As I write this article, hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of voices are being silenced on the grounds of politics and morality. Last week, American conservative political commentator Charlie Kirk was assassinated by a cis white gunman. Social media was set ablaze with conservative demands to “cancel” anyone who pointed out that though the manner of his death was morally objectionable, Kirk’s personal views—anti-abortion, anti-gay, anti-trans, anti-immigrant, anti-Black—were in fact entirely in alignment with a world in which people are subjected to violence as a result of political conflict.
These events are the latest in an escalating trend of censorship and punishment of political speech that diverges from the reigning cultural norm—a norm that is, these days, increasingly authoritarian and even fascist. Perhaps the starkest example is the chilling crackdown on individuals who dare to speak out against the genocide currently being perpetrated by Israel in Gaza, a backlash that has included the expulsion of university students, the criminal investigation of activists and cultural workers in multiple countries and even the blacklisting of non-violent pro-Palestinian advocacy groups as terrorist organizations.
These draconian measures blatantly seek to silence dissent and curb free expression. The fact that they’re coming from the political centre and right wing represents an abrupt cultural reversal from just a few years ago, when the prevailing cultural narrative was that “cancel culture” was the province of the Left, while right-wing commentators were branded as brave free speech warriors. The irony seems largely lost on those currently calling for pro-Palestinian advocates to be fired from their jobs and threatening to bomb drag queen storytimes, but the moment nonetheless invites essential self-reflection from those of us on the Left, and perhaps particularly from queer communities.
Given the triumph of authoritarianism in today’s political and cultural sphere, and the apparent failure of the social justice movement of the early 2010s and early 2020s to produce meaningful and widespread structural change, it is time for those of us who long for a world built on anti-oppressive, pro-queer and pro-trans values to ask ourselves:
Where have we failed to build a sustainable movement capable of building broad coalitions and winning the power of governance as effectively as our right-wing counterparts? Where do we stand today on the issue of free expression, diversity of tactics and divergence, now that we find ourselves subject to ever-increasing censorship and repression? And not only that, but without a rhetorical leg to stand on, given our own participation in anti-freedom of speech rhetoric? Why did we ever cede freedom of expression, historically a central value of liberatory and particularly queer movements and allow it to be weaponized against us by the Right?
Is it time at last for the social justice movement to finally say goodbye for good to our love affair with cancel culture? Let us hope so.
@xtramagazine Why are media and government officials working overtime to connect trans people to the shooting of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk? Xtra senior editor Mel Woods argues that trans people and anyone who thinks they’re an ally to trans people should be worried about the way the narrative has shifted. Because not only has the past week demonstrated gross media negligence when it comes to covering this story, it’s showcased just how unstoppable the breathless attempts to link trans people to political violence have become in America—despite that link being truly unfounded and not backed up by facts. #charliekirk #lgbtqnews #transgender #news #media ♬ original sound – Xtra Magazine Advertisement
Though the hypocrisy of right-wing critics regarding “cancel culture” has made itself abundantly clear, many prominent left-wing activists and radical queer thinkers have acknowledged and explored the real problems of intolerance for diversity of thought, interpersonal disposability and punishment by mob in our communities over the past decade. These overlapping phenomena together make up a toxic undercurrent that significantly hindered our ability to organize effectively and counter right-wing narratives that demonize and dehumanize vulnerable groups.
As a writer and cultural worker whose work has engaged with conflict and disposability in queer communities for over a decade, it has been gratifying to see the rise of genuine collective dialogue about cancel culture over the past few years. However, polarization and confusion about this topic still abound; indeed, it somehow still feels vaguely taboo for me to acknowledge the existence of the problem in such clear and uncertain terms.
Yet, it does exist—the past ten years having provided increasing evidence to this effect. Wealthy white straight men—and women, if a certain trans-exclusionary world-famous children’s author is any indication—might emerge from “cancellations” seemingly unscathed. However, the same cannot be said for the hundreds of poor, disabled queer and trans people, who have written to me over the years about devastating experiences of social ostracization and occasionally even physical violence as a result of being deemed “problematic” or “unsafe” by their communities.
What is particularly striking to me as a trans woman of colour is that regardless of whether it is right-wing populists or left-wing radicals practising cancel culture, the end result always seems to be the same: Regardless of guilt or innocence, the wealthy and powerful remain wealthy and powerful, while the vulnerable are damaged and disappeared.
Within the subculture of trans women, there is a shared folk wisdom that we are often the first among targets for cancel culture within the queer community because the vulnerability of our social status makes us easy to dispose of. I have been watching this phenomenon since I first came out nearly 20 years ago.
“Despite claims to the contrary, cancel culture does not defend the weak or uphold justice. Rather it is a collective practice of punishment and censorship that has never been and cannot be a tool of liberation for queer communities.”
Today, as authoritarians and fascists seize the tools of cancel culture for their own purposes, trans women are still the first targets we saw when the Wall Street Journal falsely reported that the ammunition used in the assassination of Charlie Kirk was inscribed with “transgender ideology” within a day of the murder, a baseless claim that ignited a wave of transphobic hatred and calls for vengeance. I am reminded of the words of trans fem writer and game-maker Porpentine Charity Heartscape, who wrote in her own essay on disposability culture that “Punishment is not something that happens to bad people. It happens to those who cannot stop it from happening. It is laundered pain, not a balancing of scales.”
Despite claims to the contrary, cancel culture does not defend the weak or uphold justice. Rather it is a collective practice of punishment and censorship that has never been and cannot be a tool of liberation for queer communities. Indeed, the struggle for our rights has always hinged around the notion of a society where divergence and freedom of expression are upheld as core principles—a notion that is today gravely under threat as authoritarian governments introduce repressive laws intended to erase queer and trans expression from public life.
It is key that we understand that cancel culture within queer community is intrinsically linked to cancel culture that comes from outside of it, just as cancel culture among the Left is tied to cancel culture on the Right. Whether we intend it or not, our use of “cancellation” against one another upholds and expands the systems of power and domination that oppress us all. Similarly, our backs on the value of freedom of expression as integral to queer and trans movements has weakened our ability to defend ourselves from erasure and censorship from the homophobes, transphobes and bigots that intend to eradicate us all.
It is something of a cliché these days in social justice movements to cite the great Black lesbian poet and thinker Audre Lorde’s words that “the Master’s tools cannot dismantle the Master’s house.” Yet the sentiment holds as true today as when she first spoke those words in 1979 on a panel at the Second Sex Conference, an international conference held in New York to honour of the thirtieth anniversary of Simone de Beauvoir’s feminist classic, The Second Sex. Less well known is that Lorde also stated in that same speech that “the failure … to recognize difference as a crucial strength is a failure to reach beyond the first patriarchal lesson.”
We are at a turning point in global history, the likely fall of the neoliberal world order established at the end of the Second World War, and the rise of renewed fascism. Queer and social justice movements must meet the moment, not by clinging to the same tools of division and punishment that are being used against us, but by letting them go and embracing solidarity instead. It is already a given that the fascists will try to build a world of fear and domination over our bodies. It remains to be seen whether we can build something better instead.
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