Cate Blanchett: ‘There’s a Distinct Lack of Shame in Society’

Actress Cate Blanchett says she believes “There’s a distinct lack of shame in society” today, suggesting that shame can be useful, as “the lessons one can learn from that are very powerful.”

“There’s a distinct lack of shame in society at the moment,” Blanchett told the Guardian this week at the Venice Film Festival, after being asked about her character, Catherine Ravenscroft, who faces a public shaming in the seven-episode of the new Apple TV+ series, Disclaimer.

“Shame is very different to guilt,” the Lord of the Rings actress added. “Guilt is a very useless emotion, I don’t know what you do with that. But shame and regret, and the lessons one can learn from that, are very powerful.”

Blanchett, however, added that she nonetheless believes there has been a lot of “shaming” in society.

“Just look at the way you attempt to parent children,” she said. “If you publicly shame them, it can lead to rage.”

“Private conversations are often far more powerful than public ones,” the actress added. “I’m not saying public ones are not important, but one-to-one, face-to-face reconciliation-type conversations are far more powerful than public shaming.”

Blanchett went on to say, “We all have dark sides,” adding, “I think there’s a belief system going around that if people don’t tell you everything, they have a sinister side to hide. That’s called privacy.”

“We think if people aren’t honest they’re doing nefarious things, but perhaps we’re in the process of dealing with them ourselves,” she said. “I play a woman that has things she has buried, traumatic things.”

The Carol star also mentioned a hotly contested book about the effects of psychological trauma, The Body Keeps the Score by disgraced researcher Bessel van der Kolk, saying, “The way trauma can remain in the body on a cellular level, and what happens to repressed memories.”

“I found that fascinating and quite painful,” she said. “And I was very grateful that I wasn’t in the same space.”

Alana Mastrangelo is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on Facebook and X at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.