In the midst of recent media coverage surrounding Kobe Bryant’s death, CBS host Gayle King interviewed WNBA basketball player Lisa Leslie. The interview was hosted in Leslie’s home, providing King with an intimate setting to question Leslie on her close friendship with the late NBA basketball star. As the two sat to discuss Bryant, addressing Bryant’s relationship with his 13-year old daughter Gianna and Kobe’s impact on the world of basketball, the conversation transitioned into the legacy he has left behind.
Days before King’s interview and minutes after the announcement of Bryant’s death, the Washington Post national reporter, Felicia Somnez, posted an article on Twitter entitled, “Kobe Bryant’s Disturbing Rape Case: The DNA evidence, the Accuser’s Story, and the Half Confession”. The article, which discussed an accusation of rape made against Kobe in 2003, was three years old. The tweet received significant backlash, as the public criticized Somnez for the insensitivity of her timing in the release of the article. On Twitter, the post was followed by comments calling for her death, threats of rape and abuse, and harassment. She was immediately “cancelled” by the Twitter community.
In King’s interview with Leslie, King asked, “It’s been said that his legacy is complicated, because of a sexual assault charge that was dismissed in 2003, 2004… is it complicated for you as a woman, as a WNBA player?” Leslie responded by saying it was uncomplicated for her, and highlighted Bryant’s respectful and kind character. When the interview was released, King received a reaction similar to that of Somnez. On social media she was referred to as a traitor in the black community, and received death threats and harassment from fellow celebrities. She too had been “cancelled.”
The public’s reaction to the holistic review of Kobe’s life is fraught with questions of accountability and journalistic integrity, but I’d like to acknowledge the way the public addresses individuals whose behavior or opinions are deemed offensive or unpopular. Cancelation — a subgenre of call-out culture — is meant to humiliate individuals in order to hold them accountable for their problematic opinion. This humiliation occurs on social media, subjecting the victim to a “trial by Twitter.”
A Los Angeles Magazine article titled, “The Day Cancel Culture was Canceled” points out that removing people from mainstream society through canceling “isn’t about teaching, it’s about creating a society where no one says or does problematic things.” It assumes that there can be a utopian society of all-knowing individuals who make no mistakes, leaving no room for those who do. In the unfortunate event that one makes a mistake, they are publicly ridiculed and socially ostracized. However, this trial will not foster a change of opinion. Victims may not understand why their dissent is a mistake — instead they understand that if they promote their unpopular opinion, they might be paraded in front of the digital community as a misinformed bigot. There is no room to remedy ignorance, only room to incite fear.
Last October in an interview about youth activism hosted by the Obama Summit Foundation, former U.S. President Barack Obama said, “I do get a sense sometimes now, around certain young people, and this accelerated by social media, there is this sense sometimes of: ‘The way of me making change is to be as judgemental as possible about other people… That’s not bringing about change.” If our goal is to create a society of well-informed and conscious individuals, cancelling someone fails to construct this society; instead, it masks the issues presented and removes these issues from discussion.
