13 ms·

And fired from your job. And yelled at on the street. And prevented from working in your field ever again. And death threats. So, blacklisting: check. Excommun

by c06n 6y ago

And fired from your job. And yelled at on the street. And prevented from working in your field ever again. And death threats. So, blacklisting: check. Excommunication: check. I'd rather not wait till it goes down further.

tstrimple 6y ago
Who (apart from Colin Kaepernick) has been prevented from working in their field ever again?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
throwawaygh 6y ago
All of those things happen to homosexuals and non-Christians in huge geographic swathes of the country, and with MUCH greater frequency. When CPAC starts eg hosting FFRF or ADL speakers I'll take the cancel culture bugbear seriously.
- refenestrator 6y ago
  And that's really bad! Don't emulate it! "We're gonna hurt some people ourselves to get even" is the devil speaking.
  - throwawaygh 6y ago
    > Don't emulate it! Where in this thread do I justify or emulate? Please quote something from any of my posts that would give you the impression that I approve of "cancel culture". However, if people are genuinely concerned about chilling speech, then why are they spending so much effort to call out SJW in a tiny handful of big cities instead of raising hell about the overt and often legal discrimination that happens in tens of thousands of rural communities? It's hard for me to take the concern about cancel culture seriously when the concern is exclusively focused on one side of the political/cultural divide even though the phenomenon happens far more on the other side of that divide. I have zero confidence that such concerns are genuine.
    - refenestrator 6y ago
      If you're going to hold yourself up as the more enlightened group, it creates a bit of an obligation to act that way. In my book at least.
      - throwawaygh 6y ago
        > If you're going to hold yourself up as the more enlightened group, it creates a bit of an obligation to act that way. In my book at least. I'm pretty sure this is exactly what I'm saying ;-)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- read_if_gay_ 6y ago
  That is cancel culture too. No one upthread made this about political sides. Why are you?
  - throwawaygh 6y ago
    > No one upthread made this about political sides AFAICT every example in the article. I always assume that the contents of the article are upthread because I always assume people read the article before commenting :) Aside from the article, my impression is that "cancel culture" has a more specific meaning than you seem to prescribe. One on hand, we never called it "cancel culture" when a teacher is fired for being gay. And on the other, CPAC's theme this year is "America Uncanceled". My understanding is that, at this point, the term does have political content.
    - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
      Naive.
      - throwawaygh 6y ago
        Perhaps it is a bit naive to assume people read the article :).
        read_if_gay_ 6y ago
        Thanks for expanding your original reply, I can see how the term itself might come across as politically charged. It’d be better if it wasn’t used mostly in conjunction with the left.
    - throwaway894345 6y ago
      I think "cancel culture" definitely has some left-wing connotations, but I think that's because it came into existence at a time when the left was doing the majority of the canceling. In the aughts, "canceling" was mostly a conservative thing (usually criticizing the war effort) and it was much less egregious (if only because social media barely existed at the time). One prominent, egregious example of conservative cancellation from the time was the Dixie Chicks. So yeah, "cancellation" has some left-wing connotations, but it's not something that only the left can do. Further, there absolutely are hypocrites who criticize "cancel culture", but who happily try to cancel people they don't like. Hypocrites are bad, but there are still lots and lots of principled critics of cancel culture (indeed, I'm pretty sure most of the Harper's letter signatories are left-of-center). That there are hypocrites doesn't validate cancel culture. Also, if you're upset about the left-wing connotations, the proper response is not to try to legitimize cancel culture, but rather to persuade your political associates to behave better for sake of the brand. TL;DR: Canceling is bad no matter who does it; recently it's mostly been the woke left who have been doing it so it does have some political connotations; sometimes people are disingenuous in criticizing "cancel culture".
- fallingknife 6y ago
  First of all nobody is saying its good when right wingers do it. But here is Bernie Sanders invited to make a speech at the right wing Liberty University: https://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9323041/bernie-sanders-liberty-university https://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9323041/bernie-sanders-liberty...
  - throwawaygh 6y ago
    In the general case, you're not allowed to teach at Liberty unless you're a very specific type of conservative christian. A statement of faith is a required component of the faculty application packet. The student code of conduct prohibits homosexual behavior. Passing off Liberty as a bastion of free expression because they invited Sanders to give a speech is beyond disingenuous, and a perfect example of the enormous double standard in discussions of "cancel culture" right now.
    - fallingknife 6y ago
      First of all I never said or implied that it was a "bastion of free speech" > In the general case, you're not allowed to teach at Liberty unless you're a very specific type of conservative christian. Let's not pretend that you are allowed to teach at Harvard, at least in certain departments, without a very specific political leaning. And certain other political leanings are not allowed in any department. > A statement of faith is a required component of the faculty application packet. UC requires a mandatory "diversity statement" for faculty job applications: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/11/19/mathematician-comes-out-against-mandatory-diversity-statements-while-others-say-they https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/11/19/mathematician...
      - throwawaygh 6y ago
        > Let's not pretend that you are allowed to teach at Harvard, at least in certain departments, without a very specific political leaning. And certain other political leanings are not allowed in any department. I can't speak to all of Harvard's departments, but I know it's completely possible to have a wide variety of political viewpoints in SEAS. The faculty itself is probably to the right of the immediately surrounding community (that that this means much in Boston Metro, but I think it's probably true in the case of SEAS). > UC requires a mandatory "diversity statement" for faculty job applications: Diversity statements typically focus on a certain type of service and teaching activity. The "how it effects my teaching and advising" part of the statement could talk about making special efforts in your teaching to help first generation college students, or supporting students who aren't neurotypical, or being really good at working with the specific circumstances of students who come from non-traditional backgrounds (eg adult learners). The outreach/service portion of the statement could discuss bringing resources to underserved rural communities. Or providing learning opportunities for prisoners. Or a million other things. Source: actually did this. Got job offers. The fact that you think writing a "diversity statement" means you have to fit a certain political mold says a lot more about what you think diversity means than about diversity statement requirements. The diversity statement is about proving that you can at the very least create an inclusive learning environment for people from non-traditional backgrounds. Why in god's name should this be political, or in fact not a requirement for a teacher? Comparing diversity statements to statements of religious faith is absurd. If you can't write a page about eg helping autism spectrum students succeed in CS 1, and someone else can, then you might not be the best candidate for a CS 1 lecturer. Opinions on the Westminster Catechism, on the other hand, are not relevant to teaching students about linked lists.
- xenophonB 6y ago
  It's not 1960 lol, there are not vast swathes of the country where that happens, since the liberal left has almost total control via the Federal bureaucracy for enforcing their values everywhere, not just in blue states
  - throwawaygh 6y ago
    This isn’t true.
shadowgovt 6y ago
Very little of that is new ("You'll never work in this town again" is an old statement). What has changed is that the Internet and the associated record of a person's conduct online can make the town very, very big indeed.
omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago
I think the point is this had been around for a while, and what people are calling "cancel culture" is the same old-same old, but with (hopefully) less prison/death. There's nothing new about receiving negative feedback for having and expressing unpopular opinions. That's really common in pretty much every single social group I've been in, including on HN.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  People are upset now that the current is shifting and you get shunned for being racist, rather than being shunned for not speaking properly or whatever the heck. The underlying mechanism has not really changed.
  - refenestrator 6y ago
    It's specifically about speaking properly. Nobody gives a shit when Uber classifies their drivers as independent contractors to stiff them on benefits, but everybody cares about the propriety of master/slave replication terminology. We're dealing with police violence by capitalizing Black in our style guides. Etc etc etc.
    - whimsicalism 6y ago
      > Nobody gives a shit when Uber classifies their drivers as independent contractors to stiff them on benefits, I think quite a few people gave a shit? I think you're attacking a straw man, it is perfectly possible to have opinions on small stylistic issues (like master vs main) while also thinking that there are fundamental economic things that need to change.
      - refenestrator 6y ago
        Uber's referendum won in California. I'm sure that people 'care', and I suppose I'm straw-manning those people.. I'm not straw-manning the system. Time and again, challenges to monetary order aren't permitted but puritanical word-propriety is encouraged. It's an energy outlet.
whimsicalism 6y ago
Half a century ago, in Japan, someone wrote a fictional story critical of the Emperor, and someone broke into the publishers house and murdered their housekeeper and severely injured their wife. [0] In response to the murder, the writer was pretty much universally condemned and the a bill was introduced in the legislature to ban writings of that sort. The fact that so many have convinced themselves that somehow we're in some new illiberal age is comical. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimanaka_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimanaka_incident
- lainga 6y ago
  Well, peoples' expectations have changed in America since we declared independence from Japan.
  - slg 6y ago
    I am curious what era of US history do you think was free of this stuff?
    - dragonwriter 6y ago
      For right-leaning, racist, sexist White male elites? Most of it. Which is why that's where most of the whining that this is a new and dangerous phenomenon is coming from. Heck, the government hyperfocus on rooting out Communism began almost immediately after the suggestion of turning the same apparatus against the KKK was rebuffed because of that organizations loyalty and patriotism.
  - whimsicalism 6y ago
    I erroneously thought the critic in the article was Japanese, although the "sir" should have been an obvious giveaway. In the states, just off the top of my head: the McCarthy era, the reaction to the 1968 Olympic raised fist incident
    - lainga 6y ago
      I guessed as much :)
conception 6y ago
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EuCsAqKWYAkfEIF.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EuCsAqKWYAkfEIF.jpg
AngryData 6y ago
I agree with your sentiment, but it wasn't that long ago that people were being brought to court in the US just for accusations of being socialist or communist. Any there wasn't even anything against the law with have different economic ideals.

by c06n 6y ago

tstrimple 6y ago

Who (apart from Colin Kaepernick) has been prevented from working in their field ever again?

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

throwawaygh 6y ago

All of those things happen to homosexuals and non-Christians in huge geographic swathes of the country, and with MUCH greater frequency. When CPAC starts eg hosting FFRF or ADL speakers I'll take the cancel culture bugbear seriously.

refenestrator 6y ago
And that's really bad! Don't emulate it! "We're gonna hurt some people ourselves to get even" is the devil speaking.
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  > Don't emulate it! Where in this thread do I justify or emulate? Please quote something from any of my posts that would give you the impression that I approve of "cancel culture". However, if people are genuinely concerned about chilling speech, then why are they spending so much effort to call out SJW in a tiny handful of big cities instead of raising hell about the overt and often legal discrimination that happens in tens of thousands of rural communities? It's hard for me to take the concern about cancel culture seriously when the concern is exclusively focused on one side of the political/cultural divide even though the phenomenon happens far more on the other side of that divide. I have zero confidence that such concerns are genuine.
  - refenestrator 6y ago
    If you're going to hold yourself up as the more enlightened group, it creates a bit of an obligation to act that way. In my book at least.
    - throwawaygh 6y ago
      > If you're going to hold yourself up as the more enlightened group, it creates a bit of an obligation to act that way. In my book at least. I'm pretty sure this is exactly what I'm saying ;-)
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
read_if_gay_ 6y ago
That is cancel culture too. No one upthread made this about political sides. Why are you?
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  > No one upthread made this about political sides AFAICT every example in the article. I always assume that the contents of the article are upthread because I always assume people read the article before commenting :) Aside from the article, my impression is that "cancel culture" has a more specific meaning than you seem to prescribe. One on hand, we never called it "cancel culture" when a teacher is fired for being gay. And on the other, CPAC's theme this year is "America Uncanceled". My understanding is that, at this point, the term does have political content.
  - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
    Naive.
    - throwawaygh 6y ago
      Perhaps it is a bit naive to assume people read the article :).
      - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
        Thanks for expanding your original reply, I can see how the term itself might come across as politically charged. It’d be better if it wasn’t used mostly in conjunction with the left.
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    I think "cancel culture" definitely has some left-wing connotations, but I think that's because it came into existence at a time when the left was doing the majority of the canceling. In the aughts, "canceling" was mostly a conservative thing (usually criticizing the war effort) and it was much less egregious (if only because social media barely existed at the time). One prominent, egregious example of conservative cancellation from the time was the Dixie Chicks. So yeah, "cancellation" has some left-wing connotations, but it's not something that only the left can do. Further, there absolutely are hypocrites who criticize "cancel culture", but who happily try to cancel people they don't like. Hypocrites are bad, but there are still lots and lots of principled critics of cancel culture (indeed, I'm pretty sure most of the Harper's letter signatories are left-of-center). That there are hypocrites doesn't validate cancel culture. Also, if you're upset about the left-wing connotations, the proper response is not to try to legitimize cancel culture, but rather to persuade your political associates to behave better for sake of the brand. TL;DR: Canceling is bad no matter who does it; recently it's mostly been the woke left who have been doing it so it does have some political connotations; sometimes people are disingenuous in criticizing "cancel culture".
fallingknife 6y ago
First of all nobody is saying its good when right wingers do it. But here is Bernie Sanders invited to make a speech at the right wing Liberty University: https://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9323041/bernie-sanders-liberty-university https://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9323041/bernie-sanders-liberty...
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  In the general case, you're not allowed to teach at Liberty unless you're a very specific type of conservative christian. A statement of faith is a required component of the faculty application packet. The student code of conduct prohibits homosexual behavior. Passing off Liberty as a bastion of free expression because they invited Sanders to give a speech is beyond disingenuous, and a perfect example of the enormous double standard in discussions of "cancel culture" right now.
  - fallingknife 6y ago
    First of all I never said or implied that it was a "bastion of free speech" > In the general case, you're not allowed to teach at Liberty unless you're a very specific type of conservative christian. Let's not pretend that you are allowed to teach at Harvard, at least in certain departments, without a very specific political leaning. And certain other political leanings are not allowed in any department. > A statement of faith is a required component of the faculty application packet. UC requires a mandatory "diversity statement" for faculty job applications: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/11/19/mathematician-comes-out-against-mandatory-diversity-statements-while-others-say-they https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/11/19/mathematician...
    - throwawaygh 6y ago
      > Let's not pretend that you are allowed to teach at Harvard, at least in certain departments, without a very specific political leaning. And certain other political leanings are not allowed in any department. I can't speak to all of Harvard's departments, but I know it's completely possible to have a wide variety of political viewpoints in SEAS. The faculty itself is probably to the right of the immediately surrounding community (that that this means much in Boston Metro, but I think it's probably true in the case of SEAS). > UC requires a mandatory "diversity statement" for faculty job applications: Diversity statements typically focus on a certain type of service and teaching activity. The "how it effects my teaching and advising" part of the statement could talk about making special efforts in your teaching to help first generation college students, or supporting students who aren't neurotypical, or being really good at working with the specific circumstances of students who come from non-traditional backgrounds (eg adult learners). The outreach/service portion of the statement could discuss bringing resources to underserved rural communities. Or providing learning opportunities for prisoners. Or a million other things. Source: actually did this. Got job offers. The fact that you think writing a "diversity statement" means you have to fit a certain political mold says a lot more about what you think diversity means than about diversity statement requirements. The diversity statement is about proving that you can at the very least create an inclusive learning environment for people from non-traditional backgrounds. Why in god's name should this be political, or in fact not a requirement for a teacher? Comparing diversity statements to statements of religious faith is absurd. If you can't write a page about eg helping autism spectrum students succeed in CS 1, and someone else can, then you might not be the best candidate for a CS 1 lecturer. Opinions on the Westminster Catechism, on the other hand, are not relevant to teaching students about linked lists.
xenophonB 6y ago
It's not 1960 lol, there are not vast swathes of the country where that happens, since the liberal left has almost total control via the Federal bureaucracy for enforcing their values everywhere, not just in blue states
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  This isn’t true.

shadowgovt 6y ago

Very little of that is new ("You'll never work in this town again" is an old statement). What has changed is that the Internet and the associated record of a person's conduct online can make the town very, very big indeed.

omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago

I think the point is this had been around for a while, and what people are calling "cancel culture" is the same old-same old, but with (hopefully) less prison/death. There's nothing new about receiving negative feedback for having and expressing unpopular opinions. That's really common in pretty much every single social group I've been in, including on HN.

whimsicalism 6y ago
People are upset now that the current is shifting and you get shunned for being racist, rather than being shunned for not speaking properly or whatever the heck. The underlying mechanism has not really changed.
- refenestrator 6y ago
  It's specifically about speaking properly. Nobody gives a shit when Uber classifies their drivers as independent contractors to stiff them on benefits, but everybody cares about the propriety of master/slave replication terminology. We're dealing with police violence by capitalizing Black in our style guides. Etc etc etc.
  - whimsicalism 6y ago
    > Nobody gives a shit when Uber classifies their drivers as independent contractors to stiff them on benefits, I think quite a few people gave a shit? I think you're attacking a straw man, it is perfectly possible to have opinions on small stylistic issues (like master vs main) while also thinking that there are fundamental economic things that need to change.
    - refenestrator 6y ago
      Uber's referendum won in California. I'm sure that people 'care', and I suppose I'm straw-manning those people.. I'm not straw-manning the system. Time and again, challenges to monetary order aren't permitted but puritanical word-propriety is encouraged. It's an energy outlet.

whimsicalism 6y ago

Half a century ago, in Japan, someone wrote a fictional story critical of the Emperor, and someone broke into the publishers house and murdered their housekeeper and severely injured their wife. [0] In response to the murder, the writer was pretty much universally condemned and the a bill was introduced in the legislature to ban writings of that sort. The fact that so many have convinced themselves that somehow we're in some new illiberal age is comical. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimanaka_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimanaka_incident

lainga 6y ago
Well, peoples' expectations have changed in America since we declared independence from Japan.
- slg 6y ago
  I am curious what era of US history do you think was free of this stuff?
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    For right-leaning, racist, sexist White male elites? Most of it. Which is why that's where most of the whining that this is a new and dangerous phenomenon is coming from. Heck, the government hyperfocus on rooting out Communism began almost immediately after the suggestion of turning the same apparatus against the KKK was rebuffed because of that organizations loyalty and patriotism.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  I erroneously thought the critic in the article was Japanese, although the "sir" should have been an obvious giveaway. In the states, just off the top of my head: the McCarthy era, the reaction to the 1968 Olympic raised fist incident
  - lainga 6y ago
    I guessed as much :)

conception 6y ago

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EuCsAqKWYAkfEIF.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EuCsAqKWYAkfEIF.jpg

AngryData 6y ago

I agree with your sentiment, but it wasn't that long ago that people were being brought to court in the US just for accusations of being socialist or communist. Any there wasn't even anything against the law with have different economic ideals.