Six Ways to Respond to Cancel Culture Tactics

In a previous post, When Cancel Culture Comes For Your Family, I noted the tactics that are employed by the cancellers, many of whom are ‘regular’ people. Once you have identified the tactics, there is still the problem of how to respond. This article aims to give you a step by step guide.

When somebody is pulling out the cancel culture tactics against you or your family, your instant reaction may be anger and rage. This anger may not be all bad. It may be righteous indignation. What’s difficult to sort out is whether we are angry because we are being confronted, or whether we are angry because we are being falsely accused. Either way, we must recognize that our emotions reveal the fact that we are being challenged, whether fairly in the way that Proverbs says, “faithful are the wounds of a friend”, or deceptively by the tactics of manipulation.

This initial anger is the throbbing response to injury. We can be tempted to sin in our anger, so we must weigh out responses from a concern for the cause of righteousness as compared to mere self-vindication.

Below are six ways to respond to cancel culture tactics:

Six Ways to Respond to Cancel Culture Tactics

1. Suffer the Wrong

In the face of unjust attacks, consider the wisdom from 1Corinthians. Paul says, “

To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? (1 Cor 6.7).

The context refers to lawsuits between Christian believers, so that must be kept in mind. But the argument to “suffer wrong” can also be seen in Peter’s statement that “love covers a multitude of sins” (1 Pet 4.8).

Recognize that grace (undeserved favor) can transcend misunderstandings and mistakes. This is not to deny that the cancel tactics have been employed, but it is to receive the injury and return undeserved favor in reply.

2. Love Your Enemy

When faced with hostility, we need to look to the example of the Lord Jesus. He chose to love his enemies and commanded his disciples to do the same. Being ready to forgive offenses and to offer love toward those who are sworn enemies can be seen in the horror of the cross, which Christ transformed into the greatest blessing.

When you love your enemy (Mat 5:44 , Luke 6:27,35), you are admitting that you have enemies. 

When the cancellers attack you, it can be very disorienting because we can assume we don’t have any real enemies. We can think that everyone likes us. Discovering you have enemies can be so jarring that you might be tempted to assume there is a misunderstanding, or you seek to redefine your opponent as an ally not an adversary.

This is a common response when people are being cancelled. They can’t believe it is happening to them. So they scramble to be as agreeable as possible so that the cancellers will be shown that they are friends. But this is very naïve.

You will never love your enemy until you admit that they are against you.

Many people who are being threatened with cancellation never get to the place of loving their enemies because they refuse to accept that anyone would be against them. This attitude is so common in evangelicalism that it has become enshrined in ‘church growth’ methodology.

With no possibility of enemies, these Christians get anemic in their love. They must create lies about their enemies (“they don’t really mean that”), or assume that they have done something wrong (“it must be my fault”).

By letting their desire to be liked dominate their thinking, these Christians perpetuate the lies which their enemies are employing to cancel them. The Christians are neither truth-tellers, nor grace-givers. They are only conforming to this world (Rom 12.2). Their enemies will ultimately cancel them, or else coerce a change on those Christians so dramatic that they are only an irrelevant shell of Christian profession.

3. Speak the Truth in Love

Confronting false accusations or misrepresentations requires a twofold approach. The two components, Paul said are “speaking the truth in love” (Eph 4:15). On the one hand, we must speak the truth. As Solzhenitsyn argued we cannot live by lies. He said:

Speaking the truth is not vengeful. It’s not meting out retribution. Rather, it is done in love. It is out of concern for our communities, and compassion for our enemy’s soul. The power of this love is specifically Christ-like because it is the enemy-love which he exhibited on the cross. It does not deny the wrongness and the hostility of the enemy. It admits it and understands it. But it chooses to love the enemy enough to speak the truth.

4. Love Enough to Argue the Case

The further step from speaking the truth in love is to love the enemy enough to argue the case. Today, few people can be bothered with carefully and clearly arguing their case, holding out the truth, but doing so from a motive of deep love and prevailing grace. Most people don’t care enough to do this. They know they can just cut ties, drop them, make them ‘talk to the hand’, and move on. Consider how great must be the personal cost involved in arguing a case because you love your enemies, neighbors, and loved ones. Most folks are unwilling to pay the personal cost. They don’t want to ‘waste’ the energy. But their disengagement shows that they don’t really care about the wellbeing of their enemies. And more viscerally, they don’t care too much if their enemies injure somebody else.

Apollos was a great example of someone who cared enough to argue his case as we are told by Luke, “he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures that the Christ was Jesus. (Acts 18.28). Apollos could have said, “Why bother?” But he chose to argue his case at great cost to himself.

Now a person may be worn down because of the canceller’s tactics. They might not be able to follow through and argue for truth in love. This can happen when dealing with an institution like the government, an employer, or a social institution like a school or church. It may just have to suffice that you choose to speak the truth in love, and leave the argument to be reconciled at the Last Day when “books [are] opened” (Rev 20.12, cf. Dan 7.10).

5. Protect and Defend Your Loved Ones

Once a person has chosen to follow through with an extended argumentation with a canceller, the aim will be speaking the truth in love to such an extent that the evil of the cancellers will be checked and other targets will be protected.

This is the reason why people will argue truth principles in court, elections, online debate, and through written reviews, rejoinders, and surrejoinders. They are seeking to curtail the growth of cancellers, who are like so many weeds. Through argumentation they clip them down so the cancellers don’t choke out everyone else.

Paul insisted on this pushback after an extended argumentation with the authorities that lead to his arrest. He said: “They have beaten us publicly, uncondemned, men who are Roman citizens, and have thrown us into prison; and do they now throw us out secretly? No! Let them come themselves and take us out.” (Acts 16:27).

Paul wasn’t pressing the authorities for an apology for Paul’s own sake. He was staking out ground to protect the new converts in Philippi, such as the jailer and the believers in his home, as well as other believers, including Lydia, whom Paul visited after getting the official apology (vv.38-40).

6. Testifying to the Truth Even When Injustice Succeeds

You’ll have noticed that the notion of success has not entered in at all. When the cancellers come for you or your family, rarely will you win.

The hope is that you will testify well, even when you lose.

Jesus lost on the cross, or so the disciples first thought (Luke 24:31).

Later on, Paul could say, “Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God” (2 Tim 1:8).

In the case of Jesus, and of Paul, it looked like they lost. But what did they do? They testified to the glory of God and the truth of the good news. Their goal was not self-vindicating success. Instead, they wanted to bear a faithful testimony. The word for testimony in the original language transliterates to “martyr”. Although all testimonies are not martyrdoms, all martyrdoms are testimonies.

As the Lord told Paul, “Be of good cheer, Paul: for as thou hast testified of me in Jerusalem, so must thou bear witness also at Rome (Acts 23.11 KJV). The miscarriage of justice prevailed and Paul was executed eventually. But his testimony remained.

Conclusion

We can take from the testimony of the Scriptures this everlasting hope: We may lose, but our testimony won’t die.

When someone uses the cancellation tactics against you, you can have confidence that you can care enough to speak, love enough to speak truth, being compassionate enough to argue, and being confident enough to testify.

You may get cancelled anyways, but your testimony will be known by God and all who seek the truth.

ACTIONS 🥅

Have you been cancelled in some way? Share your thoughts in the comments or let me know how you handled it.

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