150 public figures sign open letter decrying cancel culture

[Gormwood]

Apparently boycotting someone who offends your very being is cancel culture. "No, you can't return The Complete Harry Potter, you tranny freak."

[Galloism]

Apparently boycotting someone who offends your very being is cancel culture. "No, you can't return The Complete Harry Potter, you tranny freak."

Not really, but thanks for playing.

Why is it ok to try to get people fired when they refuse to be racist, ie, the professor who refused to be racist in favor of his black students?

[Picairn]

Apparently boycotting someone who offends your very being is cancel culture. "No, you can't return The Complete Harry Potter, you tranny freak."

"It is sophistry to try to redefine your opponent's arguments. It might feel good...

But so can jerking off in a subway." - Vivian James.

Edit: I think I just found another great quote for my signature!

[Galloism]

Apparently boycotting someone who offends your very being is cancel culture. "No, you can't return The Complete Harry Potter, you tranny freak."

"It is sophistry to try to redefine your opponent's arguments. It might feel good...

But so can jerking off in a subway." - Vivian James.

Edit: I think I just found another great quote for my signature!

I am stealing this quote.

[Arkhane]

J.K Rowling asked for this. I have lost all respect for her not because of her stance on transwomen, but her shameless pandering to political correctness from the start.

The cancel culture crowd kinda reminds me of religious fundies back in the day who are overly sensitive, preachy, always claiming the moral high ground, always looking to be offended, having huge egos and persecution complexes, demanding movies, videogames, celebrities, rock stars and music to be banned because they might "influence" and promote ideas or compel people to do evil stuff and fanatically ostracizing their own fellows for not being holy enough.

[Diarcesia]

That it didn't happen to him doesn't mean cancelling that caused people to be indefinitely unemployable doesn't exist.

The criticism is about the latter, because it leads to the question of "Are all bigots absolutely, unambiguously unredeemable?". That implies malicious intent on each and every one of them.

So we shouldn't criticise people who actively spread views known to be harmful (such as the ROGD myth in this case) because it might ruin their future?

We're talking about different things here. Telling them to stop spreading harmful views and doing more if they double down is good. Doing that plus telling them to kill themselves is not.

To give an analogy, would you deny an ex-convict employment simply because they were imprisoned? What if they're actually innocent and was falsely accused? Even if they actually did it, but they repented, is there really a way for them to make amends? Or is it once undesirable, always undesirable?

[Picairn]

I am stealing this quote.

Go ahead, make sure you credit it.

[Ifreann]

So we shouldn't criticise people who actively spread views known to be harmful (such as the ROGD myth in this case) because it might ruin their future?

We're talking about different things here. Telling them to stop spreading harmful views and doing more if they double down is good. Doing that plus telling them to kill themselves is not.

To give an analogy, would you deny an ex-convict employment simply because they were imprisoned? What if they're actually innocent and was falsely accused? Even if they actually did it, but they repented, is there really a way for them to make amends? Or is it once undesirable, always undesirable?

How many of the signatories of this letter have spoken out against the discrimination in employment against the formerly imprisoned?

[Diarcesia]

We're talking about different things here. Telling them to stop spreading harmful views and doing more if they double down is good. Doing that plus telling them to kill themselves is not.

To give an analogy, would you deny an ex-convict employment simply because they were imprisoned? What if they're actually innocent and was falsely accused? Even if they actually did it, but they repented, is there really a way for them to make amends? Or is it once undesirable, always undesirable?

How many of the signatories of this letter have spoken out against the discrimination in employment against the formerly imprisoned?

None, because I'm giving an analogy for the worst effects of cancellation. And I'm aware that while it exists, it's not representative of the entire thing.

[Ifreann]

How many of the signatories of this letter have spoken out against the discrimination in employment against the formerly imprisoned?

None, because I'm giving an analogy for the worst effects of cancellation. And I'm aware that while it exists, it's not representative of the entire thing.

So their concern with the plight of those who struggle to find gainful employment starts and ends with racists, homophobes, and other bigots. Hmm.

[Diarcesia]

None, because I'm giving an analogy for the worst effects of cancellation. And I'm aware that while it exists, it's not representative of the entire thing.

So their concern with the plight of those who struggle to find gainful employment starts and ends with racists, homophobes, and other bigots. Hmm.

Is the criticism valid?

[Sarderia]

About damn time. Cancel the cancel culture.

[Proctopeo]

None, because I'm giving an analogy for the worst effects of cancellation. And I'm aware that while it exists, it's not representative of the entire thing.

So their concern with the plight of those who struggle to find gainful employment starts and ends with racists, homophobes, and other bigots. Hmm.

Your ability to completely and utterly ignore the actual point being made is incredible.

That's not a good thing.

[Galloism]

How many of the signatories of this letter have spoken out against the discrimination in employment against the formerly imprisoned?

None, because I'm giving an analogy for the worst effects of cancellation. And I'm aware that while it exists, it's not representative of the entire thing.

I don’t think we can safely say “none” - there’s quite a few signatories in there, and I don’t know all of them. I don’t think anyone here does.

But there’s a lot of people doing good work in there at first glance - pro choice activists, prison reformers, hell one of them, David W Blight, is a professor of African American studies and wrote a book detailing the biography of Frederick Douglass. Gloria Steinem is in there, who needs no introduction, whether you feel she’s good or bad. Noam Chomsky has himself spoken about the issue of felony disenfranchisement - it’s hard to imagine he’d be against disenfranchisement but for forced homelessness and starvation.

I don’t think there’s a universal hypocrisy here as Ifreann suggests without any evidence.

[Ifreann]

So their concern with the plight of those who struggle to find gainful employment starts and ends with racists, homophobes, and other bigots. Hmm.

Is the criticism valid?

Is the concern for people left destitute because they can't get a job legitimate? Or is it just a cover for trying to protect bigots, who are themselves driving people out of the workforce by their bigotry and subjecting those people to the same destitution?

See, I do care about people who are destitute because they can't get a job, whether that is because they have a criminal record or because they are a member of a marginalised community or because they are just a raging shithead and no one wants to work with them. And thus I want to decouple people's access to housing and healthcare and all of that from whether or not they have a job. I do not want raging shitheads to keep their jobs, because they will make their workplace a worse place by being a raging shithead. I do want members of marginalised communities to keep their jobs, because they are not making their workplace worse by being Black, or trans, etc. You see how this works? People suffering when they lose their job isn't a good argument for protecting bigots, it's a good argument for making it so that people don't suffer when they lose their job.

[Galloism]

Is the criticism valid?

Is the concern for people left destitute because they can't get a job legitimate? Or is it just a cover for trying to protect bigots, who are themselves driving people out of the workforce by their bigotry and subjecting those people to the same destitution?

See, I do care about people who are destitute because they can't get a job, whether that is because they have a criminal record or because they are a member of a marginalised community or because they are just a raging shithead and no one wants to work with them. And thus I want to decouple people's access to housing and healthcare and all of that from whether or not they have a job. I do not want raging shitheads to keep their jobs, because they will make their workplace a worse place by being a raging shithead. I do want members of marginalised communities to keep their jobs, because they are not making their workplace worse by being Black, or trans, etc. You see how this works? People suffering when they lose their job isn't a good argument for protecting bigots, it's a good argument for making it so that people don't suffer when they lose their job.

I’m glad you agree Gloria Steinem is trying to protect bigots.

[Stellar Colonies]

Even if the letter and the people who signed it are flawed and hypocritical, separate and unrelated arguments against 'cancel culture' are not automatically refutable because of that.

[The Reformed American Republic]

So their concern with the plight of those who struggle to find gainful employment starts and ends with racists, homophobes, and other bigots. Hmm.

Your ability to completely and utterly ignore the actual point being made is incredible.

That's not a good thing.

I'm not posting this to gloat or anything, but just to make them aware. I put them on my foe list for that same reason. I will not be debating with them.

[Gormwood]

Your ability to completely and utterly ignore the actual point being made is incredible.

That's not a good thing.

I'm not posting this to gloat or anything, but just to make them aware. I put them on my foe list for that same reason.

"I'm not posting this to gloat."
"I put them on my Foe Lost."

[The Reformed American Republic]

I'm not posting this to gloat or anything, but just to make them aware. I put them on my foe list for that same reason.

"I'm not posting this to gloat."
"I put them on my Foe Lost."

Just to let them know not to quote me. Doing it once is fine.

[Radfems Inc]

People suffering when they lose their job isn't a good argument for protecting bigots, it's a good argument for making it so that people don't suffer when they lose their job.

So wait a minute, we should hold racists accountable by... giving them a permanent paid vacation?

[Kowani]

People suffering when they lose their job isn't a good argument for protecting bigots, it's a good argument for making it so that people don't suffer when they lose their job.

So wait a minute, we should hold racists accountable by... giving them a permanent paid vacation?

Yes. Welfare is heavily stigmatized in the US, and we don’t want them making workplaces inhospitable, and we don’t want some small business owner getting screwed out of customers because one of their employees hated Mexicans.
At the same time, however, racists have families, and unemployment tends to lead to very bad things, so we don’t want them to be reduced to complete and utter poverty.

[Radfems Inc]

So wait a minute, we should hold racists accountable by... giving them a permanent paid vacation?

Yes. Welfare is heavily stigmatized in the US, and we don’t want them making workplaces inhospitable, and we don’t want some small business owner getting screwed out of customers because one of their employees hated Mexicans.
At the same time, however, racists have families, and unemployment tends to lead to very bad things, so we don’t want them to be reduced to complete and utter poverty.

Honestly, if you reward people for being racist though, because that's what we're talking about in the vast majority of cases (most people don't like going to work), wouldn't that just make more people racist?

[The Reformed American Republic]

Imagine being fundamentally opposed to the idea of being called out for saying racist or hateful shit and having consequences for those actions.

Freedom of Speech does not equal Freedom from Consequences.

Imagine being a Leftist or Liberal who attacks the work opportunities of others by weaponizing mobs and pressuring their bourgeois corporate employers to give them the boot, all because they have an unpopular opinion that you find slightly distasteful.

Just because it's not being supported by a guy named MacArthy doesn't make it any less witch-hunty and shady.

Well, in this case, we are dealing with a form of leftism that puts more emphasis on social policies over economic ones. Overall, I'm glad there is backlash against this. Society isn't being bettered by grandstanding.

[Ifreann]

People suffering when they lose their job isn't a good argument for protecting bigots, it's a good argument for making it so that people don't suffer when they lose their job.

So wait a minute, we should hold racists accountable by... giving them a permanent paid vacation?

No, of course not. The paid vacation isn't necessarily permanent and is unrelated to efforts towards accountability.