I was curious about when some on here thought about John Oliver's segment on public shaming (I can't find a YouTube video with the monologue, but the linked article shares a lot of the dialogue), and whether or not it actually does any good. I've never been a fan of public shaming, and I think this is one of the few times that I really disagree with him. I think it can be really dangerous and can ruin lives unnecessarily.
The Atlantic put out a really great article on the segment and I have to agree with most of it.
John Oliver’s Weak Case for Callout Culture
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As an example of the phenomenon’s ostensible upside, he alighted on Tucker Carlson, shamed most recently for resurfaced remarks that he made while talking to a shock jock. “He publicly called Iraqis ‘semiliterate, primitive monkeys,’ compared women to dogs, and basically said that Warren Jeffs, who is serving a life sentence for the sexual assault of his underage brides, wasn’t that bad,” Oliver observed. “Tucker refused to apologize, and all week long there have been trending hashtags like #BoycottTuckerCarlson.”
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In The Stranger, Katie Herzog argued that [Tucker] Carlson’s public shaming “may have made the public shamers feel good,” but that it “accomplished precisely nothing.” He did not apologize. He’s still on the air. His ratings aren’t lower.
What was accomplished?
It’s possible that the shaming’s overall societal effects were negative. Offensive remarks that would’ve been lost to memory were resurfaced in a way that perhaps upset some Iraqis, women, or victims of statutory rape, among others. The fact that Carlson declined to apologize while suffering no consequences perhaps undermined anti-bigotry taboos and surely did not strengthen them.
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Last Week Tonight depends on a formula that includes a villain, a punching bag, someone to “destroy,” so that audience members can feel that they’re part of a morally and cognitively superior in-group, perennially exasperated by malign idiots in the out-group.
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https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/ar...2T14%3A55%3A00
More and more I'm starting to agree with the bolded issue.