Punishment, Shaming, and Violence

This chapter shows how understanding the emotions of shame and guilt, and the contrasting moral value systems and behavior patterns they motivate, can enable us to understand the causes and effects of violence (toward self or others) and punishment (of self or others). This explains why punishment, which is itself a form of violent shaming, stimulates violence rather than inhibiting it; and why we will need to replace prisons and punishments with non-violent means of transcending shame and guilt, such as education and life in a therapeutic community, if we wish to prevent violence.