We should all shun cancel culture

Gina Carano

“Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighbors…even by children. Because history is edited, most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?”

The elitists who run the cancel culture say those words are offensive. For the crime of posting them on social media, Gina Carano, of Mandalorian fame, will never work at Disney again. For good measure, United Talent Agency also dropped her as a client.

Lucasfilm justified its vicious virtue signaling by saying that Carano’s “social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable.” 

Ordinary people, like me, are flummoxed. Just like Carano, we have “liked” and “shared” and “retweeted” this very meme for months. Out of respect for the horrific sufferings of the Jews, we say their names. We are appalled that German civilization, at the apex of high culture, could so quickly fall to such depths of barbarism. 

We solemnly vow, “Never again,” with meaning and determination. We are not content merely to condemn dead villains who no longer have power to kill. We are, rather, intent on rooting out their evil ideas—ideas that perverted an entire culture. Only by critiquing their worldview can we be equipped to stand against totalitarianism even when its purveyors no longer wear jack boots and brown shirts.

How Lucasfilm and its cancel culture masters can pretend that this is somehow “denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities,” boggles the mind. In a search for answers, I turned to Wikipedia. That crowd-sourced repository of left-leaning information helpfully explained: “Many critics interpreted the post as comparing American conservatives to Jews in Nazi Germany.” (Wikipedia accessed: 2/17/21)

Apparently, comparing American conservatives to Jews denigrates Jews. Wow! To quote a meme I recently read, “How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?” 

Antifa operatives spent the summer bullying minorities, burning their businesses and pressuring police to abandon the innocent poor to the terrorism of lawless gangs. All the while, they called their opponents “Nazis”—and got away with it. Celebrities and politicians that fawned over their agenda and supported their riots were lionized, not canceled.

But when Gina Carano identifies with Jews who were brutalized and vandalized by their fellow citizens, the Twitter mob proves her right by mercilessly attacking her own person and career. This is “viewpoint discrimination” on full display. Some viewpoints are rewarded while others are bludgeoned into silence.

The central point of the meme that got Carano canceled is that the Nazi government did not begin with direct action against the Jews. It began by encouraging common citizens—even children—to do their dirty work for them. 

They did this with a combination of propaganda and a weaponized legal code. Propaganda convinced once-civilized Germans to turn against their neighbors. An unjust application of the law turned a blind eye to assaults on Jews, but prosecuted their attempts at self-defense.

We see these same dynamics at work today. It is up to common citizens to recognize when they are being propagandized by the gatekeepers of information. Media sources that incite citizens to hate each other should be turned off and tuned out. 

Likewise, it is incumbent on all of us to stand against unequal application of the law and every misuse of the justice system. “Liberty and justice for all” is not just an empty slogan. It flows from the proposition that all men are created equal. And, it is a bulwark against the evils of the cancel culture.

Also published in the Wyoming Tribune Eagle on 2/19/21.