I've heard several people say that cancel culture isn't censorship, because people who get cancelled aren't prevented from speaking. This is technically correct, but only technically.
Show this thread
-
Except cancel culture has been with us for centuries —the only reason for the current moral panic is that the gatekeepers have changed and folks who were formerly targeted are now handing it out.
It's true that it's mostly the far left cancelling people now, as opposed to the far right in the 1950s. But the alarming thing about both those periods, compared to the period in between, is the amount of cancelling going on.
-
-
Modern tools make cancel culture today fundementally different from whatever was happening before.
-
On the other hand, cancel culture today happens mostly in the private sphere. Old style censorship was supported by governments’ monopoly of legal force.
End of conversation
New conversation -
-
-
It's the degree of cancellation that bothers me, not who's doing it. I'd be just as alarmed if the people being cancelled were accused of being communists as the various ists they get accused of being today.
-
Certainly there are shades of grey here where certain expressed thoughts aren't without consequence. Wouldn't it also be important to acknowledge this and try to find common ground in the grey than write off cancelation as a whole?
End of conversation
New conversation -
-
-
The racist sexist right have been cancelling people quietly all along: it didn’t stop with McCarthy. Ever wondered why bookshelves were so white until the current decade?
-
That sort of quiet cancellation happens on the left too, e.g. at universities, and in journalism and publishing and the arts.
- Show replies
New conversation -
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.