I don't think you're denying the existence of anything, you're putting forward a different characterisation of behaviour you agree exists, one that presents it in a positive light. And I also may not want something to be lumped into "cancel culture" if I think it's meaningful or useful, because I understand that label is a negative and demeaning one.

Also, I think on many subjects we're way past let's talk about our "disagreements". Racism needs to stop. Employee exploitation just needs to stop. Talking shit about transgenders, gays, lesbians, transsexuals etc. just has to stop. Joking about disabled people has to stop. — Benkei

On the surface, most people should agree with you, if I didn't think about it too much, I would agree with you. But then I know you a bit too well for that, I don't want your interpretations of racism is or sexism is to be mainstream, let alone to have them enforced unilaterally on others. I am completely opposed to it.

I'm not right-wing, I'm a liberal who wants to live and let live but I recognise that sometimes that's not good enough, there are some things that require us to stand up and do something. Cancel culture may not be a bad thing, just by itself, the issue is the ideology behind it, which is held by an extreme minority, with a particularly loud voice and a lot of power in the tech field, among others.

Cancel culture targets unimportant issues, the average age of these activists is probably around 20-22, it's immature and shallow. A white actor plays a monk. An anime shows too much cleavage. A comedian makes an inappropriate joke. You're comparing this kind of garbage to abolishing slavery? Not only does cancel culture follow a disagreeable ideology with absurd interpretations but it's rarely doing anything of importance.

I'm struggling to see your point...is it that two minutes of internet searching wasn't enough? Yes. Probably ten or more might have been better. I'm not sure why I'm doing your research for you. I've no interest in convincing you that these things happen. I'm just not willing to engage on that intellectual level. If you have an opinion on whether they're right or wrong, whether they're overkill, or have hit the balance just right, whether they're right-wing inspired or cross the political spectrum...I'd be interested to talk. But I'm not scouring the internet archives to prove that the phenomena even exists! If you're at that level you'll have to find someone else willing to hand-hold you through the history of the issue.

You asked me what was missing, Isaac, and I made a complete list. I honestly didn’t know that it would upset you so. If it makes you feel any better, it wasn’t too bad for a five minute effort.

I honestly didn’t know that it would upset you — praxis

What 'upset me' if you want to put it that way, is that you thought it reasonable, on a debating platform, to dismiss @frank's contribution with a dismissive (and, it transpires, disingenuous) "hard to take seriously" rather than any kind of charitable inclusion of those concerns in the discussion.

If you seriously thought that there wasn't any evidence for the claims in the letter (an already fairly absurd position given the general academic standing in which some of the signatories are held), then at the very least we might have expected a "...really! Are you sure those things happened", not an assumption that they probably didn't and concomitant smearing of the author's intentions as non-serious.

The entire and sole counterargument in this thread has been some variation of "some right-wing people also complain about it so it must be nonsense", yours simply misses off even the pretence of justification and rests on "...it must be nonsense" alone.

It is perfectly fine to discard views you don't like, as long as you know why you don't like them. We all do that. You can't force me to listen to Trump. But what defines cancelling is the attempt to prevent access to the public space to views we don't like. Or if you prefer, it is an attempt to stop other people than oneself from listening to views that they might like, but one doesn't like. If I was foolish enough to try to silence Trump, that'd be an attempted cancelling.

Hence the cancelers would lack the capacity to suffer that opinions they don't like will be expressed publicly.

The question is whether or not all opinions should have access to the public space, or do some opinions deserve to be shunned? If yes, where do you draw the line?

I would think that, whereas public opinion can sway and is easy to influence, the law of the land ought to define unambiguously which opinions can be expressed, and which cannot, and for what reasons.

the move away from the big issue of class, is to serve the elites. For every minute you aren’t angry about class, is another minute you aren’t angry about the real issue in our civilization, class. Basically every non-issue will be enflamed to serve the 1%

So Frank, I can’t help wondering how committed you are to ‘growing the psychological muscles necessary for listening to a view we don't like’. Imagine, if you’re willing, that Marjorie Taylor Greene submitted an Op-Ed piece to the New York Times on weekly basis, assuming she knows how to read and write. How often do you think they should publish her esteemed options (instead of something more substantive)? — praxis

I think the NYT should publish nothing but QAnon content on every page from now on. Like QAnon recipes, QAnon gardening tips, and so forth.

And little snippets from Mein Kampf. The whole block of lasagne.

Why should there be charity? Can you provide an argument for charity?
— baker

Because nobody's perfect. Errare humanum est. When YOU make a mistake, do you prefer it not when people show a little charity? Or do you prefer to be treated without mercy?

Judge not, least you be judged.

Another argument is that, without things like forgiveness and redemption, societies tend to accumulate hatred until people kill one another. — Olivier5

Maybe there should not be charity. Yes, I want to be forgiven when I make a mistake.

Be judged, so you can judge others.

Without judgment social structure would crumble. I do keep to the law, because I fear the punishment after breaking it.

Without forgiveness and redemption, hatred will accumulate until people kill each other.

I don't think somehow that forgiveness and redemption could be enforced. It is great to have it. My uncle has it, he claims it's because he is a Roman Catholic, but I think he has it because he is that way inclined. Everyone has a degree of forgiveness for insults and damages, everyone has redemption and a feeling of lifted from sins, or moral badness, but everyone has this feature to different degrees. And whatever degree they are capable of it, is not going to change no matter what.

So since forgiveness and redemption can't be enforced, it is futile to wish for that. It is the same thing as teaching to a bunch of thieves and blasphemers the Categoricus Imperativus.

Without forgiveness and redemption, hatred will accumulate until people kill each other. — god must be atheist

Without that? Or..

Without judgment social structure would crumble. I do keep to the law, because I fear the punishment after breaking it. — god must be atheist

I think it's still the fear of punishment unfortunately, that does mostly the work for people and societies in general.

I think it's still the fear of punishment unfortunately, that does mostly the work for people and societies in general. — dimosthenis9

I agree. The first quote you quoted from me had been quoted from Olivier5. My mistake (and I seek forgiveness for it) that I hadn't indicated that.

But I agree with both. Small damages are forgiven, large ones are punished... that's how it should be, and generally speaking, that's how it is done in the society I live in.

The problem with cancel culture: small and large "sins" or "crimes" are both treated in an unforgiving way.

What we forget is that there is a balance to cancel culture, and it has also been going on as long as CC; the creation of what we now call Celebrities, and generally, the creation of Cults of Persons.

In Communist countries it was Marx, Engels and Lenin. Plus the local party secretaries.

In the west it morphed from the Christian god to Christian saints to heads of states to political leaders to movie stars and rock singers.

If Trump says something, half the country swoons, the other half spits in his directions.

If M-Toe, or T-Bone J, or Pamela Lee Anderson says something, at least for five minutes the entire world will hold as much weight to it as to the words of Marcus Aurelius (the latter, a bit longer.)

So while the rabble can dethrone almost randomly a statue, an institution, and a person who is institution-strong, the rabble can also erect new ones, just as almost randomly.

Thus, equilibrium state is achieved in society, with as many people leaving celebrity status or at least leading roles in shame as many are entering in pride, due to the constant action of the social catalyst "rabble". Much like in chemical reactions, it is IMPOSSIBLE by by deterministic means to predict who is going to leave, and who is going to come in. The individuals in the process are indetermined and indeterminable before each event of the transition.

double entry

My mistake (and I seek forgiveness for it) that I hadn't indicated that. — god must be atheist

No harm done. The point is the same.

Small damages are forgiven, large ones are punished... that's how it should be, and generally speaking, that's how it is done in the society I live in. — god must be atheist

Punishment satisfies the need of revenge that someone demands (and fairly imo) when large damages occur on him by someone else. And that's how justice works I think. Small damages don't need punishment cause they don't trigger so much that desire of revenge to the ones who "suffers" them. Cause exactly they are so small.

If M-Toe, or T-Bone J, or Pamela Lee Anderson says something, at least for five minutes the entire world will hold as much weight to it as to the words of Marcus Aurelius (the latter, a bit longer.) — god must be atheist

That's folks fault though, not any Pamela's.
And exactly cause the average spiritual level of humanity is still at low level, that's why the "concept of cancel culture" will get fucked up as many other similar concepts throughout history. But it will also bring some good. As everything bad always entails some amount of good. Any kind of change has both sides.

The problem with cancel culture: small and large "sins" or "crimes" are both treated in an unforgiving way. — god must be atheist

That's exactly all the juice of all that cancel culture discussion. And its main danger. It absolutely glorifies Hypocrisy,the way it is executed.

don't think somehow that forgiveness and redemption could be enforced. It is great to have it. My uncle has it — god must be atheist

It's great to have if you want to be able to move on, and not let your life get dragged by endless grudges.

Small damages are forgiven, large ones are punished... — god must be atheist

And once punished, large damages too are forgiven. Otherwise, people's life is finished as soon as they are found guilty of one single offence.

Justice is somewhat different from your average mob viciousness. It's imperfect, complicated and slow, because it must consider the rights of the accused.

What 'upset me' if you want to put it that way, is that you thought it reasonable, on a debating platform, to dismiss frank's contribution with a dismissive (and, it transpires, disingenuous) "hard to take seriously" rather than any kind of charitable inclusion of those concerns in the discussion. — Isaac

Frank receives more than his share of charity in many many discussions. Trust me on that. :wink:

If you seriously thought that there wasn't any evidence for the claims in the letter (an already fairly absurd position given the general academic standing in which some of the signatories are held), — Isaac

Oh to be young and innocent.

at the very least we might have expected a "...really! Are you sure those things happened", not an assumption that they probably didn't — Isaac

I searched the web for hours looking for examples that would support the claims and I could not find anything more supportive than what you found. People ‘exaggerate’ when doing so benefits them in some way, Isaac.

People ‘exaggerate’ when doing so benefits them in some way — praxis

Exaggeration is one thing, making something up entirely another. I don't believe the letter mentions numbers. Let's say, then, that the entirety of 'cancel culture' consists of nothing more than the dozen or so events we can verify, or even just a single event.

Take Kathleen Stock being hounded out of her job. Are you suggesting that the students at Sussex are an aberration (believe me, I've taught at Sussex, this would not be an unreasonable claim!), or was there something in the water that day. What convinces you that the event, this one event we can totally verify happened, was not indicative of a trend?

That’s an excellent example. Goodonya, mate. I just bought Material Girls and may have more to say on the subject after reading it.

Purity spirals and Stalinesque witch hunts.

It never ends well for anyone.

Without judgment social structure would crumble. I do keep to the law, because I fear the punishment after breaking it. — god must be atheist

I am all for the law and its application. Attempts at self-righteous lynching is what I object to.

Cancel culture is definetly a real and growing phenomena (although perhaps leveling off now). It is a consequence of increasing political polarization and the phenomena of politics as entertainment and a replacement of religion.

It has effected the highest levels of government. For example, Shirley Sherrod getting booted from the Obama Administration for parts of an NAACP speech that were taken out of context where she seemed to be talking about her racial bias against white people. In fact, the speech was about a personal journey of overcoming said bias. It had been selectively edited by Andrew Brietbart for a cancelling campaign, more manufactured outrage.

Since the US is a large country, you can find plenty of ludicrous examples of cancelling or ridiculous behavior.

For example, attempts to pressure a student into an apology at Yale over what seems like a quite innocuous email:

https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2021/10/19/email-from-yale-law-student-sparks-national-discussion-on-racism-and-free-speech/

Versus Yale's inability to condemn what should be an obviously condemnable speech, choosing rather to censor it so that it can't be seen in context. I'll quote it since it's at a level that I think most people would say goes beyond provocative, into the realm of being inappropriate.

"This is the cost of talking to white people at all — the cost of your own life, as they suck you dry,” Dr. Khilanani said in the lecture, which drew widespread attention after Bari Weiss, a former writer and editor for the opinion department of The New York Times, posted an audio recording of it on Substack on Friday. “There are no good apples out there. White people make my blood boil.”

Dr. Khilanani added that around five years ago, “I took some actions.”

“I systematically white-ghosted most of my white friends, and I got rid of the couple white BIPOCs that snuck in my crew, too,” she said, using an acronym for Black and Indigenous people and people of color.

“I had fantasies of unloading a revolver into the head of any white person that got in my way, burying their body and wiping my bloody hands as I walked away relatively guiltless with a bounce in my step, like I did the world a favor,” she said, adding an expletive.

Later in the lecture, Dr. Khilanani, who said she is of Indian descent, described the futility of trying to talk directly to white people about race, calling it a “waste of our breath.”

"We are asking a demented, violent predator who thinks that they are a saint or a superhero to accept responsibility,” she said. “It ain’t going to happen. They have five holes in their brain.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/06/nyregion/yale-psychiatrist-aruna-khilanani.html

Or you have a medical student being forced to accept psychological counseling and later being banned from campus as a threat for asking a pointed question about the definition of microaggressions at a presentation.

https://apnews.com/article/lawsuits-virginia-charlottesville-0a477beb7e406b5a3360c00420af4cce

Others abound. An aspiring Asian American journalist was canceled for posting an interview with an African American demonstrator in Oakland who mentioned the need to also mobilize against violent crime in the community, which had taken the lives of his family members, but which had sparked no outage or protests. Apparently this should have been censored out of demonstration footage. I have to imagine this is not that uncommon of a statement since I heard it in various forms at BLM protests in my own hometown. Censoring it is itself taking away the voice of marginalized communities.

Anyhow, it's easy enough to brand these as strange one offs. In a country of 320 million, having a few hundred cancelation stories isn't indictive of a mass movement. What I think is more illustrative of deep problems is that academics certainly feel they are at risk if they pursue investigations of sacrosanct topics, and that academic rigor and the process of science gets thrown out the window if a topic is politically sensitive.

Take implicit bias tests. These things were everywhere for a while. Police departments had implicit bias training mandated as a response to BLM. Implicit bias testing showed up prominently in the syllabi of liberal arts classes; the science of racism had been unveiled. Businesses were urged to have employees take the tests and to hire anti-racism instructors. Governments took steps to mandate the tests and training. It is still a huge business.

Laudable intentions, but there is a serious problem: implicit bias tests do not hit even the low end of bench marks for reliability used in psychological assessments. That is, your score on the test one day is not good at predicting your score on subsequent days. Your score in one sitting accounts for about 50-60% of the variance in subsequent sittings, meaning swaps between different ends of the bell curve are not abnormal. By contrast, IQ tests, which are often attacked as being inaccurate by the left, generally have reliability metrics in the high .9s; taking one test predicts 95+% of your future scores.

Simply put, without political salience, it is hard to see the tool not getting rejected on internal reliability grounds alone. What is worse, it has shown absolutely abysmal predictive validity for outcomes we actually care about. To be sure, a few studies have hit statistical significance. Implicit bias scores for grocery workers in France predicted more customer complaints from minority shoppers. However, attempts to test the validity of the tests which fail to show scores' predictive power are more common. This is despite a bias against publishing null findings, and likely an additional bias against publishing a paper that calls into question a politically charged methodology. At worst, it's arguable the field, as it is currently represented, is pseudscience.

Anti-rascism training fares even worse, with almost no standardization or study of if the specific trainings employed actually do anything to help racial biases. College campuses rushed to implement these trainings, often with no attempt to measure them scientifically.

Research has tended to show no effect from these trainings, and in many cases, they appear to actually be increasing metrics used to gauge racial bias.

https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/dobbin/files/an2018.pdf

https://www.realclearscience.com/articles/2020/12/05/research_shows_diversity_training_is_typically_ineffective_652014.html

In general, if your college anti-racism classes make students less likely to associate with people of other races, that seems like a serious problem.

The lack of scientific rigor, or outright hostility to science goes beyond diversity training. When James Damore, a software engineer at Google circulated a memo criticizing the company's diversity policies (for which he was terminated), the response in the media bordered on ridiculous.

Rather than commit to a nuanced critique explaining how a non-expert was misusing the research, and drawing conclusions that could not be supported, a general response was to call both the letter and the articles cited (peer reviewed papers in respected journals) "junk science."

On NPR I heard a professor of psychology make one of these statements. She tried to demonstrate the invalid nature of the science in question because it "called women neurotic." I don't know if this was disingenuous, or if somehow a professor of psychology made it through a PhD program without encountering the Big Five Personality Traits. "Neuroticism" in personality measures (also much more reliable and predictive than implicit bias tests) is not the "neuroticism" of common parlance.

Personality differences between men and women are the product of different but overlapping distributions. They are replicable and cross cultural to varying degrees. Causal mechanisms have been identified, as exogenous testosterone or testosterone suppression shifts scores in line with observed differences in sex. The exact nature of these differences is impossible to quantify and is always shaped by culture, but the claim that any differences based on sex is junk science is less supportable by scientific evidence than claims that humans don't contribute to global warming. Not to mention that the differences should be of no surprise as differences in behavior based on sex are ubiquitous in animals and in other primates specifically.

These anti-scientific leanings have real consequences and are more damaging when they come from the political left because the left tends to wield more influence on college campuses.

For instance, a scientific understanding of sexual violence in humans would help us prevent such attacks. But works such as Thornhill's A Natural History of Rape are faced with protests, canceled lectures, etc. which obviously have a chilling effect on publication and researchers' decisions to investigate certain topics.

Liberal antagonism to the suggestion that genetics effect anything other than humans' physical traits is wide spread and hurts research.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/09/13/can-progressives-be-convinced-that-genetics-matters

Notably, attempts to shut down investigations of human genetics gives ammo to "race realists," and the revival of "scientific" racism. Evidence of censorship is taken as proof that liberals "don't want you to know the truth about heritability." Research that could rebut racist theories is risky for scholars to pursue, less they be labeled rascists themselves.

Arguably, this leads to a bias in the field where only people comfortable with these accusations pursue controversial research areas, leading to confirmation bias that supports the very findings liberals want to attack.

Rather than educate people on how to interpret complex scientific questions, the extent to which different but overlapping bell curves don't tell you anything about a given individual, or the myriad problems (sometimes intractable) of teasing out genetic and enviornment causal factors (e.g., the huge shifts in IQ distributions seen in the Flynn Effect), there is a trend to opting for censorship. This ultimately has been a huge boon for the far right.

Cancel culture is a right wing lie that doesn't deserve the amount of air time it gets - it should be ignored especially now that it has been politicized. In fact, I think "cancel culture" is about public accountability. — Benkei

Do you mean to say that, you would like to see the cancellation of cancel culture?

In fact, I think "cancel culture" is about public accountability. — Benkei

No, it is about dominating human beings. I owe no accountability to anyone regarding anything I say, ever. To assume the right of controlling my expression, as well as any who would choose to listen to me is an exercise in tyranny. It is also self-contradictory, as to violate free expression is to assert the right of the free expression violator to freely express. But, fascists don't win the battle in the end, so no real worries.

Racism needs to stop. — Benkei

Then don't be racist. What you regard as racist is different from what I regard as racist. Meaning you're flying blind.

Employee exploitation just needs to stop. — Benkei

Employer exploitation is far more prevalent. Also, you might want to focus on exploitation of everyone by the state, they're the one stealing your money, and protecting slavery, and establishing segregation, and invading Ukraine and stuff.

Talking shit about transgenders, gays, lesbians, transsexuals etc. just has to stop. — Benkei

I'll do as I please, you have no authority over the content of my thoughts. LGBTQ people are, just like everybody else, subject to criticism and comedy. Don't like it, you stop talking to people, we owe you nothing.

Joking about disabled people has to stop. — Benkei

Violating individual Consciousness has to stop, and here you are promotoing it. What happens if I say no, and that I'll do as I damn well please? Does force enter the equation of what your brain has been indoctrinated to conclude "needs to stop?" When you say "need," are you meaning to imply that if the jokes don't stop, that these individuals will die as a result?

People fought wars over justice to get it. Slavery was abolished thanks to violence. Segregation was ended by government force. Sometimes talking things over is just over. — Benkei

Justice is a meaningless word. Justice was also touted by Hitler to justify mass slaughter. Slavery was abolished by the very state that instantiated it to gain bodies to defeat an enemy in war, not because it was noble. Segregation was ended by vote, not violence. The very same halls that instantiated slavery as an institution were occupied to vote segregation away from America for gain on the part of the Capitol Class of Washington statists, not your movements. Yes, sometimes talking things over is over, such has been the case between humans and states for millennia.

The fact societies are moving in that direction is because the wealth inequality, the abuse, the racism is getting to a point where common people no longer accept it. — Benkei

No, it's because the populations that are causing noise are willing to vote for power hungry statists that play them like fittles, instead of disbanding from the disgusting state that has caused all of these problems.

I don't even think that's really a left vs. right wing thing; that's just a lot of people trying to maintain the status quo because they cannot envisage anything better. — Benkei

That's correct, those terms mean nothing. This is about good vs evil. And your anger regarding things that the state will only ever allow the change of in exchange for other powers is a part of that evil feedbackloop that is growing more and more oppositional to human homeostasis. It's even convinced you to desire the very same power that was used to create all of the problems in the first, which is what you mean when you say "needs to stop." You mean, if only I were king, I'd make it stop. If you really want to make a change, unplugg from all political material and direct your own path. Nohing else can, or will save society from the brink we now face. I hope racism and wealth-inequality were worth your computational resources when Russia ignites the coming global conflict. That's when the monsters behind the TV's will be coming out to play, and then you'll see first hand just who your real enemies are. Keep your on the East, the cataclysm is before us.

Still waiting for your reply.

How does a person "stop being a big baby" and how does a person "grow the ability to listen to opposing views without fear that we'll slide into a holocaust if you let other people have their say"?

Have you worked out an actual didactic program for this? Can you present it here?

I once heard an interesting hypothesis about scapegoating: People resort to scapegoating when their own adherence to the values they profess reaches a critical low where even they cannot deny it anymore. Instead of admitting it and deliberately changing their ways, they metaphorically cast their own sins onto someone else and this way free themselves of the burden of a guilty conscience. This way, they clear the slate and can start fresh.
— baker

Is an interesting perspective. So maybe I'm wrong about the unhelpfulness of such generalisation. — Isaac

The issue at hand is still scapegoating. What is different, in comparison to more traditional cultures, is that modern culture has lost all sense of perspective and measure, so anything and everything can be considered "unacceptable", or "acceptable", but one can never know in advance which. As you've noted before, there is that sense of constantly walking on eggshells.

In more traditional cultures that have relatively clearly defined value systems, one can predict with good certainty what effect a certain action will have in the public space. What will be merely ridiculed, and what severely punished. But in modern cultures, one can never really know.

Why should there be charity? Can you provide an argument for charity?
— baker

Because nobody's perfect. Errare humanum est. When YOU make a mistake, do you prefer it not when people show a little charity? Or do you prefer to be treated without mercy? — Olivier5

No, that's a weak defense. "People should be given something because they need or prefer it" is far too general, too open-ended.

Judge not, least you be judged.

Evidently not true. You can be a total sheep, and still be judged. Witness the history of illegitimate children, for example.

Another argument is that, without things like forgiveness and redemption, societies tend to accumulate hatred until people kill one another.

Do you have actual real-life examples of that?

Because if anything, it seems that it is the tension between people, the tension born of perceiving each other as dangerous and merciless that keeps people in check.

How does a person "stop being a big baby" and how does a person "grow the ability to listen to opposing views without fear that we'll slide into a holocaust if you let other people have their say"?

Have you worked out an actual didactic program for this? Can you present it here? — baker

I think he's arguing for a kind of immersion therapy. A little QAnon here, a little Mein Kampf there, until you become desensitized and nonreactive.

I think he's arguing for a kind of immersion therapy. A little QAnon here, a little Mein Kampf there, until you become desensitized and nonreactive. — praxis

A sheeple, easy to manipulate?

"Nonjudgmentally listen to the views of others" has never actually been a virtue, anywhere.

think he's arguing for a kind of immersion therapy. A little QAnon here, a little Mein Kampf there, until you become desensitized and nonreactive. — praxis

That was more charity than I needed. Thanks.

Do you have actual real-life examples of that? — baker

Afghanistan. Somalia. The US.

What is different, in comparison to more traditional cultures, is that modern culture has lost all sense of perspective and measure, so anything and everything can be considered "unacceptable", or "acceptable", but one can never know in advance which. — baker

Yes, I think social media acting as a rapid multiplier has exacerbated the problem massively recently. Within days an issue which no one had even thought of last week can become socially unacceptable, with everyone acting as they hadn't themselves committed those exact sins a fortnight ago.

I think he's arguing for a kind of immersion therapy. A little QAnon here, a little Mein Kampf there, until you become desensitized and nonreactive.
— praxis

That was more charity than I needed. Thanks. — frank

I kid, but that is the general idea, yes?