Ezra Klein Voxsplains Cancel Culture

I don’t know.

I think a bright line was crossed when Big Tech cancelled the president of the United States and tens of thousands of his followers in January.

New York Times:

“Boundaries on acceptable speech aren’t new, and they’re not narrower today than in the past. …

Wokeness has particular economic power right now because corporations, correctly, don’t want to be seen as racist and homophobic, but imagine how social media would have supercharged the censorious dynamics that dominated right after 9/11, when even french fries were suspected of disloyalty. …

The rest of corporate America — and that includes my own industry — needs to think seriously about how severe a punishment it is to fire people under public conditions. When termination is for private misdeeds or poor performance, it typically stays private. When it is for something the internet is outraged about, it can shatter someone’s economic prospects for years to come. It’s always hard, from the outside, to evaluate any individual case, but I’ve seen a lot of firings that probably should have been suspensions or scoldings. …”

Corporate America has sown and will reap the whirlwind.

The key assumption behind the economic power of wokeness is that corporations can wield their concentrated economic power to force social liberalism on the public and censor and micromanage our politics to advance the unpopular views of progressive activists WITHOUT blowing up the consensus on neoliberal economics on the Republican side. They essentially believe they can have their cake (the economic policy agenda which caters to their interests which they purchase with their donations to the GOP establishment) and eat it too (wielding power over state legislatures).