The Cancel Culture Trap: Why Self Censorship is Ruining Your Content

What's up, you guys? Welcome back to the podcast. It is Friday night as I record this. It is almost 9:00 PM, and I have an international flight tomorrow that I have not packed anything for, and I have so many things to do. But we have a really interesting topic for this solo episode, so I'm excited to dig into it with you. I've got my candles lit, we're kind of setting the mood. It's a little bit of a darker topic, but it was inspired by something that I spoke about recently on my Instagram stories, and I asked you guys if you thought that you unconsciously censor yourself online, and 85% of you said 100% yes. And it's just a very real reality now with how much of our lives and businesses and brands and everything revolve around social media, that so many people have this new fear of being canceled. Now, this wasn't a thing a few years ago. If you can remember a time, people didn't walk around fearing and censoring what they say and worrying what people's opinions were going to be. And if there would be a cancel campaign against them. Like, this is much more of a newer phenomenon now. It's been around for several years, obviously, but like, social media in and of itself is quite young. So this isn't, you know, a longstanding problem that humans have faced for a long time, and it's one that I find so fascinating. So in this episode, I'm going to unpack several pop culture incidents as it relates to cancel culture. I'm also going to share my thoughts and opinions and insight from a friend of mine who has actually been canceled herself in the online space. We'll talk about what makes people want to cancel others and my advice for standing out online anyways. All right, let's get into it. Welcome to the Makeshift Happen podcast. I'm your host, Samantha Daly, entrepreneur, life coach, and your no BS bestie, here to bring you all things mindset, manifestation, and personal development. This podcast is designed to help you expand your mind and uplevel your life, so turn the Turn the volume up and roll the windows down if you're coming along for the ride. Let's go make shift happen. So the way that this whole conversation came to be was that I posted something on my Instagram stories about Sydney Sweeney because after her ad with American Eagle and the campaign that they did for the denim that was about, you know, her having good genes. There was of course an uproar and a backlash and, you know, this campaign to sort of cancel her or label her a white supremacist. And then she recently did this interview early November, so a couple weeks ago, with GQ where the interviewer, Katherine Stauffel— Stauffel, I think is, is her name— was almost trying to like put her in a corner and make her speak about the quote-unquote issues that people saw with that campaign. And Sydney's response was basically, I'm not going to talk about it because I don't think it's an issue. So the— her quote was actually, I think that when I have an issue I want to speak about, people will hear about it. Essentially saying, I'm not going to talk on this topic because it's a non-issue. And so I had posted something in my stories about just saying like how this is a major mood because I think we need to normalize not allowing other people to scandalize topics or things that actually are not scandalous and were not meant for harm or with malintent to begin with. And so if you're not familiar, you can look this up. Just look up Sydney Sweeney, American Eagle, Good Jeans campaign. And essentially, you know, people got upset because there was the, the double meaning with talking about how Sydney Sweeney has good jeans. And they were saying that her genes are superior and that now that, you know, there's this double meaning behind the ad campaign about white people being the superior race and how Sydney is now a white supremacist. And my genuine opinion is that if what you get from a denim ad that says Sydney Sweeney has good genes is that she believes she's superior to other races and is a white supremacist, then I think you need to go to therapy. Like, I really don't know what to tell you, but I just think that is so cooked. And there's just this hyper-politicization of everything, making things an issue that are a complete non-issue because people nowadays, I think, are really too sensitive and they've kind of been programmed to believe that their own internal triggers and narratives should be everyone else's problem. If you're triggered by a jean ad that says Good Jeans, then that's a you issue, babe, right? That's not— the whole world doesn't need to join in your cancel campaign and take away Sydney Sweeney's platform and her fame and, and whatever else, right? It's almost like people try to read between the lines so hard that they're actually not even reading from the same book in the same universe anymore. Like, they're just spinning things and taking the tiniest little morsel of something and turning it into a whole thing that it never actually was. Like, sometimes you're like, I don't even— I just don't think it's that deep, do you know what I mean? And so I just don't understand how someone saying that Sydney Sweeney is good-looking has turned into white supremacy. Well, I guess I do know how. It's the woke propaganda, that's how. And, and that's honestly part of— a major part of what I think contributes to cancel culture is people trying to be so woke that, and walking around just constantly triggered by everything everyone's saying. And then again, reading between the lines so hard that they're now reading off of a completely different book and fabricating things and making things up and being so offended by everything that now everything is somehow a race issue, a gender issue, a power issue, a sexism issue. Like, everything is an issue. And I also think this does us a disservice because it takes away from actual real issues. Because of course there's fucked up shit that happens in the world all the time that should be called out and should be, you know, publicized so that people can build awareness around it. And when you're doing this to everything, it's almost like the boy who cried wolf, right? Like it delegitimizes— is that a word? It legitimizes actual real problems and scandals that are happening in the world that deserve more attention. The other thing that I'll say about the interview— so the, the ad campaign for American Eagle was, I think, a couple months ago. The interview that she did recently with GQ was for some other like movie or, or project that she's been in recently. And the other thing I'll say about it is if you go and and watch it. Just look it up on YouTube. You can watch the full interview. I think it's like 20 minutes long or something. But the interviewer is— I just didn't like her energy at all because she was really trying to almost be like faking being a girl's girl with Sydney and like really complimenting her with this like fake smile on her face. And, and but then at the same time trying to like pit her into these situations where she had to answer these questions that she knew was going to make Sydney look bad. And I think as an interviewer, you know, you want to get to the hard questions and you want to ask people things about the more scandalous parts of their life or their work or their reputation or whatever, because that can make a good interview. But it felt so disingenuous. And so leading up to the conversation about the American Eagle campaign, she kind of starts out like being really friendly with Sydney, of like mentioning the American Eagle thing and almost like laughing with her about like, haha, you know, like it's just jeans, like Nothing's wrong with like, it's just jeans. And Sydney's like, yeah, I mean, like, I did a jean ad, so it said good jeans. And she was playing off of that and almost like agreeing with her and laughing and smiling, and then suddenly like is making her answer these questions of like, so, but now since we're talking about this, like, is there anything you want to say about this? Like, what's your comment? And almost like reiterating to Sydney that people felt what they felt from the jean ad was that she was talking about being like racially superior, and that in today's political climate, it's like not very good thing to be talking about and to have an ad about and whatever. And that's when Sydney paused, and in her head you can see her calculating, realizing, oh, this bitch actually is not on my side. She's trying to get me to say something that's probably going to further my cancel campaign because that's going to be a soundbite that everybody pulls. So she pauses and she's just like— because the interviewer's like, is there anything you want to say about that? And she said, well, I think when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear about it. And I just— I love that moment for her because it's like, literally, shut the hell up. Like, why are you asking me this? You're, you're trying to like get me to say the exact right thing so that you can further this cancel campaign. But anyways, that quote, that was still the major soundbite from the interview and it went viral. And now you've probably seen it. There's memes from the interview where with the interviewer's face looking at her and then Sydney Sweeney looking back like deadpan with like a straight face. And then people are using it for all different kinds of memes. But I just thought that was, that was the thing that sparked this whole conversation of like, have we, how far are we really going? With this like woke culture that, that makes us want to cancel everybody for the stupidest things. And so the reason why I think this whole conversation about cancel culture is relevant, especially to anyone listening to this podcast, is because a lot of us are trying to do big things with our life. We have missions and dreams of building brands or businesses, impacting people, and many of us are using social media in one way or another to do that. And so we become part of this online, you know, digital world where we're almost like having to yield to the societal norms and narratives and whatever the, you know, biggest woke thing is currently, to tiptoe around and make sure that we don't actually be our full selves and we don't actually say something funny or too sarcastic or too bold or too whatever because someone could take it the wrong way and then we could be the victim of a cancel campaign. And so that's what inspired me to really talk about this, that, and also the recent criticism around some things from Taylor Swift's album. So as you guys know, I'm a big Swifty, love Taylor Swift. If you don't like her music, I don't mind. But I do love her music and I've listened to it since I was a little girl. I've grown up with Taylor and just watched her evolve as a human. And she probably is like the icon of my life because I just think she's incredible. She is so wildly generous, super successful, one of the most intelligent marketers on the planet. She has built the biggest cult-like following of any human probably on planet Earth. I mean, there's so many things to admire her for and the way that she still keeps her heart open and loves big and is loyal to her friends and, you know, so overly generous to her fans and her employees and her dancers and everyone. I mean, obviously I'm a Swiftie, okay, so we'll start there. But the, the, the thing that I want to talk about with some criticism around her recent album is not about the music, but it's about this same concept of like people just taking things out of context and then turning it into a reason to have something negative to say about someone, almost just to like feel important or to feel like they have a hot take. And I think that's also part of it. Like, there's this social media culture that tells us, like, you always have to have something new and spicy and a hot take. And I can get, you know, I can understand that there's, there's a pressure there of wanting to always feel like you have something new to contribute to the conversation, or something that you noticed that nobody else noticed, and ooh, it's like a hot take. I think that also gets people to almost look for things where there aren't— like, look for issues where there aren't any. Again, similar to, like, the, the Sydney Sweeney thing. So anyway, I'll use this as an example. She has a song on the new album called Wish List. Right off the bat, it was my favorite song that I heard when I listened to the album the first time through. But there's a line in the song that says, 'Got the whole block looking like you,' and she's talking about her fiancé Travis, like, 'Got the whole block looking like you.' So some people took this line out of context and immediately ran for the hills and yelled, 'Racist, racist, racist!' 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She's too pretty. She's too happy. You know, even in her documentary that she did, Miss Americana, in part of that she talks about turning 30 and how she was like, I'm 30 now and I don't know how much longer I'll be able to do this. Meaning that she basically said like, society's still tolerating me being successful. She's wanting to like put out music and do tours and serve the fans and do all of this because she doesn't know how much longer she has left of society tolerating her success. So she's also very aware of the fact that when you grow too big, you become the monster on the hill, and then people hate you and they don't want to see you succeed and they don't want to support you and they don't want to listen to your music and they will, you know, tear you down. She's talked at length throughout her career about having to constantly reinvent yourself and the challenge that females have in the entertainment and music industry more so than males and, and all of these nuanced sort of issues. But I think it's interesting just to see how aware she is of that and then also see people's attempts to like do this to her. So if you look at that whole line in the song Wish List, it actually says, have a couple kids, got the whole block looking like you. And the song is about all these things that people want that are on their wish list. They want that yacht life under chopper blades. They want the Balenciaga shades. They want a fat ass and a baby face. They want all these things. But I just want you. You got me dreaming about a house and a basketball hoop. So she's really talking about her newfound desires for living this sort of like softer life now that she's found the love of her life and wanting to have a house with a basketball hoop in the, in the driveway and wanting to have all these little kids running around that look just like her and Travis. Got the whole block looking like you. It's very obvious when you listen to the song that she is not talking about racial superiority or wanting to live in an all-white neighborhood. Like, it's really just so comical, the things that people will try to spin to make it a problem. The other thing that people are saying about this song and this album at large is that Taylor is promoting tradwife culture now. So number one, she's not. Number two, if she was, who fucking cares? Who fucking cares? Like, why does that bother you so bad? She's, first of all, not a traditional wife because she's a billionaire, okay, who works extremely hard. She runs a massive company. She has tons of employees and pays so many people and has a huge team. She donates millions of dollars to charity. I mean, she often gives out six-figure bonuses. Like, she is a boss babe at her core. She is not a tradwife. But even if she was, why would that be such a bad thing? Why is that so frowned upon? Why are people so mad about that? Now that she's engaged, she loves to bake bread. She's been talking a lot about her journey to making sourdough bread, and she's loving that. And now she's writing songs about wanting babies and people are like, oh no, she's a conservative. And they're just making it all political. One, she's not a fucking conservative. She is so liberal. She's done— she talks about this in her documentary. She's done so many songs and things about this. She's been very clear. She backed Kamala Harris in the most recent presidential campaign. She's been so fucking clear about where she stands politically. So the fact that people are saying she's a tradwife and she's conservative, one, you're dumb, you don't pay attention, and that's not true. But two, even if she was a conservative, again, who fucking cares? Who cares? Even if she wanted to become a traditional wife and give up her music and entertaining career and just have babies and raise a family and live peacefully on her own, and, you know, like the song says, we tell the world to leave us the fuck alone and they do. Wow. Even if she wanted to do that and just bake her bread and, and raise her family, like, why would that be an issue? And also, why does that have to be political? Why does someone's preference of how they want to live their life or raise their family or, you know, priorities as they grow into a new season of their life. Why does it have to become political? I just remember a time when people could have different political views and affiliations without everyone assuming that it meant that they were like fascist or racist or sexist. Like, we've just become so extreme on both sides, and the aggressive name-calling and labeling all the time is out of an— out of— it's out of control. And so the Sydney Sweeney thing and the Taylor Swift's new album thing are just two examples that I've noticed recently in pop culture of places where people are taking things that are non-issues, spinning them into issues, politicizing them, and then creating, you know, labels and name-calling out of it where it's like, you're a white supremacist, or you're this. It's just, you know, it was so interesting to also watch how when Charlie Kirk was assassinated a few months ago, that the people that were happy about it were saying, bye-bye fascist, like, we're so happy he got killed because he was a fascist, when in in actuality, and I didn't even know who Charlie Kirk was until he got shot, but like in the aftermath of that, just like watching everything was so fascinating to see how people responded. Again, in this culture of like we need to point fingers and make labels and call out names when we're truly not informed at all about who this person is or what they think, because we've just watched like viral sound bites or, you know, little things that were pulled here and there. And so as someone who also had no clue who this person was, I was kind of observing as third-party outsider and just seeing this culture of like needing to label and name-call and whatever. And so all the people that were happy that he was murdered were saying bye-bye fascist because they believed that he was a fascist. When, you know, the irony in that is that the individual who killed Charlie, or, you know, the groups of people or the government or whoever, right, was responsible, um, for assassinating Charlie Kirk, those were the people that were actually committing an act of fascism. Because shooting someone, murdering someone in public because they have different beliefs and you deem those beliefs unacceptable and you believe that they must be silenced at all costs literally is fascism at work. And so I just found it so like confusing, compelling, interesting, fascinating to watch this whole name-calling cancel culture thing taking hold of a really, you know, public politicized issue and people name-calling and saying, oh, you're a fascist, when in actuality they were supporting an act of fascism, which is literally murdering someone for their opinions. And I pretty much— and one thing about me is like, I love to stay out of politics. I love not watching the news. Like, I love it for my peace, for my happiness. I'm way more at ease. I'm a more productive person when I do so. So this— what I'm talking about here isn't really meant to be like a commentary on American politics, but rather like just the sensitivities that we've developed as a woke society and how those things directly influence cancel culture and people not feeling safe to be themselves online. Because as we've seen, you don't need to be a political activist like Charli to still be victimized by woke cancel culture. Like, Sydney and Taylor are great examples of this. All you have to do is be a little too pretty or a little too successful, and they will take something completely unproblematic and they will turn it into a reason to call you racist, fascist, white supremacist, whatever any of the other names are, right? And so again, I want to disclaim, because we have to nowadays, that I'm not saying that those things aren't real issues, that there aren't real racist, fascist, white supremacist, whatever in the world. Of course there are. I'm just observing how quick we are to point the finger at people and label them those things for no good reason. It's literally like the Salem Witch Trials out here. Innocent people are bound to get burned in the process because everyone is terrified of being accused. We are all afraid of saying the wrong thing, of, you know, having the wrong opinion, of being associated with the wrong person, or whatever. And so because we're all terrified of being accused or being canceled or being wrongly associated with someone, like, then everyone starts pointing fingers and being like, well, you said this and you're this and you're that, because it almost makes them feel like they can separate themselves and, and, you know, show to people, oh, I'm not that, I'm not that. To go back to the Charlie Kirk thing for a second, just on social media afterwards, there were a lot of people saying and feeling like they needed to proclaim out loud publicly, like, just so you know, like, this is a safe space because I'm against this, this, this, this, this, or, you know, whatever is happening, blah, blah, blah. But like, I do not support this, this, and this. And it's like, why are we doing that though? Why are you— why do you have to do that? That's what I'm saying when I, when I say it's like the Salem Witch Trials. It's like, because everyone's being accused of being a witch, you feel like you have to go out on your social media and be like, just so you know, I'm not a witch. I do not believe these things. I do not associate myself with these people. I've never talked about this or said this or believed this or thought that. Like, I, I am not, I am not, I am not, I am not. And And that also adds to the fear that a lot of us carry of being canceled, because it's not even like you have to say anything too bold. Like we— like we're talking about here, especially with pop culture and celebrities. It's like you could literally say anything. You could say fucking good jeans and you can— and oh, you're the target now. You're a white supremacist. You're being canceled. It's crazy. It's crazy. Another kind of pop culture example I thought I would bring to the table is the controversial joke. Joke that Matt Rife made. He's a comedian, if you're not familiar with him. He made a joke in his Netflix special. It's called Natural Selection, if you want to watch it. But to summarize it roughly, he was telling a story about a female hostess at a restaurant with a black eye, and he said something along the lines of, yeah, but I feel like if she could cook, she wouldn't have that black eye. Now, this sparked a ton of backlash because people felt that it was minimizing domestic abuse and that it was kind of a victim-blaming statement. But here's the thing, I think it's okay to not laugh at that joke. I think it's okay to find that joke distasteful or inappropriate or not funny at all, right? Like, totally valid if you don't think that's funny, don't laugh. When I watched the Netflix special, I personally didn't get a chuckle out of that joke, but I also didn't feel like I needed to take to the internet to tear him down and start his cancel campaign or make threat about him. And something that I think is worth noting is like Matt also makes jokes about everyone and everything, like gay, trans, disabled, Black, white, deaf, amputee, sorority girl, uh, been to prison, in a wheelchair. I mean, he truly does bits on every type of person. Every range of humanity are targets for his jokes. And with comedians in general, I think, you know, it's always going to be the case that there's someone who takes it personal or it hits something a little too close to home for them, and so they find it distasteful or it's not funny for them, or they're, you know, just personally kind of triggered by it. And I think that's the risk that you take as a comedian. But does someone's career need to be cancelled over a bad joke, even if it was a joke that went too far? Like, why is our instinct nowadays— because it wasn't like this before, this is, like I said, cancel culture is like a fairly new social phenomenon— why is it our instinct nowadays to want to fully rip someone's career and livelihood out from under them? Them when they make a mistake? Does it— does it make us feel powerful when we're upset and we're triggered and we're offended? And so we want to be able to, like, you know, it feels good to punch back. We want to be able to take something from them. Is— is that what it is? Why are we no longer capable of giving people grace, of letting them make mistakes, and also assume that it doesn't mean that they're an awful fucking person through and through, and that they should, you know, their life should be ruined forever? Why can we not leave room for people to say stupid shit or have a fuck-up or do something bad and grow because of it. Like cancel culture, I think, really prevents people from also learning from mistakes and growing because you don't get any second chances. It's like, nope, you're done now. We decided we no longer want to support you. You can't make money. You're not famous. You don't— like, we just want to take their livelihood away from them. For what? Right? It feels like we've developed a sort of cultural norm to throw a tantrum when a public figure hurts our feelings. Now, are there people who deserve to be canceled? Absolutely. Let me think of a few off the top of my head. Diddy, Jeffrey Epstein, right? But Matt Rife, Taylor Swift, Sydney Sweeney, that random business coach that you used to love until she got too successful and too loud. Like, I think we need to get a grip. And collectively, like, what I would like to see happen is that we all just stay a little bit more unbothered and we find it within ourselves again to be able to see something that we disagree with or we dislike or that we think is, you know, not cool or not funny or whatever, and we just move the fuck on because this is the same rise and fall that we always see, right? Like the formula is copy paste with cancel culture. The public loves you. TikTok loves you. Millions of people are cheering on your rise to fame. They love supporting you. They love being like one of the early adopters, the early supporters. Like they're there for you. They're backing you. They're spreading your stuff. They're loving it. And then there's a threshold where you become too successful for the public to tolerate anymore, as Taylor Swift has famously said. And that is when people reach up and they grab you off your pedestal and they tear you down with their claws. And it's like, nope, we made you what you are and now we are going to sink your ship entirely. So another song off of Taylor Swift's recent album is called Cancelled and and this fits perfectly into this conversation because of course it's about cancel culture. And there's a line from the song that says, one single drop and you're off the roster. Tone deaf and hot, let's fucking off her. And it's really about exactly this, this culture of like, oh, you got too hot and you said something that was a little bit tone deaf. Hey, don't forget that every month we are picking a listener of the month to win $50 in cash just for showing love to the show. All you have to do is leave an epic review of the podcast on Apple Podcasts, screenshot the review before you hit submit, and DM that screenshot to us on Instagram @makeshifthappenpodcast. And that's it. I want to thank you for being such a loyal listener and show my appreciation by putting a little extra cash in your pocket. I know it's super easy not to do it, but every single rating and review seriously helps the show rank higher and reach new people. So we appreciate them more than you know. We'll announce the next winner at the end of the month and slide into your DMs if it's you, so keep an eye out and good luck. Love you guys and thanks for supporting Makeshift Happen. You're done. We're going to end you. And she's basically saying in this song, good thing I like my friends canceled. And you know, if there's people around her that have had cancel campaigns against them, which of course there have been, she is still standing next to them. She's on their side because she's also been the victim of a cancel campaign. If you're a longtime Swiftie, you know the whole Kanye West, Kim Kardashian drama of them totally canceling her. She was the trending hashtag on Twitter of Taylor Swift is over party. Everyone hated her. She had to escape reality for a year and was never seen in public, uh, kind of ran away and hid, um, because she couldn't be seen, couldn't handle being out in public, like suffered a really hard cancellation. And that's where she she came back with her Reputation album. So if any of you love songs off of Reputation, but you don't know the lore behind that, like, massive comeback to music, well, that was after she was canceled. So I have a friend, someone in my life who went through a public cancellation in the online space a few years ago. And as I was preparing for this episode, I thought it would be really interesting to reach out to her and ask her some questions about her personal experience with being canceled online, specifically on social media. And so I'm gonna share with you some of the things that she told me. She told me that being ostracized from a group is one of the most isolating, confusing, and painful things that she thinks a human can possibly go through. She said, it felt like I was backed into a corner and everyone was pointing and yelling and shouting at me. And it was the most painful thing I've ever experienced, even more so than the grief of my sister dying. And what she said to me about that was that when my sister passed away or when I had a miscarriage, you know, with that kind of grief, everyone is there to support you. But with cancellation online or defamation of character, no one is there for you. Everyone turns their back on you because it's like you become this virus, you become this leper. It's like the Salem Witch Trials again. Once you've been labeled a witch, no one can be seen with you, no one can be associated with you. People don't want to have any connections with you because they don't want to be next. And that's one of the most dangerous parts of cancel culture, is exactly that, is like we turn our backs on people, even people that we love, even people that we trusted, even people that we supported, maybe even when we don't have the full evidence or all of the facts or the information. And because there's this, you know, public campaign of like, oh, everyone collectively thinks that this is a bad person, now you remove yourself from any connection to that person. And that only makes it worse and fuels the cancel culture machine. And so she told me that that betrayal piece was the part that really hurt the most. And when the people that you never suspected would actually end up siding with the masses and also contribute to the cancellation or decide to distance themselves from you or not speak to you or not be associated with you, like people that you, that you thought were your friends or people that you thought were loyal to you or clients or whoever, like that betrayal part, she said, hurt so, so much because there's people that you, that you just think they wouldn't do that to me and then they do. She said it felt like everyone was against me and my self-confidence crashed. I didn't want to be here anymore. It created insane levels of fear and shame around showing up online and even in my personal life. She removed herself from the internet for over a year, like never posted online. She said that she couldn't even open her phone because it had hundreds of messages and emails from people. She even had an old teacher asking her like, are you okay? Because of how viral it had all gone. She had so many emails and such a trauma from the emails that she was receiving during that time that for a year after that, she had to hire someone else to manage her email inbox because she couldn't even, you know, physiologically in her body manage opening her email inbox because of the PTSD from that experience. People just demanding refunds, posting about her, making threads, tearing her down, calling her out in their stories. Like she said, it was truly the most awful experience. Of her life as it was happening. But then something she told me was kind of surprising but also really beautiful, that, you know, years later, looking back in hindsight, it is one of the best things that ever happened to her because it rearranged her entire life and it allowed her to really put the pieces back together in a way that felt more organic and aligned. And it shifted all of her priorities, and she was really able to see who her true friends were. And those were all gifts of the post-cancellation, things that she never would have done before. She wouldn't have slowed down, she wouldn't have stopped hustling, she wouldn't have been able to see who was a true friend or not, she wouldn't have built her life and her business based in faith and, you know, found her relationship with God. And there's a lot of beautiful things that happened as a result of really needing to hit her knees and ask for grace and guidance. And so she told me, previously, you know, I would let everyone's opinions influence how I thought about myself, but after being canceled, I was really able to build build much stronger boundaries around who actually has a say in my life, who actually can tell me anything about who I am, about my character, about my worth, about my actions, about, you know, what I'm doing, how I'm building my business, anything. So it went from, you know, a ton of people's opinions online mattering to her to only a small core group of people whose voices that she really allowed in. So she kind of recognizes now in retrospect that she was looking in all the wrong places for validation, and she was really getting it from from that. She had everything. It seemed like everything was going well, you know, she was really successful doing all the things. And only— it was only in the cancellation that she was able to like see the cracks in that and rearrange her life from a much more aligned place and stop trying to get validation from the wrong sources. And then she also told me that, you know, nowadays when the public tries to cancel someone, she is always thinking about the person being attacked act first and really tries not to side with the public right away or just blindly believe whatever the narrative that's being spread. And, you know, really try to see the, the possibility of, oh, is this person that's being canceled, are they actually evil? Did they actually do all these things? Is any of this potentially taken out of context? Like, what is the deeper truth underneath the, the sound bites and the short clips and all of that? And so even with things Blake Lively's public cancellation over this past summer. Was it this past summer or the one before? Which, you know, was a whole thing. And then when Taylor Swift's song came out, they're like, oh, I guess we basically found out that Taylor and Blake are still friends because she's like, good thing I like my friends canceled. But anyway, Blake Lively's like public cancellation after the whole drama with the movie of It Ends With Us and people saying that she didn't promote it properly and that she was not sensitive enough to the domestic abuse and all those things, um, and her, you know, the lawsuit that she has with Jeff Justin Baldoni and all the crazy things. She, my friend, was telling me like, even when that was happening, like, I'm always thinking of the person who's being canceled and I really try not to jump to conclusions. Cuz a lot of times like it is, you know, certain things taken out of context or something has some truth to it, but it's not the whole truth. And so it has just given her a different perspective on a lot of things. She also told me that like later on, like later, later, much later after the cancellation, people came around to her and actually said sorry and admitted that the reason that they jumped on the bandwagon to cancel her was because they were in a dark place themselves at the time. And it became too hard to see her winning all the time as a 26-year-old millionaire. And when they saw like what other people were saying and that other people had complaints or issues or whatever narratives about her, they just chose to believe it because it felt good to be able to pile on and kind of tear her down because it, it allowed them to affirm the belief that, oh, that's right. Like, I don't have everything, not because I'm behind or doing something wrong, but because all the people that do have something, they're evil and not good people and bad and whatever. And I think that's also a common thing is like when you see someone living an expression or an experience of life that feels almost too good to be true and it really hits you in— it triggers you because it's like, oh, I really desire that. I want that to be true for me. I wish that could be my life. For some people, it actually feels feels good and validating to get some information from somewhere that goes, oh, but that person's actually not happy, or she's actually a bitch, or she actually is, you know, got all of her money by doing fucked up things, or she's actually evil, or whatever. And you go, oh, thank God. Like, you know, that kind of feels good inside, and that makes sense to me because I was over here thinking she had everything that I wanted, and now I just get to feel better about myself by realizing that she probably only got that because she's a horrible person, or because she did shady things, or whatever, whatever.. And so I think that's part of the challenge too, is like if we were all working harder on being fulfilled in our own lives, like for our lane, you don't have to be the most successful person making the most amount of money. Like you have to define what success means to you personally and your life, your season of life, the priorities that you have, what matters to you most. Pursue those things, put your blinders on and find your own version of happiness. If we were more concerned with doing that, like, as a society, I think there would be a lot less cancel culture because there wouldn't be as much of this, like, oh, like dopamine hit or like validation from, like, tearing someone else down. Because a lot of it does come from envy and jealousy and those kind of, like, triggered emotions where it just feels good to realize that the person that has everything that you've ever wanted, like, oh, it's just too good to be true. And that's a story that we would love to perpetuate because it allows to feel a little bit better. And that's really sad. That is actually really, really sad. So like I said, my whole inspiration for really bringing this conversation forward was the Sydney Sweeney interview thing, but it started making me connect the dots and think of a lot of different scenarios where this has all come up recently in the, you know, the public kind of landscape and how these things, even if they are not directly related to running an online business, actively are affecting creatives, business owners, Content creators, all of the above, because the more that we see this played out in the public sphere, the more that we are increasingly afraid to be ourselves, the more that we keep putting out dry, boring vanilla content. Even this episode, right? There's things that I'm talking about in this episode that if someone wants to take a soundbite and twist it in the wrong way, they absolutely can. And that is the risk that I'm taking because I want to be my full self. I want to bring interesting conversations forward. To my audience without fearing that someone's going to grab a soundbite, assume something about me, and then point their finger and label me something. And I don't want to be the person who's, you know, watering down my personality or afraid to be my silly, funny, bold, sarcastic self in my content and, you know, make cheeky jokes and like, I don't want to not do that. But it is scary. And I understand why a lot of my clients come to me and they're like, why am I— why am I not funny on my social media? Like, I know that I'm so funny, or why can't I express my weird, goofy side? Like, I have such a richer, deeper personality offline, and I don't know why that's not translating in my social media. Why do I feel like, you know, people won't get my dry humor or my sarcasm, or they'll take it the wrong way? Why do I have so many drafts in, like, that I'm not posting because I'm just afraid that people are going to take things the wrong way? It's because we live in a soft society where we can't be funny anymore and everything has to be politically correct because you don't want to be the next witch up on the Salem Witch Trials. So consciously or unconsciously, you are censoring yourself, and it's out of self-preservation and protection. And I get that. But hopefully this conversation, this episode, my own expression helps liberate you in some way of being like, no, we should be able to have opinions. We should be able to talk about things. We should be able to make jokes. We should be able express the full range of our personality and trust that it's going to magnetize the right people. And if some people don't like it, then who fucking cares? And so if we are all consciously or unconsciously censoring ourselves in some way, what that means is that one of the simplest and fastest ways for you to stand out online is to throw caution to the wind and just say what you think. Be yourself. Make your jokes. Risk it all, babe. Risk it all. As I always say, like, you have to polarize to magnetize. A magnet is only magnetic because it has polar opposite ends. And the same is true for your brand, for your audience, for your content, for your messaging, your copy. Like, if you're not willing to be polar, then you're not going to get those people that are completely completely attracted to you and like, oh my gosh, you are for me, you're my person, you're my mentor, you're my whatever. But at the same time, the other side of the coin of that is that there's going to be people that you aggressively repel and they're like, oh, like she's too much. I don't like her. I don't jive with her personality. I don't get her. I don't think she's funny. I don't get her jokes, whatever. That is part of it. That's part of becoming a magnet. The most magnetic version of yourself is being willing to be polar. And what I also want to be clear about this with is that this doesn't mean that you have to get political by any means, because like I said, I really love to stay out of politics. I love to not watch the news. I love to be like, mm, like living my happy, peaceful, energetically protected life. Of course I'm going to stay informed, but like, I'm not going to try to go too deep because I know that it actually really messes with my life. So if you're like, how do I be polar without being political? Like, as we've discussed, people will consider some of the dumbest shit as being polar. So trust me, it does not have to be anything political and not even close to it, right? You can be polarizing with something as simple as sarcasm or cursing or wanting to be a stay-at-home mom. Apparently, are you a tradwife? I don't know. Apparently that's fucking polar, babe. Or if you are, you know, unapologetically you want to be a millionaire, well, there's going to be people that are triggered by that. So that's polar. In a society like ours that is currently void of personality and firm opinions, simply having a personality or a sense of humor is polar enough to capture attention. An example of this I thought of recently was, you know, someone commented on one of my reels and basically the gist of it was like the reel said, how it feels to know the same people calling you cringe are the ones who get excited when their boss lets them leave 10 minutes early. Early. So throwing a little shade to, you know, the haters on the internet who are calling you cringe and being like, okay, but you're getting excited when your boss tells you you can leave 10 minutes early. I'm out here risking everything to build something that I love and am passionate about. So quit hating from your lunch break type energy. Someone commented on this reel and she was just like, I love you, but I don't like when entrepreneurs try to minimize 9-to-5 people. Even if they say something about you, we know better. Basically saying like, you should be the bigger person, take the high road, like don't talk down about people. That have 9-to-5 jobs. And, you know, I basically just replied back to her saying, I get that, but like me having a sense of humor means that not every statement I make is going to be the most politically correct thing. But like, of course I respect anyone who works hard, entrepreneur or not. I respect hard work, period. And I think anyone who knows me and actually knows, you know, my true personality really knows that and knows that this is just like a cheeky, funny, silly reel. And it's not like I'm actually saying if you work a 9-to-5 job, like, you're useless. Also, I wasn't talking about everyone who works a 9-to-5 job. I was talking about haters and specifically people who are calling you cringe on the internet. And she kind of doubles down on it and is like, well, it's funny to you, but not them. Like, it's funny to you, but not to them. Like, you can be funny without minimizing people. And so that's kind of the thing where it's like, am I minimizing people or am I just making a joke? And where do we draw that line and how do we define that? Because if you go watch any stand-up comic comedian, any— anything like— and you look at every joke, you might be like, oh well, they're, you know, talking badly about this person, or they're making fun of such and such situation, or they're minimizing whatever. And it's like, we actually just need to be able to take things as a joke and sometimes not make it into a bigger issue that it's not. Is me taking a shot at haters on the internet who want to call you cringe when you're trying to put yourself out there and live your passion minimizing a whole group of people who work 9-to-5 jobs, or is that something that's more about you or something that you have going on in your life, or it's your perception of what I said? And would it be possible to just see that and be like, oh, I don't think that joke is funny, and just like scroll and move on? And so the other thing that I had mentioned to her was like, you know, one of the best marketing tips is to be polarizing. So of course I am stirring the pot intentionally here. Like, we know how social media works. And she's like, I thought that was going to be your original reply. And actually one of my friends did that with her videos and that's how she went viral. So it's like, okay, so why are we having this conversation? You know, you know the situation, you know what it is, babe. You know that we're all out here trying to be a little polar, trying to be a little spicy, trying to say something funny, trying to be sarcastic, trying to like do something. Does it have to be an issue? So here's my honest thoughts on what makes people want to cancel others. This is what I'm going to call coddle culture, and I think coddle culture is the precursor to cancel culture. We have a culture where we want to coddle every single issue, insecurity, everything, to the point where you can't even speak about it, say it wrong, do it wrong, mention it wrong, whatever. And because if you do, you're the bad guy, you're a monster, you're evil, you deserve to have everything you've ever worked for ripped away from you. Like, us coddling every single issue on the planet is the reason why there's so much cancel culture. So I do think that coddle culture is one of the main precursors and things that leads to cancel culture. I also think, of course, a main contributor to cancel culture is the jealousy of success. And that's something that we have to work on within ourselves, which is why so many women in my community who are doing these incredible things like helping people regulate their nervous systems, helping people with money mindset, helping people improve their own lives so that they can be happier, helping people take care of their mental health so that they are more stable or know how to handle their own triggers. Like, helping people really shift from within is the thing that is going to help us deal with this intense jealousy that we have, like, as a society of other people's success, milestones, money, all the things. And that's why I love, you know, having these conversations or talking about money, desires for success, millions of dollars, whatever it is. Because the more that we talk about it, the more that we can normalize wanting those things, having those things, achieving those things, and make it not so crazy and wild and quote unquote evil for someone to like want money or have money and want to like tear them down because of it. Another thing that of course contributes to cancel culture is the bandwagon mentality of like Well, everyone is saying this and I've seen so many viral clips. And the dangerous part of this is like the out-of-context clips that spread like wildfire on social media a lot of times aren't even true. Like they are so wildly out of context where you're like, that's not— people are making it seem like it's something that it's not. And then it creates the bandwagon of everyone going, oh, well, did you see that they said this or she did that or blah, blah, blah, and they haven't even looked into it. They don't even know what the full conversation was or what the context of that was or anything else about this random person. They just go, I saw on TikTok that blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And like, that's our source of like information nowadays. Like, I saw on TikTok and it's one random viral out-of-context clip and that's how you're formulating your whole opinion of like jumping on the cancel campaign for someone. So that's a big issue. I think the other thing that I sort of touched on was like needing everything to be about you. Why do people need everything to be about themselves nowadays? Like, people are incapable of seeing something that they disagree with or don't like and just moving on instead of needing to, like, point it out for attention. It's like you could make a video about how much you love strawberries and someone would be like, well, I'm allergic to strawberries and this is really insensitive to people that— and what about blueberries? And it's like, that's, that's actually the world that we're living in right now. And there is not not one thing that is more fucking annoying than a person in the comment section who's like, well, what about— and then it's like, okay, bitch, and this video wasn't for you. Like, you'll watch a video of someone talking about a topic, say something in relationships, and it's talking about a certain dynamic or what you need to do to like heal your relationship. And it's like, well, what if you're divorced and you have kids involved and he's a narcissist? But it's like, well, babe, this video then wasn't for you. It's not talking— sorry that this content creator didn't make this video personally for you with your whole life story baked into it, just keep scrolling. Just move the fuck on. It doesn't need to be about— everything doesn't need to be about you. Shut the fuck up. Like this. That's also part of like what leads to this cancel culture, in my opinion. Again, these are my opinions. You don't have to agree. And lastly, just like unhappy people, right, who find significance for whatever reason in tearing others off of of a pedestal that sometimes they, you know, built in their own mind. And I think that's, you know, something that I talk to my clients about a lot is being careful if you have people that are coming into your world, if you are a practitioner or a coach or a healer or whatever, and you have people coming into your world who you can feel that they have, they have placed you on a pedestal in their mind and they're, you know, really like fangirly. With you, you want to be cautious of those types of people. Because even if I don't want to put myself on a pedestal for you, if you put me on a pedestal and then I do something that doesn't fit the narrative that you built for me and it makes you want to rip me off of my pedestal, that's, that's really hard to prevent. And so you do kind of have to think about like, does this person— are they looking at me as like a a savior or something that's just way too much responsibility than actually what the relationship should be. So again, these are my personal thoughts and reflections on cancel culture, where we go wrong, how it affects creatives who want to put themselves out there, especially online, who want to build brands or businesses and utilize social media to help them grow and spread their message and help more people, because it, it stops us from really being our most authentic selves. And at the end of the day, it's preventing you from being able to reach more people and help more people. And I think that's a significant issue that we should be talking about. And so these are my personal opinions and thoughts, reflections. I find it fascinating to see this play out on the main world stage with so many different types of figures, whether it's, you know, pop culture, celebrity, political, all the ways. And just sort of see how, of course, when we watch this over and over again, it's going to have an effect on how we show up and how safe we feel being ourselves in the online environment. If you didn't like this episode or you disagreed with any of my takes, I just want you to know that that is totally okay. We don't have to be identical twins. We don't have to have all the same thoughts and opinions all the time. I genuinely respect other people's independent thinking, and I'm not gonna start yelling at people and calling them sexist or racist or fascist or homophobe or any of the other phobes just because they didn't like something that I said. Said, because apparently that is, you know, the normal response nowadays when we don't like someone's opinion. We just start wild name-calling, and that's on cancel culture, folks. I think we will end that episode here. If you did enjoy it, please send it to a friend or share it. It is literally the best way to help support the podcast. All right, I love you guys, and I will see you next week. Bye! If you loved this episode, make sure to check out the show notes where I've linked a few similar episodes I know you're also going to love. You'll find them under the similar episodes section in description down below with direct links so you can dive in and start listening right away, or add them to your queue for later. Binge away for even more growth, expansion, abundance, and fire motivation.