> Why not eliminate the possibility of the worst fears of cancel culture so that becomes moot and society is improved?
Indeed why not? It’s glaring to me that when I read these arguments, the solution to cancel culture never seems to be to limit the ability of employers to fire at will.
The only reason cancelling works at all is that you can be fired for any reason or no reason at the drop of a hat, with little to no recourse, and at great financial loss to yourself with the potential of losing your food, shelter, and medical care in an instant. People have been begging to change this system for a long time for this very reason.
But why does this system continue to exist if it has the potential to be so destructive? As far as I can tell it serves wealthy elites like large corporations very well. They enjoy having this ability to ruin your life by firing you. It’s the best leverage they have!
This is why the whole cancel culture debate is so fascinating to me. Generally speaking the people who are so upset about cancel culture are the very people who are standing in the way of eliminating the worst consequences of it. Instead they ground their position in the idea of free speech, but paradoxically the principles of free speech preclude any solution to cancel culture, because such a solution would restrict free speech!
I’m really waiting for the day that cancel culture warriors recognize the root problem here: that we built our society in a way, on purpose, to give people (business owners) this great power over others (employees) as a means to control them. If I can be fired tomorrow and still have food, housing, and healthcare then getting fired isn’t going to ruin my life. The flip side of that is employers won’t be able to fire their employees for any reason or no reason, and that seems to be a bridge too far for some of even the most ardent anti cancel culture warriors (see if Musk would ever advocate to curb his own ability to fire his employees).
Very much this. The enormous arbitrary power that employers wield and have always wielded, is one of the sacred cows of capitalism. Underprivileged people have had to deal with being fired (or never even being hired) for irrelevant reasons or in fact without any reason being given at all. But now that this same hammer is coming down on white people's offensive tweets, suddenly it's a "free speech" issue.
Indeed why not? It’s glaring to me that when I read these arguments, the solution to cancel culture never seems to be to limit the ability of employers to fire at will.
The only reason cancelling works at all is that you can be fired for any reason or no reason at the drop of a hat, with little to no recourse, and at great financial loss to yourself with the potential of losing your food, shelter, and medical care in an instant. People have been begging to change this system for a long time for this very reason.
But why does this system continue to exist if it has the potential to be so destructive? As far as I can tell it serves wealthy elites like large corporations very well. They enjoy having this ability to ruin your life by firing you. It’s the best leverage they have!
This is why the whole cancel culture debate is so fascinating to me. Generally speaking the people who are so upset about cancel culture are the very people who are standing in the way of eliminating the worst consequences of it. Instead they ground their position in the idea of free speech, but paradoxically the principles of free speech preclude any solution to cancel culture, because such a solution would restrict free speech!
I’m really waiting for the day that cancel culture warriors recognize the root problem here: that we built our society in a way, on purpose, to give people (business owners) this great power over others (employees) as a means to control them. If I can be fired tomorrow and still have food, housing, and healthcare then getting fired isn’t going to ruin my life. The flip side of that is employers won’t be able to fire their employees for any reason or no reason, and that seems to be a bridge too far for some of even the most ardent anti cancel culture warriors (see if Musk would ever advocate to curb his own ability to fire his employees).