S1E1: Madeleine Shield: How Should we Respond to Shame?

As Maddy explores, shame is the psychological desire to be socially connected and understood, and its fulfillment is essential to our wellbeing and flourishing, while its neglect leads to psychological and moral damage. Invoking the eudaemonistic framework of (neo-Aristotelian) virtue ethics, she argues that the practice of shaming cannot therefore ever be ethically justified. From this it follows that the most ethically desirable reaction one can have to shame is one which best allows them to resist or overcome the emotion. To this end, Maddy analyses two common responses to shame, compliance and anger, proposing an alternative: the practice of emotional vulnerability.

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