Kanye’s Creepy Comeback

The funny thing about the concept of cancel culture is that its popularization coincided with the demise of the mechanisms through which a person might truly be exiled from public life. The mainstream is now fractured into pieces; former gatekeepers in the media and entertainment industry are constantly undermined; the internet has created anarchic new routes for public figures to reach an audience. When an entertainer is canceled, it mostly means that certain moneyed interests—such as a publicly traded company that must cater to the diverse sensitivities of investors or consumers—are more hesitant to work with them. But it doesn’t mean that regular people can’t, or won’t, still engage with whoever succeeds at grabbing their attention.