With the reality of social media, can someone truly be canceled and face the consequences of their actions, or is the cancellation of those people just another example of performative activism?

Performative activism is when a person uses a social cause to increase their finances or get more likes on social media. This type of person would rather people know that they are not sexist, racist, homophobic, etc., than actually doing something to help a cause.

“I think that cancel culture can be good because it teaches people that are uninformed and brings attention to topics that we would not talk about,” said junior Misty Ramirez.

For example, TikTok influencer Mikayla Nogueira got canceled for lying to her followers after she lied about a review of mascara. She put on fake lashes and said that it was what the mascara did to her lashes. After this Youtuber Jeffree Star posted a Tweet about Beauty influencers not being honest on their reviews. Star has been off the internet for months because of being canceled himself because of many problematic things he has done in his past.

“I think that cancel culture can be very toxic sometimes if not all the time, people cancel celebrities for really stupid stuff like of course there is the big stuff and I agree on canceling people that made huge mistakes but most of the time these people don’t get canceled because of stuff that us normal people do,” said Junior Nabila Al-Qadumi.

However, Star came back after a few months of being away from any social media platform because people started posting saying how much they missed the era on social media where people could be honest with their public. After his comeback, many people went back to supporting him even after his comments.

And all of this leaves us wondering if people really care about those issues and if they are not going to learn anything from their actions. Is canceling them really worth it, or is it just a waste of time? Don’t get me wrong, I believe that yes, people should be held accountable for their actions, but I think there are other ways to hold them responsible.

“I think cancel culture is stupid,” said South Windsor senior Maanal Sheriff. Obviously, there are cases where the person is wrongly canceled. They did not do anything wrong and people were just bored and wanted to cancel someone with a false rumor. But this is not the case with Jeffree Star. He deserves to be held accountable for his actions.

“I think that cancel culture can be very toxic sometimes, if not all the time; people cancel celebrities for really stupid stuff like of course there is the big stuff and I agree on canceling people that made huge mistakes but most of the time these people don’t get canceled because of stuff that us normal people do,” said Junior Nabila Al-Qadumi.

Cancel culture can be used for both good and bad. People can be canceled for anything from doing something that one person doesn’t like to something that is actually problematic. So it is important to analyze the situation and see why people are canceling them not only following what other people are doing.