Who doesn’t love a good scandal? To be a part of a group with a high moral standing and watch drama unfold like a reality TV show? It can be fun to be an outsider when a youtuber makes a joke in poor taste, or when beauty influencers shade their friends on Instagram, but the other side of the scandal is dark and messy, and shows a lot about what it means to be a social media user in today’s society.
Cancelling someone with a lot of fame or influence can feel exhilarating, but really it’s just an exploitation of human mistake in order to gain clout. Claiming moral superiority as an attempt to bring influencers down is often the result of rumor that escalates exponentially after the initial trigger.
This summer, Tati Westbrook, who only had 5 million subscribers on Youtube at the time, made a video demonizing James Charles, who she had previously stated she loved as she would a son. Tati’s 40 minute video describing what was originally a simple misunderstanding skyrocketed her subscriber count to 10 million, and other influencers were quick to weigh in. Jeffree Star tweeted a claim that Charles is a sexual predator and a danger to society, when the two beauty influencers were close friends only months before.

This is only one example of the dangers of cancel culture. Charles lost 3 million subscribers in a matter of days, but the real impact was on his personal life. In a month, he lost his best friends, and gained a lot of hate. 

Charles isn’t the only one to be cancelled, and he will not be the last, but this cancel culture that can ruin lives based on pure speculation needs to be recognized as toxic and cruel. It goes to show the loss of moderate opinions and encourages a tendency to believe rumors and write people off, regardless of personal relationships. Just because things might fall back into place later, as Charles’ career managed to salvage itself, doesn’t mean that jumping to conclusions and wrecking lives for entertainment and fame is acceptable.

The only people who know what happens in the midst of a scandal are the people involved, and the exploitation of personal drama is revolting. So, when these scandals arise, don’t click on the articles anymore. It’s entertaining, but it adds no value to your life, and it only serves to ruin someone else’s. It’s time to cancel cancel culture.