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The Cancel Culture Straw Man
The marketplace of stale ideas doesn’t want a peace treaty, it demands surrender.
Surrender and Peace are different things
In a culture war, there could theoretically be a culture peace treaty. Just as a nonaggression pact between peoples may allow conflicting populations to coexist, a cultural non-aggression pact — we’ll call it a tolerant society — could afford room for a broad range of different ideas and perspectives. Indeed, once the aggression is off the table, the interaction between disparate groups may spark new ideas and opportunities, building upon diversity to create a stronger synergistic whole.
A tolerant society doesn’t happen all by itself. It takes work to build one. To continue to exist, it must be defended. Karl Popper’s paradox of tolerance tells us that in order to maintain a tolerant society, that society must be intolerant to intolerance. Tolerance isn’t a simplistic moral absolute. It is a nonaggression pact, a contract of cooperation — or at least noninterference — between parties. The protections that are afforded by a peace treaty only apply to those who are willing to abide by its terms. It is an agreement to live in mutual peace with others who also consent to the same rules. It is not a promise to behave peacefully even in the face of…
