Sexuality and the Imprint of Shame: What Queer Guys (and Their Therapists) Need to Know — Part 2/3

PART TWO — DEFENSES AGAINST SHAME

We encounter shame in a number of social contexts, particularly around sexuality and sexual identity. In our culture, we believe we can “undo” shame in several ways: coming out, forming relationships, seeking and receiving validation, having sex, and/or (re)claiming our autonomy. We take steps that symbolize autonomy and independence; by doing so, we think we’ve undone a legacy of shame, and have become more of the person we aspire to be. But I would argue that shame leaves an imprint and its residue stays with us.

The question is, how do we protect ourselves? What are our defenses against shame? In his book[i], Dr. Donald L. Nathanson (1992) introduced the “Compass of Shame” — subsequently validated by other researchers[ii] — which is a tool that enables us to manage shame by understanding how it causes us to alternatively punish ourselves, attack others, withdraw, or engage in shame-avoidance (i.e., points on the compass).

Psychoanalyst Nancy McWilliams[iii] discusses the role of defenses in coping with difficult emotions or trauma:

The phenomena that we refer to as defenses have many benign functions. They begin as healthy, creative adaptations, and they continue to work adaptively throughout life. […] The person using a defense is generally trying unconsciously to accomplish one or both of the following: (1) the avoidance or management of some powerful, threatening feeling, usually anxiety but sometimes overwhelming grief, shame, envy […] and (2) the maintenance of self-esteem.

Defenses and Queer Men

When we punish or attack ourselves, what does that specifically look like in queer men’s communities? Sometimes, this kind of defensive strategy expresses itself through significant HIV and STI anxiety, even when we objectively experience low to no risk of infection or develop any significant symptoms. The shame makes you think you need to be punishing yourself, and fear of HIV/STIs feels like a perfect excuse. If you feel bad about having causal sex because the world has told you that it’s irresponsible, or that it’s something you do en route to monogamy and “settling down” with the “right” partner, then you’re going to feel bad. If you feel bad about casual sex and you leap into self-punishment, that will take away from an opportunity to work through the unwarranted shame. Sex is not the problem.

It’s normative in queer men’s spaces to experience heightened body consciousness. It’s also common to experience daily rejection on hookup apps. This will also activate shame. Sometimes, we punish or attack ourselves by saying, “I’m not good enough” or “I’m bad at love” (to quote Halsley). We may say we’re not attractive, or that we need to do better, we need to look better, or we need to change who we are. Yet changing who you are is an attack on yourself, on your physical body. Dr. Margaret Paul talks about the connection between shame and our attachment to control.[iv] She suggests that shame can be so overwhelming that if we can somehow take responsibility for that shame, make it our own problem, then at least we have some control over it. We convince ourselves that we can prevent feeling rejected — by sculpting our bodies or minimizing our own emotions — if we locate the problem of a harsh environment within ourselves.

We might punish or attack others — that’s another way to deal with shame. How do we attack each other in our community? Sometimes we reduce gay men to only wanting sex, as though it’s a bad thing. We say it in a derogatory way, “that’s all they want, that’s all they know, that’s all they understand.” What we’re actually upset about is all the difficult feelings that come up when we try to participate in the very sexualized culture we’re criticizing. Our community also attacks in the form of femme, fat, and drug shaming. We’re overcome with shame when we think about people seeing us as any of these labels and so we project this anxiety onto others and convey it with a tinge of disgust.

Withdrawal represents another defense against shame. Sometimes, one person in a romantic relationship will say, “we just have different libidos,” or “I’m not that sexual a person.” Sometimes that’s true, a portion of the time that’s a dirty lie. Desire discrepancy and hyposexual arousal problems are real. But, in many instances, our bodies have partially shut down so that we can continue to participate in romantic relationships in a way that takes the pressure off. Then, we don’t have to have all these difficult relationship conversations about pleasure, jealousy, and inadequacy that activate our shame. What we frequently call social anxiety may, in fact, be a form of withdrawal protecting us from re-experiencing shame.

For many people, a shame avoidance defense looks like becoming a workaholic. After all, no one can suggest you’re not enough when you’re always working. For queer men, I would argue that our proportionately high rates of drug and alcohol abuse and our focus on gym culture are unique ways that shame-avoidance manifests. We don’t ever want to feel left out, overlooked, or rejected. In the context of body sculpting and gym selfies, shame avoidance can begin to look to others like narcissism.

Don’t get me wrong: narcissism is not a dirty word. Rather, narcissism is about our fear of being erased, of being decentered. It’s that part of your psyche that gets activated when you feel like you’ve been overlooked and decide you need to do something to intervene. As a result, people may experience you as a “big personality” or “obnoxiously confident,” but actually what is happening is that the part of you that has struggled with shame for so long has been activated, and you’re now subconsciously protecting yourself by taking up social space and fighting back with a bit of grandiosity.

Next: Part Three — Processing Shame.

Endnotes

[i] Nathanson, D. L. (1992). Shame and pride: Affect, sex, and the birth of the self. W.W. Norton & Company.

[ii] Elison, J., Lennon, R., & Pulos, S. (2006). Investigating the compass of shame: The development of the compass of shame scale. Social Behavior and Personality: An International Journal, 34(3), 221–238. https://doi.org/10.2224/sbp.2006.34.3.221.

[iii] McWilliams, N. (2011). Chapter 5: Primary Defensive Processes. In Psychoanalytic Diagnosis: Understanding Personality Structure in the Clinical Process (2nd ed., pp. 100–125).

[iv] Paul, P. M. (2011, October 06). Why We Feel Shame and How to Conquer It. Retrieved June 18, 2017, from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/margaret-paul-phd/dealing-with-shame_b_994991.html.

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