I think the problem with cancel culture is that it doesn’t allow for any sort of creative perception on the part of the perceiver and that its overall message is that it strives to stifle that creativity with an eye toward making everyone act the same. This makes a scary kind of sense when you consider the current Administration’s bent toward controlling what we do.  People are easier to control when they are all supposed to be acting exactly the same. Much like a private school with a uniform requirement, our current society’s desire to remove any and all characteristics that don’t suit the governing class’s sensibilities is simply a means of trying to control the masses. For instance, it’s easier to spot someone who is not obeying the dress code if the dress code is that you all wear the same outfit.

The idea that we can limit someone’s creative capacity through some tyrannical cancellation of them as a creative being is ludicrous.  Cutting someone down simply because their perception of a person or group of persons doesn’t fit with your own perception of that group or person goes against the very idea that being creative is a gift from God and that He wants us all to use our gifts. He wants us to express the things that we’ve seen and the things that we’ve learned in such a way that others want to understand us better and in a way that shows that we, through our description of the people we meet and interact with, are also trying to understand the people in our lives a little bit better. If you always describe someone very carefully as being male or female, tall or short, overweight or underweight, dark hair, dark eyes, whatever… then it is obvious that you’re not digging very deep to see what kind of a person you’ve met. If you’re more concerned with describing a politically correct package, then you aren’t necessarily concerned with what kind of an individual you’re dealing with.  You aren’t worried at all about what their hopes and dreams are or what makes them tick.  How deep of a relationship can you be in with people if you are just looking at their outer characteristics in such a bland, nonsensical way?

If there is no depth to our relationships, then we can easily become numb to the plight of others. If we have no reason to become endeared to someone, whether it be through our shared love of a certain type of music or a certain type of food or our favorite color, our favorite musician, any and every experience that we’ve had that we can share together, then we’ve missed the boat.  If we don’t share and absorb these things with other people, then it becomes easier for us to look the other way when they are experiencing adversity or crisis. It becomes easier for us not to be emotionally involved to the point where we might want to help them in their time of need.

This culture that wants to erase any sort of characteristic that might create an emotional response is actually doing a disservice to everyone by not allowing us to experience each other in a way that will evoke compassion and empathy for one another. If we’re all the same, then what’s there to feel? If we’re all exactly alike, then why get emotional or upset at all when someone around us is experiencing trauma or pain?  If they’re just like us, they can handle it just like us, right? This is one of the biggest problems I see with cancel culture and it’s one that most people seem to be overlooking. Most people have a natural tendency to want to look the other way when someone’s in trouble. There are a few compassionate souls out there who actually seek out opportunities to help others, however, they are few and far between. Taking away the need to distinguish ourselves from one another makes it easy to justify keeping our eyes straight ahead and not paying attention to whatever pain may be occurring in your neighbor’s life.  It makes it easier for the powers that be to do whatever they may want to do to further their agenda without interference from those with true compassion for others.

Self-expression is vital to creating community.  As an author, when I write I want to create a sense that the characters are people you know. A sense that these are people that you care about, these are people that you’ve had relationships with. They may have even been people that you hated or people who treated you poorly.  As with anything that is blatantly labeled as fiction, you must have an understanding that it is not the gospel truth about each and every person out there. It is just the truth about the characters within the pages of that book and that’s all it’s meant to be. There is no reason for anyone to try to go inside those pages and change those characters’ traits to suit their preferences. If these extremely sensitive people don’t want to read the book, they don’t have to read it. That’s the joy of having the freedom to be creative and to speak creatively.

Our society is playing a dangerous game by seeking to cancel creativity. And it has been shown time and again that creativity takes a backseat to every other agenda. They’ve cancelled creativity schools, there are parents out there who cancel creativity in their child because they don’t think it’s practical, and just as a common everyday issue, creativity is frowned upon by those who don’t understand it. If the objective of those who seek to cancel entertainers and authors and other creative types is to promote unity and equality, they’re certainly going about it in the wrong way. As I said before in order to truly understand others and show compassion and empathy toward other human beings, we need to understand what’s alike about each other and what’s different. That’s what draws us to one another and that’s what makes us want to understand each other. Without the ability to take the good with the bad, we have no real purpose here.

Rebecca Benston is the owner of Higher Ground Books & Media and the author of over twenty titles currently available through Amazon and other outlets. Her books include a mystery series (The Rona Shively Stories), empowerment resources such as Wise Up to Rise Up, Don’t Be Stupid (And I Mean That in the Nicest Way), Single, Sober, & Serious, and From Judgment to Jubilee, children’s books including Grumble D. Grumble Learns to Smile, All the Scary Things, and See How Strong You Are. Benston lives in Springfield, Ohio with her awesome daughter, Mya and enjoys traveling, reading, writing, and telling it like it is. She enjoys being able to help other authors get their stories out there through Higher Ground and has recently expanded her freelance services to offer more extensive guidance as a writing coach and social media manager. For more information, you can contact Benston at highergroundbooksandmedia@gmail.com.

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