Cancel culture IRL

Thermal said:

The rather massive difference being a few people even being aware, and social media reaching millions. That's what makes CC different: volume produces dramatically different response.

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No it doesn’t.

People were being what is now called “cancelled” on the demands of a handful of people or pressure groups throughout my lifetime.

Darat said:

That isn’t unique to so called “cancel culture”, its the same human behaviour we’ve recorded since records began!

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Human have always done this, so it's no big deal. Not worth talking about.

You know what else isn't new? Racism, sexism, murder, slavery, thievery... Yep, it's nothing new, why would we ever bother to spend any time talking about those things and the negative impact they have on people and society as a whole?

Darat said:

People were being what is now called “cancelled” on the demands of a handful of people or pressure groups throughout my lifetime.

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And do you think that was a good thing?

tyr_13 said:

The people who popularized the phrase and the most common usage refers to a NEW and inherently problematic, unjust, phenomenon. The common usage refers to things that plainly put are not true. This is why people keep harping on it not being new.

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None of the people I quoted linked upthread appear to be saying that anything is new, other than perhaps the speed at which an attempted cancellation spreads from one carrier to the next. Whom are you thinking of when you refer to "people who popularized the phrase" and did they do so before or after the people I cited above at #1379?

tyr_13 said:

You can't dance in and out of common use and underlying phenomenon to justify the phrase.

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What are you citing as "common use" here? I'm happy to go with the Merriam Webster link already provided above.

Emily's Cat said:

And do you think that was a good thing?

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If they were being canceled for racism, sexism, murder, slavery, theiver...then yes. If they were being canceled for being trans gender or gay or Jewish...not so much.

This is the extreme pacifist argument applied to shunning instead of physical force.

d4m10n said:

None of the people I quoted upthread appear to be saying that anything is new, other than perhaps the speed at which an attempted cancellation spreads from one carrier to the next. Whom are you thinking of when you refer to "people who popularized the phrase" and did they do so before or after the people I cited above at #1379?

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Concurrently with.

Again, you cannot site common usage to defend use of the phrase and then ignore the elements of the common usage that uncut that support.

'But I don't mean it that way' works neither here nor the Confederate flag.

JoeMorgue said:

How is that possibly a bad or scary thing?

"More people have an equal voice" is only scary if you're just a default contrarian troll or scared that you might lose your unfair advantage in a system.

I'm sorry social pressure is moving more toward the popular vote and away from the electoral college. Deal with it.

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Its not scary, or displacing anything. Its that a mob of randos seldom gets anything right. They are free to yap about it into infinity, but when real people lose their real jobs over Twitter twats, that should at least give pause.

I like to imagine how I would take it if something like this backfired, and I was on the receiving end. That's how you realize what is fair, rather than fantasizing about damage you can do to imagined and faceless enemies. But that's me. You do you.

Darat said:

No it doesn’t.

People were being what is now called “cancelled” on the demands of a handful of people or pressure groups throughout my lifetime.

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Sure. Was that a good thing? I'm guessing probably not. So let's up the ante and go global with the same poor idea, right? Bunch of random tweeters are sure to fix that, what with how unerring they are.

JoeMorgue said:

Indeed.

Again nothing being complained about here is new or noteworthy in the slightest outside of who's using their opinions and influence to change society.

Old people writing "Letters to the Editor" aren't cancel culture but young people doing what amounts to the same thing on Twitter are. And as you say the only difference is one person using an "official" gatekeeping method and the other isn't.

That's why the people complaining have to keep referring to "The Mob" and "Mob Mentality" as if Twitter is somehow more driven by that then an HOA or a Political Party or literally anything else.

But this is what the Proudly Wrong always do.

When their house is burning down, the discussion is about how to put out the fire at their house.

When anyone else's house is burning down the discussion they demand we have is a broad philosophical debate about the what degree society is responsible for putting out house fires, or a sea-lioning "Oh I'm sorry when did we prove the fires were objectively bad?," or a hand wringing "Oh but if we let fire fighters just start pouring water on houses willy-nilly they could flood a house out if they go too far...." or some other parallel meta discussion designed to keep us as far away from putting out the other people's fire as possible.

And when called on it their response is always either a faux-innocent or huffy "Oh I can't talk about whatever I like."

"Cancel Culture" has not wielded its power to influence society any more (or less) responsibly then any other. It's not worth a new term, it's not worth becoming a society boogeyman.

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I wonder how much of the gatekeeper pushback to cancel culture really comes from a discomfort with having their decision making and general culture examined by the unwashed masses.

If there's one recurring theme from these stories of cancellation, it's often the case that those in traditional gatekeeping positions often have massive lapses of judgement or moral blind spots.

The metoo cases out of Hollywood, such as the open secret that Weinstein or Cosby were serial sexual predators, showed how poorly the current structure was dealing with blatant criminality, much less minor ethical problems. As it turned out, internet mob justice was far more effective than just letting these ghouls sweep the bad behavior under the rug.

Less extreme, you see senior editorial staff getting in a huff whenever the unwashed masses mock some the lazy and/or unethical pieces that run in their publications. They really don't enjoy when people point out how much of a reactionary hack Brett Stephens is and jeer at the idea that he's a serious thinker. They also don't like it when you point out that their "intellectual" Andy Sullivan was still passing off decades debunked race-realism pseudo-science as serious material worth consideration.

When it comes down to it, "cancel culture" is little more than powerful people complaining that their shortcomings are being criticized in the public forum, something that previously would not have been so easy as they controlled all the major means of public discourse.

These people are just going to have to live with the idea that their decisions might be scrutinized. It won't be so easy to appoint some reactionary crack-pot to a prestigious job at the NYTimes and have the rubes swallow it without complaint.

pgwenthold said:

Yes, we get it. It's not "canceling" that is the problem, it's that the WRONG PEOPLE are being canceled that is the real issue.

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And they'll never, ever admit that so this thread is doomed to last forever.

tyr_13 said:

Concurrently with.

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Got a link?

tyr_13 said:

Again, you cannot site common usage to defend use of the phrase and then ignore the elements of the common usage that uncut that support.

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Again, what are you citing as the common usage?

Here's what I've linked before: https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/cancel-culture-words-were-watching

Merriam Webster said:

To cancel someone (usually a celebrity or other well-known figure) means to stop giving support to that person. The act of canceling could entail boycotting an actor’s movies or no longer reading or promoting a writer’s works. The reason for cancellation can vary, but it usually is due to the person in question having expressed an objectionable opinion, or having conducted themselves in a way that is unacceptable, so that continuing to patronize that person’s work leaves a bitter taste.

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Does this strike you as a good description of this particular denotation of the key word?

If so, what would you say "cancel culture" should be taken to mean?

TragicMonkey said:

And they'll never, ever admit that so this thread is doomed to last forever.

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Is Kaepernick one of the right people or the wrong ones?

Thermal said:

Sure. Was that a good thing? I'm guessing probably not. So let's up the ante and go global with the same poor idea, right? Bunch of random tweeters are sure to fix that, what with how unerring they are.

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Yep look at how badly canceled Travis McMichael, Gregory McMichael, and William "Roddie" Bryan got. The whole Ahmaud Arbery was wrapped up nicely and then this twitter mob gets their hands on it, now these people already cleared are facing murder charges!!!!!!!

Some of the most egregious canceling the online mob has done.

d4m10n said:

Got a link?

Again, what are you citing as the common usage?

Here's what I've linked before: https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/cancel-culture-words-were-watching



Does this strike you as a good description of this particular denotation of the key word?

If so, what would you say "cancel culture" should be taken to mean?

Is Kaepernick one of the right people or the wrong ones?

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Oh wow, your own post undercuts you, a pattern I have noticed.

You can't just take 'canceled' and think it is identical to the phrase 'cancel culture'. Your link connects them, but does not make the mistake you do by saying they are the same. The latter arises from the former. From your link, "The idea of canceling—and as some have labeled it, cancel culture—has taken hold in recent years due to conversations prompted by #MeToo and other movements that demand greater accountability from public figures."

'Some have labeled' the act of canceling to 'cancel culture' which is recent. I don't actually agree with all of that article's scholarship ('canceling' in this context comes from black Twitter but 'cancel culture' as a description of the action comes from conservative media), but the point of contention doesn't differ.

d4m10n said:

Is Kaepernick one of the right people or the wrong ones?

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I'm not interested enough in him to bother having an opinion about that. I don't think everything that occurs to anybody is actually my business, even to the extent of paying attention to them, much less judging them, much less trying to tell everybody else how to judge them. I cancel where I want to, don't where I don't, and I don't care what other people think.

tyr_13 said:

You can't just take 'canceled' and think it is identical to the phrase 'cancel culture'. Your link connects them, but does not make the mistake you do by saying they are the same.

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I did not say they were the same. In fact, I asked you whether you could say what the phrase means, assuming we take Merriam's definition of the key word as a starting point.

'canceling' in this context comes from black Twitter but 'cancel culture' as a description of the action comes from conservative media

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Once again, I encourage you to review the selection of tweets I linked above. I'm relatively confident they predate what you're talking about here with conservative media, probably by a fair bit.

TragicMonkey said:

And they'll never, ever admit that so this thread is doomed to last forever.

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Because we've decided to give all the volition and agency in all discussions entirely to the people who are wrong for some reason, so "Infinite Stubbornness" is now an unbeatable and acceptable tactic.

All the meta-discussion we have to have is always for their benefit, not ours.

Earlier I made the comparison of Cancel Culture to your aunt being mad that you brought your black girlfriend to Thanksgiving knowing it would set off your racist uncle and that would ruin Thanksgiving, yet doesn't get mad at your uncle for being a racist, usually with some variation of "Well he can't change" so we have to just accept it, as if his racism is somehow more ingrained into him than tolerating his racism is into everyone else therefore he gets to use to control the situation and we don't.

It's the same thing. Tone policing is arguments is almost always some variation on the correct side being admonished for not putting enough effort into finding new and unique ways to convince the wrong side they are wrong and almost never any effort put into telling the wrong side to just stop being wrong.

The onus is always on us be constantly tailoring some individual new and interesting way of proving that 2+2=4 for every specific wrong person and never on the incorrect person to ever try to just hurry up and accept that 2+2=4, this idea that their being a completely passive participant in the discussion is just assumed and its everyone else job to do all the work of dragging them, kicking and screaming, back toward a place of basic intellectual standards.

That's why they get to decide when the discussion ends by just never listening, why they get to decide what level the discussion is taking place on by just randomly changing it whenever it suits them, why they get to decide the tone of the argument etc, etc, etc.

d4m10n said:

I did not say they were the same. In fact, I asked you whether you could say what the phrase means, assuming we take Merriam's definition of the key word as a starting point.

Once again, I encourage you to review the selection of tweets I linked above. I'm relatively confident they predate what you're talking about here with conservative media, probably by a fair bit.

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I don't trust your scholarship and note that the origins of a phrase does not mean the current common usage is as it was originally. 'Fake news' etc.

PhantomWolf said:

I do have to wonder where all the Conservative crying was when Juli Briskman got fired.

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There seems to be an undercurrent here that cancel culture is a problem with “conservatives” but not noble “non-conservative” people.

Thermal is not conservative, nor I, nor d4m19n I believe and probably others in this thread. This lazy characterisation of posters is very annoying.

Emily's Cat said:

Human have always done this, so it's no big deal. Not worth talking about.

You know what else isn't new? Racism, sexism, murder, slavery, thievery... Yep, it's nothing new, why would we ever bother to spend any time talking about those things and the negative impact they have on people and society as a whole?

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I don’t see you doing a lot of hand-wringing over racism, sexism, murder, or thievery. But for some reason “cancel culture” is a big problem for you.

How do you reconcile that?

tyr_13 said:

I don't trust your scholarship and note that the origins of a phrase does not mean the current common usage is as it was originally.

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I'm going to continue to use the phrase in the 2017 sense, if that's okay with you. I'm also going to discount your claim that "'cancel culture' as a description of the action comes from conservative media" at least until someone comes up with evidence supporting that claim.