Cancel Culture

A couple of week’s ago my daughter spoke on her podcast about “cancel culture.” At the end of her episode, she spoke about what “cancel culture” is and how it needed to be held accountable.

“Cancel culture” refers to someone, usually a person of some kind of celebrity status, or a brand or company being called out for something they did wrong or controversial. That person or company is then “cancelled” or boycotted. Their reputation is usually very hurt and it can be hard for them to recover. “Cancel culture” also doesn’t give people a chance to learn from or apologize for their wrongdoings.

Some recent examples would include author J.K. Rowling, Dr. Seuss, Chris Harrison, or even Mr. Potato Head. You can look up examples of people or companies that have been “cancelled” and I’m sure you would recognize some of the events as they are often publicized.

In an article about “cancel culture”, someone compared it to a “medieval mob looking for someone to burn”. It’s main platform is Twitter, but often is found on any social media. If you look up “cancel culture” you’ll see that a lot of people are calling for the cancelation of “cancel culture” itself, yet it’s very hard to get rid of. This kind of culture makes people walk on eggshells, because they’re so scared to mess up and get cancelled. It leads to people being overly cautious on what they say and do, not standing up for what they truly believe in for fear of backlash, and ultimately letting accounts on Twitter decide what is and isn’t acceptable.

This is not how we, as Christians, are called to live.

Jesus himself knew He would be “cancelled” eventually. Matthew 16:21 tells us that “from that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” People decided that what Jesus was doing was “wrong” according to them and called for his death.

The difference is, Jesus knew what He was doing would get Him “cancelled” and He still proceeded. We are called as Christians to follow these footsteps and not give into the fear that “cancel culture” sets before us.

In Mark 13, Jesus is talking to his disciples about signs of the end times. Mark 13:13, says “Everyone will hate you because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.” Jesus knows that as Christians, we will receive backlash and ultimately we could be the ones that get “cancelled”. Yet he calls us to stand firm.

Again, we are called to stand firm in the Lord, despite the fear that we may get “cancelled”.

Read another article about cancel culture that was recently a part of the What’s Josh Reading posts.