What Do Brene Brown and Donald Trump Have in Common?

Does Shame Have Utility in a Shameless Culture?

Over the last decade there has been an all-out war on shame. Voices in this battle have denounced all the destructive effects of shame on lives and relationships. The leader in this effort to expel shame was social work professor and shame researcher Brene Brown. Dr. Brown hit the scene in a large way after her TedX talk in Houston went viral. In this talk Brown describes her research on shame and her understanding of the antidote to shame, vulnerability. This talk led to more Ted talks and several books on shame, vulnerability, and shame resiliency in different contexts.

Parallel to Brene Brown’s shame eradicating efforts, there was another unexpected, darker, soldier in the war on shame. Donald J. Trump. As Judith Butler writes, much of Donald Trump’s appeal was also in freeing followers from shame:

His appeal to nearly half of the country has depended upon cultivating a practice that licenses an exhilarated form of sadism freed from any shackles of moral shame or ethical obligation.

Butler goes on:

In that way, shame occupied a permanent and necessary place in the Trumpian scenario insofar as it was externalized and lodged in the left: the left seek to shame you for your…