What exactly is "cancel culture"? It came slowly upon us didn't it? It's showed initially as something that needed to be deleted from facebook or twitter as being "incorrect." It grew further as a book or two being canceled and then progressed to a point where a statue or flag needed to be taken down. All for what purpose? Because one or another group or individual, not the majority, thought it offended them and the voice of the majority “be damned.” I not only disagree but J'Accuse those proponents of cancel culture for creating an environment from which no intellectual tree will bloom, eventually stunting growth of the mind, eliminating free speech and free thought thus eventually killing innovation and change. J'ACCUSE: History is made up of facts and fiction by both those who have lived through it and written about it and those who have come afterward, taken a look backward and pieced history together. It is made up of those who have won and those who have lost, all coming together for a compendium of what the past has looked like. It changes over time as more writers enter a field and think about history and uncover more information. Whether good or bad, to deny history is to eliminate both the fact and the fiction. Denial homogenizes us all into one collective thought from which there is no growth.. Stagnation is the culmination. To know history does not mean you have to “love" it. It is to be used as a lesson, good or bad.
Was there slavery? Yes! Was it abhorrent? Yes! Does it still exist in the world? Yes! Should it be eliminated? Yes! But if we learn to deny its existence we may live to regret it. We would not know in a generation or two that an historical truth was a bad thing. The Holocaust is still being taught in German schools. German schoolchildren are required to visit the concentration camps in order to never forget so it should never happen again. This is the importance of acknowledging and protecting history. So burn the statues, burn the flags, burn the books, let's all forget the past. Kill Shakespeare as a misogynist, homophobe, kill Dr. Seuss as a racist. Let's go about finding misogyny, homophobia, anti LGBTQ, anti race, anti religion, anti anything from every single book. Let's burn it all. J'Accuse the "woke society" of anti growth, anti thought, anti intellect, J'Accuse!