De Jure
The Mob, Carl Hoeckner - 1935
The court of public opinion is incredibly effective at sentencing and punishment; often times a little too effective. The now saturated debate over “cancel culture” highlights the power of collective opinion when coupled with the launchpads of online communication. It can be a source of true destruction for a person’s reputation. We now have scores of park screamers, talk show hosts, and syrup mascots that have been excised from the social body for their malignant composition. But just as this nuclear force can be catastrophic, we can also use its energy productively. When refined and managed appropriately, social outrage can be used to empower an ethical society; a principle that is easy to forget about amidst our current moment.
When Stefan Molyneux was canceled by the public for promoting white-nationalist, anti-Semitic, and other impressively bad ideas, corporations followed suit and blasted him out of the public discussion. It wouldn’t be surprising if you’ve never even heard of him, which means that the halt to his quickly proliferating podcast and other idea-spreaders was pretty effective. His continual irrelevancy in the marketplace of ideas is a good thing, and it’s all thanks to the vitriol of online tweeters and bloggers moving their thumbs in irate configurations. The mob did what it was supposed to do, and we are better now for it. The obvious criticism here is that often the canceling of a person or business is not so clearly justified and the public ends up engaging in a kind of exaggerated friendly-fire.
Controversy abounded when Carson King, a 24 year old regular-guy tailgater rose to fame after a clip went viral depicting him at ESPN’s College GameDay, holding a sign with his Venmo username, and jokingly inviting donations for Busch beer. This subsequently led to him receiving thousands of dollars in donations, King then donating the money to University of Iowa Stead Family Children’s Hospital, and having Anheuser-Busch match his donation alongside a sponsorship. This was a lovely iteration of viral internet culture raising over $1M for philanthropy. Then the domino effect took a weird turn when a journalist decided to publish racially insensitive tweets he had unearthed from King’s teenage years. Anheuser-Busch promptly disassociated themselves from King, and King made a public apology for the comments he made at 16 years old. In an epic sequel to this shitshow, the reporter responsible for exposing King’s old racist tweets was then blackballed himself when the public exposed old racist tweets that he, himself, had made. This is a tale that falls right between laughter-inducing and surreally terrifying, but highlights the unhinged dangers of social mobs on missions to defame and deplatform.
The key, in all this, is finding the sweet spot to channel the powerful energy naturally generated by social agitation. When someone engages in wrongdoing, there are only two main vectors of discipline and punishment. The first is clearly the law, but legal boundaries are meticulously crafted to limit unjust victimization. Often times, implied hate speech or other dangers are insufficient for legal prosecution. The other domain to exercise power is the public milieu. When the abilities of the law fall short, or when we determine that something is just above the threshold of regulating to preserve personal liberties, the force that can substitute for the legal system is our social habitat and its unrefined methods of regulating appropriate behavior.
If a public figure promotes horrible ideas, unapologetically, that are outside the purview of legal measures, taking away this person’s public credibility is a worthwhile endeavor. Molyneux was rightfully removed from the public eye. The question becomes how to limit the application of social indictments to only reasonable and judicious cases. People calling for the death-penalty when someone leaves their dog in a car just simply won’t cut it for a balanced social court.
A major component to being able to channel public condemnation effectively is by fostering forgiveness as a core principle of the social body. It is incredibly difficult to appease the social hivemind once it has reached a verdict on one’s crimes. In law, the accused always have the right to present a case in their defense and retain the presumption of innocence to back it up. On Twitter, you’re pretty much fucked. Any transgressions that are escalated to the online horde’s collective attention are quickly snowballed into having you and your loved ones threatened with murder. The online social sphere has made it impossible to come back from the other side of condemnatory accusations.
We have to find ways to reinforce apologies and repentance as legitimate tools rather than effete acts of lip service. Allowing room for forgiveness will promote a healthy communication climate and will limit the spread of accusatory misinformation. On the flip side, it will allow us to make the court of public opinion more just and less reactionary. The interconnected social body is likely to accelerate as communication becomes more technologically streamlined. Toeing the line between fair and unfair outrage is a crucial element that needs cultivated alongside this escalation. If you find yourself upset about someone’s behavior online, you might take a moment to examine how many of those around you are indulging in the same source of rage. Is there even an opportunity for the accused to come out innocent on the other end? If not, you might put your phone down for a moment. Are you in a mob?