The Cancel Culture Is Nothing More Than Hyper Bullying

Say the wrong thing these days and you can get yourself cancelled. Our modern cancel culture is reaching nearly every aspect of life and leaving destruction in its wake. Unfortunately, you don't even have to be a celebrity or a corporate giant to be cancelled any more. Anyone and everyone can be put on the hit list.

If you step back and look at it objectively, it's easy to see that the cancel culture is nothing more than hyper bullying. Someone says or thinks something a large group of people don't like, and that group will turn around and call for complete cancellation.

What does it mean to be cancelled? That depends on who you are. Some people have lost their jobs and careers. Others have suffered irreparable harm to their reputations. Others have gone broke, lost their families, and so forth.

It Should Not Be Acceptable

Before the events that inspired the cancel culture, bullying was a hot social topic. Perhaps you remember all of the TV and online ads decrying the evils of bullying. Then what did we do? We turned around and weaponised the same tactics against people who said or did things we found disagreeable.

How many celebrities have been publicly bullied online or in the mainstream media for comments made decades ago? How many people in the public eye have said something they thought was innocuous only to have the whole cybersphere turn on them?

If bullying kids in school is not acceptable, bullying by way of the cancel culture should not be acceptable, either. People have a right to do and say as they please as long as they don't break the law. And when the law is broken, we have a court system to hold lawbreakers accountable.

The Cancel Culture's Effects

Living in the midst of the cancel culture has an impact on mental health – even for average people like you and me. That impact is generally not good. London psychoanalyst María R. de Almeida says the effects of the cancel culture are easily identified if you're willing to see them.

For those of us who have not been cancelled directly, the most prevalent negative affect is a collective unwillingness to genuinely speak our minds. We are afraid to say what we really mean because we do not want to offend someone else. Fear of cancellation leaves us to either be dishonest or not speak at all.

The Cancelled

How are the cancelled affected by the culture? In terms of one's mental health, being cancelled can lead to everything from depression to anxiety and feelings of isolation. Cancelled people often feel condemned. In some cases, they are not even given the opportunity to make amends.

The Bullies

Those responsible for cancelling others – in effect, the bullies – do not even know they are being mentally impacted by their decisions. But they are. For starters, the ability to join the chorus of bullies calling for someone to be cancelled gives a person a sense of empowerment.

That sense of empowerment becomes dangerous when a person believes that they are morally fit to determine what is right and wrong for everyone else. Over time, the bully can believe that their way of thinking is the only way of thinking. That can lead to a growing sense of hostility toward anyone who doesn't see or live life the same way.

The cancel culture is a high-powered form of bullying. It is very real and very dangerous. Will we do anything about it, or will modern society become increasingly more polarised?