One post. One comment. One mistake. In today’s digital world, that can be all it takes for someone to be “canceled.” Within hours, millions of people may be criticizing, unfollowing, or demanding for someone to lose their platform entirely. Some believe that cancel culture is an important way to hold people accountable, however, others argue that it’s harmful to open discussion and has a way of shutting down conversations instead of encouraging them.

While accountability is important, cancel culture often goes beyond holding people responsible and instead creates an environment where people are afraid to speak openly or learn from their mistakes. 

Accountability matters, when people do or say something harmful they should be called out and expected to take full responsibility, but everyone makes mistakes. Learning from these mistakes is usually how people grow and reflect on their wrongdoings. However, in the age of cancel culture, these extremely public mistakes can lead to intense backlash that leaves no room for understanding and meaningful conversation. 

To put this in perspective, imagine somebody is out with their friends and has a slip of the tongue where they bring up an inappropriate or controversial belief or topic. In most cases, this slip up would either be apologized for or ignored as something said in the moment. However, if you accidentally make this slip up online you are now defending your actions to millions of people. 

When it gets to the point where people are afraid to have cordial and deep conversations due to the fear of being canceled and having their opinions held against them, it begins to undermine the principle of free speech and the idea that the people have a right to form and express their own opinion.

We don’t live in a world of total uniformity where everyone thinks the same way and has the same beliefs. These differences are what keep the world spinning and keep new ideas flowing. Of course, there are limits to how far these thoughts can go and that is where holding people accountable comes into play.

Accountability will always play an important role in addressing harmful and wrongful behavior, but when fear of speaking out due to the chance of backlash silences conversations that need to be had, everyone loses the opportunity to learn. Building an online and real world culture that encourages responsibility, while allowing room for understanding and growth is far more productive than one focused solely on silencing and punishing.