Dick Gregory Shame

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What is shame? According to Webster’s Dictionary, shame is a feeling of dishonor or disgrace. In Composition I recently we were assigned to read an essay called Shame by Dick
Gregory, an author. In this essay Dick Gregory tells of a point in his life where he was shameful because others pitied him. This shame changed him and affected his whole life. He also learned how hard it is to not pity someone else. Pity hurts, shame changes people, and it’s hard to not pity others.
Pity can really hurt a person’s feelings and affect their self-esteem. Dick Gregory was made to feel shameful of his poverty at a young age because people pitied him. His class was collecting change for needy families and he wanted to impress a girl in his class by donating a lot. The only …show more content…
Dick Gregory saved up every dime he could. When it came time to turn in the money his teacher tried to spare him the embarrassment of him having to say he had no money, because she didn’t know that he had saved up some cash. He would not allow this so his teacher called him out on how poor he was. The things his teacher said to him made him leave the room in tears. He was hurt by the fact that not only his teacher pitied him but so did the girl he liked.
This pity made Dick Gregory ashamed of his poverty even though it wasn’t his fault.
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No one should be made to feel ashamed of things that are not within their control. The pity that Dick Gregory’s teacher showed for him set the core believe that being poor was something to be ashamed of. This core belief he now had hurt him. It made him work extra hard and change where he was in life. Granted getting out of poverty was a good thing, but the pain of feeling ashamed for something that wasn’t even his fault must have been awful. He grew up to be better off than he was as a child and with an understanding for those that have been in that situation. Dick Gregory later in his life found out how hard it is to not pity someone else. It is
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