How Does Nathaniel Hawthorne Use Public Humiliation In The Scarlet Letter

When I was four and I was acting up in the store my mom yelled at me infont of all the shoppers, I felt worse about making my mom mad over what the patrons in the store though of me. The Scarlet Letter was a book written by the American author Nathaniel Hawthorne his book provides us with insight into punishment and the hypocrisy of those who attempt to condemn us . Through Hester Prynne, Dimmesdale and in some cases Chillingworth, Hawthorne proves public humiliation is a useless and cruel punishment and often times those who judge us have skeletons in the closet as well. Hawthorne shows us the reader that public humiliation is pretty much ineffective and compared to the way we judge ourselves often useless.Public shame is useless because often times we judge ourselves harder than anybody else can judge us and others can often see right through this. In the second chapter of the book while …show more content…
Even though Hester might be strong enough to handle the criticism of the people in the town their actions are still cruel and uncalled for and they often times become abusive to Pearl someone who has nothing to do with Hester's actions. When Hester and Pearl where walking through the town center a group of children saw them they said “Look—there’s the scarlet letter lady! And there’s the little scarlet letter running alongside her! Let’s throw mud at them!” they began to throw mud at Pearl and Hester while they were just minding their own business. Even though they’re children their actions are still uncalled for Hester already has to live with the letter she doesn’t deserve any more criticism especially in that form. They’re kids so their actions may be sort of excusable but they learned the hatred from someone and that someone is probably a parent this proves that public punishment can have unintended ramifications like this especially to Pearl who is just an innocent