considering the role of shame in collective liberation

we can choose how Palestine shapes us

“our hearts are big enough. we can be in solidarity with many struggles at once. we can show up and lift up one another. our hearts are big enough. i promise. our hearts can withstand the love we feel for each other.” - Aja Monet, surrealist blues poet 

A few months ago I was on a bus [shakily] reading

Fariha Róisín

’s ninth dispatch about the genocide in Gaza. Around that time, the IDF had just pulled out from Al-Shifa hospital, leaving an estimated 300 martyrs– their crushed, dismembered, unrecognizable bodies– in their wake.*

*less than a month later, Palestinians uncovered a mass grave of 283, 300, 400 (it grows by the day) bodies, some with hands and feet bound, near the wreckage of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis.

In this dispatch, along with updates and reflections on the constant state of anger she feels while witnessing this genocide, Róisín posed an interesting argument for how white supremacy, zionism, and narcissism present similar behaviors and beliefs. 

She included a source image from a TikTok by user @erinraii that showed a Venn diagram of white supremacy and clinical narcissism. All of the following traits fell into both categories (i.e. the diagram is a circle): 

• Tragic victim complex

• Lack of empathy

• Sense of entitlement

• Gaslighting 

• Focus on image

• Difficulty taking criticism 

• Depends on nostalgia

• Willingness to exploit others

• Rewrites history 

• Preoccupied with domination/power

• Discomfort when others get attention

• Wants to be idealized

Róisín linked the above to zionism and the atrocities in Gaza– adding “deflecting blame” to the list through her mentions of Israel writing off all accountability as “Hamas! Human shields! Hamas!”

The U.S. government is (of course) one of the only ardent supporters of Israel during this time. They are sustaining the proliferation of Israel’s physical and psychological violence through exercising veto-ing rights in (decades of) UN Security Council meetings – most recently blocking Palestinian membership– sending an endless supply of direct funds and weapons to Israel, and continuing their efforts to dehumanize the Palestinian people.

In her dispatch, Róisín notes:

“While members of the Knesset are continuing to state there is no such thing as a Palestinian, Biden is telling us the death toll in Palestine isn’t as high as the number of dead bodies being found, and according to former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett, “not one” Palestinian civilian was killed at the recent murderous rage orchestrated by the IDF at Al Shifa.”

I highly recommend the entirety of her piece (and her work in general), but there was a sentiment she shared in this dispatch that has been in my mind since I read it:

“I recently watched this video that said shaming people into caring is not the way, and even though I agree, shame has actually been a useful tool for me in my life. I think for a narcissist to be humbled, they actually need to feel shame, to feel embarrassed by their lies. This is what we mean when we talk about “doing the work” - sometimes others show you how to do the work, you just need to be humble enough to do it.”

I am hesitant to ascribe individual pathologies to whole systems and modes of belief, but it is an interesting exploration nonetheless. And is a system not an amplification, a collection, of the people and their beliefs, behaviors, and actions? Both the cause of and the reaction to their neuroses?

Anyways, shame.

I’ve thought a lot about shame in my life. It is a place I have felt deeply entrenched in, and paralyzed by, for most of it. Learning how to exist with it has given me a lot of perspective into the ways shame has dictated my actions. 

In almost all cases that I recall feeling ashamed (existing in a state of shame), I reacted/behaved in ways most contradictory to my values. It is when I am feeling ashamed that I am my most defensive, avoidant, blame-shifting, and least empathetic. 

I understand these behaviors to be protective of my ego; a scorched-earth attempt to keep my sense of self intact. This is both a psychological defense mechanism to cling to a perceived sense of safety and control and a neurological process devoted to maintaining identity. There is an entire brain region dedicated to recalling and updating your self-concept – it is crucial for our survival. 

Intellectualizations aside, feeling ashamed feels Not Good and I have done and said things I am not proud of to try and alleviate the pain of existing there. I imagine many people have. Now amplify that tendency to reaffirm self-concept at any cost to the systems level; a tendency that is self-substantiated through colonial vestiges of unrestricted autonomy, entitlement, unceasing growth, control, politics of persuasion, abstraction, and force. My gut tells me that ramming more shame against that 1. Does not permeate and/or 2. Builds walls higher, thicker, with more heavily armed guards. 

Róisín’s invitation to ‘humble’ narcissists and narcissistic systems as a tool in the movement for a free Palestine sparked my curiosity. I tend to believe similarly to the person she alluded to – shaming people is not the way. But she is far from the only one to suggest purposefully shaming others. The idea (and practice) rears its head anytime there is a mass movement towards changing belief systems and actions. Elections, culture shifts, anti-war efforts all come to mind as times when I see people shaming each other the most– even between those fighting for the same cause. 

Knowing how paralyzing and antagonizing shame feels for me, I wondered what the observed and studied responses to shame were in people with and without narcissistic personality disorder and/or narcissistic traits. 

What shame does to us

[to note: the studies linked + referenced below largely represent studies carried out in an American/Western populace. While I do not center clinical and empirical data as the only credible modes of authenticating experience, I felt it useful to guide us here]

Shame researcher Brene Brown defines shame as “the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging—something we’ve experienced, done, or failed to do makes us unworthy of connection.” She notes that this perception of being unworthy of connection, or merely the fear of it, can make us dangerous and lead to destructive, hurtful behaviors against ourselves and others.

For any person, experiencing shame is distressing and leads to actions that help reduce the experience of shame. One common behavior is lowering the perceived status of the people or group that instilled (or witnessed) the shame. If the shaming event was committed by someone(s) we hold in contempt, the act can be construed as an unreliable and unimportant judgment of our character. The self can stay intact, we can still believe ourselves to be good and worthy. Even further, “we can see ourselves—and be seen by others we respect—as the innocent victims who have suffered an undeserved injustice.” Anger is then seen as a justified, righteous response. 

When this is elevated to the level of a group, they often respond to threats to identity with the same emotions as if it were being committed against them personally. If a group’s identity is defined in contrast to another, “hostility toward the out-group [becomes] an essential feature of in-group identity”.

Shame and guilt often are conflated. Many researchers believe that shame reduces one’s tendency to behave in socially constructive ways while guilt promotes socially adaptive behaviors.

This is, however, only the case for people without narcissistic personality disorder. The inability to feel remorse or guilt is a diagnostic criterion for NPD in the DSM-5. The distinction between the two is important, especially when considering NPD, as shame, conversely, is often a driver for narcissistic beliefs and behaviors. 

For those with NPD, experiencing daily shame is positively associated with trait vulnerable narcissism, a subtype of narcissism that is characterized by being defensive, avoidant, insecure, hypersensitive and vigilant for criticism. In my up-close experience with clinical narcissism, I have always understood it to be a disorder specifically driven by unendingly deep, debilitating shame. I do not doubt that Róisín has a similar understanding given the experiences she alludes to. But it is easy to forget when your brain works structurally differently than that of a person with NPD. 

The mechanisms that hurt and help you are not the same as those of a narcissist. They are nearly the exact opposite.

So if shaming others, especially narcissists (and, for this argument, systems that mimic narcissism or behave narcissistically), drives them further into their present identity and inspires action that bolsters the self rather than questions it:

What is the role of shame in collective liberation? 

How has it been used in efforts for a liberated Palestine? 

Is there a way to use shame that promotes the collective good?

Weaponization of Shame

Shame as a silencer, distraction, and deterioration of self. 

Those who feel ashamed turn to the shaming of others to restore perceived power and control. If a system cannot find a reason to persist from within, it will force itself forward using methods of coersion, suppression, and elimination.

Shame is an extremely effective weapon to weild against others if your goal is to have their own minds do your bidding. The self-perpetrating aspect of weaponized shame is why it is so insidious. It is a favorite tool of domestic abusers and oppressive systems alike.

While researching shame, I came across a paper published in 2012 that investigated the validity of “collective emotions”. It is heavily referenced in other parts of this essay. Without my prompting, the case study they explored was Israel’s use of shame against Palestinians during the expansion of the occupation and the demotion of Palestinians to refugees within their own land. 

It discussed the “shaming potential” of the occupation and the compounded violence it led to,

“...the prolonged imposition of restrictions on movement render many Palestinian males of working age unemployable, ashamed before wives and children for whom they cannot provide and upon whom they have been prone to vent frustration” 

Shame must always find a target deemed lesser-than to channel its rage. It can cause an unraveling from within.

The paper also discussed the communicability of shame once it is beaten into, and established in, a people. The feeling [of shame] in each Palestinian is “reinforced by their presence in everyone else around her.” It is further symbolized through establishments of the occupation– Israeli settlements, military bases, the separation barrier, and ubiquitous checkpoints. 

In other words, violent suppression is a temporary solution. Shame has the potential to destroy a people for generations without ever having to raise a gun so long as it is reinforced. (Though, Israel has opted to use both methods).

On the Western front, I see the notion that the disgust toward the Israeli government and its genocidal mania, and the ideology that sustains it, is an expression of “antisemitism” as being deployed to silence and distract. 

It is intended to make people believe that opposition to the endlessly funded, intentional, and systemic annihilation of a people is a shameful act that is more threatening than the annihilation itself. This conflation does more harm to Jewish people than the pleas for a permanent ceasefire ever could.

To be frank (to a potentially dangerous extent), the attempts to equate anti-zionism and anti-semitism have instilled a knee-jerk hesitation to interact with strangers who show outward presentations of Judaism for the first time in my life. This is not for any feelings towards the religion, but out of fear that this person in front of me might support something I find abhorrent — the ruthless collective punishment of the Palestinian people.

This is an assumption I combat within myself because I know its roots are unfounded; there is an abundance of Jewish people who do not support this genocide or the zionist project. Judaism is a beautiful, compassionate, and expansive religion I have briefly studied and long admired. But I mention these feelings to say that I would never have thought of the two as inherently intertwined without the link being weaponized in an attempt to silence and disenfranchise people. The idea was planted and the brain is pliable.

I am ashamed of this fear or bias or whatever it is I’ve developed. That shame has frozen me from being more vocal in support of my Jewish friends who are, understandably so, deeply uncomfortable and holding many layered tensions right now. I imagine that this fear + bias in others has led to direct antisemitic harm against people. This is not excusable. The fabricated linkage between anti-zionism and anti-semitism must be looked at honestly if we are ever to keep everyone safe as we intend. 

Further, I am not afraid of people. I am afraid of the imperialist project and the lengths people will go to to support its domination and control.*

*At the UCLA Palestine Solidarity Encampment, 100+ pro-Israel aggressors violently attacked students in the encampment for hours into the early morning while militarized LAPD officers watched and laughed. The same guards then brutalized and arrested the pro-Palestine protesters en masse. I am terrified of that. 

I believe (I hope) it is becoming abundantly clear to many across the movement that time spent arguing whether or not your actions are anti-semitic is a distraction. If you know that what you are doing is in alignment with the values of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign or a derivative thereof:

• the promotion of positive cooperation and respect between all those seeking to
  campaign in support of the rights of the Palestinian people and who share the Aims, Objectives and Values of the PSC;

• a commitment to equality and seeking to ensure that discriminatory acts are not
  committed against anyone by the PSC, its members or its staff as outlined within the Code of Conduct;

• the opposition to all forms of racism, including Islamophobia and antisemitism;

• the promotion of the voices of Palestinian civil society, ensuring that this is inclusive of those who may face additional barriers in having their voices heard relating to aspects of their identity; and

• independence from any political party or government

then there is no use in continuing to fight with strangers about the cause. If your approach does not oppose the proliferation of Islamaphobia, anti-semitism, or any hateful ideology against a group, then it is not in alignment with the movement. We know this. Next.

Moving toward collective care

What we wield is how we build 

Ismatu Gwendolyn, a revolutionary writer and person I Deeply Admire, shared a perspective on their Instagram that is reminiscent of my politic and my view on the questions posed above. 

They spoke of how specticalization on the internet is keeping us enraged, impulsive, and unable to focus on what we are moving towards. We cannot connect the dots because we are continuously force-fed more dots of increasing disturbance. They shared a worry about how ill-prepared we are to continue to care about the things we care about so vocally right now; how the things we cannot see will come for us if we do not build community care infrastructure instead of shields. 

“Sustainable movement is TOWARDS something. Not away from violence! I don’t just dream of the absence of violence, I dream of the presence of lasting peace. How do I build that now, today?” -ismatu gwendolyn 

I offer the addition that existing in an enraged and impulsive state turns us away from each other. We begin to shame others for not caring enough, not speaking out enough, not having the exact right reaction to the horrors we witness. Rage is healthy and necessary, but constantly feeding it is isolating and unraveling. 

At the end of the day, while social media has been integral to bringing global awareness to Gaza and has inspired mass mobilization, it is still an enabler of the imperialist project. The apps still benefit from our undivided attention, no matter what that attention inspires. So long as our eyes are on the screen, they benefit. I would not doubt that executives at Meta are factoring in the profitability of a publicized genocide into their development strategies. 

The work does not stop at feeling angry or scared. It does not stop at sharing the horrors far and wide, and it is seldom, if ever, shaming those who don’t.

If we intend to have agency and awareness over the actions we take, we must zoom out and connect the dots. All of this has always been much bigger than Palestine. 

“Palestine has never been a single issue. Palestine is a prism that reveals the world to itself. It reveals the vast spectrum of our struggles as inextricably interlinked, intercommunal, local, personal, collective. There is no outside in the struggle for collective liberation” - Threads user @atlajala 

When we can see the whole picture, we can act in ways reminiscent of the world waiting to be born. 

Revolution is an act of love.

I understand love to be the act of seeking to understand, to uplift, to witness, to facilitate care, and to co-create.

as bell hooks knows — healing is a communal act.

and as Brene Brown says, shame cannot survive being spoken. It cannot survive empathy.

How can we organize and build communities of care that structurally and sustainably hold us? All of us. 

How can we use rage as inspiration toward connection and healing?

What can each of us do to hold those around us better?

The answers already exist, we just have to look and be willing to embody them. 

I look to the solidarity encampments.

I look to the care shown by my community. 

I look to those who have organized long before I was born.

I look to the words of those much wiser than me. 

I look to my body and all that it knows. 

This is not [at all] to say that we must play nice with oppressive systems. Quite the opposite. 

This is rather an invitation to use this opportunity – this massive collective momentum – to imagine a world where we do not need or rely on the oppressors' tools to drive action toward a just and liberated world. (I’m thinking of you, Audre Lorde). Not only is it not sustainable, it is in direct conflict with the basis of collective liberation. We are destined to commit the same harms that have been committed against us unless we recognize the chance to choose differently.

Think differently.

Act differently. 

We must. Lest the cycle continues. 

I am you / Refaat Alareer, Palestinian poet, deceased

So, to the notion that we must shame the unshameable, I invite you to resist the urge.

Imperialism cannot be shamed. It is the employment of shame. 

In the effort to liberate Palestine, Sudan, Congo, Haiti, the oppressed people within all Western states, all the silent violence we must keep in our hearts, we are laying the foundation, or rather building on the foundations that have been laid by generations before us, for a world built by and for the collective. Those who are not yet on board with the cause will still be a part of that world. They will not, nor should we want them to, poof into thin air. 

If white supremacy and zionism are narcissistic, compounding more shame will only serve to strengthen their defense mechanisms that drive harm to begin with. 

Organized action that has the potential to instill shame into others, but is otherwise not intended to do so, is more effective as it can circumnavigate the immobilizing impacts of processing shame. Publicizing voting records and protesting + calling attention to decisions are actions taken in an attempt to raise awareness, garner support from others, and hold people/systems accountable. They are intended to apply pressure. If the perpetrator feels ashamed or, more favorably, guilty for their actions, that is their process of grappling with the gap between their actions and their values/humanity. From what I’ve seen, my relationship to shame, and the things I’ve read for this piece, this self-reckoning is much more likely to inspire behavior change than being directly shamed ever will. A person + a people must contain the desire to change. Being shamed, or “humbled” will unlikely inspire this desire. For narcissists and narcissistic systems, shame is not only incapacitating but fuel to the flame of narcissistic harm. 

Can we move away from the modeling of:

“how to shame others/ systems into submission”

To (the short term) —>

“How can we ignore and organize around distractions from people/systems unsympathetic + antagonistic to the cause”

To (the longterm) —>

“How can we move this system and all people through shame; to thaw us; to co-create a solution that serves the common good?”

The latter is admittedly more time-intensive. At a moment where direct, immediate action is overdue, the task seems daunting. Especially as we’ve been throwing our voices, our bodies, our minds at the cause for months (years) now and nothing seems to give. But things are giving. They will. We do have a say in how they do and if they’ll stay that way. 

“If systems of domination are interconnected, then systems of liberation are also interconnected…While personal transformation has always been part of anti-oppression politics, interconnected liberation brings with it a vision that creates more space for possibilities of who we are becoming, as opposed to just knowing what and how we do not want to be.” – Chris Crass.

I, like many, often feel lost and hopeless and unsure of what to do. But I have to believe that focusing our efforts on elevation, protest, mutual aid, and collective care is more productive than shaming those who do not yet desire to understand. 

For now, consider changing the minds of imperialists as being off the table. Move away from shaming tactics. We need minds and bodies together, moving towards. Study. Resist. Commune.

This is right now, but it is also what was and what could be. 

Shame is the tool (the weapon) of now. What could our tools look like? (we’re already using them. Look! Look! Join!)

xx