The Culture of Shame, in the context of last week's "Tiger Mom" controversy

> seems more like an ad hominem than anything else: "Look at these barbarians in their shame culture, the shame culture itself must be barbaric!"

A common feature of a culture of shame is that it takes any criticism of any part to be an ad hominem attack on the whole. There are two different ways to read any criticism of a society: (1) "Look at those barbarians!" (2) "That's wrong. They should fix it." To the extent that a society prefers reading (1), I think that that tendency of that society is inferior to the contrary tendency of another society. To the extent that Western societies such as the United States also display a similar tendency, I think that the United States also has a problem.

This, however, does not imply that one culture as a whole is superior to another -- in fact, this over-generalization is exactly what I'm trying to criticize. All societies have problems of one kind or another. They should fix those problems, or at least try.

> Some people should be ashamed of themselves.

Sure, the 300 pound guy should be ashamed of himself. But that's a matter of conscience. It would be wrong for others to ostracize him, or to expect him to ostracize himself out of shame.

It's one thing for a person to feel guilt and/or shame when he realizes he did something wrong. It's another thing for an entire society to use shame as a means of forcing individuals into compliance even when the behavior in question is not obviously wrong, like playing Villager Number Six.