Ant Middleton: Cancel Culture claims another scalp
He has apologised for both sets of statements, yet, like most victims of cancel culture grovelling on bending knee, this did not save him.
With every passing week, word of yet another target of cancel culture inevitably hits social media news cycles. It seems we have become collectively numb to this phenomenon of ritual public humiliation for daring to hold the wrong opinions, having been hit with an overdose of it over the previous years, that we come to expect it in the same manner as we do the sun rising every morning.
This week’s victim is one Ant Middleton, who the internet describes as a Who Dares Win star (I had never heard of the star or the TV program before his cull from the entertainment industry). He was sacked by Channel 4 due to his comments on the current lockdown, as well as the Black Lives Matter movement (hereafter ‘BLM’). Last June, at the height of the BLM riots, he branded the protestors ‘absolute scum’; strong words for sure, but no reason to hound someone out of a job.
To add to his list of crimes, he is also a lockdown sceptic, who commanded people to continue their lives as normal. Of course, such views are forbidden in a world gripped by hysteria.
He has apologised for both sets of statements, yet, like most victims of cancel culture grovelling on bending knee, this did not save him. This force is unforgiving.
What is also worthy of note is that he was only fired recently, meaning that his previous statements had been sitting back-stage, only just being pulled into the spotlight. This is an odd state of affairs, as it is often the case – especially in an age where the window to everyone’s private life is accessible online – that opinions out-of-sync with the status quo are clamped down upon immediately. Middleton’s past misdeeds have been brought to the surface at a rather irregular time.
Channel 4 found his opinions problematic and placed a hand on his shoulder to usher him out the door. Middleton produced a tweet implying that his decision to leave the show was voluntary and completely on his own accord, stating that he had ‘decided its time to move on.’ The best method for Channel 4 was to remain silent, yet they did not.
They refused to let Middleton leave quietly, producing a statement of their own declaring that ‘our views and values are not aligned.’ Nowadays, one isn’t only paid to do a job and laugh at the boss’ bad jokes, they must also fulfil an unwritten contract provision that functions much like a purity test. Their current and future employment depends on appeasing the approved opinions, with the surveillance state apparatus of social media ensuring that there is no place to hide.
Middleton was this week’s example of cancel culture. Or, alternatively phrased, this week’s victim who cancel culture chose to make an example of. Who will it be next?
