Has cancel culture taken a toxic turn? It seems most Americans believe it has metastasized — and contend freedom should trump hurt feelings.
A new survey from Rasmussen Reports found this week that 72% of Americans believe cancel culture has “gotten out of control,” with just 15% disagreeing with the notion.
An additional 12% of respondents said they’re not sure where they stand.
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The poll language described cancel culture as a “form of censorship that harms the careers and reputations of public figures for doing or saying things that are considered offensive.”
Then, respondents were asked if it has gotten out of hand.
Rasmussen collected the data via telephone and online response, capturing it at the end of October in the wake of controversy surrounding comedian Dave Chappelle and his Netflix project, “The Closer.”
Chappelle has been under fire for comments made in the show about the transgender issue. USA Today has more:
In it, he says “gender is a fact” and defends Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling’s statements denying the validity of transgender identity.
His transgender statements led to calls to boycott his work. Last month Netflix employees walked out and held a rally outside company offices in Los Angeles to protest his statements in “The Closer.”
Interestingly, Netflix hasn’t backed away from the special, despite calls for cancellation and sustained rage.
But that’s just one example of cancel culture unfolding in the mainstream. Faithwire has covered plenty of other cases of purported cancel culture run amok and we’ll most certainly cover many more.
The central question in these instances is whether free speech should be more important than hurt feelings. Rasmussen asked respondents about this dynamic as well.
It turns out the majority of Americans (75%) believe protecting free speech is more important than “protecting people from speech that is offensive.”
Read the complete results here.
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