I agree with Massaro in the sense that shaming techniques do
not seem to be an effective punishment to deter crime in a legal sense. There
are too many factors that reduce formal shaming unnecessary and insufficient in
consistent deterrent results. However, I wanted to pressure him in the social
realm of shame. He argues that shame will not be effective because the social
conditions of modern day U.S. society are not compatible with the previous
shame culture present in white colonial America. But what about small
communities in which shame culture is still present? If he is claiming that
shaming is not acceptable given situations where the benefits of shaming are
not nearly guaranteed, then would he be lenient on legal cases where the agent
involved was part of a community that had the qualities of historic shame
culture? If he is being absolutist on the idea that legal shaming should not
occur because it would be inconsistent and ineffective, then he would have to
concede that there is never an instance where legal shaming should be used
(which does not seem too terrible). My issue comes into play when the
alternative to shaming would be a consequence that seems ineffective as well,
such as incarceration in some cases.
Take this case: an 18 year old boy is caught with marijuana
in his car. Perhaps he has already been on probation before due to another
unimportant incident. Because of his previous probationary period, he is
sentenced to jail instead of a lighter sentence. However, he is part of a tight-knit
community that truly despises drug use, and all of his friends share the same
values as the community. He values his place in his community more than
anything. Shaming in this instance could be a punishment that is significantly more
effective than being incarcerated. I feel like Massaro may not give leniency
towards these cases because there’s still the empirical argument that you
cannot truly know if it will be beneficial. However, I think that there should
be more leniency for cases such as this.
It seems, at least to me, that the last place a shaming sanction is needed is the kind of community you describe.
ReplyDeleteThe point of court mandated shaming is to create a judging moral community which can shame the offender, where one did not before exist. After all, the offender can keep her mouth shut, and it is unlikely that anyone would go investigating government documents for a crime to shame when they do not suspect it in the first place.
So if a community like you describe, with very close social and moral bonds, exists, such a community would have no need of a court sanction because the judging community (which could shame the 18 yr boy in your case) would need no extra legal structure to supplement their community. If they did not such supplement, they probably were not such a close community in the first place.