Episode
Brené Brown is Wrong About Shame
- Podcast
- Heretic Hereafter Podcast
- Published
- Feb 4, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 264
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Summary
“Shame is “I am bad.” Guilt is “I did something bad.” …Guilt: I’m sorry. I made a mistake. Shame: I’m sorry. I am a mistake.” -Brené Brown, PhD Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan. I sobbed through the end of her Netflix special. Brown has done amazing work bringing the vocabulary of emotions to the masses and demonstrating the power of vulnerability. But while I find her to be a winning and gifted communicator, I don’t think she’s entirely right about shame, and I worry about how the above definition impacts our ability to form communities. Brown has described us as living in an “epidemic” of shame. She points out the negative health outcomes associated with people who exhibit high levels of shame, including depression, eating disorders, and suicide. Heretic Hereafter is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. In a way, I agree—we’re living in an era defined by shame. But is it an over proliferation of shame? There I’m not so sure. It feels like many good people are feeling too much shame while others (including many in power) are completely shameless. Speaking for the anti-shame side, let’s look at social media shaming. Sometimes necessary, as in the Weinstein case. But there are a fair number of folks out here catching strays. (Remember that white teen who went to prom in a Chinese-style prom dress?) Public shame is a clumsy cudgel, flattening context and often leveling behaviors several magnitudes apart. Too often it’s cancel first, investigate later. Shame doesn’t feel good, and so it’s perhaps natural that we don’t want to inflict it on others. That’s very “love your neighbor,” right? Plus, shame can be such an overwhelming emotion that it triggers defensiveness rather than sober reflec…