wordsmith.social/jonbeckett

Sometimes while browsing the social internet I notice names that have been absent from the algorithmic timeline for quite some time. Names that have cancelled me for daring to question — no matter how quietly — their soap-box tirades.

Obama's words at the youth summit come to mind;

“This idea of purity and you're never compromised and you're always politically 'woke' and all that stuff, you should get over that quickly. The world is messy; there are ambiguities. People who do really good stuff have flaws.”

There is a danger that if you filter out voices that don't fall in step with your own, your view of the world becomes narrow — polarised. It's too easy to convince yourself that people are either with you or against you.

It occurs to me that those cancelling others become the objectionable voices cancelled in turn. It's self defeating.