“Cancel Culture” Is NOT A Myth — What Everyone Gets Wrong About That Term

No one’s bothering to use the actual definition in these debates.

Cultural critics keep writing articles about how “cancel culture” doesn’t exist, that it’s just a myth.

They’re dead wrong.

They’re too lazy to actually look up the meaning of the term, and are instead shifting it to suit their political agenda.

We’re living in an addled era in which terms that have clear, precise definitions are being altered and molded in service of a specific depiction of current social, cultural, and political events. It’s a terrible way to have productive conversations; how can we understand each other when we don’t even understand the terms we’re using?

In a society that’s dizzy from the constant partisan bickering, it’s vital that we have sturdy concepts to shore up our discourse and comprehension.

Unfortunately, a rash of vague buzzwords has broken out in our collective consciousness, which means that our top journalists are now better equipped than ever to feed us broken stories and faulty analyses, further contributing to the general divisiveness and angry ignorance that’s infected us all.

One of those buzzwords is “cancel culture”.

The debate around that term revolves around whether what it describes actually exists or not. Is it something that every celebrity needs to be cautious of? Or is it just a conceptual boogeyman created by “deplorables” with which to demonize “libtards”?

Let’s take a look at a couple of definitions of the term from sources that are a tad more reliable than our commentariat:

From Wikipedia:

“a form of boycott in which someone (usually a celebrity) who has shared a questionable or controversial opinion, or has had behavior in their past that is perceived to be offensive called out on social media, is ‘canceled’; they are boycotted by their former followers or supporters, leading to declines in celebrities’ careers and fanbase.”

From Dictionary.com:

“the popular practice of withdrawing support for (canceling) public figures and companies after they have done or said something considered objectionable or offensive. Cancel culture is generally discussed as being performed on social media in the form of group shaming.”

In both cases, these definitions refer to attempts to cancel a major figure’s career, and not the actual cancellation of their career. They describe the actions, not their results. The culture, not the endgame.

The culture itself is very real.

If a comedian is found to have made offensive jokes in their past (Shane Gillis), or an actress states that a non-trans actor should be able to play a trans character (Scarlett Johansson), or a celebrity who was accused of a sex crime yet found not guilty is about to publish his memoir (Woody Allen), there are immediate and strident calls for them to be removed from their latest project or for their work to be retracted or for their business associates to cut ties with them.

These calls come from a culture whose raison d’etre is to cancel the work and creators deemed “problematic”.

It’s not enough for the members of this culture to say “I don’t like this person, so I’m just not going to support their work”. Such a nuanced attitude is absent in the mind of an emotional mob that thrives on likes and retweets.

No.

They have to start social media campaigns to get them fired from their respective platforms and to ensure that their work can’t spread to the masses. These are the actions of a crowd that thinks it’s doing the future a favor by nipping Bad Ideas in the bud.

And that’s the crux of cancel culture. Cancel culture doesn’t consist of mere criticisms and condemnation, things that are part and parcel of notoriety — it consists of trying to render a major figure a persona non grata in the entire industry, if not all of society.

So maybe there is some truth to the notion that a famous personality losing out on a single gig doesn’t count as “cancellation”. It’s a conversation worth having, if we can agree that the culture behind the attempted cancellation is tangible and influential.

But the real conversation we need to have is why offended audiences feel the need to treat a prominent Thought Criminal’s reputation with the sensitivity and patience of a Jim Crow-era lynch mob.