You're missing the point. Petty theft is bad but petty thieves don't deserve capital punishment. Similarly, those tweets are bad but King didn't deserve to be canceled for them.
Is it considered petty theft by all the victims of the latest racist mass shooting in NYand their friends and families?
King literally dehumanized Black women thus making it sound like its okay to kill them in cold bloaod and livestream it. There would be no deterrence for that if people didn't find it unacceptable.
By the same metric you should also not hold the reporter who revealed the racist tweets responsible for the actions of Anheuser-Busch and other companies. He didn't do the canceling.
Comments
You're missing the point. Petty theft is bad but petty thieves don't deserve capital punishment. Similarly, those tweets are bad but King didn't deserve to be canceled for them.
Is it considered petty theft by all the victims of the latest racist mass shooting in NYand their friends and families?
King literally dehumanized Black women thus making it sound like its okay to kill them in cold bloaod and livestream it. There would be no deterrence for that if people didn't find it unacceptable.
No, but King isn't the one who committed that mass shooting. You shouldn't hold him responsible for others' actions.
By the same metric you should also not hold the reporter who revealed the racist tweets responsible for the actions of Anheuser-Busch and other companies. He didn't do the canceling.
I'd argue that the reporter did do the canceling, though. Canceling happens in three stages:
1. Someone with access to a wide audience learns of a minor transgression, blows it out of proportion, and blasts it to them all
2. People who heard about the minor transgression start pressuring the employer/school/business partners/social media moderators/etc. to cut ties
3. The employer/school/business partners/social media moderators/etc. kowtow to the pressure and actually do cut ties
If you've done any of those steps, you've participated in cancel culture.
Now do the same analysis for racism.