Online Shaming and the Right to Privacy

Shame in Teaching-Learning: A Humanbecoming Perspective

“…The act of shaming may arise in many forms including bullying (Dzurec et al, 2014), online shaming, cyberbullying, and mob shaming, all terms contemporarily found in common parlance. As Laidlaw (2017) identified, online shaming raises significant legal concerns about the right to privacy since it is an attack on the person’s identity and dignity. Whether online or in person, such as the proverbial wearing of a dunce cap to declare openly to those in view that a person failed to conform to purported expectations, shaming another has the potential to assault the identity, integrity, and inherent dignity of another.…”

“…The apparent ease of publicly shaming those who may or may not share a particular belief, understanding, or ideological stance (Bovy, 2020; Brown, 2020; Konkol, 2021) or those whose reportedly unsubstantiated actions (Konkol, 2021) are inconsistent with societal or personal expectations is increasingly prevalent in the stories shared in the public arena. Analyzing the relationship of online shaming and the right to privacy from a legal perspective, Laidlaw (2017) noted that, as an attack on the person not actions, shaming impinges on a person’s “right to be free from assaults on one’s dignity and identity” (p. 21). Raising concerns about the perceived emergence of societal norms that support or encourage the shaming of another, as long as the person’s words, behavior, or beliefs are inconsistent with an espoused view, this brings one to ponder the meaning of shame in the sciencing and art of teaching-learning in nursing, especially in an era of virtual learning and seemingly instant far-reaching communication enabled by technology and social media.…”

Managing organizational reputation in response to a public shaming campaign

“…This new form of public, online shaming is characterized by an intensified eagerness of society to publicly name and shame either people or organizations, and involves the "exposure of personal identifiable information of the targeted individuals, who are perceived to have transgressed different degrees of social norms (though often violated none or only minor legal offences), for the purpose of humiliation, social condemnation and punishment" (Cheung, 2014, p. 3). In certain circumstances, public shaming can be considered a form of abuse (Cheung, 2014;Laidlaw, 2017). Indeed, Laidlaw goes on to state that "shame can be an element of a wide variety of abuse.…”

“…In some ways, shaming is not any category, simply a tactic employed, to varying scales, in inflicting the abuse" (Laidlaw, 2017, p. 3). However, the same author recognizes that public shaming has value as a core regulatory tool to address any kind of human rights abuses (Laidlaw, 2017). Therefore, the behaviour of the organization or the individual is integral to the way that online shaming is perceived, either as a form of abuse or as a way to highlight and bring attention to poor behaviour that goes against societal norms.…”

Scambaiting on the Spectrum of Digilantism

“…11 A growing legal literature has been reviewed by Laidlaw in a recent paper connecting online shaming to violations of privacy. 12 Philosophical literature on online hate speech and other objectionable content is sparse but includes Levmore and Nussbaum. 13 In the recent media studies literature, digitlantism is associated with the "weaponization of visibility".…”