Woke or wokeism and cancel culture are terms that have gained a lot of currency recently. The word ‘woke’ used to have a positive connotation as a well-informed, self-aware person who speaks out against racial or social discrimination and injustice. The term has now been weaponised and is often used sneeringly or pejoratively to silence both the oppressed as well as others speaking out against oppression. Unfortunately, the desire to appear woke has also resulted in the cancel culture, where people ostracise others based on what they say or have said in the past. Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel made a ‘joke’ and now people are asking for him to be cancelled:
It wasn’t a particularly funny joke and I am not a Jimmy Kimmel fan (many others I would rate above him). However I had to really think long and hard to understand how people made the leap to call this bit racist --- because apparently he was talking about BTS.
Kimmel had also said something about how the BTS fandom is pretty extreme and compared it with the coronavirus. Again it is a leap, but people are using this to conclude that Kimmel is racist.
We've seen it repeatedly in India, where people are quick to take offence; often on the most bizarre of assumptions. Calls for brand boycotts are frequent and fierce. Apps are uninstalled, people burn products and post videos, often forcing brands to take down adverts, recall products, change names and more. This backlash to Kimmel’s joke is similar.
The K pop band BTS is a phenomenon and has arguably the largest, fiercest and most committed fan following in the world. They are offended and have taken up cudgels on behalf of their idols.
This is a feature of Cancel Culture – people’s older actions /utterances are dug up and presented as ‘proof’ of a pattern of racism or bigotry or whatever it is they are accused of. This happens even when those people may have apologised for the comments made in the past.
Jimmy Kimmel has been insensitive and even offensive in the past as for the Blackface incident which he admittedly apologized for. His smugness is annoying – even to me. And yes, as a white male born and living in a wealthy developed nation, he is among the most privileged people in the world. There is much that he would have been and perhaps still is ignorant about.
Here people are asking for Jimmy Kimmel to lose his job because of the jokes he cracked. Does he deserve this punishment? When people take offence at jokes such as these, insisting that they are offensive and hurtful when they don't actually encourage racism or bigotry, doesn’t this muddy the waters? This sort of behaviour is a great excuse for the real bigots to criticize and belittle groups they disagree with. I myself am clear in mind that offensive ‘jokes’ that punch down are just not funny. But to create a sense of grievance against largely innocuous stuff is to trivialise genuine issues.
I don’t watch a lot of Jimmy Kimmel because I find him a little too smug and I don’t think he is particularly funny. But I would argue that if he was indeed alluding to BTS, he was punching up here - given the incredible fame and power the group currently has. In my book, a joke is fine as long as it punches up and not down - even if I don't find it funny.
Maybe Kimmel was more ignorant and offensive in the past and is less so today – he is a work in progress perhaps. But to take umbrage at a joke I did not find funny and then ask for him to lose his job, is not OK. Cancel Culture is doing more harm than good – precisely because it overreacts and picks easy targets. This ends up undermining the larger work of creating a more just, equitable and inclusive society.
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