Imagine waking up from your deep sleep.
When you open your eyes, the first thing you do is opening your fully-charged phone in the nightstand beside your bed.
You see hundreds of notifications, a wave of panic goes through your mind, but then you find out that they’re not from your boss or coworkers and you breathe a sigh of relief. Still, you continue browsing through your phone to see what the fuss is all about.
When you open your Twitter timeline, the first thing you see is… a picture of yourself. Posted by a stranger that you don’t even recognize. Not only that, you also see… your full name, your home address, your exes and pets’ names, and probably what you’ve eaten last night, all of that, in the internet. For everyone to see and read.
And then you read someone with the username @ Pu55yDestroyer1438 wishing you “I hope you choke on your food today,” among all the replies you’ve read, and you don’t even dare to look the reply below them that tells you “good morning I hope you go to hell” which is, you figure out, are directed to none other than yourself.
…That’s how it feels to be ‘cancelled’, apparently.
Basically, yes. If you’ve spent enough time on social media (particularly the one that I regularly use, Twitter and Instagram) you must already have an idea or two of how “cancel culture” works. If you don’t, well, I’ve already tried my best to describe how it feels above, even though I haven’t experienced it myself, thankfully.
Before going further, I would like to input these words that I fully agree with:
Pretty much sums up everything that I want to talk about in this post. Although what I’ve written here is probably & relatively simpler, and just merely my take on this ‘cancel culture’.
Cancel culture has been around since forever. Not just in Twitter or Instagram, it has always been in our lives, a situation where one person commits one mistake, and the next second everyone is out for their blood. You mess up once and then everyone judges everything about you since the day you were born (OK, I’m kinda exaggerating, but there really are someone who does THAT). Ever heard of the saying “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to ruin it” by Warren Buffet? It’s kind of heavily related with this topic, because no matter how many good deeds that they have done, once they mess up, it’s over for them. Does that scenario sound familiar to you? If yes, then it’s a sign that it has been deemed as something common in our society, and that’s what I’m going to talk about. Truthfully, I still don’t get why this so-called cancel culture is normalized, that most of people see it as a ‘reasonable’ action, an act of punishment or redemption. Still, honestly though…
Aren’t we all still learning?
We make mistakes. That’s what makes us human. We all learn from mistakes. We are capable — always have a room for development and improvement. And that’s what makes us humans, grow.
You can be 18 or 58 and still make mistakes. We’re a defective item that has tons of flaws. Everyone must know that no one is born perfect or well-educated from the get-go. And that’s why, we make mistakes and we learn from it, we learn from our surroundings, we learn from other people, we learn from experiences, and that’s how we can define ourselves as a person.
That’s why, once again, I don’t get why cancel culture often (actually, not often, but always) happens and how normalized it is in our society. Other people act like they’re Gods or Saints, who never make a single mistake in their lives, who thinks they have the rights to judge other people’s way of life just based on one mistake. Sometimes people find faults and pick on our mistakes but are blinded by their own.
If I had to give one example, then it would be: I often see situations where certain people (in this context, public figures) gets ‘cancelled’ over a mistake they did in the year of 2013. Excuse me, what? Yes. 2013 as in 7 years ago, for God’s sake… People change their minds everyday, heck, we’re not even the same person we were yesterday, let alone years ago and cancelling someone over when they were probably still a 16-year-old snot-nosed brat is just plain stupid, sorry not sorry. So much can happen in the span of years, and judging someone by their past alone is not a reasonable action. This is just one example of many, and I’m sure you’ve ever encountered one of those situations, where it happens to your favorite celebrities or to a celebrity you don’t recognize, even if it doesn’t happen to yourself (and hopefully not in the future, too).
“You’re just condoning bigotry!” or “but I’ve never been racist as a kid!” well, good for you, sweetheart. However, you have to realize that the world doesn’t revolve around you. Every people you meet in the streets or on the internet grows up in different places, different countries with different cultures, different norms which is already embedded into their brains since day one. There are lots of people who are blessed with supportive & educative environment, and yes, good for them! But there are also lots of people out there who aren’t blessed with one either, who grew up in a conservative society where they are never given a chance to argue back, to question what they’ve been taught, to say “no” or even ask “why?”
Also, news flash! Rethinking or reevaluating our opinions and judgment on something isn’t (and shouldn’t be) a shameful thing. Just like what the picture above have said, it’s just that we probably haven’t challenged the idea that contradicts ours. Our beliefs changes overtime — and it’s perfectly normal. We all learn something new everyday, after all. It’s good if you can stick to your principles for a long time, but it’s also okay if what you’ve believed in changes after reading or listening to other people’s minds.
There are too many heads, too many bodies here, too many perceptions of what is right and what is not. Is it bad if it hurts other people? Is it good if it satisfies other people? It’s ambiguous, it’s abstract, the good or bad, purity or impurity, there is no definitive parameter to it. That’s why here we are, constantly learning, realizing that some things in life aren’t as straightforward as what the grown-ups in your life have always made you believe.
Truthfully, I think it’ll still be a long way before this ‘culture’ disappears for good, heck, it will probably not disappear knowing a human’s ego have no limits, including myself. But, I hope next time people can educate each other kindly and properly, tell them that’s wrong and how is the right one supposed to be, instead of sending horrible words or death threats that they don’t deserve to hear. Because trust me, it does nothing, you’re just giving wounds, remember that on the other side of the screen, is a real, breathing person just like you. That’s how words are, a double-edged sword. One word from you can save someone, yet it can also take someone’s life.
However, it’s an exception, though, if you already educate them of their mistakes, but they still repeat it despite knowing that it’s wrong. Well, congratulations, now they’re officially a bigot! Other exceptions that I don’t condone are a literal criminal act such as rape, sexual assault, bullying, DUI and such. I don’t think those kinds of things deserve a kind redemption, and some of them don’t even deserve a redemption at all, as they cause a huge trauma and deeply wounds others. They deserve punishment, as painful as the pain that they gave to their victims while laughing.
Live rightfully, folks, and never stop learning! For it is also part of the process to define yourself. XOXO!
