The Boundary Between Justice and Online Shaming: The Psychology of Social Punishment
People evaluate one another’s behavior in accordance with the rules, expectations, and moral values of the societies in which they live. Particularly in situations where right and wrong are sharply distinguished by society, these evaluations may go beyond personal opinions and develop into collective social responses.
When a behavior crosses the boundaries of what society considers acceptable, the response may be directed not only toward the behavior itself but also toward the person who engaged in it. Particularly in situations involving strong moral concerns, it may become easier to move from the judgment that someone “did something wrong” to the judgment that they are “a bad person.”
A single behavior, and sometimes even merely an allegation, may begin to overshadow a person’s past behaviors and other characteristics. In such cases, considerations of who the person was in the past, who they are today, and the extent to which the allegations made against them actually represent them may gradually recede into the background. As judgments about a person take shape this quickly, the response may eventually go beyond criticism and develop into collective exclusion and reputational harm.
Why does a group so quickly move toward judging and punishing a person on the basis of limited information? When does a response to an allegation move beyond the pursuit of justice and become a form of punishment capable of affecting a person’s life? And at that point, is what emerges still a pursuit of justice, or has it become part of a culture of public shaming?
Moral Outrage and Punitive Behavior
Moral outrage can be defined as a strong emotional response that emerges when a person perceives that an important moral rule or value has been violated. Witnessing someone being treated unfairly, harmed, or violating a social norm can elicit this emotional response. Moral outrage often does not remain merely an emotional reaction; it may also motivate individuals to translate their emotional response into action.
One important consequence of moral outrage is a strong desire to punish the person perceived to have committed the wrongdoing. When people witness a violation, they may not simply think that “the harm should be repaired”; they may also believe that “the person who did this should face the consequences.”
How Does Individual Anger Become Collective Anger?
An individual’s anger in response to a behavior initially reflects their own personal evaluation. However, when they encounter other people who respond similarly to the same event, they may realize that their anger is not theirs alone. Over time, a shared response directed toward the same person or event may begin to emerge. As anger is expressed and shared, a common understanding of what is unacceptable can become increasingly reinforced. At this point, an individual moral judgment may gradually develop into an attitude shared by a broader community.
Emotional Contagion
Emotional contagion can be defined as a process through which one person’s emotional expression elicits a similar emotional response in another person (Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1993). Emotions that are expressed particularly strongly may evoke similar emotional responses in those who observe them. This process is not limited to face-to-face interactions; it may also occur in contexts such as social media, where other people’s emotions and behaviors are observed indirectly (Herrando & Constantinides, 2021).
As people encounter similar reactions in those around them, they may feel more comfortable expressing their own anger. A thought they initially hesitated to express may become a more firmly held position through the approval they receive from others, leading the individual to express that anger more openly.
The Culture of Public Shaming: Punishing in the Public Eye
When a shared response within a community extends beyond criticism of a behavior, it takes on a different dimension. When the focus of the response shifts from the behavior to the person, the aim may become directly punishing the individual and damaging their reputation in the public eye.
Clark (2020) conceptualizes public shaming in the social media era not merely as a large number of people reacting to one person, but as a process in which an individual is intensely targeted in the public sphere, subjected to reputational harm, and socially excluded. Thus, one of the features distinguishing public shaming from other forms of social response is that the reaction begins to extend beyond the behavior itself and target the individual’s social identity.
Stigmatization
When a response begins to extend beyond the behavior itself, the individual may come to be defined by a particular label. Stigmatization is associated with a process in which a characteristic attributed to a person comes to overshadow their social identity, causing them to be evaluated primarily through that characteristic rather than as a whole person (Goffman, 1963).
When a person begins to be associated with something they are believed to have done, that behavior may become a label attached to them. Once a person becomes associated with a particular label, their subsequent behaviors may also be interpreted through the lens of that label.
Being repeatedly associated with a negative label can affect how individuals perceive themselves as well as their psychological well-being. Particularly in situations involving public humiliation, intense emotional distress, anxiety, depressive symptoms, and stress may emerge as psychological consequences (Li et al., 2024).
Being publicly shamed does not simply mean being criticized for a particular behavior; it may also threaten a person’s social standing in the eyes of others. Fritz (2021) argues that, particularly in cases of online shaming, public condemnation can develop into a process that causes psychological harm, alienation from one’s social environment, and social isolation. Targeting an individual in the public sphere can therefore affect both their social relationships and their sense of belonging within their community.
What Lies Behind Participation in Public Shaming?
One of the most straightforward motivations underlying participation in public shaming is the desire to uphold justice—that is, the belief that the behavior should not go without consequences. Individuals may use anger and condemnation to draw attention to injustice, protect others, or defend social norms.
At the same time, when people respond to others on moral grounds, they may also communicate something about themselves. By opposing a particular behavior, they express their own values and send the message, “I do not consider this behavior acceptable.” In this sense, the expression of moral outrage online may also be associated with motivations to gain social status and reputation (Van Bavel et al., 2024). This phenomenon is discussed in the literature as moral grandstanding. The concept refers to the expression of moral views not only because a person considers a behavior wrong, but also, to some extent, as a way of displaying their own moral commitments, values, or social standing to others (Grubbs et al., 2019).
More complex dynamics may also underlie participation in public shaming. When individuals perceive the negative outcome experienced by another person as “deserved,” they may view punishing that person as more legitimate and necessary. Beyond this, seeing the person being punished experience difficulties or negative consequences may itself produce a sense of satisfaction. This phenomenon can be understood through the concept of schadenfreude, commonly defined as pleasure derived from another person’s misfortune (Barron et al., 2023).
Social Comparison
People may compare themselves with those around them when evaluating their own social standing. Particularly when they perceive another person as a rival, that person’s failure may lead them to evaluate their own position more positively. In this sense, the pleasure experienced may stem not only from seeing the other person receive what is perceived as deserved punishment, but also from feeling better, safer, or more advantaged as a result of that person’s relative decline (Smith et al., 1996; van Dijk et al., 2008).
The Limits of the Pursuit of Justice
Moral outrage cannot always be regarded as having a negative function. Responding to injustice, standing with those who have been harmed, and making unacceptable behaviors visible can be important for social change. However, the magnitude of a response should also be considered alongside the harm it may cause. Particularly on social media, the cost of participating in punishment may be relatively low, while its consequences for the targeted individual can be extremely severe.
The rapid spread of an allegation on social media does not mean that the allegation has been verified. Therefore, it is also important to consider the source on which the allegation is based and how reliable that source is.
Opposing a behavior is not the same as deeming every form of punishment acceptable for the person believed to have committed it. The pursuit of justice requires us to consider both what we are defending and what kind of person we become in the process of defending it.
Kaynakça
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- Herrando, C., & Constantinides, E. (2021). Emotional contagion: A brief overview and future directions. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 712606. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.712606
- Clark, M. (2020). DRAG THEM: A theory of the disinhibition of grievance and aggression in online communities. Communication and the Public, 5(3–4), 271–286. https://doi.org/10.1177/2057047320961562
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