When Republicans Capitalize on Cancel Culture
Josh Hawley is promoting his book on the same platforms he accuses of censoring conservatives.
“Banned in Boston” is a phrase that probably doesn’t resonate with many people today. But there was a time when Footloose might as well have been set in Beantown.
Founded by Puritans in the 1630s, Boston held onto its Puritan zeal—if not necessarily the Puritan faith—for centuries. From 1659 to 1681, Christmas was outlawed there. Long after the American Revolution, which started there, Boston famously banned books, plays, and songs. In 1882 Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass” was banned. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Earnest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises and a serialized version of his A Farewell To Arms were prohibited. The Everly Brothers’ song “Wake Up Little Susie” hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts but was nonetheless barred from Boston radio in the 1950s. William S. Burroughs’ Naked Lunch was briefly banned in Boston (and Los Angeles) in 1962 until courts overturned the decision a few years later.
I shouldn’t single out Boston, given that censorship in America has a long and storied history. From John Adams’ Sedition Act in 1798 (which outlawed malicious criticism of federal officials) through both world wars, there has been plenty of censorship in this country. And I mean real censorship, which involves the government, not private actors forbidding free expression of one kind or another.
But the reason I start with Boston is that the phrase “Banned in Boston” became a fantastic marketing tool. Few things piqued buyers’ interest more than being told a book was too hot to handle in Beantown. Upton Sinclair once remarked, “We authors are using America as our sales territory, and Boston as our advertising department.”
We’re seeing something similar today. Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, for instance, has been playing the part of martyr to cancel culture. He had a contract with Simon & Schuster for his new book, but the publisher pulled out after Hawley questioned the results of the presidential election. He quickly landed a new publisher, Regnery, and the book came out this week.
Hawley’s book is called The Tyranny of Big Tech. You can find it on Amazon, where the tyrannical Big Tech firm lets you download it instantly with a click.
For his book tour, Hawley did a live video interview for the Washington Post, owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. Hawley defiantly told technology reporter Cat Zakrzewski, “Don’t try to censor, cancel and silence me here.”
Zakrzewski replied, “Senator, we’re hosting you here.”
In one of his many recent appearances on Fox News, Hawley said “free speech in America now depends on the whims of a monopoly corporation.” He was referring to Facebook, whose oversight board endorsed (at least temporarily) the company’s decision to ban Donald Trump from its platform after the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. Hawley also made the same claim on Twitter. He even posted a Fox News clip of him denouncing Facebook on Facebook.
There are certainly many serious concerns relating to free speech and Big Tech these days, and Hawley even raises some of them, though I’m dubious about his proposed remedies.
For instance, Amazon indefensibly banned a book by philosopher Ryan T. Anderson, When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment, because it ran afoul of their policies on transgenderism, despite being a serious and scholarly work—whether or not you agree with it.
But as wrong as Amazon’s decision was, or even if you passionately oppose the decisions by Facebook and Twitter to ban Trump from their platforms, it’s still ludicrous to contend that free speech in America is at stake in any of these decisions.
As a legal and constitutional matter, free speech has never been freer or more secure than it is today. For good or ill, from pornography to potshots at politicians, as far as the feds and the courts are concerned, it’s the Wild West out there.
The culture is another story entirely. The old Puritan ethos that brought us “banned in Boston” has been reborn as a censorious contagion infecting vast swaths of the left and, truth be told, big parts of the right. Cancel culture is a thing. But it’s an American thing. I’d argue it’s worse on the left, in large part because the left controls more big institutions in the media, entertainment, and education. I don’t like it, but I’m not prepared to put the government—never mind Hawley—in charge of policing speech.
Ironically, Hawley’s hawking of his book illuminates one way to deal with the problem. Perhaps “Banned on Facebook” is the new “Banned in Boston.”
Cancel culture is real, and it is a problem.
But victim culture is also real and a problem.
Another culture that is real--and very, very big problem--is that of powerful, well-connected people cynically posing as victims in order to martial the anger of their followers against a desired target. Right now, there is no better route to political significance that to be a victim, and there is no more desirable way to be a victim than to be canceled.
GOP base voters love to play the victim card. Hawley, Cruz and others know that. Hence why they constantly complain about being canceled and censored - the implication being it’s only a matter of time before they come for you. It’s all phony and it’s all shtick but it works. Ben Sasse says the Republican Party needs to be the “party of gratitude not grievance”. Well that’s not what base voters want. They want grievance all the time; they want to play the victim card 24/7.
Pandering is one thing but when it turns into actual bad policy that’s when I get worried. And right now there is a lot of bad policy being proposed out there. Hawley has proposed legislation that would require social media companies to certify to government bureaucrats that their platforms are neutral; he’s proposed legislation that would ban mergers and acquisitions from companies with a market cap of $100B or more. He’s also proposed legislation that would ban auto scrolling. Nuts.
Senator Bill Hagerty just introduced a bill to repeal section 230 and basically turn tech companies into utilities. That would be a disaster. I think Ben Sasse is the only member of the Senate (only Republican at least) who is against repealing section 230. In the House, Republicans are proposing something called the "Big Tech Accountability Platform" which would essentially end section 230 and bring back the fairness doctrine. You can read about it here:
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210415/17330746625/republicans-big-tech-accountability-platform-calls-both-more-less-moderation-not-fairness-doctrine-fairness-doctrine.shtml
All of this is bad and does nothing for the cause of free speech. If anything it will just cancel more people as only the very big companies - the same ones Republicans are claiming censor conservatives - will be able to comply with all the regulation and litigation.