How Public Shaming on Social Media Affected Me (what I did about it and what I’d do differently next time)
I’d have said I have experienced my fair share of being publicly humiliated except we have the Internet now with its social media and with it the autonomy, anonymity, and distance that lay the groundwork for people to publicly humiliate one another. Not long ago it happened to me.
Friends had participated in a political demonstration and posted selfies. It was delightful to participate in their joy and proclamation of sisterhood evident in the still photos and their words about the experience. In my enthusiasm I gave them a shout out as well as applauded the countless others in similar demonstrations across the country that day. Hours later, out of the blue, a family friend who’d helped raise me left a comment, scolding me for my post and what I had to say about the event. Having been reprimanded by this person when I was a child, I heard their voice loud and clear, even in print. There was anger and shaming in it. How it made me feel as an adult was stunning.
In the seconds it took to read the reprimand I seemed to shrink in size from a grown adult to a cowering child.
It happened instantaneously. There was no gap, no breathing room for me to catch myself mid-free fall so I could assure me I was safe and everything was all right. My body flooded with shame and embarrassment that would last for hours. Inside myself I retreated to a quiet place to hold vigil until the pain passed. It reminded me of a line from Anne Sexton’s poem Courage: “The first spanking when your heart went on a journey all alone.” Shame isolates. That is its power.
Looking back I realize I made a number of decisions on my own behalf that evening. The first decision was to hold vigil for the pain. I knew me well enough to know I would get through to the other side of this by just sitting with it.
The second decision I made was to not touch the comment. I didn’t click “Like” and I did not respond. Liking the comment would’ve been a lie. To comment on it would’ve embroiled me in a match of egos and I didn’t want that. I wasn’t comfortable deleting the comment because I still considered this person my elder even though I was decades removed from the 6-year old me that had been triggered.
So I left the comment alone. Then something amazing happened. People who read my post also read this person’s comment with one friend after another defending me. The way social media works, with each person who showed up to offer a comment of support, this put the post in front of other friends who would then support me in the face of the tongue lashing. Each one was careful to refrain from pointing their finger directly at the person who chastised me but each one said something completely endorsing my post, my self-expression, and my stand. I felt supported, reassured that I was OK. I felt held, respected, and appreciated.
I am not a stranger to public shaming. I was raised in the 1960’s and ‘70’s when parents and other adults would just as soon raise a hand to a child publicly as privately or give them a dressing down in public places. Also, I was the kid some teachers, pushed and triggered to their limit, would turn on when they wanted to gain control of the class and the easiest method was to single out the child that wouldn’t fight back. I say “child.” This happened to me as a child, a teenager, a twenty-something in college and a 43-year old in graduate school.
Being surrounded with loving care after being publicly humiliated could never have happened in a school setting. Leaders that single out for shaming those they believe to be weak, even when they’re reacting in the heat of the moment, know what they’re doing. It intimidates the stronger students, drawing a line in the sand without having to directly confront them – a line those students will not cross for fear of being publicly humiliated as well. A line students also will not cross for fear of making things worse for the person who was singled out. This is an often used tactic, not only in the classroom, but in business and corporations as well.
Those who employ it don’t recognize the weakness it reveals in them, to gain control over the whole, including the stronger ones, by singling out the weaker ones. It’s a coward’s move. They also don’t realize that us “weaker” ones, those who tend to be more respectful of others, also tend to be much stronger than we appear. When they single us out, they lose our respect – respect they have enjoyed, respect that has to be earned back, if it ever can be.
There were other decisions I made that night. As a little girl when I was scolded face-to-face by that same person I did what I always did in such situations: I believed there was something terribly wrong with me. At least as an adult, even though I felt the same fear and shame as I had way back then, I knew this person was in the wrong, not me. So I drank up the nurturing attention of friends’ rallying around me.
Another decision I made was to write. I wrote so many pages about it – words and emotions all over the place! It was therapeutic journaling, an exercise that brought me out of the quiet place inside, where I’d been hiding, into the light where I could manage it on the page.
What I now understand about that night is when the family friend came after me, my inner child was triggered. It was as if she awoke from a dream shocked to find herself in trouble again, staggering to gain composure while under attack, unable to think straight or fully comprehend what was happening. Before she could get her bearings, the fear, shame, and guilt sent her into that free fall where she’d just have to wait to hit bottom and then figure out how to start over to get her life back in order.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but when I went quiet inside and kept to myself that night, I gave my inner child time and space to recover and come back to herself after being treated badly. Another thing I didn’t realize at the time was that by reveling in my friends’ support, I gave my inner child the same brand new experience I was having – loving support showing up after a public humiliation! These were two very good things.
If this were to happen again, I now have other decisions I’d make that would protect my inner child (and me) sooner and better.
That night when I couldn’t find a gap, a space in which to gather myself before the free fall into shame, my inner child got triggered and we blended. That’s why I experienced the same amount and kind of fear, guilt, and shame with this person that I’d experienced as a child – because that child and me, in that moment, were one and the same. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
I’ve since learned that, even if I can’t see it or feel it, there is always a gap that I can choose to step into, slow down, look around, assess the situation, and make a reasonable, measured response. And that when I do that, all those feelings of fear, guilt, and shame dissipate because my adult Self is in charge while my inner child gets to remain protected by me.
In fact, if I miss the gap, I can dance around until I find it, side step right into that gap, that space, gaining my composure, scooting my inner child out of harm’s way and taking charge of the situation.
I’ve also learned that one of the easiest ways to create the gap between offense and response is to practice the art of being curious about everything – especially what goes on inside. When I practice curiosity, when someone is rude to me I’m more likely to have this internal conversation, “Wait a minute. What’s that? What’s this all about?” all the while giving me time to assess before responding. And when I get triggered such that the gap shrinks to nothing, as soon as I get curiosity on board I can step back and say to myself, “Oh! There it is. I got triggered. Wonder why? What’s going on?”
When others are rude, they’ve been triggered and are lost in their own defensive reactions. Rudeness doesn’t actually require an immediate response. Sometimes just creating that gap to assess the situation puts silence in the middle of whatever’s going on, confounding the person being rude while I gain my composure. Most of the time, as I calm down they calm down and everyone benefits. And if they don’t calm down, well I’m standing still in the gap from where I can make measured moves to extricate myself from the situation.
That night, when I saw the shaming comment, if I could’ve been curious, my internal conversation would’ve gone something like this: “Oh, wow. I guess I could’ve foreseen this. And isn’t that curious? It’s as if I’m still 6-years old and this person feels they have the right and responsibility to set me straight. What do I do? Respond? Delete their comment? ‘Unfriend’ them? I think I’ll just leave it alone.”
All the while my inner child would’ve been protected with neither her nor me having to visit those frightening emotions from 50 years thence. And I would’ve gone on with my evening, still reveling in my friends who would come to rally around me, but not having to feel shamed, wrong, small, and defenseless.