Conservatives mean two separate things whenever they talk about "cancel culture."

One is social consequence for an exposed pattern of empowered abuse. They hate it.

The other is strategic coordinated outrage abusing a target over an invented/minor infraction. They love it. https://twitter.com/JShahryar/status/1353124692069019649

Conservatives love to blur the lines.

They pretend that the first one is the second one, when one of their own has been caught abusing their power for years.

Conservatives love to engage in the second one under the auspices of the first one, when they see the opportunity.

It's easy to blur the lines, because in both cases you have outraged people, and often a person losing their job.

The way you can tell: watch patterns of abuse.

Look who argues to protect abusers from the abused. Look who chooses to defend the powerful from the less powerful.

The "cancel culture" conservatives fear is consequence for abuse, and it is very good, and it's long overdue.

The "cancel culture" they complain about is the type in which they engage, but they very much believe in it—they just want exclusive access to it.

And that's that.

Firing Lauren Wolfe for saying that she was glad that fascists failed to maintain their grip on their control of the U.S. government is not the same action as arresting Harvey Weinstein, or impeaching Donald Trump.

Anyone not understanding that doesn't want to understand.

I use "conservatives" here advisedly. A conservative wants to protect maintain and entrench the status quo—and our status quo is optimized for empowered abuse and enablement.

Don't get distracted. Watch for where the power is, and where the abuse is. You'll see.

In short, this is dumb.