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In a post about "cancel culture," @CathyYoung63 makes it clear that it's only "cancel culture" when the cancelation is motived by "progressive notions of equity and social justice."
In other words, anti-CC is not apolitical. It's about opposing the woke.
In a post about "cancel culture," @CathyYoung63 makes it clear that it's only "cancel culture" when the cancelation is motived by "progressive notions of equity and social justice."
In other words, anti-CC is not apolitical. It's about opposing the woke.
Being anti-"cancel culture" is less about free speech then are about creating a rhetorical club to attack progressives and social justice with.
Don't get me wrong - some things labeled "cancel culture" are awful and can chill speech.
Don't get me wrong - some things labeled "cancel culture" are awful and can chill speech.
But virtually identical behavior from the right isn't called "cancel culture."
Which makes sense if anti-"cancel culture" is really just about being anti-woke, but not if anti-"cancel culture" is truly about free speech.
Which makes sense if anti-"cancel culture" is really just about being anti-woke, but not if anti-"cancel culture" is truly about free speech.
At the end of her piece, Cathy acknowledges that right-wingers can be intolerant too. But it's not "cancel culture" when conservatives do it, she says, because that's about "politics and loyalty" and not moral judgement.
Even if that were true - it's not - it would still be some pretty weak special-pleading.
This past October, Andrew McKevitt was deluged with vitriol, and his employer deluged with demands he be fired, because he snarked that he wanted Trump to die in prison, not of Covid.
This past October, Andrew McKevitt was deluged with vitriol, and his employer deluged with demands he be fired, because he snarked that he wanted Trump to die in prison, not of Covid.
So when a left-wing online "mob" demands someone be fired, that's "cancel culture." But when a right-wing "mob" does the exact same thing, that's not cancel culture, because it's "a matter of politics" rather than "moral judgement"?
But the truth is, right-wingers - including the informal anti-woke faction Cathy is more-or-less aligned with - try to "cancel" people for all sorts of reasons, not politics alone.
I'll give a few examples. I could do many more.
I'll give a few examples. I could do many more.
Florissa Fuentes, a police detective in Massachusetts, was fired because she hit "share" on a photo of her niece at a Georgia BLM protest.
Fuentes unshared the photo, but the union and other police (including some from other states) demanded she be fired, and she was.
Fuentes unshared the photo, but the union and other police (including some from other states) demanded she be fired, and she was.
(You might say that doesn't count as "cancel culture," because the "fire her!" demands were mostly coming from within the industry, not from a social media campaign.
(But if that's so, then Gary Garrels - who Cathy cited as a CC victim - doesn't count, either.)
(But if that's so, then Gary Garrels - who Cathy cited as a CC victim - doesn't count, either.)
Or what happened to Cathy's debate partner @LDBurnett - and to many, many other professors. Campus Reform attacked a tweet in which she said Mike Pence should "shut his little demon mouth." That led to a deluge of online attacks and furious demands that Burnett be fired.
Campus Reform and similar sites are essentially a machine for generating right-wing "mobs" focusing hatred, anger, and demands for firing against progressive professors.
Why is that not called "cancel culture"? Because they're right wing. That's the only reason.
Why is that not called "cancel culture"? Because they're right wing. That's the only reason.
James Riley, the dean of students at U of Alabama, tweeted a criticism of US and police racism in 2017. In 2019, Breitbart found the tweet and earlier anti-racist tweets and wrote an article, leading to Riley being forced to resign.
But Breitbart is right wing, so it's not CC.
But Breitbart is right wing, so it's not CC.
Or when the Sad Puppies group - who pretend to be anti-woke, not right-wing - ran a letter-writing campaign demanding that a cover designer be fired because they claimed she called them Nazis on her personal Facebook page.
If the left did that, it'd be called cancel culture.
If the left did that, it'd be called cancel culture.
Or when GamerGate, another "we're not right wing" org - Cathy wrote an article defending GG in 2019 - ran a social media campaign to boycott publishers for publishing opinions GG disagreed with, and to try and get writers fired. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/20/inside-gamergates-successful-attack-on-the-media/
When a Vox writer criticized a colleague for signing the Harpers Letter (explicitly saying she didn't want him fired), anti-CC people falsely said she wanted her colleague fired and deluged her social media with abuse (she had to take down her social media for a while).
That kind of social media "mob" would 100% be called "cancel culture" if the "mob" was left-wing. But in this case, it was a mob of anti-cancel-culture people.
Like when an anti-CC "mob" got Des Moines Register reporter Aaron Calvin fired by digging through old tweets for ammo.
Like when an anti-CC "mob" got Des Moines Register reporter Aaron Calvin fired by digging through old tweets for ammo.
In the Aaron Calvin case, "the newspaper [was] forced to hire extra security due to threats." https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49857358
Or how about when a police union objected to a political cartoon about racism and the police force being shown in school, leading to social media demands that the teacher be fired - including from the Governor of Texas? https://twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1297586994344865798
There are so many examples.
There is absolutely no principled free speech reason to call identical actions "cancel culture" coming from the left, but not from the right.
It's just a political tactic used by the anti-woke. https://twitter.com/JeffreyASachs/status/1292855253902266369
There is absolutely no principled free speech reason to call identical actions "cancel culture" coming from the left, but not from the right.
It's just a political tactic used by the anti-woke. https://twitter.com/JeffreyASachs/status/1292855253902266369
One final comment: "Irreversible Damage" is vile, transphobic, poorly researched, and a piece of shit. Its incendiary cover alone, implying that trans people are a horrible danger to six year old girls, is enough to mark it as hate literature.
I don't think Target should carry it (not denying they have a right to), and I don't think Amazon should carry ads for it, any more than Target would carry, or Amazon would accept ads for, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
I'm not saying that no one who disagrees with my views should be published. I'm saying this specific book is hateful trash that belongs on the same shelf as "The Turner Diaries."
If objecting to hateful garbage is "cancel culture," well, sign me up.
End of rant.
If objecting to hateful garbage is "cancel culture," well, sign me up.
End of rant.
Links to some of the stories I referred to in this thread.
First and foremost, of course, is Cathy's article. https://arcdigital.media/crime-and-banishment-fd181e2ee306
First and foremost, of course, is Cathy's article. https://arcdigital.media/crime-and-banishment-fd181e2ee306
But also...
https://www.chronicle.com/article/right-wing-trolls-attacked-me-my-administration-buckled?cid=gen_sign_in&cid2=gen_login_refresh
https://cw.ua.edu/54140/top-stories/breaking-dean-of-students-allegedly-resigns-after-pictures-of-past-tweets-surface/
https://lailluminator.com/2020/10/19/wheres-louisiana-tech-loyalty-to-professors-whose-opinions-provoke-death-threats/ https://www.masslive.com/police-fire/2020/09/former-springfield-police-detective-florissa-fuentes-fired-over-black-lives-matter-social-media-post-files-lawsuit-against-city.html
https://www.chronicle.com/article/right-wing-trolls-attacked-me-my-administration-buckled?cid=gen_sign_in&cid2=gen_login_refresh
https://cw.ua.edu/54140/top-stories/breaking-dean-of-students-allegedly-resigns-after-pictures-of-past-tweets-surface/
https://lailluminator.com/2020/10/19/wheres-louisiana-tech-loyalty-to-professors-whose-opinions-provoke-death-threats/ https://www.masslive.com/police-fire/2020/09/former-springfield-police-detective-florissa-fuentes-fired-over-black-lives-matter-social-media-post-files-lawsuit-against-city.html
