Cancelling- a now popular term on social media has been described as a way to gain justice for marginalized victims by calling out their abusers- sexual or otherwise. It’s highly popular on platforms such as Twitter where it first gained prominence among black users , back in 2015 as a reaction to something they disapproved of. The #MeToo movement, the cancellation of celebrities such as Kevin Hart, James Charles, R. Kelly and more are merely wider known examples of cancel culture. Now, most people say cancel culture is necessary as it gives people who had never spoken up before a platform speak.
However, the confusion regarding cancel culture arises when the question comes up- What does it aim to achieve and how does it affect people (not just celebrities) when they are ‘cancelled’. If the aim is to make the public aware of the person’s action which a community or person find offensive or problematic, it achieves it to some extent. However a cancelling isn’t carried out by one person, its usually started by a ‘victim’ who calls for someone to be cancelled and then, Twitter or Instagram picking up on the hashtag , spread it to a huge group of like minded people. What this effectively does is result in a large amount of people openly condemning an individual or group. In effect, it is a mob trying to claim justice for the ‘victim’. Keep in mind, all this happens in a matter of hours. The “cancelled” personality wakes up to a tremendous amount of hate. Their associates distance themselves from them to avoid the backlash spreading to them. Cancelling results in the person’s social and professional life getting essentially “canceled”. Now the question to ask ourselves is- is this justified?
Cancel Culture is at times, merciless and we need to take a second look at the process and examine whether it truly is a tool for justice. Let’s start at the very beginning. When an accusation is made- the aim is to achieve justice. And a key part of justice is the presumption of innocence. No judgement is passed until both the accused and accuser have had their say. But, social media doesn’t abide by this norm. Progressive communities on Twitter and elsewhere usually have their own norm of placing their belief in the victim. However, like any other norm, this can be abused as well. Essentially, there is no onus to actually prove their accusations. This is not to say that all accusations are false of course. But this isn’t the only reason this call-out justice is flawed.
Cancel Culture , as pointed out by many Youtubers ( ContraPoints for reference) follows the principles of essentialism and Abstraction. A claim or an accusation is transformed into a statement with fact and its further obscured and all details are lost. Moreover, the claim usually gets attached to a term that is negative like- homophobic, racist, sexist , toxic, manipulative etc. And Essentialism means that it is no longer the behavior of the person we condemn, but the person itself. That’s where cancelling essentially turns into character assassination. And again , all this happens in a matter of hours . There is no time assigned for verification of claims or self reflection. Instantaneous judgement becomes a norm.
There are further problems . Cancellation has a transitive property associated with it. Once a collective group decides someone is cancelled, associating with them in the most minimal way itself becomes reason enough to cancel them as well. Its obvious what the problem here is. Twitter and Cancel Culture have a very binary way of thinking. You’re either “good” or “bad”. And which part you fall in , is decided by other Twitter users and their collective. And if you even associate with someone bad, you qualify as bad. This is almost totalitarian. More importantly ,Cancel Culture considers all “bad” as equally bad. Someone being accused of catcalling isn’t a rapist. A collection of problematic tweets don’t make the person a criminal and it is necessary we understand the same. Someone acting ignorantly or even accused of the same ,doesn’t mean they are a hardline bigot. This is what essentialism, abstraction and assumption of guilt end up doing.
Ignorant Behaviour or wrongful behavior warrants criticism. However, Cancelling isn’t criticism. It is mob justice . It is necessary to recognize that not all ignorance is hatred. Ignorance can be resolved by even a rational conversation.
Understanding and Communication are necessary. And this is exactly what cancel culture fails to understand- there is no promotion to understanding, it doesn’t allow the person a space to improve, it doesn’t facilitate necessary dialogue. It brands individuals in ways that may be unfair at times. It is often weaponised to destroy people who maybe merely mistaken or ignorant to their actions. It doesn’t pay attention to the intention of the cancelled person. It barely gives them a chance to explain themselves and even when they do, they simply dig themselves further into the pit of never ending criticism that social media has proven to be. There is no duty of repair or rehabilitation which is necessary in society. If we value rehabilitation over punishment and we aim to reduce ignorance through education, cancel culture accomplishes nothing. Its reduced to a form of online vigilantism.
To conclude, its necessary that when we accuse someone or back someone accusing someone, we owe it to ourselves and society to fix this problematic behavior and not bully individuals with no proper aim in mind . There are times cancelling someone has gone too far. It results in isolation and ostracisation of individuals and when you have no support system left in place, it is hard to stay strong and survive the backlash. The effects of this can be incredibly harsh.
All we can say is , bring back self reflection and facilitate meaningful conversation. Hateful vitriol and character assassination accomplishes nothing. If we truly wish to have a just society, aim at facilitating conversation and correcting individuals when wrong in a way that doesn’t seem so blatantly unjust.
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