Shall we continue into an infinite regress of zingers?
You are correct that I didn't provide supporting reasons myself. Fair point. I suppose I didn't think your comment warranted it. Saying that might come across as harsh, which isn't my goal. I'd rather shift into a constructive and specific discussion instead. In that spirit, I'll elaborate on my criticism. Let's start with your leading sentence:
> Nope, shame is ineffective as a tool for change.
There are lots of ways to improve this sentence; here is one suggestion: consider a phrasing like "In comparison to _X_, shame tends to be less effective for _particular purpose_."
I'd suggest avoiding empirical claims about likelihoods you aren't able to defend. Take this sentence fragment:
> More often people shut down or ignore you if you attempt to shame them...
If done forcefully, this _might_ lead to "shutting down" or "ignoring"; however, on what basis can one say this happens "more often"? More often than what? The writing here overreaches -- this is why I called it "overconfident".
There are many situations where one person points out a shameful behavior in another, who recognizes it, feels bad, and i.e. apologizes and modifies their behavior. My point: it would be faulty to dismiss the idea of shame as useless in social contexts.
Finally, the next sentence also struck me as an overreach:
> As a tool for oppression however, yes it's quite effective.
Care to elaborate your thinking on that one? What do you mean by oppression?
By oppression I think of a power dynamic where the weak are kept in a lower position by the more powerful. Is this what you mean? Why do you think shaming is particularly effective way to oppress? In my mind, military, physical, legal, and economic mechanisms tend to be more effective, historically speaking.
I could speculate. Perhaps you are referring to the practice by certain religious systems to make people feel ashamed for merely doing things that all humans do (make mistakes) and thus deserve punishment (e.g. by the religious elites, or worse, by yourself, thus making yourself feel weak and unworthy).
In short, I'm sufficiently enough in these ideas to be rather unsatisfied with writing that doesn't unpack the ideas at all. No offense intended. I look forward to learning what you mean.
Eh, you either seem unaware that your comments aren’t the only ones in this discussion, or narcissistic enough to believe only you deserve a full response, because every answer you’re looking for and more are in sibling comments around you, yet you choose to engage only in my shortest comment that had context you could pretend didn’t exist.
If you were trying to show some of the worst faith engagement possible on HN, you did it.
You are correct that I didn't provide supporting reasons myself. Fair point. I suppose I didn't think your comment warranted it. Saying that might come across as harsh, which isn't my goal. I'd rather shift into a constructive and specific discussion instead. In that spirit, I'll elaborate on my criticism. Let's start with your leading sentence:
> Nope, shame is ineffective as a tool for change.
There are lots of ways to improve this sentence; here is one suggestion: consider a phrasing like "In comparison to _X_, shame tends to be less effective for _particular purpose_."
I'd suggest avoiding empirical claims about likelihoods you aren't able to defend. Take this sentence fragment:
> More often people shut down or ignore you if you attempt to shame them...
If done forcefully, this _might_ lead to "shutting down" or "ignoring"; however, on what basis can one say this happens "more often"? More often than what? The writing here overreaches -- this is why I called it "overconfident".
There are many situations where one person points out a shameful behavior in another, who recognizes it, feels bad, and i.e. apologizes and modifies their behavior. My point: it would be faulty to dismiss the idea of shame as useless in social contexts.
Finally, the next sentence also struck me as an overreach:
> As a tool for oppression however, yes it's quite effective.
Care to elaborate your thinking on that one? What do you mean by oppression?
By oppression I think of a power dynamic where the weak are kept in a lower position by the more powerful. Is this what you mean? Why do you think shaming is particularly effective way to oppress? In my mind, military, physical, legal, and economic mechanisms tend to be more effective, historically speaking.
I could speculate. Perhaps you are referring to the practice by certain religious systems to make people feel ashamed for merely doing things that all humans do (make mistakes) and thus deserve punishment (e.g. by the religious elites, or worse, by yourself, thus making yourself feel weak and unworthy).
In short, I'm sufficiently enough in these ideas to be rather unsatisfied with writing that doesn't unpack the ideas at all. No offense intended. I look forward to learning what you mean.