The Faults of Cancel Culture
Growing up in the 21st century, the internet has been an incredibly influential part of my life. It has molded how I interact and view the world around me. Along with the internet influencing the modern slang that I share with millions around the world, it has shaped my humor and outlook on life. An old concept that has reemerged under a new name throughout the internet is Cancel Culture. Cancel Culture is similar to a modern form of ostracism or public shaming. It occurs when groups of people withdraw support for public figures. This is often referred to as “Canceling” a public figure, and after the fact, it is referred to as the person being “Cancelled.”
Cancel Culture is not efficient in holding people accountable for wrongdoings, does not allow for personal growth, and has watered down the severity of significant crimes online.
I’ve watched Cancel Culture grow immensely, especially throughout the past year when the app, TikTok, has gained traction. I have clear memories of scrolling through TikTok or YouTube to find out a popular content creator has been canceled. I remember when media influencer Tati Westbrook put forth false allegations on James Charles which caused him to lose over 3 million YouTube subscribers within two days. I had never watched either very closely, so, from an outsider’s perspective, it was eye-opening to watch people turn on content creators they claimed to support. I’ve watched people desperately try to take platforms away from the most famous Hollywood actors, to small businesses, and media creators.
There is little correlation and continuity within Cancel Culture. It has been so normalized where harsh allegations and people’s desperate attempt to cancel others leave me unfazed.
Cancel Culture Is Not Efficient
Firstly, Cancel Culture is not efficient in holding people accountable for their actions. Although It can have significant ramifications for those incredibly reliant on their audiences, people who get their income from other sources are completely unperturbed. Though, when taking a further look into the pool of people whose income is directly affected by their audience, the repercussions on careers who are affected vary tremendously. Specifically, within the music industry, artists tend to keep their careers on track even after full-blown crimes.
One famous example is Chris Brown. Chris Brown, a famous R&B musician, has continuously been in legal battles since 2009. Chris Brown has been charged and arrested for felony assault countless times, engaged in domestic violence, charged with two criminal counts of owning a restricted species with no permit, investigated for fraud, and has had a history of using homophobic slurs. Although people have tried to mercilessly Cancel Chris Brown by taking away his platform and success, it just doesn’t work. Millions of people continue to listen and support Chris Brown simply because they enjoy his music. He continues to succeed in building a net worth of over fifty million dollars. Although Chris Brown has gone to jail multiple times and has pleaded guilty, he refuses to make a public apology for his bad actions.
Secondly, the music artist Kanye West has been involved in multiple controversies including remarking that slavery was a choice on a TMZ interview. “When you hear about slavery for 400 years … for 400 years? That sounds like a choice.” (Kanye West) This along with other controversies such as Kanye expressing a distaste to the 13th Amendment, the amendment which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, has made millions of people try to Cancel Kanye West. Even with an army of people demanding that Kanye West needs to take accountability and apologize, he just doesn’t. Despite the fact that millions of people have claimed to have “Cancelled” him, his career continues, and he continues to make millions of dollars.
Cancel Culture Does Not Allow for Personal Growth
When people make mistakes, it is crucial for them to take accountability and learn from them. When someone is Cancelled, there is little to no opportunity to redeem yourself as a person. This includes making a sincere apology and truly learning from the mistakes made. For example, TheOdd1sOut, a popular animator on Youtube named James has been “Cancelled” for tweeting,
/s is a tone indicator that signifies emotion or intent within writing. Many people use these tone indicators as they can be very helpful for Neurodivergent people who have trouble picking up on social cues. Other tone indicators include /s (sarcasm), /j (joking), /srs (serious), or /r (romantic). After James posted the tweet he received instant backlash so he removed the tweet and posted an apology on Twitter.
James was simply uneducated about tone indicators. He shouldn’t have joked about tone indicators, but he made an honest mistake and attempted to own up to it. Although James posted a sincere apology a large number of people continued to try and Cancel James by withdrawing their support of his channel. Multiple replies to James’ tweet went along the lines of, “I used to love your videos, but I’m sorry I can’t support you anymore” (Twitter). This is a common reoccurrence within Cancel Culture. Someone makes an honest mistake, then attempts to take accountability for their actions, but they are given no opportunity to grow and learn. Instead, they continue to be bashed for actions that they do not agree with.
No One Takes Cancel Culture Seriously Anymore
Lastly, The number of people who take Cancel Culture seriously is rapidly declining. This is due to so many people trying to Cancel others due to minuscule and flat out stupid reasons. For example, Quackity, a famous YouTuber and Twitch streamer named Alex is getting Canceled on Twitter for speaking Spanish. What makes this situation even more ridiculous, is that Alex is a native Spanish speaker who lives in Mexico. On a recent Twitch stream, he was addressing the situation, and told the stream that people were telling him,
“That’s not his language (Spanish) to speak.”
This was the reasoning of many people for “Cancelling” Alex. He then proceeded to say, “I spoke Spanish before I ever spoke English. I feel like I’m walking on eggshells.” (Quackity) This situation in itself is ridiculous. Although most people have realized that, there still are people who truly believe Alex should be punished for speaking Spanish.
Why Is This Bad?
Most people have started to tune out Cancel Culture because a large majority of it is ridiculous, but this is a big issue. Cancel Culture tackles dealing with people who slip up on small things accidentally, to severe crimes that result in jail life sentences. People have combined drastically different issues together due to Cancel Culture. Now, many people have stopped taking all of the issues Cancel Culture deals with seriously because they are often ridiculous, but this means the severity of actual life-threatening crimes that Cancel Culture also deals with are not being taken seriously. Cancel Culture does not take things on a case by case basis. It tends to be the same result no matter the issue. I’ve noticed on social media when influencers are accused of crimes such as domestic abuse, or fraud, it isn’t taken as seriously as it should be taken. It is now taken with the same silly approach as influencers who have done something such as writing on the bathroom stalls at a public restaurant.
This leads to a 19-year-old TikTok creator, Benji Krol. Benji Krol was accused of grooming a 15-year-old child. The 15-year-old made a long string of tweets explaining the situation broadcasting his accusations to the public. Though it was later proven that the 15-year-old was lying and that Benji was innocent. Within the week that everyone thought Benji groomed a minor, people were not taking the situation seriously. On the TikTok comment sections of Benji Krol’s account, people were making jokes pertaining to serious accusations while simultaneously tearing apart Benji. Comments included, “It’s the 💫 g r o o m I n g 💫 for me”, “chile- anyways so *covers cup*”, and “BALD HISOKA BALD HISOKA BALD HISOKA BALD HISOKA BALD HISOKA.” Even though the allegations the 15-year-old put forth weren’t true, these are completely inappropriate comments to put on the internet. On TikTok you can “like” comments in the comment section, these likes are displayed on the screen. Each of these comments received hundreds of likes. Child grooming is a serious issue and people are mocking it.
Doesn’t Cancel Culture Keep Influencers Accountable?
Many would argue that Cancel Culture has helped keep people accountable. This in many instances is actually true, but that in itself does not redeem Cancel Culture. When thousands of people collectively partake in Cancelling someone, it definitely does damage. Most content creators when put under this sort of pressure are rushed and desperate to try and save their career. It has created an environment where content creators shove out apologies in an attempt to salvage their careers rather than learn from their mistakes. Even when content creators put out a genuine apology people are so used to dubious apologies, that they continue to tear them apart. It is more important to learn from the mistakes that we make so we can create a better experience for those online.
Hurtful actions from creators need to be taken seriously, but the best way to handle that is to educate them rather than banish them.
What We Need to do Instead of Cancel Culture
We need an alternative to Cancel Culture. People should not be walking on eggshells to avoid making mistakes. We need to create an environment where people feel comfortable enough to admit their mistakes and use them to grow and learn in order to improve as a person. This starts with listening to others and educating them without attacking them. When people are attacked in the severity that Cancel Culture deals out, it causes people to act defensively and not properly learn from their mistakes. People cannot grow from their mistakes when they are only worried about the well-being of their careers. We must create a better environment to do so. Aside from the other faults within Cancel Culture, the main solution is to curate an environment that promotes growth. When we create this positive culture, then the other enigmas associated with Cancel Culture will fall into place.
In Conclusion…
Cancel Culture is inefficient and not worth promoting in the media. It is a bigger priority to hold people accountable in an environment that promotes personal growth and helps others learn from their mistakes. Cancel Culture does none of that, even with good intent, it fails to do so.
Thus, Cancel Culture is not efficient in holding people accountable for wrongdoings, does not allow for personal growth, and has watered down the severity of significant crimes online.
Works Cited
Benjamin Krol. [@benjikrol]. (2020, August 21). i wanted to do one ib how i normally edit my pictures [Video]. TikTok. https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMJV7quhb/
Chris Brown in court | Pictures. (2014, March 19). Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://uk.reuters.com/news/picture/chris-brown-in-court-idUKRTR3HNGH
Jayden. (2020, November 25). Quackity was Cancelled… [Video]. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOHyYMYxfi4
Kedablake. (2020, August 25). Benji Krol Is DONE After This…. (Benji Krol Exposed). Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2LPTBw9jxs
Metro. (2020, February 27). How many times has Chris Brown been arrested A history of all of the Chris Brown arrests. Retrieved December 07, 2020, from https://www.metro.us/how-many-times-has-chris-brown-been-arrested-a-history-of-all-of-the-chris-brown-arrests/
OccupiedGarrett. (2019, April 10). Why Cancel Culture is Dumb. Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYLwHrOqnGk
Rallison, James (TheOdd1sOut). “I think putting /s to show sarcasm is a really great and useful tool! /s.” November 19. Tweet.
Rallison, James (TheOdd1sOut). “Sorry for that last tweet. I didn’t understand how deep tone indicators went past /s and it wasn’t my intention to discredit any ND (neurodivergent) people.” November 19. Tweet.
Reach — Internet Best Friends. (n.d.). Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://www.reaching.to/groups/5485
Shane. (2018, June 29). The Truth About Tana Mongeau. Retrieved December 14, 2020, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLFOqYjmroA
Staff, T. (2019, June 17). TMZ Live: The Full Kanye West Episode. Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://www.tmz.com/2018/05/02/tmz-live-kanye/
West, Kanye. Personal interview, TMZ Live. 1 May. 2018.
YouTuber Jenna Marbles quits over blackface. (2020, June 26). Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-53192702
13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Abolition of Slavery. (n.d.). Retrieved December 13, 2020, from https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/13th-amendment
ًmilf. (2020, October 06). Please use tone indicators how there supposed to be used!! don’t use /srs as a joke pic.twitter.com/IMlmMk0Yqg. Retrieved December 20, 2020, from https://twitter.com/clairomilf/status/1313576332052242432
