How do we think about cancel culture?

'Cancel Culture' needs to be properly defined

Question: How do we think about cancel culture?
Position‹4 of 4: There's no such thing as cancel culture
Argument: 'Cancel Culture' needs to be properly defined

The way in which this phenomenon is argued, tends to be diluted down to the point where it's rendered frivolous. A proper description needs to be determined if we are to take it seriously.

The argument

There is an ongoing dispute by all sides as to how to define this cultural phenomenon. We have an extreme view on one side that denies it exists and is merely a shield with which to avoid legitimate accountability by people of 'privilege' (which can define a wide group of people depending on the circumstances). On the other side, we have those who claim that any and all criticism levelled at them is a form of oppression and should be condemned. Thus you have those who deny that 'Cancel Culture' is even real. One can describe “cancel culture” as a situation in which a person is subjectively aggrieved but the legal route is not an option. As a result, repercussions are sought through shaming or ostracism taking the form of a type of “erasure” towards the 'offender', whereby the 'aggrieved' does not wish to be reminded of the 'offender’s' existence. The 'aggrieved' demand that those in their periphery follow suit by: a) not mentioning the 'offender's' name online (or when they do replace some letters with asterixis). Or b) ensuring that if the 'aggrieved' and those willing participants to his/her cause are "exposed" to this person unintentionally via another medium, then they are to declare that medium is guilty of committing an offence to the 'aggrieved' and must face similar repercussions to the 'offender' unless they “repent”. Therefore, sending a signal to other mediums warning them to not have any reference of the 'offender' so the 'aggrieved' does not have to be reminded of them in their day-to-day life.

Premises

[P1]There is an ongoing dispute over how to define the phenomenon, with one side denying it exists—calling it merely a shield the privileged use to avoid accountability—and another treating all criticism as oppression. [P2] Without an agreed definition (one candidate being a subjectively aggrieved party seeking shaming, ostracism, or "erasure" where no legal route exists), claims about "cancel culture" cannot be meaningfully assessed. [C] 'Cancel culture' needs to be properly defined before one can even say whether it exists.

Counter-arguments

The body contradicts the position it is filed under. It goes on to supply a definition of cancel culture — a detailed one, describing an aggrieved party seeking shaming or erasure where a legal remedy is unavailable, together with the pressure placed on third parties to comply. A phenomenon that can be characterised at that level of specificity is not one of which there is no such thing. Difficulty in agreeing a definition is a fact about a contested term rather than evidence of an empty category: "populism", "terrorism" and "art" are all defined incompatibly by different speakers without anyone concluding their referents are absent. The definition offered is also constructed rather than observed, and it builds a motive into the description — that the aggrieved party simply does not wish to be reminded of the offender's existence — which converts a disputed empirical question into a stipulation. Nor are the two "extreme views" the body identifies adjudicated: noting that one flank denies the phenomenon and the other treats all criticism as oppression establishes that both overreach, which supports a moderate reading of a real thing, closer to the sibling position that the term is a myth in its inflated form than to the claim that nothing is there. The strongest case for this position — that individual episodes are better described as consequences, boycotts or ordinary criticism — is one this body never makes.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] That all sides dispute the definition shows the term is contested, not that its referent is absent; "populism" and "terrorism" are defined incompatibly without their referents being doubted. [Rejecting P2] The premise proceeds to supply a detailed definition of the phenomenon, including its mechanism and the pressure placed on third parties, which is inconsistent with the position that no such thing exists — and it stipulates the aggrieved party's motive rather than establishing it.