“Moral” Emotions: To The Rescue Of Shame

Not knowing very well what to write about, I turned to the clinic, to daily work, to the discomfort that is repeated in patients, to the experiences themselves and to the society through which we are traversed, viewed, exponential …

This week, a “leaked” video of a television program called the Island of Temptations made the news, where a couple had “uninvited” relationships in full camera focus, openly. I do not have much more information on this, but I just for interest in this text: What was the shame , guarantor of moral behavior, which allows us, evolutionarily speaking, preserve the intimacy of the public, separate the good from bad?

My intention is not to judge the format of the program, it would be hypocritical in doing so, since I have seen some of its editions, I simply consider that stopping, questioning and analyzing, allows things to go a little more free of unconsciousness. It has its joke, because it was just the “temptation” of the serpent (signifier of the reality show) to taste the forbidden fruit, which aroused modesty and shame in Adam and Eve.

Alín Salom notes in his article The shame in question: a question of shame: “post – modern society enjoys degrade the subject”. Helen Block Lewis (1971) considers shame as an affect aimed at protecting and maintaining relational emotional ties. For her, shame serves as a sign that the social bond is in danger and that the self must be strengthened to achieve it. In the same vein, the appearance of the disgust and shame are favorable indicators in the children’s clinic, precisely because they facilitate love for others and oneself. Let me explain, although Silvia Bleichmar treats this issue very well, so I will build on her. Modesty is associated with toilet training because that is a defining moment in the delimitation of the inside and the outside, that is, of the representation of their own body, defining the edges of the self to the extent that what is inside is part of me, what remains outside, even if it is part of me, is ugly. Ultimately, it is the recognition of something that has to be hidden before the other . It is something of the order of the body that causes discomfort being displayed.Thus, modesty appears as the source of morality, understood not only as what should not be done, but also as what, by doing it, harms the other. And what is built there is not only the renunciation so as not to be rejected, but the renunciation for the love of the other .

Another aspect that I proposed to clarify is the differentiation of moral emotions, since sometimes they are confused with each other due to the relationship between them, where in addition, the protagonist over time has been guilt, which has received greater theoretical development, but I think that shame is the great forgotten in therapy, I do not know if it will be in honor of his “shyness” … However, we have all felt ashamed at some time, thinking “earth swallow me”.