Cancel Culture

[Cramulus]

They were the idol, I was devoted.
Then they strayed into discomfort,
now they're CANCELLED.
now their art means NOTHING.

Through 'Share' Sermons and 'Like' Pulpits, we assemble like clergy.
We watch you like fireworks, like the sermon on the Mount Rushmore.
We made these boots for you, size 100, they must fit you.

You say the things we want you to say.
Stay on course, you are perfect
reenforce and support me, you are perfect
give us the sequel, you are perfect
We made you, monster, and we can break you

We worship gods, not humans
If your hand shakes as you draw the line between up and down
the eddy will twist into a vortex
your head will spin in exorcism
we throw the clothes that smell like you in a trash can, light it on fire, and sob

The thumbs up are paparrazi now, following you to your car, chasing you through the tunnel
don't be human don't be human don't be human
faster and faster, the double yellow line thrashes back and forth like a snake
We crash at top speed into a tweet you made five years ago
the age of fools

Now the chase is over, we righteously unfollow
we are righteously the crowd, the gallows, the passion

A parade in your dishonor
Like some defeated Gothic King
still living, now silent

Someone will stand atop your warm corpse like a soap box
Calling Out a euology, wreathed with paparrazi
you will not rest in peace. you will be forgotten.
you will diminish, move out to the country,
haunted by the aftertaste of ambrosia
no one cares about you anymore

How could you do this to us?
Repentance is for mortals, not gods
maybe you'll get one more moment in the sublimelight
which is not about your art, it's your apology tour.
With the stage lights focused like lasers
you will be naked and blemished,
disgusting and shameful.

I tell all my friends I will never enjoy you again,
and if my friends relate to you,
fuck them, too

sitting in the audience, clothed in unimportance
our blemishes and our shame are private
the pulpit is empty--we have emptied it, you and I
I call out another motherfucker
to viral applause
standing before the cathedral
purifying myself
for ascent

[DerKirche]

Where's the "upvote" button on this "forum" thing?

[The Wizard Joseph]

I like your word sublimelight. This was very thought-provoking Cram! I'm very comfortable just being mortal and a mostly unknown, but I think I get where you're going with this drive to some kind of godhood archetype peer pressure.

[LMNO]

I'm still not gonna listen to R Kelly, though.

[Cramulus]

yeah but point of order - R. Kelly's issue is not as trivial as human error, misreading the crowd, or making a bad tweet during a less progressive time.

[hoopla]

It’s kind of shocking how fast all sympathy can be pulled from a single infraction. Torch-wielding mobs have been mocked in public for decades, yet nobody seems to remember that when they are waiting in line to light their torch. I fear the internet is making us collectively sociopathic.

[Doktor Howl]

Yeah, I know precisely where Cram is coming from.

[Al Qədic]

What I find almost as interesting as this "cancel culture" of dropping celebrities like a hat at the tiniest slip up, is the fact that becoming a gasoline bartender and serving up the people's grenade isn't always the way this shit goes down. Lots of mobs do grab their pitchforks and chant for blood, but other fans come rushing to defend their god-people; they internalize the "you are perfect" mantra so much that they don't even get hypocritical and attack the person for screwing up, they just venerate them even harder. Others, on what I think of as the flip-side of this phenomenon, will fervently support people in spite of the fact that (or even because) they fuck up real hard, real often. Just look at all the people who continue to support [insert famous sleazebag here]; they become blind to the mistakes, or even have those mistakes twisted into something positive by their brains because "This guy is so good, though!".

[altered]

This is a tough one for me to post about in a short, to the point way. I keep wandering off into the depths of the forest of tangential asides on the slopes of Mt Abrupt Subject Change.

I feel there is value in holding shitty people accountable for their shitty behavior. Before a certain degree of shittiness has been passed, however, it’s more valuable to leave the door open for potential redemption.

If anyone from AT LEAST the age of 21 upward can genuinely say their entire internet history and history of real life interactions could be brought into the present day and no one would find a single bit of it questionable, come out and admit you’re the second coming of fucking Christ already, we are all sick and tired of waiting.

[LMNO]

I have to be honest, when I hear about people I like accused of shitty things, my feelings about them do change.

I'm not a complete fool, so I know how to weight my priors in light of new information (note, I didn't say evidence).  Sometimes it rises to the level of "ain't fucking with you anymore", sometimes it doesn't.

There's also a difference between "famous" people and a social circle.  I was very disappointed when I heard Chris Pratt not only found Jesus, but his church is anti LGBTQ+.  I'm still going to see films he's in, but I'm not going to actively seek them out.  And Parks and Rec doesn't have the glow it once had for me (which sucks, because there are so many good actors in it: Plaza, Retta, Offerman, Pohler).

But Louis CK?  Fuck that guy.  His show Louie was amazing.  I mean, some of the better television I've seen.  But like hell I'm going to watch it now, or see anything of his in the future.  Same with Hardwick.

But then there's people like Dan Harmon.  He got called out early in #MeToo, and you know what he did?  He apologized.  Not fake-apologized, either.  He was genuinely contrite, asked for forgiveness to both the woman who accused him, the cast and crew of his shows, and the fans.  Then he shut up and listened to what he could do to make the situation better.  And then he did them.

I've only very rarely heard of instances where someone's IRL friends or immediate online social circle ("Top 10" in MySpace parlance) have canceled one another, and it's usually because of something really bad.  The instances of "I heard a rumor that person is bad and you're bad if you support them" is typically reserved for the friends-of-friends and total strangers. 

[Cramulus]

I knew what about these terrible people though? was coming. I admit--what's missing from my OP is a bit about how there are good reasons we want to do this and sometimes it's an important part of the immune system.

Louis CK really had an opportunity to turn it around, and failed. I think it would do our whole culture a lot of good if we saw some people turn it around properly.



I have a different social circle experience... I don't want to go into details, but it's basically the weaponization of #MeToo energy. In short, I've watched a friend get unfairly dragged. There is no quarter given for apology or healing, and no accusations have been made in a public forum where they can be addressed. And our organization has suffered for it.



Part of the motivation for writing the OP was watching the crowd turn on Nathan Pyle, the guy who draws this comic:



The dude made a pro-life tweet in 2017, and god, some of the people on my friends list got real upset about it.  I saw a bunch of posts where people jumped on a soap box to denounce him and declare his comic dead. Like his religious affiliation is some huge betrayal, like it totally sours these non-political feel-good comics about cute aliens.

The next day, someone else crawled through all of his posts over the last two years, and found tons of stuff that fills in the rest of the canvas - he supports Black Lives Matter, is anti-trump, calls out hypocritical christians who lack compassion, and generally supports left wing politics. In the overall calculus of things, he seems alright.

I found myself weirdly annoyed that people got hung up on this one piece of data, excluding everything else. CANCELLED.


in part, it sits weird with me because I watched this video the other day, where a panel of 10 women were debating about feminism. The ones that didn't identify as feminists were asked -- why not?

A few of them said that their pro-life stance led to them being publicly called out and rejected from feminist spaces. That the current incarnation of feminism is only for lefties. Is that ideal? It really made me think.

It's interesting to me. I keep thinking about Marshal McLuhan's "The Medium is the Message" -- the structure of social media filters us into finer and finer islands. What does that do for the efficacy of political movements?

At a certain point, alchemically speaking, separation must be followed by coagulation. In the post-trump years, we will need to build coalitions or things will remain as they are.



And look - I make art. I run events. I have weird opinions. I'm also an idiot. I make mistakes. I don't want to live in a world where in order to make art successfully, I have to hide everything about myself and put forward this totally sanitized beige radio-friendly exterior. When I look at my favorite artists, writers, etc--they are all flawed shitbags. It's the human condition. After failure, I think there is room for acknowledgement and growth. I don't see that happening in a lot of #CancelCulture.

[LMNO]

But here's the thing -- Pyle tweeted out his personal outlook a day or so ago: Personally anti-choice, believes in a separation of church and state, votes Democratic, etc etc. 


[Insert "and just like that" meme]


I'm sorry your friend went through that.  I hope they find a better social circle.

[Faust]

But here's the thing -- Pyle tweeted out his personal outlook a day or so ago: Personally anti-choice, believes in a separation of church and state, votes Democratic, etc etc. 

Why should he have to?

He was forced to clarify his position based on backlash of an out of context tweet from 2 years ago as if he needs absolution or needs to justify himself to an attention deficit public court who have declared themselves an authority on these things and do so badly.

Nothing he has said in the last couple of days is new, everyone familiar with the nuance of his character would not have needed it.
 
Instead these people felt they were entitled to a position of moral superiority on this person without any responsibility to look into the finer details of his character. Instead people form opinions on soundbites and pass judgement on someones career until they lose interest and move onto the next thing that gives them a dopamine hit from being angry about.
The terminology around this gets ugly, outrage culture, etc.

The conservatives call this a witch hunt, which is far too generous. The witch hunters were thorough.

If I ever have to act as a public figure or heaven forbid someone who creates for public consumption, I will feel obliged to validate everything I do with lovecraftian narration from Darkest Dungeon: "In time you will know the tragic extent of my failings"

[LMNO]

Yes, it would be wonderful if humans in general were not prone to lazy assumptions based upon incomplete information, especially in situations where they could make themselves feel morally superior.

[hoopla]

It’s a kink.