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Cancel culture IRL

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Cavemonster said:
I don't think the people responding to you are arguing that no one self censors.

Throughout the history of published writing, self censorship has been incredibly common. For much of history, writing critical of the powers that be or strong social norms could get you thrown in prison. Writers certainly tailored their output to that, and to every strongly held social norm.

What people are rejecting is that cancel culture is creating a particularly widespread and new chilling effect that's a real problem in a way that's remarkably different from older social norms.
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The claim wasn't that no one self censors ( as per your examples ) but young authors are self censoring from writing outside "their own immediate experiences for fear of being cancelled by an 'anonymous lynch mob' online."

It's a new claim with very little supporting evidence and, as we've seen in this thread, zero evidence to refute that claim.

Self censorship, as a practice might not be new per se especially if one's writings could result in spending years in the gulag but this is an apparently new phenomenon.
 
Stout said:
The claim wasn't that no one self censors ( as per your examples ) but young authors are self censoring from writing outside "their own immediate experiences without doing considerable research and getting feedback from peers who have had those experience for fear of being cancelled by an 'anonymous lynch mob' online."

It's a new claim with very little supporting evidence and, as we've seen in this thread, zero evidence to refute that claim.

Self censorship, as a practice might not be new per se especially if one's writings could result in spending years in the gulag but this is an apparently new phenomenon that should lead to better quality writing.
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I've added the underlined to your post to better reflect the research you have brought to the discussion. I'm not saying I agree or disagree, but your statements almost seemed misleading without acknowledging what your article actually was saying.

My opinion on the matter is more along the lines of:

Criticism leads to self reflection leads to research leads to editing leads to better work.

None of this is new.
 
TragicMonkey said:
I think the new thing is people complaining about it because they want to be issued free passes on any consequences of saying whatever they please. Previously, people accepted that "hey, if I publish my pro-Hitler screed I might get fired from my job working for Steven Spielberg" but now they want to publish their pro-Hitler screed and somehow get immunity from bad consequences (although I'm certain they'd accept good consequences). They'd sue Spielberg (or try to "cancel" him) for firing them "for having an opinion".
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It's basically the "I want to be a pharmacist but not give out birth control" thing again.
 
Stout said:
The claim wasn't that no one self censors ( as per your examples ) but young authors are self censoring from writing outside "their own immediate experiences for fear of being cancelled by an 'anonymous lynch mob' online."

It's a new claim with very little supporting evidence and, as we've seen in this thread, zero evidence to refute that claim.

Self censorship, as a practice might not be new per se especially if one's writings could result in spending years in the gulag but this is an apparently new phenomenon.
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Again, I don't believe anyone disagrees with the claim in the broadests sense.

Some young authors are avoiding writing outside their experience.

There has been no evidence given to refute it because no one is arguing it never happens.
 
Cavemonster said:
I looked at the first two, these seem to be individual cases about which there is much to discuss, as with most of the news items discussed on the forum.

What specifically would you like to discuss about these articles?
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Give them a read, think about the underlying pattern, decide which of those 'censorings' you think are reasonable, and which are not... and why you hold those views.

I'd like to skip over the incredibly stupid deep-dive into a) whether or not "cancel culture" is a good name for the phenomenon under discussion and b) whether or not this phenomenon is new. I don't give a rat's ass if people agree with the nomenclature, or if it's been around for a million years - I haven't given a crap about that since page 1.

I'd also really like to avoid the shallow slings of partisan politics insisting that it's all one side or the other doing the cancelling, or whether it's all one side or the other complaining about cancelling. It's neither of those things, it's a mix that affects all political viewpoints.

I'd much rather discuss whether or not this type of socially-prompted censorship and deplatforming is ethical or reasonable. I'd also like to discuss whether there are any feasible ways to make sure it only happens in reasonable ways, and what the risk is of it getting out of hand and turning into a mob-based style of McCarthyism, enforcing moral conformity.

Those are my concerns and the things I'm interested in discussion.
 
Emily's Cat said:
Give them a read, think about the underlying pattern, decide which of those 'censorings' you think are reasonable, and which are not... and why you hold those views.

I'd like to skip over the incredibly stupid deep-dive into a) whether or not "cancel culture" is a good name for the phenomenon under discussion and b) whether or not this phenomenon is new. I don't give a rat's ass if people agree with the nomenclature, or if it's been around for a million years - I haven't given a crap about that since page 1.

I'd also really like to avoid the shallow slings of partisan politics insisting that it's all one side or the other doing the cancelling, or whether it's all one side or the other complaining about cancelling. It's neither of those things, it's a mix that affects all political viewpoints.

I'd much rather discuss whether or not this type of socially-prompted censorship and deplatforming is ethical or reasonable. I'd also like to discuss whether there are any feasible ways to make sure it only happens in reasonable ways, and what the risk is of it getting out of hand and turning into a mob-based style of McCarthyism, enforcing moral conformity.

Those are my concerns and the things I'm interested in discussion.
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Fair enough, I'm definitely guilty of wallowing a bit too much in the semantics in this thread and I'm happy to talk about the meat.

On the first article, the issue of YouTube putting restrictions on livestreaming.

Here's my background framing.

YouTube, like many social media platforms has been used to do a lot of unsavory things. Social media has even been cited as a major force in organizing the Rohingya genocide. YouTube was certainly used to spread a lot of political misinformation around US elections.

I think social media companines are right to be concerned about being used to organize violence or spread misinformation. And they're right to take steps to try to curb those sorts of misuse. I fully acknowledge their motivations are probably not all puppy dogs and patriotism. But whether it's in fear from their brand being tainted, fear that government may try to step in if they can't show they're regulating themselves, or on the off chance that it's motivated by real ethical concerns. Those motivations don't matter too much because they all converge on "Do what you can to at least try to minimize the dangerous stuff".

Social media services are in a weird liminal space that we as a society haven't really fully understood yet, and I think we fail when we try to shove them in categories that don't fit.

They're not really like any publisher in the traditional sense. They don't and can't scrutinize every piece of content.

But they're not really like a neutral service like UPS either.

If you send something weird through UPS that's a communication between two individuals. What people post on YT becomes a part of their ecosystem of search results, recommendations, communities etc.

So we can't say that the content is none of their business like a package shipping company, because the content spills out in a lot of ways. That's what makes it "social". And we can't say they need to individually approve of every piece of video with minute discretion. The volume is so huge that would be impossible, and that high volume is part of their social model. And even if they could make millions and millions of judgement calls every day, people probably wouldn't like that any better.

So the only tools available are going to be broader guidelines.

I'm not inside the YT meetings about how they decided live streams showing guns was a rule they were going to enforce. And I'm also not going to say that's a perfect rule.

But I think however they set the rules to try to manage the real ugly stuff, there's bound to be collateral damage. And that's a shame, but I can't see a great alternative.

I do value independent journalism. But I think if independent media of ANY kind relies on one other business for everything, they're going to be vulnerable to policy decisions that don't have anything to do with them.

There was some similar anger when both YT and FB changed their algorythms in a way that made it much harder for some independent creators who had been using the two services for their livelihood. A couple creators I really enjoyed had to stop making content because it just wasn't profitable anymore. And that sucks. But, I don't see retaining the old model as something YT owed to them either morally or legally.

I recognize that YT is a profit driven company and they're going to take the actions in their own best interest.

In all, I don't see this as part of a cultural push to enforce values and punish any kind of wrong thinking. I see a crude practical attempt to limit truly harmful content. And unfortunately, crude might be the only option right now.
 
Mumbles said:
Are you standing outside a Cosby comedy show with a sign? That's a protest.



Are you refusing to listen to anything involving R. Kelly, as an organized group? That's a boycott.



Are you blocking/unsubscribing from someone, and that's it? That's just you spending your time elsewhere - it's nothing?



Did someone get fired for unacceptable behavior? That's "capitalism in the US".
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If only there was some useful catchall term for things like protesting shows (with the intent of shutting them down), boycotting entertainers, encouraging mass blocking (e.g. the block bot) and trying to get people fired for offensive things they say or publish outside of the workplace. While we're at it, we can throw in efforts to disinvite or deplatform controversial speakers like Ayaan Hirsi Ali or Ted Honderich, along with efforts to cancel offensive public displays such as the Black Mass.

Ah well, guess we'll make due without. [emoji1745]
 
Emily's Cat said:
I'd much rather discuss whether or not this type of socially-prompted censorship and deplatforming is ethical or reasonable. I'd also like to discuss whether there are any feasible ways to make sure it only happens in reasonable ways, and what the risk is of it getting out of hand and turning into a mob-based style of McCarthyism, enforcing moral conformity.

Those are my concerns and the things I'm interested in discussion.
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I think the primary problem is that companies are being looked at as public platforms. Twitter, YouTube and other social media do not exist to act as a proxy of the town square, they exist to make money. As such, they have content rules and limits that are often clumsy and counter-intuitive, but in the end thought to produce the best result for the investment.

The same is true of Amazon where a single complaint of IP infringement can knock a brand off the platform for months because it just isn't a big deal to Amazon that it is right, it just wants to avoid liability.

The problem is not that the companies are acting the way they are acting, the problem is that we have allowed them to ascend to a place of such importance in our lives. Companies act to increase revenue and decrease liabilities. They don't care about whether their rules have been gamed by one political party or the other unless it impacts their bottom line.

Are you logging on to Twitter? Are you watching ads on YouTube? Are you buying stuff from Amazon? Then you are to blame for the actions of these companies.

Steal a page from the cancel culture: don't let entities you don't like make money from you.
 
Dr. Keith said:
I've added the underlined to your post to better reflect the research you have brought to the discussion. I'm not saying I agree or disagree, but your statements almost seemed misleading without acknowledging what your article actually was saying.

My opinion on the matter is more along the lines of:

Criticism leads to self reflection leads to research leads to editing leads to better work.

None of this is new.
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Additions noted however that type of qualification was not given in the article I linked to in post #1734. The meat of that post was a direct copy from the article it linked to and the first response I got to it was a bunch of chaff about a rich old paranoid guy and tabloids.

We're all familiar with the amount of research authors do before writing a novel. "I'm researching for a novel is commonly heard and, just as an aside is an excellent excuse for explaining yourself should you be caught in a compromising situation, like that time I was discovered in a Bangkok whorehouse.

James Michner even included the research he did in a novel he wrote. I think it was Texas, it was a while ago.

Kazuo Ishiguro mentioned nothing about intimately familiarizing yourself with your subject matter and was saying.

'I very much fear for the younger generation of writers. Novelists should feel free to write from whichever viewpoint they wish or represent all kinds of views. Right from an early age I've written from the point of view of people very different from myself. My first novel was written from the point of view of a woman.'
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Which he implies might lead to his attempted cancellation had he written that novel today and some activist had gotten a bug up their ass about it.
 
Stout said:
Which he implies might lead to his attempted cancellation had he written that novel today and some activist had gotten a bug up their ass about it.
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If he has done a good job I doubt it would be a problem. If he relied on lazy stereotypes or degrading caricatures then it probably would be a problem.

How hard it must be to have to now assume ones work may be subject to criticism.
 
Dr. Keith said:
If he has done a good job I doubt it would be a problem. If he relied on lazy stereotypes or degrading caricatures then it probably would be a problem.

How hard it must be to have to now assume ones work may be subject to criticism.
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That's not what he's saying though. he's saying some young authors are afraid of writing from viewpoints outside their own immediate experiences. Period.
 
Stout said:
That's not what he's saying though. he's saying some young authors are afraid of writing from viewpoints outside their own immediate experiences. Period.
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For writing the best advice is to write what you know. So most good authors tend to write from their own experience. It is actually much harder to write from a point of view you have never experienced, but some are able to pull it off really well. I see no reason to expect that to change.

And yet I'm willing to bet you $3.50 that over the next five years there will be at least one successful work of fiction written by a young author from a viewpoint that is outside their own immediate experience.
 
Dr. Keith said:
For writing the best advice is to write what you know. So most good authors tend to write from their own experience. It is actually much harder to write from a point of view you have never experienced, but some are able to pull it off really well. I see no reason to expect that to change.

And yet I'm willing to bet you $3.50 that over the next five years there will be at least one successful work of fiction written by a young author from a viewpoint that is outside their own immediate experience.
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And that's when I noticed Dr. Keith was a giant crustacean from the Paleolithic era.
 
Dr. Keith said:
I think the primary problem is that companies are being looked at as public platforms. Twitter, YouTube and other social media do not exist to act as a proxy of the town square, they exist to make money. As such, they have content rules and limits that are often clumsy and counter-intuitive, but in the end thought to produce the best result for the investment.

The same is true of Amazon where a single complaint of IP infringement can knock a brand off the platform for months because it just isn't a big deal to Amazon that it is right, it just wants to avoid liability.

The problem is not that the companies are acting the way they are acting, the problem is that we have allowed them to ascend to a place of such importance in our lives. Companies act to increase revenue and decrease liabilities. They don't care about whether their rules have been gamed by one political party or the other unless it impacts their bottom line.

Are you logging on to Twitter? Are you watching ads on YouTube? Are you buying stuff from Amazon? Then you are to blame for the actions of these companies.

Steal a page from the cancel culture: don't let entities you don't like make money from you.
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Indeed, cancel the cancelers. Anyone that doesn't like the policies of YT, FB, or Twitter, well go use another social media platform. Theres HUNDREDS out there. Stop acting as if you* have the right to say anything on their platform. You don't. Do I sometimes disagree with who they censor and ban, sure I do. But they are under no obligation to keep or display a series of 1's and 0's that you or I submitted to them.

Actually, Parler is back up and running. Yes, they did find hosting. Believe it or not there are cloudhosting services out there besides AWS, M$, and Google. The barriers to entry for purely software based services are actually really low, lower than they have ever been in fact. Totally different than last mile internet infrastructure co's deciding what traffic they feel like sending you (different and related topic that conservatives have a prevailing opposite opinion on than social media co's).

*I'm using "you" as in a general 2nd person not directed towards you DrKeith.
 
It's amazing when people in power were keeping people down for *checks notes* all of history we didn't have to have a side discussion about authors being scared to write outside their personal experience.

But now we do for some totally random and not at all ulterior motive.

FUNNY... THAT.
 
Dr. Keith said:
For writing the best advice is to write what you know. So most good authors tend to write from their own experience. It is actually much harder to write from a point of view you have never experienced, but some are able to pull it off really well. I see no reason to expect that to change.

And yet I'm willing to bet you $3.50 that over the next five years there will be at least one successful work of fiction written by a young author from a viewpoint that is outside their own immediate experience.
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No doubt and hopefully by a young author ( and publisher ) that has the stones to tell the Twitter outrage mobs to go pound sand. Are we talking $3.50 USD or Canadian? That's like five bucks Canadian.
 
JoeMorgue said:
It's amazing when people in power were keeping people down for *checks notes* all of history we didn't have to have a side discussion about authors being scared to write outside their personal experience.

But now we do for some totally random and not at all ulterior motive.

FUNNY... THAT.
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Oh gee...maybe because the topic just came to light a couple of days ago.

Just sayn'
 
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