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Coming to terms with cancel culture ...

The times, they are a changin'

By Jeremy GosnellPublished 2 years ago 9 min read
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Several years ago I was working at a telecommunications retail store, a mobile phone shop basically. One day a mother came into the store followed by her young(ish) child. My friend Josh rushed over to see what she needed, and quickly learned she was shopping for a phone so she and her kiddo could stay connected. He immediately started his corporately ingrained sales process, running through the gauntlet of features on all the newest phones. He was winding down his presentation as the woman settled on the iphone X. Then, suddenly the interaction shifted. It was when Josh asked the question, “What color does he want?” that the proverbial shit hit the fan.

“He?” the woman replied, staring at Josh in disgust. “Clearly, this is a little girl.” Quickly Josh and the entire store learned her daughter was transitioning (male to female) and inadvertently Josh had shattered her sense of identity and self. Despite repeated apologies, the woman proceeded to berate Josh for a good five minutes before the store manager stepped in and asked the woman to leave. We thought the incident was over, when days later we got a call from corporate explaining that the mother had contacted them, and action had to be taken to ensure the child (and her mother) was treated “fairly.” Josh would need a few days off work to attend courses on gender diversity, and it’s possible his future with the company was in jeopardy. Our manager assured the corporate office this was an honest mistake (and it was) but that didn’t suffice. Additionally, the little girl was to be awarded a new iphone free of charge, and an additional 250.00 in store credit which she could spend however she pleased.

For years, I regarded this incident as an example of cancel culture run amok. Josh was a good guy, he made an honest mistake. His job was in jeopardy, and missing multiple days of work when in commissioned sales can cost a small fortune, especially during the holiday season. It seemed an unreasonable crime for something innocent. And for the perceived “victim” to receive a free 900.00 phone and store credit as recompense, I thought was over the top.

My attitude was reinforced as I watched Kevin Hart replaced as host of the Oscars over a homophobic joke, and as celebrity after celebrity was dethroned for posts, tweets, and jokes they made years ago. It seemed as though the world had grown far too sensitive and that free speech was under assault from the far left.

So why has my opinion changed? First, let’s examine where cancel culture came from, and how it’s risen to prominence in the modern era. Cancel culture has appeared as my generation, the infamous millennials, have made our way into more senior positions across a multitude of industries. Millennials have tightened the noose on how employees, celebrities, journalists, and nearly anyone interacts with the world around us. Why are we so damn sensitive, and why do we demand such a high standard of accountability for perceived slights?

I propose it all leads back to capitalism. Let me explain. Prior to the 1980s the United States was embraced by a form of capitalism that encouraged companies to produce high quality products for their consumers, and additionally treat their employees well. Health benefits were common, as were labor unions, and the gap between CEO pay and employee pay was a fraction of what it is now. We often refer to the 1950s-1970s as America’s golden age. A household could survive with just one member working. Home ownership was common among Americans in their late twenties, and college was ultimately affordable. That changed in the 1980s with Gordon Gecko, the famed Wall Street shark and inspiration for the film The Wolf of Wall Street. Gordon Gecko proposed that greed was actually good, and the real measure of a company's success wasn’t the quality of its products or the health of its labor force, but in fact the profit of its shareholders. Somehow, this mentality infiltrated American capitalism and within a few years it became the operating procedure of nearly every publicly traded American company. It was this mentality that ushered in low wages, pathetic benefits packages, and the outsourcing of American manufacturing jobs to low cost nations like China and India.

Advertising laws were relaxed, and the consolidation of major corporations meant that the same 5 or 6 companies owned damn near everything. The gap between rich and poor grew, and within a few decades the American middle class was all but wiped out. While I don’t have hard data to support this, I would fathom a guess that the Greed is Good shift in American capitalism led to the housing crisis of 2008 and the great recession.

All of the wealth that should have insured millennials entered a workforce with a high percentage of labor unions, good pay, and realistic benefits had been transferred to 1 or 2 percent of those at the top. The cost of college had become so profit incentivized that many of us couldn't afford it without taking on high interest student loans. Laws were even enacted to ensure shareholder profits came before all else. It’s these very laws that allowed Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter. Since Musk was offering shareholders well above Twitter’s current share price, the Twitter board couldn’t deny the sale, otherwise they would be short changing their shareholders.

All this left the millennials a country that was broken. The struggle to get ahead was so fruitless, many gave up and decided to live out of vans. Home ownership became a pipe dream, and the promise of American greatness seemed as distant as the 1960s moon missions. How could our generation enact any social change when our world was controlled by a small handful of corporations protected by laws that encouraged greed, deceit, and wealth inequality.

The short answer, we couldn’t. However, not all hope was lost. We accepted that if we couldn’t change the stars of American capitalism, we could at least interject some of our social beliefs into the mainstream. The majority of millennials agree on a few tenants of American decency. One, is that gay people deserve to live their life authentically as themselves. Two, mental health is a big deal and it should be respected, openly treated, and those suffering shouldn’t be austresized. Third, racism is a problem and it simply shouldn’t be accepted. Fourth, women are equal to men and their treatment over time has been despicable. They’re needed now more than ever in high ranking positions across the board. Fifth, our planet is dying and previous generations have accelerated its death with appalling environmental policies. Finally, in order to ensure these social virtues are respected, taught and given the opportunity to flourish, there must be accountability for those that openly disregard them.

It was largely the millennial generation that nurtured the #metoo movement to the point that Hollywood powerhouses like Harvey Weinstien and Bill Cosby were brought to justice. It was largely millennials that opened the dialogue about mental health, and held those that disregarded it accountable for their insensitivity. It was largely millenials that ensured the success of Barack Obama’s candidacy and brought forth a president that progressed an agenda of gay rights and climate restoration. Obama’s hallmark achievement was Obamacare, which brought a large number of millennials under the umbrella of health care coverage for the first time. It was millennials that picked up our new fangled camera phones and recorded incident after incident of police brutality against black men. And, it was millenials that demanded reform from a society that once turned a blind eye to the plight of inner city minorities that had long been forgotten and demonized. Hell, it was millennials that said, “You know what marijuana is actually pretty helpful for a whole range of medical struggles.”

We millenials should be proud, because it isn’t #metoo or the conviction of murderer Derek Chauvin, or even the election of Barack Obama (and today Joe Biden) that stands as our greatest achievement. It’s the fact that Gen Z has gleefully picked up the mantle we lifted and started running with it. It’s Gen Z that is promoting an agenda of trans-rights and further decorating the LGBTQIA flag with more colors than ever. It’s Gen Z that simply won’t tolerate bigotry in any form, and has the guts and gumption to actually NEVER shop at a retailer again if they display disgraceful social or employment policies. It’s also Gen Z that is proudly bucking the economic system of America by refusing to work and touring the nation by van for a living. They’ve cracked the code of wealth via YouTube and TikTok. Many of them are professional video gamers and bloggers. Piece by piece they are building a new financial system where the currency is free time, not money.

Frankly, corporate America and those at the top are scared. Before, it was easy to disqualify someone from the American dream on the basis of their race, sexual idenity, or because they struggled with mental illness. Do that today and get caught, and you just might get canceled. It was easy for a comedian who was paid 10 million dollars for a comedy special to spend an hour denigrating the marginalized. Today, well there are consequences for that shit.

Together, the millennials and Gen Z have had such a profound effect that our ideology of change is infiltrating America’s education system, a process that will ensure the next generation is even more effective than we have been. Yes, critical race theory is a hot button topic, but like it or not it’s coming to a school near you and we millennials and Gen Z feel it’s necessary and warranted. So no, we may not have big expensive homes, luxury cars, or all the trimmings of a decades old baby boomer career, but we are building a better world.

We got together and said, okay if you’re going to leave us a broken planet, a disastrous and unfair economic system, and roadblock after roadblock to achieving success, you’re at least going to treat ALL of us with some basic respect, or we won’t fucking buy the shit you are selling. And in doing so, we redefined the American dream. No longer is it the hope of the youth to work their way up the corporate ladder so they can exert power over others while obtaining wealth. Today, the American dream is a renovated van and the open road. Both attainable and achievable for anyone.

So yes, cancel culture may make us uncomfortable some of the time, but it is both a justifiable and necessary response to the wrongs of the past that left two generations with more problems than solutions. We should all come to terms with it, because like Bob Dylan said, “The times are a changin.”

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