Conservatives should critique, not copy, left-wing cancel culture.
I was working at The Christian Post during the Obama administration and spent a lot of time reporting on the many incidences of left-wing cancel culture at the time. I still recall the disappointment I felt in many of my left-leaning friends’ unwillingness to critique their own side. I was thankful, however, to befriend others on the left during this time, such as Will Saletan and Kirsten Powers, who were willing stand up for the rights of conservatives, even when they disagreed with them. Powers authored a book on the topic in 2015 titled, The Silencing: How the Left is Killing Free Speech.
I’ve never mentioned this publicly before, but when I was a professor and interviewing for many tenure track positions, there was at least one job, maybe more, I know I did not get because of my conservative views. It’s hard to describe the feeling of being on the receiving end of cancel culture, especially from people who claim to value classical liberalism and tolerance.
Today, as government power has shifted from left to right, so has cancel culture.1 There are many recent examples, but the cancellation of Jimmy Kimmel hits a new low due to its absurdity.
After Kimmel made some jokes related to the death of Charlie Kirk (video here), FCC Chairman Brendan Carr threatened ABC, which is owned by Disney. ABC then removed Kimmel from the air indefinitely. Ironically, this is happening after claims that Kirk died a free speech hero.
Notably, ABC’s decision came after Nexstar announced it would pre-empt Kimmel’s program. Nexstar is currently in negotiations to acquire a rival company for $6.2 billion, which will need FCC approval.
Kimmel had mischaracterized the political beliefs of Kirk’s alleged shooter as MAGA, something Kimmel said he had planned to address Wednesday before the show was canceled. Kimmel also mocked Trump’s reaction to the death of Kirk. Regardless of the reason, in a free society government officials shouldn’t be dictating what jokes are acceptable.
And now I’m witnessing many of my right leaning friends tie themselves in knots trying to defend this. That same feeling of disappointment I felt for my lefty friends during the Obama administration I feel for my righty friends today.
Kimmel isn’t the only victim of right-wing cancel culture this week. At least 15 people so far, including MSNBC political analyst Matthew Dowd, have been fired or suspended for not mourning Kirk the right way due to an online campaign by MAGA activists. If you’re not opposed to cancel culture when it comes from your own tribe, you’re not really opposed to cancel culture.
If you’re not opposed to cancel culture when it comes from your own tribe, you’re not really opposed to cancel culture.
If you consider yourself on the right side of American politics, your voice is especially important right now. This is not a time to remain silent or, worse still, defend these actions. Show that you will defend the rights of those you may disagree with. Or as in this case, the right to joke about the president and his allies.
If you consider yourself on the left side of American politics, remember how you feel right now. The right wing will not be in control of the government forever, assuming we remain a democracy. The cancel culture pendulum may yet swing back to the left. That is when your voice will become important. Show that you will defend the rights of those you may disagree with.
What Else We’re Reading
More in Common: “Attitudes towards political violence in the United States”
Social media discourse skews towards the extremes.
Democrats and Republicans alike both vastly overestimate their political opponents' support for political violence.
Americans are concerned that there's going to be more political violence in the future.
Americans want unity, constructive dialogue, and respect for freedom of speech.
YouGov: “What Americans really think about political violence”
Younger and more liberal Americans are more likely than older or more conservative Americans to say political violence can sometimes be justified, but this remains a minority opinion among these groups. Among the very liberal, 25% say political violence can sometimes be justified and 55% say it can't; among adults under 30, 19% say it can be justified and 51% say it can't.
RNS: “Charlie Kirk's AI resurrection reveals new era of digital grief”
Megachurch pastor Jack Graham was in the middle of his Sunday message to Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas, this past weekend when he paused to cue up an unusual sermon illustration. After encouraging people to respond to the killing of conservative Christian activist Charlie Kirk by turning to God, he instructed the congregation to listen to a roughly minute-long audio clip of what sounded like Kirk delivering a short speech.
“Hear what Charlie is saying regarding what happened to him this past week,” Graham said.
As the clip, which encouraged listeners to “pick up your cross, and get back in the fight,” ended, the congregation burst into applause. A few seconds later, they rose to their feet in a standing ovation.
David French: “There Are Monsters in Your Midst, Too”
If, say, you’re a highly partisan Republican, you will often look at corruption and acts of violence by your partisan opponents and say, “That’s just what the left does” or “That’s what leftism leads to.” Corruption and violence reveal the left’s true nature.
If a right-leaning extremist commits an act of violence — or if a Republican is brazenly corrupt — then the response is different. “Every orchard has a few bad apples” or “How dare you compare me to that terrible person?” or “Normal Republicans are nothing like that.”
As a result, no matter the facts of the moment, you end up mad at the opposition. If a left-leaning assassin kills a Republican, then you’re angry because the left is violent. If a right-leaning assassin kills a Democrat, then you’re angry because the left blames the right for what is obviously an evil individual act.
Online algorithms magnify the problem. They recognize that you are hungry for content that amplifies every bad act by your political enemies and that you hate to read or see any form of attack on your friends, so you live in a carefully curated false reality.
Liberal Currents: “Yes, It’s the Guns. It’s Also the Phones. Life online is corroding the virtues that make liberal democratic life tenable.”
A confounding aspect of where we are right now as a country is that the everyday person in their home or workplace is horrified and frightened by acts of violence, political or otherwise. But the people we are online are often not. Moreover, who we are online matters deeply for the state of our democracy and the nature of our society. It’s no longer tenable, in the year 2025, to delineate between the digital world and “real life.” The bile we swim in daily, sometimes for hours on end, is corroding the virtues that make liberal democratic life tenable. And, even among the most responsible of us, the deleterious effects of engaging our fellow citizens through a screen are nearly impossible to avoid.
Right-wing cancel culture existed during the Obama administration, and before, but it wasn’t dominant and didn’t have the use of government authority like we see today.
 | A guest post by
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