The Left Pretends to Care about "Cancel Culture" Only When it's Convenient

All of a sudden members of the Left seem to care about “Cancel Culture.” The truth is, they don’t. Their objective is to be the “good” side fighting the “bad” side. They can’t fight against what “Cancel Culture” actually is without coming clean about their full throated support of it, from Hillary Clinton to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - they are 100% behind it and never speak out against it. Unless they can use it as political leverage and then suddenly, they are shocked SHOCKED that cancelling is going on here.

The term “Cancel Culture” was part of the black community’s unified voice on Twitter to enact change. But it’s used now in place of a better term. This is not driven by the black community but almost entirely by the white community - young people who came of age in the era of social justice warriors vs. the trolls, an online tribal split that began in 2013 on Tumblr and 4-Chan, respectively. By all accounts, at least for now, the social justice side has won the culture war and they are now inflicting what made Tumblr unbearable on Twitter and it has spread throughout culture, here and abroad.

“Cancel Culture” is the weapon of choice for the new found fundamentalism of “Wokeness” and that, too, has been appropriated from the black community. It would be great if we could find a better word and a better term to describe what is happening now.

What the Democrats and people on the Left use as their most powerful point of leverage is how they feel “unsafe” and because of that, employers, editors, educators and ruling class overlords must move mountains to make them feel safe again.

If one student MIGHT feel unsafe if the whole class reads Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, even if no such student ever came forward, out that book goes. Usually you will find the objection has been made by a young white warrior speaking on behalf of those who MIGHT be offended. Or if thousands of Apple employees feel “unsafe” after someone who wrote a book that contained a passage they don’t like - he’s fired. If Twitter throws continual fits about old tweets or wrong-think, the Oscars will never have a host and they will paint themselves into a corner so tight they become 100% irrelevant.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the biggest threat Trump posed to the Left was that he was flagrantly offensive. He was deliberately offensive and to a culture that had built itself up on being inoffensive, fair and “good” that was WORSE than a Hitler or a Stalin rising to power. If you compare Trump to Putin, or Xi Jinping or Kim Jong-un you will be hard pressed to find any proof of any similarities at all. He didn’t murder journalists or force ideology on students or forbid protesting. Sure, he tried by banning Critical Race Theory or making the tearing down of statues a Federal crime but really, Trump’s grip on the country as a would-be dictator was minimal and ineffectual. Why, because the Left still controls culture, science, education, and news.

Now, of course, after the new icon of the new Left, Liz Cheney, is voted out of leadership that’s supposedly “Cancel Culture.” It isn’t. If Cheney’s publisher dropped her book, like what happened to Josh Hawley, then sure. That is an example of it. If Cheney was forced to resign by her fellow congress members, as Al Franken was by the Senate, then yes, that’s “Cancel Culture.” Voting her out of leadership? Nope. That’s Democracy. Why, because that is how Democracy works. That is how government works. She still has her voice - in fact, a more powerful voice than she ever has had - and she’s still a member of congress. Maybe voters will opt out of electing her next time but she is a Cheney, after all, so I would not bet on that.

Recently, The Atlantic tried to make the case that denying Nikole Hannah-Jones tenure over the 1619 project is an example of “Cancel Culture.” Nope. She has a five year deal to see how it goes and then she could get tenure. That is called a compromise. Do you think anyone on the Left would ever reach such a compromise over any kind of objections? Nope. It’s up to individual companies like Trader Joe’s to stand up to the hysteria. Here, you see a fair resolution to a controversial issue.

Some are in full support of the 1619 Project and Critical Race Theory as the new doctrine of the Left. But many are not. It does teach the idea that the Revolutionary War was fought because of slavery and that slavery is the reason why America was formed at all. This is just a factual misread of history. Teaching it that way is like teaching Creationism. It’s a theory not based in fact and it influences how history is taught and from what perspective. Americans have every right to protest this becoming agreed upon doctrine in higher education. To call it “Cancel Culture” is to diminish what the 1619 project seeks to do. It is not being offered as an alternative. It is being offered as the new truth that must be accepted or else.

When people get fired for wrong-think they are helping to protect the image of a massive corporation. They aren’t getting fired because they are forcing American culture to adopt a specific philosophy that defines who they are now and what their history has been about. They are merely expressing what they think and THAT, to the Left, is what’s dangerous. Everyone has to be on the same page, believing exactly the same things, saying the same things, reading the “right” books, learning the “right” history.

Some have suggested, wrongly, that banning Critical Race Theory from schools IS censorship. It isn’t, not when the entire community on the Left is, as we speak, forcing a certain belief doctrine on ALL PEOPLE EVERYWHERE. Banning it from schools is saying - we object to this being the chosen doctrine we’re forced to accept. Should the Left loosen its rules, should it stop firing people for what they think, should it stop silencing dissent across the board? Then sure, teach whatever you want in schools if the idea remains that everyone is entitled to their opinion and is entitled to speak up and speak out against it. Right now, that isn’t the case.

Here is an example - if you even criticize Black Lives Matter you can get fired, and many teachers already have. If you criticize Critical Race Theory you can be fired. If anyone criticizes the Constitution or George Washington or even Abraham Lincoln (criticizing does not mean erasing and renaming schools) nothing is going to happen to you. THAT is the difference. One ideology allows for dissent, the other doesn’t. Banning it from schools is like saying - we can’t allow a philosophy that forces itself upon people and doesn’t allow for them to criticize or push back against it.

“Cancel Culture” does exist on the right, of course, and one could argue it was invented by conservatives. Candace Owens recently led a mission to get Christy Teigen dropped from Target after she was outed for encouraging a young woman to commit suicide. To me, that is an example of “Cancel Culture” and one I would not condone. I believe people should be given a chance to apologize for things they’ve done and said, not punished outright. But for members of the Left to scream about it now without taking responsibility for how it has infected the entire Left like a cancer is laughable. They’re accusing her of hypocrisy without also saying: “Cancel Culture” must be stopped no matter whom it punishes - but they won’t say that. They can’t say that because they themselves will get cancelled.

I will never support it. I will support the political candidates and parties that fight against it. I will always defend those who are being unfairly cancelled for what they think, write, say, do.

Recommended reading:

What My Soviet Life Has Taught Me About Censorship and Why It Makes Us Dumb [Aero Magazine]

On the Hypocrites at Apple Who Fired Antonio Garcia-Martinez [Matt Taibbi]