Public shaming and victim shaming are a fundamental part of the criminal system. Judges are turning to public shaming as a means of punishment rather than actual prison time or conviction. Houston, TX judge Ted Poe, for example made a convicted drunk driver carry a sign that read “I killed two people while driving drunk” instead of serving time in prison. Embarrassment is becoming the new form of punishment and justification. Public shaming is jumping from the court room and criminal system to the internet, more specifically the social media. In his book So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed Jon Ronson states “The powerful, crazy, cruel people were now us. It felt like we were soldiers making a war on people’s flaws..,” (Ronson 90). The people who stay voiceless and won’t speak up in the real world are making their voice known in the online world, without fearing the effect it may have on others.
“With social media, we’ve created a stage for constant artificial high drama. Every day a new person emerges as a magnificent hero or sickening villain,” explains Jon Ronson in his book So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed (Ronson 79). People on social media are eager to jump at the chance to stand for what’s right by making it a point to tear one down. Justine Sacco was the senior director of
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It is never the victim’s fault, especially when it comes to rape. Victim shaming is an unwelcomed influence in society today. Some people in today’s society blame and shame the victim to distance themselves from a terrible occurrence because it gives them the illusion that it will never happen to them. In the case involving Lindsay Armstrong the lawyer uses victim shaming to take the attention off of the boy who raped her and put it on her. The boy was found guilty and sentenced to four years in a young-offenders’ institution at the Expense of Lindsay’s