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Rachel Maddow devoted the first half of her show on Tuesday to the concept of using shame to persuade public officials to change course.
Maddow said, “What makes them change course and do the right thing instead?” One thing that sometimes works is shame and embarrassment. Being confronted with the wrongness of what they are doing, feeling shame or embarrassment or at least the possibility of public rebuke, and the awkwardness of not being able to explain their actions in a way that satisfies anyone. Sometimes you can't turn officials around, but sometimes you can. Sometimes something like this can cause officials who otherwise behave weakly and wrongly to find their back and change their minds.”
After playing clips of Senate Republicans apparently not wanting to answer questions about Trump's pardon of violent 1/6 insurrectionists, Rachel Maddow continued:
They cannot justify what they are doing here. Therefore, they have no way of answering even very basic questions about it properly. And that turns out to be important. Because of the indigestion, the self-loathing that all of these senators felt today, the shame and embarrassment they felt today as they were repeatedly asked about their party's president, 211 people were released, most of whom were actively incarcerated in federal prison for acts of violence against police officers while they were involved in a violent attack on the US Congress, from which some of these senators had to run for their lives. The feeling they have, this disgusting feeling that they have to swallow and try to find a way to stop talking about it because they can't say anything about it that doesn't disgust them and that isn't instinctively wrong.
This feeling of not being able to say anything sensible or true that justifies Trump opening the prison doors to 211 actively incarcerated people, many of whom were there for violent attacks on police officers. That's the feeling it gave the senators when they were pushed to do so. This disgusting feeling, maybe this is what will save the country.
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From a historical perspective, Rachel Maddow was right. Shame used to affect elected officials. Officials sometimes changed course and did the right thing when the public and media voiced their shaming intensely enough.
In the polarized environment of 2025, is the media apparatus still able to exert shame? The mainstream media is owned by large corporations and billionaires who have already shown a willingness not to challenge Trump and the Republicans.
We have seen Republicans in the House and Senate wait for the blowback from Donald Trump's past actions.
If the mainstream media caves to Trump and Republicans live in a conservative media bubble, could shaming Republicans in the House and Senate the way Maddow suggests work?
If pardoning and releasing violent criminals who beat police officers and tried to overthrow the government only resulted in four Senate Republicans publicly criticizing Trump, those odds don't seem all that promising.
However, public shaming is better than sitting around doing nothing, and who knows, maybe Trump will eventually go so far that even members of his own party condemn him in large numbers.
We haven't seen it yet, but anything is possible.
What do you think of Rachel Maddow's suggestion to use public shaming? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
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