It seems like everyday in today’s society someone is getting cancelled. There are always hashtags on Twitter saying someone is over party or someone is cancelled. Influencers and celebrities are not safe to say anything without the risk of being “cancelled.” Merriam Webster defines cancel culture as ending support to a celebrity or influencer because of an objectionable opinion or questionable behavior. This has become a plague to our society and needs to stop.

Name a influencer or celebrity, and it is very likely that they have been “cancelled” at some point in time.

One of the biggest examples of cancel culture happened in May 2019. James Charles was on top. He had 16 million subscribers on YouTube, which deemed him the most subscribed to beauty channel on the platform. His reign came to an end in May. 

Fellow YouTuber, Tati Westbrook, uploaded a video speaking on Charles’ questionable behavior throughout their friendship. She said he was predatory towards people and went behind her back to do an ad for a brand that was a direct competitor of Westbrook’s company Halo Beauty. This video went viral and caused three million of Charles’ subscribers to unsubscribe from his channel, wanting nothing to do with the scandals he was involved with, while Westbrook’s subscriber count grew. He felt the need to take a mental health break before posting a video explaining his side of the story. In August, he was finally able to gain back all the subscribers he had lost, as people began to forget all that he was accused of. 

The issue with cancelling people is that most times, the fans only know one side of the story. No one can place judgement with only knowing half of what actually happened. Hearing slanderous things causes young people watching these celebrities and influencers to immediately think they are bad based on what one person says. This is unfair to the creator whose name is being dragged through the mud because they are unable to explain their side before losing fans.

Another issue about this trend is that it comes from a place of hate. It’s human nature to hate someone that one doesn’t even know. This can cause people to try to take others down in an effort to make their idol look better than the person they hate. A lot of times, the saboteur will do a deep dive into a celebrity’s past, via social media, to intentionally search for any instances that prove toxicity. They will then screenshot any occurrence of questionable behavior and repost it in order to take someone down. More often than not, this works, and a hashtag will start up saying whoever is cancelled. The story of what happened spreads like wildfire. Most times, these behaviors are from far in the past. People should be held accountable, but it’s not like they can go back and fix what they’ve already done. It’s better to just forgive and forget.

An example of this type of sabotage was when this exact situation happened to David Dobrik, a very popular YouTuber with 13.8 million subscribers. Back in 2018, fellow YouTuber Elijah Daniel found old tweets posted by Dobrik using racial slurs. Of course, saying these types of words shouldn’t be swept under the rug. Fans of Dobrik were angry that this happened. However, it just fizzled away over time. Some fans believed that since he posted those tweets when he was only 16, he was still figuring out what can and can’t be said. Others were apprehensive to continue being a fan because of the negative connotations behind the words he said. Overall, he didn’t lose too many fans, but it was a deliberate attempt to take down his career.

It’s very apparent that everyone makes mistakes throughout life. It’s unfair to put celebrities on a pedestal and expect them to act like they are perfect people. Pleasing everyone is not possible. No matter what someone says, people are going to be angry. Celebrities really have to restrict what they say on topics in order to avoid people attempting to take them down. According to an article by the New York Times titled “Everyone is cancelled,” rapper Cardi B was cancelled for defending her husband and fellow rapper Offset on some homophobic lyrics in one of his songs. People considered her homophobic because she was defending homophobia, which could very well be true, but she also could’ve just been defending her husband. Celebrities like Cardi B have to be very careful with what they say and how they say it.

Cancel culture can have long lasting effects on a celebrity or influencer’s career. Losing fans hurts album sales, views and subscriber counts. These are the factors that bring in money. 

Some people who are affected by this don’t care about the money.

Being knocked down by millions of people can hurt a celebrities’ motivation to continue doing something that they love. Some have to take a mental health break because dealing with the negative comments is too much. Mental health is important, and it’s worrying that some celebrities get so upset about what others are saying that they have to take a break. It is completely valid to take time off in order to feel better. However, it’s not fair that celebrities go through complete breakdowns after making mistakes because we all have our faults. Ours are not put on blast to the extent that celebrities’ mess ups are, so no one really understands how damaging it can be.

At times, cancellation can be valid. In extreme cases, some celebrities and influencers need a reminder that what they are doing needs to be taken down a few levels. This can be a turn in their life where they decide if they want to continue to be problematic or change their life for the better. 

Not every person who is cancelled turns into a redemption story.

In early 2018, influencer Logan Paul made a very controversial video, in which he showed the body of a man who had unfortunately taken his own life in the suicide forest in Japan. During this video, Paul and his friends continued to laugh and joke despite the fact that they had just seen someone taken by suicide. 

This caused an outrage among fans and people who weren’t viewers of his videos. Many news outlets covered what happened, which made the story spread very quickly. He lost millions of subscribers and continued to lose them even after he tried to apologize. Posting something of that degree is disrespectful to the friends and family of the deceased as well as the fans. It is also not the message that should be spread on the topic of suicide. Someone who is struggling might have watched this video to put a smile on their face and in no way got what they expected. Paul claimed his intention was to spread awareness to suicide, but he did it in the worst possible way. An article by Engadget titled “Logan Paul hit new lows in 2018, but it doesn’t seem to matter” explains that Paul has continuously been problematic. Whether it’s tazing dead rats or vlogging a stranger’s car crash, it’s clear that Paul hasn’t learned from his past mistakes.

On the contrary, it’s nice to see when a celebrity is able to come back stronger than ever, despite all the hate. Some are able to do this, and some feel the need to take even longer breaks before they can come back. Apology videos may result after cancellation, which is a great way for the audience to finally see the other side of the story. In some cases, celebrities turn to anger and fire back to their critics on social media. Most are able to come back because they still have a strong fan base waiting for them and have a passion for what they do that they aren’t ready to let go of. It’s inspiring to see someone rise from the ashes like this.

Cancel culture has become a normal part of today’s society and promotes everything we shouldn’t stand for. Today, we should be spreading love, not hate, because there are too many horrible events happening every day. Some celebrities build their career from the ground up, just for it to be brought down in a matter of seconds and because of one negative thing that they may have said or done. This needs to stop. People make mistakes, so we just need to let it go and move on. Extreme cases that lead to cancellation are a little different as they can be important life lessons to the influencer or celebrity, however small instances that lead to cancelling should be let go. It’s way too hard to be a perfect person, and the people sabotaging others careers have likely made mistakes themselves.

Cancel culture is hypocritical, toxic and needs to stop as soon as possible.