Credit;PA
It was announced this week that veteran actor John Cleese will take on the topic of “cancel culture” in a forthcoming television series for the UK’s Channel 4.
The new documentary will reportedly explore “why a new ‘woke’ generation is trying to rewrite the rules on what can and can’t be said”.
John Cleese: Cancel Me will see the British comedian and actor meet various subjects who claim to have been “cancelled” for their actions or statements, and activists who have led opposition to various public figures.
In a statement, Cleese said: “I’m delighted to have a chance to find out, on camera, about all the aspects of so-called political correctness. There’s so much I really don’t understand, like: how the impeccable idea of ‘Let’s all be kind to people’ has been developed in some cases ad absurdum.”
Environmentalist campaigner and Guardian journalist George Monbiot had a lot to say about the new show, penning an impassioned thread in reaction to it and the general furore about ‘cancel culture.’
He said:
“As yet another right-winger is offered yet another platform to explain how he has been oppressed and de-platformed, by all means let’s talk about cancelled subjects. But I mean cancelled subjects, not “cancelled” ones.”
“Let’s talk about capitalism, and the way it drives us towards ecological and social destruction. Let’s talk about economic growth, and its incompatibility with the protection of the living world.”
“Let’s talk about advertising, and the way it exploits our weaknesses and hacks our minds. Let’s talk about consumerism, and the way it ends up consuming us. Let’s talk about corporate power. Let’s talk about oligarchic power.”
“Let’s talk about the City of London’s role as the offshore capital of global finance, and the corruption and organised crime it facilitates. Let’s talk about billionaires, and the many lives they ruin. Let’s talk about the redistribution of wealth.”
“Let’s talk about the inequality of ownership. Let’s talk about the ownership of second homes, and their role in causing homelessness and community death. Let’s talk about how the extreme legal protection of property makes a mockery of the idea of equality before the law.”
Let’s talk about the disproportionate emissions of the rich. Let’s talk about how ecological destruction is a function of wealth. Let’s talk about how we can’t consume our way out of the environmental crisis.
“Let’s talk about cars and the way they destroy urban life. Let’s talk about planes, the impossibility of “fixing” them on a realistic timescale, and the need to shut down airport space. Let’s talking about what One-Planet living really looks like.”
“Let’s talk about nuclear weapons, and the duty to retire them. Let’s talk about the arms trade, from which UK companies profit massively, while raining misery on other nations. Let’s talk about the financial sector’s role in stealing land and resources from poorer nations.”
“You don’t want to talk about these subjects? You don’t want to provide these issues with a platform, anywhere in the billionaire press or on network TV? But I thought the media was against cancel culture? I thought it was against de-platforming. How odd.”
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