Friday, July 17, 2020

Ross Douthat on Cancel Culture

Ross Douthat took on cancel culture in his most recent column. As always, his ideas were compelling and interesting. And yet, the column contains flaws, which I believe worth underscoring.

Since Douthat will argue that all cultures cancel, we should wonder whatever that means and why it is pertinent. Universal generalizations should only be trotted out with extreme caution.

Consider two cases. In one case A is interviewing for a job over lunch. He slurps his soup, wipes his mouth on his sleeve, mumbles incoherently and yells at the busboy. In the end, he does not get the job. Has he been cancelled? In one sense, his candidature has been canceled. In another sense, his performance is limited to the situation at hand. He is not deprived of any and all means of employment. He has simply missed out on one specific job opportunity.

In another case, B has been publicly denounced as a racist, sexist, homophobic bigote. He has become radioactive and can no longer get any job. He loses his friends and is no longer invited to family gatherings. He becomes persona non grata, by the public attack on his reputation. Whereas A might practice manners that are acceptable in one situation but unacceptable in others, B has been effectively deprived of all social connections and any chance at making a living.

Are these two simply different versions of cancel culture? I think not. Losing out on a job is not the same as losing out on any and all jobs. The latter case, that of B, corresponds more closely to what we call cancel culture. It’s most recent origin lies with the Storm Troopers of Nazi Germany, who canceled all Jews, destroyed their businesses, got them fired from their jobs and made it impossible for them ever to get another job. 

When you say that all cultures cancel, you need to make a distinction between the two cases. Today’s American cancel culture more closely resembles the Nazi version, because once you are canceled you have no chance of overturning the judgment. If you miss out on a job opportunity you can always reapply. And you can always improve your manners before your next job interview. The information about your performance is not advertised in public, because if it were, you would have a cause of action.

Not inviting your neighbor to a dinner party is not of the same import as placing a sign in front of his house identifying him as a child molester.

Then, Douthat makes this strange remark:

The canceled individual hasn’t lost any First Amendment rights, because there is no constitutional right to a particular job or reputation. 

Evidently, he is ignoring the point I have been trying to make. Moreover, while you do not have a constitutional right to a job, and while you do not have a constitutional right to a reputation, the two are incommensurate. When it comes to your reputation, if someone maligns your reputation, you most certainly have a cause of action in a court of law. You can sue for libel, slander or defamation of character. If the defamatory action makes it impossible for you to get a job, you will have recourse in a civil court. 

The strange part about cancel culture is that its victims seem not to have a way to sue a Twitter mob, but that does not obviate the fact that our law-- I assume it’s a Common Law principle-- allows us all the right to defend our reputation. No one has a right to defame your character. No one.

12 comments:

Giordano Bruno said...

I think the recourse it to be able to sue both the online mob, and the platform.

But these are tactics that reflect a failed culture, a post-Judeo-Christian culture of power, not virtue. It is better to find another culture to invest in.

urbane legend said...

I assume it is a Common Law principle also, but the cancelists have no use for Common Law, respect, manners, nor any other civilized conduct.

David Foster said...


Jonathan Haidt summarized a paper (by Bradley Campbell and Jason Manning) which may help explain some of the dynamics going on. In brief: prior to the 18th and 19th century, most Western societies were cultures of *honor*, in which people were expected to avenge insults on their own–and would lose social respect and position should they fail to do so. The West then transitioned to cultures of *dignity*, in which “people are assumed to have dignity and don’t need to earn it. They foreswear violence, turn to courts or administrative bodies to respond to major transitions, and for minor transgressions they either ignore them or attempt to resolve them by social means. There’s no more dueling.” The spirit of this type of culture could be summarized by the saying “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me.”

Campbell and Manning assert that this culture of dignity is now giving way to a new culture of *victimhood* in which people are encouraged to respond to even the slightest unintentional offense, as in an honor culture. But the difference, Haidt explains is this:

“But they must not obtain redress on their own; they must appeal for help to powerful others or administrative bodies, to whom they must make the case that they have been victimized.” Campbell and Manning distinguish the three culture types as follows:

“Public complaints that advertise or even exaggerate one’s own victimization and need for sympathy would be anathema to a person of honor – tantamount to showing that one had no honor at all. Members of a dignity culture, on the other hand, would see no shame in appealing to third parties, but they would not approve of such appeals for minor and merely verbal offenses. Instead they would likely counsel either confronting the offender directly to discuss the issue, or better yet, ignoring the remarks altogether.”

What we are seeing in recent months is a *combination* of the victim culture and a reversion to honor culture----if you feel victimized, the authorities are supposed to suppress the evildoer, but if they don't...or even if they do...you are allowed to beat that person up, or at least lead an on-line mob attack on him, yourself.

I discussed the Haidt essay earlier here:

https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/51688.html

David Foster said...

Stuart, is it really necessary to do the reCaptcha thing for commenters who are logged in with an identity?

Stuart Schneiderman said...

I do not know what the reCaptcha thing is and I do not know how to turn it on or off. When I leave a comment I need to click a box to prove I am not a robot-- if they only knew. As for the different cultures, I wrote about this some twenty five years ago. An honor culture is best described as a shame culture, whereas what they call a dignity culture should really be called a guilt culture-- these terms come from Ruth Benedict, as noted in my book.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

It’s no accident that the Cancel Culture came from the Left. They are destroyers.

Cancel is not a form of free speech. It’s scorched-earth destruction. It’s social homicide — the complete destruction of a person’s social standing.

David Foster said...

From what I see, it is not just clicking a box, it's also necessary to identify various objects out of multiple images, sometimes on more than one page. They should have implemented it so that the blog owner could enable or disable it selectively.

Stuart Schneiderman said...

I just tried to change the moderation box-- you will tell me if I succeeded.

urbane legend said...

What we are seeing in recent months is a *combination* of the victim culture and a reversion to honor culture----if you feel victimized, the authorities are supposed to suppress the evildoer, but if they don't...or even if they do...you are allowed to beat that person up, or at least lead an on-line mob attack on him, yourself.

This will eventually turn on them, won't it? A good number of us are getting tired of being blamed for the "victimhood." If they think they are victims now, what will they think of a taste of their own medicine, not that I am recommending that?

urbane legend said...

No reCaptcha box

Anonymous said...

Cancelling means "we intend to destroy you and your family; we will say, 'Oh, well' if someone kills you after we publish your address/workplace/etc." I can hardly believe anyone thinks otherwise.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

“What we are seeing in recent months is a *combination* of the victim culture and a reversion to honor culture----if you feel victimized, the authorities are supposed to suppress the evildoer, but if they don't...or even if they do...you are allowed to beat that person up, or at least lead an on-line mob attack on him, yourself.”

This is the kind of $#!% girls do to each other. It’s like something straight out of 1692 Salem, Massachusetts. Wiccans all.

“The Man” is supposed to come to the rescue. Yet “The Man” is simultaneously scolded as being the cause of the problem. Or so we are told.

Social media is destroying our culture, and our nation.