Is There Value In "Guilt"?

Three lifelong friends, Alex, Bob and Cal, meet for a drink. Alex and Cal, distress all over their faces, have a burning issue to discuss among the three confidantes. Unbeknownst to Bob until now, Alex cheated — and his wife knows it. Nan, distraught, having almost found him in flagrante, unceremoniously threw him out of the house — Alex on his knees begging for her forgiveness as she pushes him to the door. Who can blame her, though? Nan's a true victim — we needn't consider whether some flaw in their marriage helped lead to Alex's conduct. It's simply not relevant here.

Alex overtly presents himself to his two friends as inconsolably broken, desperate to get back home to his wife and young children. Despite the several glasses of wine with his two friends, though, he expresses no "guilt."  Thus, even though he drank wine that has often, in the past, led to greater truth and candor on his part, Alex facially seems not to suffer from any guilt at all, notwithstanding this calamitous turning point in his life. Notably, though, he acknowledges to his friends that Nan didn't cause him to cheat. Simply, "Mirella [a woman he met on a business trip] came to also have my heart! What can I do?" Almost as if he had intended to continue to straddle the two relationships.

Bob, learning all this for the first time, doesn't tell Alex that he has done something terribly "wrong." Nor that he deserves what he got. He's not a preacher, as he prides himself in saying. Rather, although not having been asked for his thoughts, Bob goes to the opposite extreme. He points his finger to Alex's chest — that of the admitted adulterer (assuming that sharply accusatory word has efficacy nowadays) — and oddly says: "Most of all, don't feel guilty."

He doesn't tell his friend, Alex, that "wrong" has no role in the equation, but simply that feelings of "guilt" won't accomplish anything meaningful — pointedly saying that it's a "useless" emotion. And, as Bob curiously suggests, it may even prove to be a negative. Maybe he sees Alex potentially as Lady Macbeth neurotically washing her hands: "Out damn spot," unable to cleanse the blood she imagines is covering them — indicative of her deep feelings of guilt over the murder of husband Duncan, the king.

Alex, operating from his "dark place," looks Bob in the eye wondering if his remark was some kind of silly joke, and wonders to himself how Bob's response makes any sense at all. Cal, though, taking the bull by the horns, is aghast. Judgmental as always, Cal says: "What the hell are you talking about? The guy's been caught by Nan red handed. He desperately wants back in, and you tell him that there's no value in remorse?" Bob responds: "You didn't listen. I didn't tell him 'don't feel remorse, don't take responsibility.' I said, 'don't feel guilty.'" "As if there's a meaningful distinction between them," Cal annoyedly retorts.

When Cal is later alone with Bob and confronts him over his mind numbing "don't feel guilty" comment to Alex, Bob maintains that Alex simply seemed to Bob to be in a terribly "bad place" of self-blame. According to Bob, Alex needed to get past this dangerous moment in his life to better deal with the broader problem that manifested itself in the cheating — a problem that wouldn't go away by Alex merely "feeling" or even exhibiting guilt. Ergo, for Bob, a useless emotion! Cal isn't talking about guilt in the nature of some "stigma" associated with guilt — as in a scarlet letter of sorts. Rather, for Bob, an inward sensation of guilt based on one's subjective view of one's conduct is different than moral shame which has traditionally been associated with dishonor rather than guilt. In the thoughtful words of Herant Katchadourian in his volume simply named "GUILT":

"Shame is considered to be the more public emotion, linked as it is to the exposure of a defect, failure or transgression that damages one's public standing. Guilt, on the other hand, arises within the self, is rooted in the conscience, and is associated with private feelings of remorse and self-reproach."

Changing the venue but not the subject, any criminal lawyer worth her salt counsels her client who pleaded guilty and is about to be sentenced on how vital it is to demonstrate to the judge total contrition. Although he has pleaded guilty, however, he likely doesn't feel "guilt." He even privately tells his family and friends, "Yeah, I did it (sort of); but I don't see what was so wrong. I got caught, so I pleaded guilty. My lawyer told me it was the best way to get a softer landing." (His lawyer tells him to keep that "stupid, self-defeating, crap" to himself).

His lawyer recognizes that she's only a lawyer and doesn't try to push for feelings of "guilt." On the other hand, an outwardly visible expression of remorse expressed to the judge will be crucial — and his lawyer does, indeed, push hard for that. She recognizes that there's no value in wasting her time to even try to motivate the defendant in the direction of genuine guilt except as a means, accomplishable in rare instances, to drive the defendant to the promised land of better expressing remorse. Basically, pardon me, the defendant's lawyer is counselling what might be a false expression of remorse — when guilt isn't actually a component of such remorse. But that's her job at the end of the day, whatever critics of the legal profession might say about it.

Criminal lawyers, it must be said, aren't generally, after all, accomplished instructors of the Strasberg school of "Method Acting." Most criminal defendants, as this one, don't genuinely feel guilty even if they plead guilty. And most attorneys wonder whether there would be any real value in it anyway, especially if their crime is the result of what amounts to somewhat sociopathic behavior.

Parenthetically, would Bob's stated view of how Alex should respond to his marital calamity be of value in the courthouse circumstance too? That is, don't feel guilty even though you've pleaded guilty. It's, as Bob would put it, worthless: "Just take responsibility for what you've done (and show it), period." Something he curiously omitted in dealing with Alex!

In fact, in the case of the guilty pleading defendant, Bob would probably say that "feelings" of guilt, here too, might be a negative. For him, at least as he expresses it, the guilt ridden person who engaged in wrongdoing becomes too self-absorbed in the experience of feeling guilty when confronted with it — a self-imposed tyranny of sorts. And, further, that the wrong emphasis on what occurred doesn't sufficiently address "taking responsibility," as is needed. Judges too, it is worth noting, aren't really experts anyway in detecting genuine feelings of guilt, and make their judgments by outward demonstrations of remorse instead.

So, let's turn to religion. God often tells us that we are sinners and, indeed, that we will sin. He tells us with great specificity how to do repentance (tshuvah  in Judaism) actually describing the exact words to employ regarding our sins. The clergy add that we must promise never to do these sins again and, for some of them, to literally beat our breasts to demonstrate our sinfulness. What would Bob say here? That demonstrating guilt in this way is a self-absorbed act that will potentially take us to a dark place? That becoming too engrossed in what we have done ends up being a negative force? That all we should do is show remorse, whatever that means if experiencing guilt is itself not implicated, and take responsibility for what we have done without the need to "feel" guilty?

Notably, neither the Hebrew Bible, for example, nor relevant sources demand, or even advise, us to actually "feel" guilty. Put otherwise, the emotion  of feeling guilty or experiencing guilt is not a requirement of religious observance. Yes, experiencing guilt may be a practical means to accomplishing remorse for one's wrongful conduct, and actually taking responsibility — perhaps by seeking forgiveness from the wronged individual or providing some form of financial, or even "emotional" restitution. But the "feeling" itself on the part of the individual who engaged in the wrongdoing surprisingly doesn't seem to be required — at least religiously.

It's a kind of an interesting reality given that the "culture" of Judaism, in particular, seems to be constantly awash in guilt, particularly when, as is often the case, certain friends and family members act or try boldly to "make guilt work" — as it often does. And it may be that God Himself, without commanding it, also makes guilt work with or without intending it, although likely "with" it. And, so, although Bob told Alex to not feel guilty, telling him would be somewhat like telling him to love someone. You either do or you don't. Love, somewhat like guilt, can't really be the subject of a commandment.

So where does this all leave us? At bottom, putting aside whether the emotion of guilt is good or bad, helpful or unhelpful, either in personal interactions or in connection with one's relationship with God, it nonetheless exists. Period. And, in many ways it exists because the emotion of guilt is ingrained in us when we're young, tapping us on the shoulder and reminding us to feel guilty if we engage in meaningful wrongdoing of any sort. Perhaps I should feel guilty because I — even unintentionally — embarrassed someone I care about; defamed someone behind her back; was unfaithful to my spouse or loved one; took credit for another person's creation; cheated in some business context; violated the Sabbath; or ate forbidden food.

When we become old enough to understand that a guilty conscience may prove, in extreme circumstances, to be a negative in our lives because we become too self-absorbed in experiencing that emotion, it may be too late to alter our ability to withdraw from it.

If, in the other hand, we gravitate to those who purport to conduct an intervention or to be the (ostensibly) "wise counsel" willing to tell us to dispense with feelings of guilt as they do us no good, perhaps we're simply allowing them to let us off the hook. If I'm a person who feels guilty because I've done something wrong — and I clearly engaged in that wrongdoing, intentionally or knowingly — why shouldn't I feel guilty? Why isn't it beneficial when those of us who have done wrong suffer on account of it? Isn't that a mechanism toward self-improvement, particularly when the wrongdoer isn't otherwise punished for it?

As a friend and mentor (whom I often call "the Muse") so aptly and prudently put it to me just the other day, "guilt is what helps keep civilization civilized." Now, true, some commentators, and some of us, often conflate "guilt" and "shame" (the latter being the public's excoriation of the guilty person). At day's end, though, however one characterizes these dual regimes the inherent value of their impact may not be so terribly bad at all.

I know — many psychiatrists would disagree. So?

Originally published MEDIUM, December 10, 2021

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