Argumentative Essay On Cancel Culture

Despite constant reminders, it seems that we are never truly aware of internet surveillance by social media platforms and peers until we are called out for our behavior. Cancel culture forces people who feel like they are invincible on the internet into a vulnerable state where peers demand them to explain themselves and apologize or endure the consequences. With this, cancel culture embodies the once widely popular humiliation penal logic that prioritizes shame and humiliation when sanctioning crimes to society. Through technological advances that have made way for greater accessibility, cancel culture has developed into the most democratic system of punishment in the United States– especially compared to the longstanding judicial system.

Deplatforming, according to Karmen Yap in her case study on cancel culture, is to prevent someone sharing views widely regarded as unacceptable or offensive from continuing to contribute to a forum (Yap 2022). At first glance, this seems to exemplify the incapacitation penal logic in the manner that an offender is removed, or at least attempted to be, from society, or at least social media. Upon further analysis, deplatforming seems to more closely emulate the humiliation penal logic which is rooted in the belief that shaming rulebreakers through their body is most effective to instill fear and discourage rebellious behavior amongst the general population (Friedman 2023). Tactics like marking, isolation, or public shaming all served to deter the individual who commited the crime from engaging in it once more, but also to deter the public from commiting such crimes. Yap explores how cancel culture has roots in cyberbullying which inherently intends to humiliate. Cancel culture’s initial step of formerly and publicly exposing one’s potentially problematic actions displays remnants of cyberbullying as a person is usually surveilled and targeted online instead of their actions randomly appearing on someones feed and gaining attention. There lies also the cyberbullying characteristics of desiring to embarass someone in front of as many people as possible and

A study from Pew Research visually details the strong correlation between political identity and stance on cancel culture. Democrat-leaning citizens demonstrate more appreciation for or acceptance of it and Republican-leaning citizens demonstrate more disdain for it. Republicans tended to describe canceling people as a silencing tactic and a threat to human rights. Democrats on the other hand perceive canceling people as an opportunity to illuminate societal ills. Conservative Republicans seem to view cancel culture as an unjust attack on free speech because their values and opinions are often the ones under attack (Pew Research 2021). This divisiveness exacerbates the struggle to have nuanced discussions about the societal controversies that cancel culture