Ctrl + Alt + Delete: Digital Communities in Cancel Culture

Ctrl + Alt + Delete: Digital Communities in Cancel Culture

Megan Matthews

Artwork Anna Morrissey

Social media is supposedly about connectivity. The OGs; MSN, Myspace, Facebook, and even that lil Nintendo chat page that everyone spent 2008 and 2009 rinsing at sleepovers; were created to bring together collective communities. You can chat with your friends, stay in contact with family across the world, and even make new acquaintances that you would otherwise never get to meet. Social media has created a spider’s web of connectivity that spans across the globe. However, like a spider’s web, the beauty of the initial togetherness that social media creates, is more fragile than it seems at first glance.

Our generation is perhaps the most ‘connected’ in history, through socials. Yet, our sense of togetherness is fragmented by cancel cultures, our desires to be accepted on social media, and the ultimate isolation of reality.

In the new digital age of 2021, politicised, and sometimes accusatory, social media forums have brought a whole new use and meaning to the internet. Gone were the simple times of MSN messaging about homework, and instead the internet has become a forum for every type of conceivable subject—topics that demand followings and pledges of social commitment. The political Left and Right are in a constant battle for social media attention and you need only to look at a Trump supporters TikTok suggestions, in comparison to a Biden-stan’s, to see how divided these social communities really are. These contrasting groups crave and are designed for different types of content—no lover of Obama is gonna wanna see a swarm of red MAGA hats on their feed. However, what this new face of social media has created is a sense of ‘good vs evil’—the morally righteous vs the morally corrupt— the former of which we, as lowly members of real-life society, are desperate to be visibly accepted into. If you use social media in a more active context than Debra from Milton Keynes who posts regular updates about her kids and her cat’s most recent operations, you have to pick a side. It’s become socially and communally important that each person is part of one of these internet ‘sides’ or ‘communities’. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as these communities can stimulate lasting and important real-life changes. Social justice causes get boosted on pages that otherwise would never have seen them, charities can raise money quickly and successfully, and socially conscious information can reach more people than ever before. For example, in terms of body positivity, arguably the increased use of diverse, body-inclusive models in high-street store adverts is a direct product of body-positivity pages such as Jameela Jamil’s iWeigh, FatPheebs and online media personality campaigns such as that run by Ashley Graham. These Instagram accounts have sparked social movements within communities that had before been negated from the projected, societal idealism of ‘perfection’—that which is broadcast on the social stage.

In the same way, social media creates safe spaces for topics that have historically been considered taboo. Mental health is a clear example of this. Even 10 years ago, there would have been no space for people to express support for Naomi Osaka and retaliate against her terrible recent experience with the French Open which saw her drop out to preserve her mental health. The flooding of support she has garnered since her departure, would arguably have not been so easily acknowledged without the current social media climate and the social communities that have come and stood in her defence.

Social media is a place that creates real-life change and within that a sense of togetherness and belonging for the many.

However, social media’s togetherness and it’s created sense of community can arguably be incredibly problematic. You’ve picked your socio-political-moral-side—great. You’ve done reading and educated yourself about social causes that fit in with that sides ethics—amazing. You’ve shared some relevant information in a way that you find digestible and your followers find accessible—fantastic. However, as we’ve seen more than ever since the increase in politicised conversation on socials over the last year, a lot of people’s engagement with these social media communities is painfully performative.

The question of whether you’re actively engaged in a social media community, or simply following along with one in order to stay ‘woke’, stay visually moral, and retain your place in the ‘morally correct’ internet community you desire to be a part of, is in itself, problematic.

This need to keep-up with your ‘community’ and show a sense of ‘togetherness’ as a show of that commitment to your ‘side’ or as a proving of your mutable and ever-engaged morality is a direct opposition to the definition of togetherness in our own society—one that takes authentic commitment, active allyship and productive displays of care as a measure of true humanity.

Cancel culture plays a big role in this reading of internet connectivity. Cancel culture sees ‘communities’ of the internet tackle and take down those that have done wrong in the eyes of the morality gods—mostly those in the public eye. That isn’t to say, in some cases, cancel culture isn’t warranted. J K Rowling should do one, David Dobrik is a wasteman, and Hilaria Baldwin’s Spanish-cum-cucumber-cosplay is as baffling as it is offensive, confusing and downright stupid. There are those that have been cancelled for assault, rape, abuse and molestation and all of them deserve to stay firmly in the cancelled division of our society, cultural reading and general opinion. However, when we look at the premise of cancel culture, the community that drives it is arguably not always coming from a place of insightful education and true criticism. Cancel culture is a pack of internet wolves coming to feast on those that step out of line of the morally conscious, the socially sound and the honourably righteous. This fear of being ‘cancelled’ has pushed performative displays of social consciousness to the forefront of our social media movements—that which pushes people, and influential companies, to actively lie to avoid it.

“J K Rowling should do one, David Dobrik is a wasteman, and Hilaria Baldwin’s Spanish-cum-cucumber-cosplay is as baffling as it is offensive, confusing and downright stupid.”

Pretty Little Thing—the gas-guzzling fast-fashion company that is known for its exploitation of workers, killing of the planet, and the perpetuation of a clothing culture that is actively contributing to the destruction of our world—is a key example of this plight to appear part of a morally conscious community to avoid cancellation. On ‘Earth Day’ the company posted several blog entries about ‘Easy Ways to be More Sustainable’. The hypocrisy of this sentiment is obvious—it is a performative attempt to fit in with the buzz word of the moment, an active plight to avoid being ‘cancelled’, and an attempt to mask the true horrors of their lack of environmental consciousness. The word ‘sustainability’ has become an influential industry in its own right over the past 5 years and it rakes in the moolah—both economically and in terms of brownie points for our social and ethical consciouses. Pretty Little Thing is jumping onto this trend, to protect their image, present themselves as something they’re not and rake even more coin into its £1billion bank.

In the same way, in cancel culture, it is comforting and protective to be a part of the pack of wolves going for the individual at fault. Obama put the pack-mentality of call-out culture on blast at an Obama Foundation event in 2019: “If I tweet or hashtag about how you didn’t do something right or used the wrong verb, then I can sit back and feel pretty good about myself. Did you see how woke I was, I called you out. Then I’m going to get on my TV and watch my show … That’s not activism. That’s not bringing about change. If all you’re doing is casting stones, you’re probably not going to get that far.” Social media has created a climate that makes a community out of call-out culture—whether that be because it’s ‘on trend’ or for fear of being rejected from the protective guise of the wolf pack itself. It’s much safer to be on the side of those sending criticism, hate, and condemning messages to those that have done wrong, than it is to be on the side receiving it. This, in turn, creates an environment that sees people spout hate over things they don’t even really care that much about, as a form of active self-preservation—if you don’t seem ‘with us’, you’re ‘against us’. This created community of cancel culture, this wolf pack of hunters ready to pounce to keep themselves safe, is in many ways, the most isolating and arguably unproductive component of our new age society—together in name only, and wholly an act of self-preservation in practice.

Our generation craves togetherness, and yet strives to cancel others for fear of losing our own place on the side of the morally good. Instead of creating a community of likeminded individuals, cancel culture and performative actions for inclusion have proven that our generations search for interconnected community and togetherness on the digital stage has actually created a disparate sense of detachment from truth, idealism and identity. Togetherness is a power that we wield when in actual communities—communities like iWeigh that empower and enact real change. Let’s use the internet for that—that’s real togetherness.