Shame and Suicide

There are unicorns in Haruki Murakami's book Hardboiled Wonderland at the End of the World. It's been a long time since I read it, but I remember it like this: the unicorns tread lightly and eat only the most wilted of grasses. Their impact on the environment is mitigated so they take up as little space as possible and do as little harm as possible. 

When I read this for the first time I had a restriction-based eating disorder. I was also a follower of a strange and radical internet cult called the Church of Euthanasia. The tagline of this religion was: "Save the planet, kill yourself," the implication being that humans are a virus on the planet and that nature is far better off without us. 

These types of thoughts were what gave me permission to attempt suicide when I did. I wanted to mitigate the harm that I was causing on this planet. I felt the imbalance of consumption in our capitalist model and I viewed my life as a drain on Earth's benevolent resources. 

The sheer act of having resources is enough to induce massive shame. We are currently in a cultural upheaval with regards to race, oppression, and privilege. It is difficult to consciously consume when we know there is "no ethical consumption under capitalism." Maybe this is why someone messaged me to kill myself after my last blog post.

I understand where this thinking comes from. The disconnect that people with privilege has is a violence on oppressed groups, because if you can't see the inequality, you will continue to blindly perpetuate it. The backlash of the "woke mob" is not unfounded. As a self proclaimed social-justice warrior, feminist, and anti-capitalist philosopher, I have followed all lines of thinking to their conclusions. 

If it is true that I should be filled with shame for my existence, then the final conclusion of that is simply suicide. I followed that path of thinking to its conclusion, and trust me when I say, I sincerely gave my entire effort to killing myself. Yet, I was saved by a miracle. So I had to contend with what I had done, and the life that was now open before me. 

When you follow an idea to its conclusion, you see its root. For instance, just because someone doesn't actually commit to killing themselves, many of us live our lives in a way that is slowly and less obviously a form of suicide. Our shame eats us up from the inside so that we shrink away from our expansion. We feel guilt and depression for the color of our skin, for access to resources, or even for having food when "there are people starving in Africa." 

Many people would say that shame is a good thing. It is used as punishment to correct bad behavior. But can you really shame someone into being a better person? I think we are greatly misunderstanding the difference between educating someone and making them ashamed. If someone is properly educated, they can them become an ally. But if they are full of shame, they might actually retaliate in violent ways against themselves and others. 

If you live a life of shame, you reverberate shame. Shame will steal your joy. It will corrupt every life experience you have so that you can not feel free to enjoy it. You will feel guilty to be alive and so you will want other people to feel guilty to be alive. You will make it your life's mission to spread your shame.

There is another way. I'll tell you about it next time.

In the meantime, what do you think?