We’ve all seen, and sometimes felt, the effects of the “cancel culture”. Just over the past few weeks there have been attacks on Mr. Potato Head, Dr. Seuss, Aunt Jemima and now Pepé Le Pew. Increasingly ridiculous examples of things that are somehow offensive to someone appear almost daily.
And people are OK with this? I don’t mean everyone because I personally know a lot of people who believe, as I do, that dropping the “Mr.” from “Mr. Potato Head” is nothing short of insane.
What I’m wondering is how anyone can be OK with this. And, if you’re one of the people who find Aunt Jemima inappropriate, how far will are you willing to let things go before you consider it to be too far?
I mean, there must be a limit. Right? There must be a line you’re not willing to cross. Each time I see another something getting erased because it might offend someone, I think to myself, “surely this can’t go any further”. And then it does.
The city of Palmyra in Syria was the home to the historic Temple of Bel. ISIS took control of the region around 2010 and set out to erase anything that they found offensive. The Temple of Bel, which had stood since the year 32, that’s nearly 2,000 years, was blasted into an unrecognizable pile of rubble.
Clearly someone thought that this was a good idea. Probably every member of ISIS thought this was a good idea. Because one group of people decided that “cancelling” the Temple of Bel was the right thing to do, a work of art created two millennia ago was wiped from the face of the earth. Just because it offended someone.
Presumably even the people who believe that it’s OK to behead people that disagree with them had a line they wouldn’t cross. And, thankfully, we never had to see where ISIS drew the line. But the things they destroyed are gone forever.
While we might never know what ISIS would consider to be “going too far”, I hope we can all agree that they did.
I wonder how far will the members of the cancel culture go before they feel they’ve gone too far? George Washington and Thomas Jefferson owned slaves so should we topple the Washington Monument and the Jefferson Memorial? Is that OK? Or maybe the Statue of Liberty should go next since it’s obviously offensive to those who don’t believe in democracy and freedom.
Should we have an “Indigenous People’s Day or Rage” like in Portland and allow them to destroy the Lincoln Memorial? Or is that on the far side of the line that shouldn’t be crossed? Maybe Mount Rushmore should be blasted away. After all, with 300 million people in the United States, it’s unreasonable to think that at least one person isn’t offended by it.
Unfortunately, none of these examples are too crazy to be true. There have already been calls to remove Mount Rushmore because it’s “a symbol of white supremacy and structural racism.” So we know that, at least to a few people, destroying Mount Rushmore is thought to be a good idea.
Presumably even the people on the Left who are OK with ANTIFA/BLM beating up innocent people for disagreeing with them have a line they won’t cross. But, the things they’ve already destroyed may be gone forever.
I have to believe that there’s a building they’re not willing to burn, a statue they’re not willing to topple and a part of our history they’re not willing to erase. It has to be true, or they will destroy a country that has proudly stood for nearly a quarter of a millennium.
There must be a limit. We just haven’t reached it yet. When we do reach that limit, whatever it may be, I wonder if we’ll recognize what we have left?
