[maconic]

I don't know if there is a good fix for it, but labels are a very potent weapon. In the U.S. a few decades ago, calling someone a communist sympathizer was a dangerous label. In China in the 1950s being called a rightist was a dangerous label. Today being called a racist, a pedophile, a Nazi, etc. are still dangerous labels. In this article cited the author was labeled a sociopath by an ex-boyfriend and also of being cruel ("cruelty-based view of the world"). These labels are difficult to undo because they are so easy to remember. If you live in a small village and, let's say, get labeled a derogatory term like a "slut" ... that quickly propagates until every villager accepts it as common wisdom that you are. So I do like the discussion about how to engineer a better social system, but it would require censoring label accusations until they had been proven, and this goes up against another part of the social system of supporting free speech. So I think you'd have to ban negative labels in the way that we don't legally allow hate speech (in the U.S.) despite the First Amendment because of the way it causes disproportionate and long-term harm to the victim. I don't see any other realistic solution to a problem that has existed ever since humans formed social groups and speak languages... being ostracized, exiled, or worse has been the outcome of shaming for the last 100k years. I don't see a great way to avoid it other than to just walk on eggshells and always be really nice to everybody or develop the reputation of a maverick... tough but honest and fair (like Sen. John McCain was known for). Regardless, you have to fit yourself into some admirable persona that society values to avoid shaming. If there are other people that get shamed because they don't fit into one of the socially admirable personas, perhaps the best way to address it is to expand the list of socially admirable personas.