Cont: Cancel culture IRL Part 2

[I Am The Scum]

Imagine Little Debbie sponsoring legislation to outlaw Hostess snack cakes because they're unhealthy. If you go along with that because Hostess treats have a lot of sugar in them, then you've been conned. You haven't made the grocery store selection healthier; you've just given a monopoly on the thing you oppose to one specific corporation, consolidating their control over it.

The exact same thing is true when one goes along with the creator of professor lists or the deporters of Israel critics because it is technically true that some people yelled on Twitter a few times.

 

[johnny karate]

Do you doubt whether free speech groups like FIRE (and the most notable spokespeople for those groups) wrote polemics against the rise of cancel culture? Can we assume their arguments were incorrect because they were also supported by the sort of hypocrites who failed to apply them when conservatives took power? I don't think it makes any sense to argue that cancelling public figures for airing controversial opinions is just fine because The Free Press & co. have failed to call out both sides when they suppress opposing views, just as I don't think it makes any sense to pretend that only conservatives are tempted to suppress opposing views.

"Canceling" isn't really a thing. It's a buzzword used a euphemism for what used to be considered social consequences for bad behavior.

And when the people who weaponized this buzzword under the guise of "free speech" fail to call out actual instances of speech suppression, it not only makes them raging hypocrites but calls into question the entire enterprise.

I'll put it to you this way: You tried to convince us that the Star Wars lady getting fired and your favorite podcast getting cancelled was a Very Serious Problem, but have said nothing in this thread about the 600 people who were fired because of their comments about Charlie Kirk. This, by the way, is a much larger number than any accounting of people fired because of "cancel culture".

So why should anyone take anything you have to say on this subject seriously?