applied by our political leaders and countless non-leaders.
Thanks to the advent of liberal parenting, the simultaneous advent of the concept of avoiding trauma at all costs, and thanks to social media, our embarrassment organs have atrophied to an extent that makes it literally impossible for some people to consciously experience a feeling of being wrong, even when faced with physical facts proving they are wrong.
A well functioning embarrassment organ would once upon a time deal with it — it’s unpleasant to be wrong but it’s human and it’s not the end of the world. Without such a well functioning organ and without a sense of accountability we might well witness the end of the world in a certain sense — brought about by those so terrified by embarrassment that they cannot even acknowledge having the capacity to experience it.
Lukyanenko’s argument still stands. Embarrassment is a powerful motivator for change. Ironically, it can also be a powerful motivator for non-change, when your deep, unconscious, and never-to-be-acknowledged fear of embarrassment is so strong the only way you can continue living with yourself is to keep believing everything you do is The Right Thing therefore there is no reason to fear embarrassment for being wrong. And this is why we can’t have nice things.