Leonardo Fennell is a research intern at Civitas.
The viral controversy surrounding Ed Sheeran in recent weeks has, once again, reopened the debate around cancel culture, throwing another log on the fires of the culture wars and renewing the conflict between free speech and a supposed right not to be offended.
Yet, the Sheeran controversy is particularly revealing because it is difficult to identify exactly what form of cancellation is taking place. Sheeran faced backlash from pro-Palestinian members of the public after Macklemore was removed from his tour, following pressure from venue owners. Macklemore had himself faced pressure from pro-Israel groups after making pro-Palestinian statements on stage, leading to criticism of Sheeran for his role in Macklemore’s removal.
It is a peculiar example of cancel culture because cancellation appears to be moving in multiple directions and across both sides of the political divide. Perhaps the natural conclusion is that we still do not really understand what cancel culture is, nor why people do it.
The problem begins when we see cancel culture as a completely new phenomenon of the modern age, rather than as the latest form of social policing that has existed throughout human history. As I argue in my new Civitas report, Combatting Cancel Culture, this distinction matters because it allows us to separate cancel culture, which can go too far, from the human need for moral social policing, which is undoubtedly necessary.
If this is not immediately obvious, imagine what society would look like if we never told off children for biting strangers on the Tube. Social policing helps a society establish moral boundaries, reinforcing the standards necessary for social cohesion and trust.
Cancel culture is a form of this moral social policing. It becomes corrupted, however, when it no longer reflects a broadly cohesive society enforcing shared moral standards. Instead, it becomes a weapon used by increasingly polarised groups attempting to subjugate one another and establish moral hegemony. In short, it is the unfortunate response of a divided society that has lost much of its unifying moral framework originally found in Christianity.
For centuries, this moral framework was shaped in the West by the idea that to be human is to be flawed, and that punishment should not simply inflict humiliation and retaliation, but seek to restore the offender to society. Through punishment followed by mercy, society can enforce moral boundaries without permanently isolating the individual or pretending that only others are capable of wrongdoing. It is a social practice that mirrors the deeper Christian understanding that human beings are tainted by Original Sin yet remain capable of forgiveness and redemption.
The absence of mercy in modern cancel culture reveals a system of moral policing that has abandoned this Christian understanding of human nature and, in its place, absorbed philosophies that can encourage our worst tribal instincts: above all, the instinct to see our opponents as morally irredeemable and ourselves as morally righteous.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s vision of the naturally innocent individual corrupted by society being the crucial example. If society is understood primarily as the source of our corruption, moral responsibility can increasingly be directed outwards, towards the structures and individuals supposedly responsible for our condition. This can encourage a politics of competing victimhood, in which one side claims the status of blameless victim while the other is cast as the culpable aggressor. The result is a bitter cycle of resentment, division and scapegoating.
However, if cancel culture is partly a symptom of a damaging understanding of human nature, there is both cause for concern about the difficulty of changing this view and hope that a better understanding could make cancel culture more productive for civil society.
The bad news is that reorienting people towards a philosophy that recognises our common flaws and demands responsibility for our own moral state is difficult. There may simply be less enthusiasm for practising patience in judgement, extending mercy to our neighbours and accepting that we too are capable of being wrong. It is easier to pay lip-service to these ideals when they are directed at other people.
But there is hope in the fact that this is not ultimately a problem belonging to the left or the right. If cancel culture grows from our tendency to see ourselves as morally righteous and our opponents as morally corrupt, then the corrective is available to everyone.But there is hope in the fact that this is not ultimately a problem belonging to the left or the right. If cancel culture grows from our tendency to see ourselves as morally righteous and our opponents as morally corrupt, then the corrective is available to everyone.
A renewed emphasis on human fallibility, personal responsibility and mercy could provide something that the culture wars currently lack: a moral principle of humility that both sides could embrace to cultivate the conditions for good-faith debate. Perhaps our moral focus should be less on Ed Sheeran at all and redirected on the areas of our life where we are not so virtuous.
The answer to cancel culture may therefore begin with a simple demand: start with yourself.
Leonardo Fennell is a research intern at Civitas.
The viral controversy surrounding Ed Sheeran in recent weeks has, once again, reopened the debate around cancel culture, throwing another log on the fires of the culture wars and renewing the conflict between free speech and a supposed right not to be offended.
Yet, the Sheeran controversy is particularly revealing because it is difficult to identify exactly what form of cancellation is taking place. Sheeran faced backlash from pro-Palestinian members of the public after Macklemore was removed from his tour, following pressure from venue owners. Macklemore had himself faced pressure from pro-Israel groups after making pro-Palestinian statements on stage, leading to criticism of Sheeran for his role in Macklemore’s removal.
It is a peculiar example of cancel culture because cancellation appears to be moving in multiple directions and across both sides of the political divide. Perhaps the natural conclusion is that we still do not really understand what cancel culture is, nor why people do it.
The problem begins when we see cancel culture as a completely new phenomenon of the modern age, rather than as the latest form of social policing that has existed throughout human history. As I argue in my new Civitas report, Combatting Cancel Culture, this distinction matters because it allows us to separate cancel culture, which can go too far, from the human need for moral social policing, which is undoubtedly necessary.
If this is not immediately obvious, imagine what society would look like if we never told off children for biting strangers on the Tube. Social policing helps a society establish moral boundaries, reinforcing the standards necessary for social cohesion and trust.
Cancel culture is a form of this moral social policing. It becomes corrupted, however, when it no longer reflects a broadly cohesive society enforcing shared moral standards. Instead, it becomes a weapon used by increasingly polarised groups attempting to subjugate one another and establish moral hegemony. In short, it is the unfortunate response of a divided society that has lost much of its unifying moral framework originally found in Christianity.
For centuries, this moral framework was shaped in the West by the idea that to be human is to be flawed, and that punishment should not simply inflict humiliation and retaliation, but seek to restore the offender to society. Through punishment followed by mercy, society can enforce moral boundaries without permanently isolating the individual or pretending that only others are capable of wrongdoing. It is a social practice that mirrors the deeper Christian understanding that human beings are tainted by Original Sin yet remain capable of forgiveness and redemption.
The absence of mercy in modern cancel culture reveals a system of moral policing that has abandoned this Christian understanding of human nature and, in its place, absorbed philosophies that can encourage our worst tribal instincts: above all, the instinct to see our opponents as morally irredeemable and ourselves as morally righteous.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s vision of the naturally innocent individual corrupted by society being the crucial example. If society is understood primarily as the source of our corruption, moral responsibility can increasingly be directed outwards, towards the structures and individuals supposedly responsible for our condition. This can encourage a politics of competing victimhood, in which one side claims the status of blameless victim while the other is cast as the culpable aggressor. The result is a bitter cycle of resentment, division and scapegoating.
However, if cancel culture is partly a symptom of a damaging understanding of human nature, there is both cause for concern about the difficulty of changing this view and hope that a better understanding could make cancel culture more productive for civil society.
The bad news is that reorienting people towards a philosophy that recognises our common flaws and demands responsibility for our own moral state is difficult. There may simply be less enthusiasm for practising patience in judgement, extending mercy to our neighbours and accepting that we too are capable of being wrong. It is easier to pay lip-service to these ideals when they are directed at other people.
But there is hope in the fact that this is not ultimately a problem belonging to the left or the right. If cancel culture grows from our tendency to see ourselves as morally righteous and our opponents as morally corrupt, then the corrective is available to everyone.But there is hope in the fact that this is not ultimately a problem belonging to the left or the right. If cancel culture grows from our tendency to see ourselves as morally righteous and our opponents as morally corrupt, then the corrective is available to everyone.
A renewed emphasis on human fallibility, personal responsibility and mercy could provide something that the culture wars currently lack: a moral principle of humility that both sides could embrace to cultivate the conditions for good-faith debate. Perhaps our moral focus should be less on Ed Sheeran at all and redirected on the areas of our life where we are not so virtuous.
The answer to cancel culture may therefore begin with a simple demand: start with yourself.