Meet the author: Greg Lukianoff on The Canceling of the American Mind
Partners:
In association with:
From universities to public office, schools to social clubs, the pernicious reach of cancel culture seems to know no bounds. While ‘cancellation’ may once have been reserved for high-profile celebrities, now everyone – from charity directors to porters, activists to comedians – is vulnerable to being censored and punished for holding the ‘wrong’ opinions. Social ostracisation, career derailment and even jail sentences are a genuine threat to those who seek to speak freely.
However, critics of the very idea of ‘cancel culture’ argue that a changing attitude to public discourse is a good thing – with protective measures and accountability providing safe spaces for historically marginalised communities. Cancel culture, they say, is merely ‘consequence culture’ – an overdue course correction to rein in old-fashioned bigotry. Social media and the internet have presented new challenges – from fake news to trolling – with many now arguing that free speech is simply too rife with dangers to be allowed.
In The Canceling of the American Mind, the president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), Greg Lukianoff, and his co-author Rikki Schlott explore how workplaces and universities across all domains – including science, medicine, media, academia, finance and law – have internalised a culture of fear about expressing dissenting views. Moreover, they have adopted the practice of strategically quelling speech unpopular among the elite (by which the authors effectively mean ‘the ruling class’). Meticulously documenting cancel culture as a pervasive force that has taken over American institutions, Lukianoff and Schlott point out that Britain has not been immune to cancel culture either, from the firing of Kathleen Stock and cancellation campaigns against JK Rowling to the suspension of Cambridge’s Nathan Cofnas.
Building upon his groundbreaking text, The Coddling of the American Mind – which has influenced much of the understanding of the roots of cancel culture – Lukianoff articulates the dire problems present in political engagement across the English-speaking world. Should we resist the pessimism underlying ‘You Can’t Say That!’ culture, and try to figure out concrete solutions to reclaim a culture of free speech? Or are sceptics right, that free speech is too dangerous in a febrile public square – particularly online? And, as Lukianoff suggests, are the problems with cancel culture both external in our institutions and bureaucracies, and internal – with the ever-present need to check our own inclinations to cancel our adversaries and stand up to the policemen in our own heads?
