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One thing I hope we don't loose sight of while pondering the disturbing nature of Nikole Hannah-Jones being recently harassed off Twitter is the class dimension of what happened.
It's about race and gender, yes, but it's also about class disciplining, ie you don't belong here.
It's about race and gender, yes, but it's also about class disciplining, ie you don't belong here.
There's a deeper story to be told about how class signifiers can be weaponized against those from working-class or lower-middle class backgrounds in elite or extremely public discursive spaces. One's "habitus" becomes disqualifying for offering any commentary or opinion.
The pattern we have seen over and over is that the people who claim to decry "cancel culture" are all the beneficiaries of intergenerational wealth, elite private schooling and those they target tend to be from working-class backgrounds, upwardly mobile and journalists of color.
At the very least, it seems like the anti-cancel culture hysteria seems to coincide with an effort to keep certain professional spaces exclusively white and upper middle class. The people most focused on "cancel culture" are not economically precarious, this is not their motive.
They are in many ways the most insulated and successful journalists in the field. Yes, we are living in an era of downward class mobility, even for the highly educated, but these people are secure. The threat to them is existential, not material.
A final thought. What can we say about the ethics of journalism if working-class people are seen as fit to be the subjects of stories but never the authors?
What about those who write about poverty, but would never want someone from a working-class background as a colleague?
What about those who write about poverty, but would never want someone from a working-class background as a colleague?
