How did pride come to be the antonym of shame? There is no word, in English anyway, that denotes the state of a lack of shame—the way Adam and Eve dwelled in naked bliss before they were expelled from Eden, that prelapsarian innocence in which they were free of pride as well as shame. Shouldn’t you be able to shed the cloak of shame without donning the raiment of pride?
In particular, when I mention raiment I am thinking of the finery of Gay Pride. If I am not ashamed of being gay, does that require me to be proud of it? And proud of what, exactly? Proud of the pulchritude of my sexual objects or the agility of my sexual acts? Probably not. Proud to be associated with the many illustrious homosexuals who have brightened the course of human history? This would seem to hit closer to the mark, but what is the basis for it? If I share with Michelangelo or Marsden Hartley an admiration for a muscular male physique, is that something any of us would want to boast about? Proud to be willing to stand up and be counted, rather than lurk in the shadows of the closet? This may be the answer, but if so, it seems a little dated, at least in the cities that have Pride parades in the United States, a country in which gay people can be married, for God’s sake. A march in Cairo or Lilongwe would have a different flavor. The masks would be more functional than festive.
Minorities have often felt ashamed that they deviate from the cultural norm. Jewish-American fiction of the postwar years is redolent of Middle European cooking, which mothers from the old country lovingly labor over and assimilated children embarrassedly sniff. Shame is a social sentiment, an emotion you feel in the presence, real or imagined, of others. The children of Jewish (or Irish, Hispanic, you name it) immigrants wanted to be accepted into the dominant culture. Until recently, to do so in America you would have had to take on the trappings of what the sociologist C. Wright Mills astutely identified as not a class but a status group, bound by commonalities of taste and knowledge—and, for the most part, by sexual orientation. If you were gay, you could try to pass as straight. If you looked the part, you could pass as WASP if you were Jewish, or white if you were black. The risks—of humiliating exposure, of lacerating self-hatred—were vividly demonstrated in the Douglas Sirk movie Imitation of Life, in which a light-skinned young black woman pays a grievous price for her attempt at deception. But can you blame her for not wanting to follow her mother’s path as a rich white woman’s maid? Is she passing because she is ashamed of being black, or simply because she wants to rise to a status unavailable to black people at the time?
The ambition for advancement is distinct from shame, which is the internalization of social stigma. Unlike the Black Power movement, which sought to achieve political clout, the “Black Is Beautiful” proponents urged African-Americans to reject standards of appearance that made them look whiter. The two causes were allied: Huey Newton was photographed with his Afro, and he also posed holding a rifle. But the struggle for power, unlike the campaign for black beauty, did not come in reaction to shame.
We do all too many things that we can justifiably recall with shame. Being gay or black or disabled—states of being over which we lack control—are not among them. But, by the same logic, why should we be proud of them? If I worked to achieve American citizenship, I might regard my accomplishment with pride. Having been born American, as well as white, Jewish, and (at birth, or close enough) gay, I’m not ashamed of any of it, but I can hardly take pride in it, either.
Pride in the face of shame feels like overcompensation. You’re trying too hard. Are you sure you’re not still registering some shame?
Arthur Lubow is a journalist based in New York. He is the author of Diane Arbus: Portrait of a Photographer.
