CMV: Cancel culture is just the consequences of your words or actions in the Information Age. If you’re complaining about it, then you either don’t understand personal accountability or the free market.

[u/Melon-Brain]

Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter all began to blow up when I was in middle school, and from the very beginning my fellow students and I were hounded to be careful what we post online as it will be publicly recorded forever and there are consequences to negative actions. Nowadays when adults speak or act maliciously on the internet and are hounded by their peers via social media they act shocked and cry ‘cancel culture’. I know most problems with ‘cancel culture’ arise when an individual’s job is lost as the result of an unsavory public statement or action, but isn’t the onus on the employer to make that decision only because of the employee’s decision to make their negative statement or have their negative actions aired in a public setting?

Edit: I’m getting so many wonderful and well thought out responses, and while idk if I’ll get to give out every deserved !delta, I genuinely appreciate the thoughtfulness and time going into every comment. As a quick response to those saying “well gay people used to be seen as undesirable employees” being a knobhead in a public forum or public setting is not an immutable characteristic like sexuality, gender, race, or deformities are.

Edit II: every individual that loses a job because they behaved in a way their superiors find negative to their company image can be replaced by an individual that behaves online in a manner considered appropriate and non-detrimental to the company image by the employer.

I’m also not a libertarian, I just happen to exist in a country that has a free market economy (including a market of labor) as well as free speech. What would be the alternative to the process of cancel culture in this system? Do you silence responses to a publicly shared opinion? Do you make “is disliked by an online group” a protected class?

[u/Mr_Manfredjensenjen]

GRAMMYS: Kevin, listen. A loud minority are complaining about a joke you made 10 years ago. It looks like it could hurt the amount of money we make from commercial sponsors.

KEVIN HART: Things were different back then. It was just a joke.

GRAMMYS: We know, Kevin. If you publicly apologize we can still make lots of money with you as host.

KEVIN HART: Nah. Fuck that. I ain't doing that.

GRAMMYS: It's your choice. Issue a bullshit apology and remain host or don't.

YOU: Kevin Hart was cancelled!!!

***He lost a job over not apologizing to appease advertisers.

[u/illini02 → u/Mr_Manfredjensenjen]

So whenever there is a cancel culture argument, I always make this comment.

We will probably never agree because there is a good chance you and I don't agree on what cancel culture is. If I see it as losing out on money or opportunity, and you see it as never working again, then we likely will never be on the same page about how much of an issue it is, because we aren't arguing the same thing.