Hiding from Humanity : Disgust, Shame, and the Law.
Title:
Hiding from Humanity : Disgust, Shame, and the Law.
Author:
Nussbaum, Martha C.
ISBN:
9781400825943
Personal Author:
Physical Description:
1 online resource (357 pages)
Contents:
Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- I. Shame and Disgust: Confusion in Practice and Theory -- II. Law without the Emotions? -- III. Two Problematic Emotions -- Chapter 1. Emotions and Law -- I. Appeals to Emotion -- II. Emotion and Belief, Emotion and Value -- III. Emotions, Appraisal, and Moral Education -- IV. Emotion and the "Reasonable Man": Manslaughter, Self-Defense -- V. Emotions and Changing Social Norms -- VI. Reasonable Sympathy: Compassion in Criminal Sentencing -- VII. Emotions and Political Liberalism -- VIII. How to Appraise Emotions -- Chapter 2. Disgust and Our Animal Bodies -- I. Disgust and Law -- II. Pro-Disgust Arguments: Devlin, Kass, Miller, Kahan -- III. The Cognitive Content of Disgust -- IV. Disgust and Indignation -- V. Projective Disgust and Group Subordination -- VI. Disgust, Exclusion, Civilization -- Chapter 3. Disgust and the Law -- I. Disgust as Offense, Disgust as Criterion -- II. Disgust and the Offender: The "Homosexual-Provocation" Defense -- III. Disgust and the "Average Man": Obscenity -- IV. Disgust as a Reason for Illegality: Sodomy, Necrophilia -- V. Disgust and Nuisance Law -- VI. Disgust and the Jury: "Horrible and Inhuman" Homicides -- Chapter 4. Inscribing the Face: Shame and Stigma -- I. The Blushing Face -- II. Primitive Shame, Narcissism, and the "Golden Age" -- III. The Refusal of Imperfection: The Case of B -- IV. Shame and Its Relatives: Humiliation, Embarrassment -- V. Shame and Its Relatives: Disgust, Guilt, Depression, Rage -- VI. Constructive Shame? -- VII. Stigma and Brand: Shame in Social Life -- Chapter 5. Shaming Citizens? -- I. Shame and the "Facilitating Environment" -- II. Shame Penalties: Dignity and Narcissistic Rage -- III. Shame and "Moral Panics": Gay Sex and "Animus" -- IV. Moral Panics and Crime: The Gang Loitering Law -- V. Mill's Conclusion by Another Route.
Chapter 6. Protecting Citizens from Shame -- I. Creating a Facilitating Environment -- II. Shame and a Decent Living-Standard -- III. Antidiscrimination, Hate Crimes -- IV. Shame and Personal Privacy -- V. Shame and People with Disabilities -- Chapter 7. Liberalism without Hiding? -- I. Political Liberalism, Disgust, and Shame -- II. Mill's Defense of Liberty Reconsidered -- III. The Case against Disgust and Shame -- IV. Emotions and Forms of Liberalism -- Notes -- List of References -- General Index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Y -- Z -- Index of Case Names -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- G -- J -- K -- L -- M -- P -- R -- S -- T -- U -- W.
Abstract:
Should laws about sex and pornography be based on social conventions about what is disgusting? Should felons be required to display bumper stickers or wear T-shirts that announce their crimes? This powerful and elegantly written book, by one of America's most influential philosophers, presents a critique of the role that shame and disgust play in our individual and social lives and, in particular, in the law. Martha Nussbaum argues that we should be wary of these emotions because they are associated in troubling ways with a desire to hide from our humanity, embodying an unrealistic and sometimes pathological wish to be invulnerable. Nussbaum argues that the thought-content of disgust embodies "magical ideas of contamination, and impossible aspirations to purity that are just not in line with human life as we know it." She argues that disgust should never be the basis for criminalizing an act, or play either the aggravating or the mitigating role in criminal law it currently does. She writes that we should be similarly suspicious of what she calls "primitive shame," a shame "at the very fact of human imperfection," and she is harshly critical of the role that such shame plays in certain punishments. Drawing on an extraordinarily rich variety of philosophical, psychological, and historical references--from Aristotle and Freud to Nazi ideas about purity--and on legal examples as diverse as the trials of Oscar Wilde and the Martha Stewart insider trading case, this is a major work of legal and moral philosophy.
Local Note:
Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2017. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.
Genre:
Electronic Access:
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