Cancel the Culture: Why canceling needs to stop

When I need a break from Webex calls and my page long to-do list, social media becomes my safe place. But now, it seems like every time I open up TikTok or Twitter, there’s a new person getting canceled — and it’s getting exhausting.

What started as a way of addressing unacceptable behavior has turned into a toxic environment of cyber bullying and hate comments known as “cancel culture.” Not only has cancel culture become ineffective, it’s shifted to bored teenagers taking out their anger on celebrities by targeting them under the guise of confronting them, giving themselves a sense of superiority in the process.

Disconnected from reality and always plugged in to their phones, most Gen Z-ers seem to think that typing, “No *heart emoji,” or “she thought she did something,” in someone’s comment section is acceptable or doesn’t have a real impact on that person. Being so desensitized to this blatant bullying is not a quality for our generation to be proud of — it’s something we need to work on.

Cancel culture has become increasingly popular and socially accepted that the line between education and shaming has been completely blurred — making people way too comfortable with writing and clicking like on hate comments. These commenters need to understand the difference between making someone a better person and outright bullying them.

The other day, I saw a TikTok with over 200,000 likes saying to cancel Rihanna because she used a song in her Fenty show that was offensive to Muslims. In no way am I condoning this behavior — she and others need to be held accountable for their actions. But there is a difference between teaching someone a lesson so they can grow as a person and trying to destroy someone’s entire career and reputation to boost your own ego.

Cancel culture makes teens and young adults think bullying someone online is acceptable. These hate comments end up improving the world one celeb at a time, right?

Wrong.

According to Clinical Professor of Communication at the University of Southern California, Karen North, cancel culture has been utilized by people online looking for a sense of community during quarantine. In an interview with Insider Magazine, North said that the “appeal of angry activities online is probably amplified by people’s frustration and misery in today’s environment.”

Whether they’re aware of it or not, teens are using public figures as a common enemy to make them feel unified with other commenters and comment-likers — the evidence is in the hoards of social media users making hate comments on “canceled” stars’ posts, all with thousands of likes.

“Digging around for clues about a celebrity’s life may give people a sense of accomplishment.” North said. “It can feel like celebrities aren’t human, and some people may find comfort in realizing that celebrities are imperfect too.”

Sometimes we think that these comments are harmless because celebrities are so “used to it.” But is this really the mentality that we want ours and future generations to have? What happened to empathy for other people?

The name “public figure” reflects how people see these celebrities — emotionless “figures” — existing purely for people’s entertainment as well as their judgement.

Putting these figures on a pedestal is the problem that causes our generation to be so judgy and hateful towards them. But they’re humans too, and nobody should ever get “used to” waking up to see hundreds of thousands of comments about how much people they have never even met hate them.

It’s easy to look at a situation someone else is involved in and make judgments about it — regardless of if you actually know them or what really went down. But who are we to instantly villainize people we don’t even know over allegations that may or may not be true?

Yes, sometimes there is evidence online — a tweet or video proof of decisions a celeb made that were undeniably wrong. But a majority of people have done something they’re not proud of, so it’s not fair to hold others to completely different standards of never messing up.

What’s more important is having civil conversations to encourage growth and allowing people second chances to not make the same mistake again. Constructive comments that let the celebrity know they did something wrong in a civil way are better than these destructive, people-don’t-change ones.

It’s also important to acknowledge the difference between making a silly mistake and growing from it, and intentionally doing something to hurt others and getting away with it. I’m not saying I’m against people being held accountable for their mistakes — I’m actually all for it. But sending someone death threats and hateful comments is not the way to make them a better person just because you think they “got too cocky” or that “fame changed them.” 

Rather than writing blatantly rude comments on that person’s posts, simply choose to stop watching their TikToks or encourage them peacefully to work on their issues.

Unfollow them. Block them. But don’t take it upon yourself to go after that person and bully them into a fake apology that won’t promote genuine growth.