I think there’s a simpler explanation that wasn’t really talked about in the article — “cancelling” is just voting with your wallet and right of voluntary association and pressuring those in power to do so as well. This kind of behavior is born out of the natural frustration of people not only not facing consequences but at times becoming more successful as a result of the harm they cause. It’s filling a gap in our legal system so if you want to see cancel culture end it will be because it moves to the courts with things like a national hate speech law and sexual assault and domestic violence laws that don’t heavily favor the abuser.<p>You’re free to not like or want these things to be codified in law but it’s still nonetheless the formula of how to turn mob rule into a dialog. Nobody is showing up to the house of a murderer with pitchforks anymore because we have a functioning court system. Factory owners aren’t having their door broken down by angry workers because we have labor laws.
Does this count as cancel culture or not? <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicks#2003%E2%80%932005:_Iraq_War_comments_and_backlash" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicks#2003%E2%80%932005:_...</a><p>And they were just speaking out against the war and a President.
The way social media works today is crazy. Like someone's tweet can be cherry picked out of 10,000+ tweets to control any narrative about that person. I often delete tweets out of pure regret and often think how the tweet would be weaponized against me in the future. This is why I've largely shifted to messenger apps with disappearing messages turned on. Some things just need to be ephemeral and forgotten about.
Power propels cancel culture. Causing harm, pain, discomfort, whatever, to someone else gives people a feeling of power. Especially when they feel they have a righteous reason for doing so.
Part of it is enacting a cost for the wrong behavior<p>Part of society understands that the excarcerated deserve employment opportunities<p>But then another group wants someone fired for telling a bad joke at a tech conference tweeting the wrong joke while on a trans-atlantic flight<p>We must understand that we are all a product of our best and worse moments and learn to forgive
Cancel culture doesn't exist. People shun those they dislike. That's human nature. Entertainers are routinely cancelled for not being entertaining enough. Being morally objectionable makes people be disliked as well. The rise in prominence is due to two things: The permanent record that is The Internet and fake outrage from right-wing media. The same people who created the Hollywood black list for suspected Communists.<p>The story of the beer guy and the reporter who cancelled him and got cancelled is mostly fake. The reported did background as standard practice and found the racist tweets and reached out to the beer guy for comment. He never intended to play them up or make a case to "cancel" him. But the beer guy issued a proactive statement that the Register was targeting him which lead to an immediate and over-the-top counteroffensive driven by right-wing media. The anti-cancel culture missionaries look for any and every excuse to protect racist messaging, so they fight any and every attempt to shed light on racism.<p><a href="https://www.cjr.org/first_person/aaron-calvin-viral-story-tweets.php" rel="nofollow">https://www.cjr.org/first_person/aaron-calvin-viral-story-tw...</a>
Let's look at the most recent cancel culture that I have seen.<p><a href="https://ottawa.citynews.ca/local-news/ontario-liberals-drop-candidate-after-homophobic-facebook-comments-uncovered-5363040" rel="nofollow">https://ottawa.citynews.ca/local-news/ontario-liberals-drop-...</a><p>So election is going on:<p>>Alex Mazurek was terminated after homophobic comments on Facebook from 2014 were unearthed.<p>POLITicians are supposed to be POLITe.<p>>The Ontario Liberals are dropping their candidate in the Chatham-Kent-Leamington riding after comments he made on Facebook several years ago were brought to light.<p>There's basically no chance the liberals win in chatham. This has more to do with virtue signaling. "We are so virtuous that we would never let one of our candidates say homophobic things.<p>>In a statement posted to Facebook, Mazurek said the comments were unacceptable, but noted he was 13 years old when he wrote them eight years ago.<p>13 years old you said something mean? Cancelled!<p>What makes the NDP care what a 13 year old boy said? All people mature and get wiser since they were 13. What made the liberals go nuclear on a riding they have 0% chance of winning?<p>It's about saying how virtuous they are.
I mean, maybe it was dumb for AB to put the guy's name on the can in the first place. Maybe we should be decrying stupid corporate advertising stunts
There was a whole lot of right-wing driven cancel culture in the 1920's and particularly the 1930's and 1940's. It's not a right or left thing, it's just convenient to use whatever is at hand that generates the appropriate response.
> Driven primarily by young progressives<p>Progressives tend to be more concerned with economics than with culture war. Trad libs are more likely to wage culture war.