Right wing cancel culture at it again.

[Batmanisaplaceinturkey]

This really is a scary time for free speech.

Another example right wing hypocrisy when it comes to free speech:

Jimmy Kimmel Live! suspended indefinitely after host’s Charlie Kirk comments https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2025/sep/18/jimmy-kimmel-live-suspended-indefinitely-after-hosts-charlie-kirk-comments?CMP=share_btn_url

Colbert and Meyers were very measured too from what I saw. .

I do find it very odd when people don’t distinguish between the UK and US. It’s like when George Floyd was killed by a US police officer and some people seemed to hate UK police for it.

fwiw I don’t think Kimmel should have been taken off air. But this is in another country. Not here. I do think that he probably deserved some sort of fine though. To say “This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he calls a friend. This is how a four-year-old mourns a goldfish," is really lacking in decency when a human being has been assassinated. Presumably Kirk was Trump’s friend. I know when my best friend died in her 20s that I certainly mourned her like a broken hearted child. The left have some views with a strange disconnect. They oppose the death penalty for convicted criminals, but one leftist dishes out the death penalty to Charlie Kirk (with no criminal trial) and then others celebrate and poke fun the fact that this was done and the grieving friends / colleagues. The left is every bit as scary as the right.

If you are talking about free speech in our country, that went long ago. Even on this website. People saying they supported the conservatives at the last general election and arguing for them were shut down by being called “Tory bots”. And worse, shamefully, MNHQ let this stand. A clear breach of their own guidelines (accusing a poster of not being genuine - which if so is something needing reporting). if you voted Tory years ago, you were called racist. Well oh look, that party gave us our first non white PM in Sunak and is now also led by a different non white person, KB. I have found that on this website, the prevailing view is very, very strongly defended.

And I’m not even a Tory. I’m a centrist.

So what I'm getting from this thread is that totalitarianism is fine, and no-one's worried that the US has become a dictatorship, because trans.

Great.

I’m not wholly sure who ‘they’ are in your comment. The left? Or the right? Or in general?

You may not believe a return to speaking freely will happen. It may not be likely to happen. The very right leaning American conservatives don’t want this to happen (though CK seemingly advocated for this) @Butchyrestingface likely doesn’t think this will happen. However, how on earth can it be wrong to state that debate is the way forward? And why the need for the sneery ‘it’s cute’ comment that is more typical of a patronising man?

Though it may take some time, I still have more faith in the Left in realising how problematic the nodebate movement was and will move back to open debate than the Right given that the #nodebate movement was initially started by regressive and manipulative men.

If you are talking about free speech in our country, that went long ago. Even on this website. People saying they supported the conservatives at the last general election and arguing for them were shut down by being called “Tory bots”. And worse, shamefully, MNHQ let this stand.
"Freespeech us under attack because Mumsnet wont censor speech I don't like!"

Do you people even hear yourselves?

JK said absolutely nothing wrong, this is all so utterly ridiculous!

I loved the Trump clip when asked how he was holding up and all he said was about the new ballroom. He is living his best life being hosted by royalty not giving a fuck about what’s going on at home.

Well said!

Am I really old?

I remember Cancel culture as starting during the Iraq war with the Dixie Chicks (yes I am old). Alongside the rather amusing "freedom fries" debacle they basically lost a lot careers wise. Good song though.
Then with the increase in internet, public shaming became almost a hobby for some people https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/So_You've_Been_Publicly_Shamed
Then the left took to it in a big way.and expanded it. You could say "hah hah serves those rightwingers right for how they treated the Dixie Chicks." But I doubt all the people being "cancelled" in the 2020s would have been involved in the Dixie Chicks cancellation.
Now we have the same thing from the right, but a more exaggerated version. Again, I doubt all the people caught up in this will be "deserving".

It's all very "my team"versus "your team" but also a death spiral to the bottom.

I agree, This site has gone nuts (only recently I think) with aggressively right wing people

I'd say since about 2018, around there. So not that recent. It's always been on the FWR board, just more as an undercurrent. Some have been trying to voice concerns for ages about this and getting laughed at and saying that it's not at all.
Only now people are getting to see it more as it's becoming more and more blatant as people are presumably feeling more emboldened.

Stephen colbert 's. Show was cancelled wasn't it?

Can’t you see those things are connected? The left messed up so epically pandering to their extreme wing they have ushered in the right.

Couldn't agree more

What’s the issue? The site isn’t all in line with your thinking?

Oh come on. Surely you can see that they weren't saying that?!

This. 100%.

This. It's absolutely crazy isn't it? Luckily I don't hear anyone speak like this in real life!

Not at all, I know people don't all think the same. I was just responding to a comment upthread that's all saying they thought it was a new thing, this "aggressively right wing" stuff they're seeing.
I'm just saying it's been around for years, especially there, just it's more blatant now (all over MN on most boards now, presumably because people are feeling more emboldened now)

FFS. Amazing that people calling for "consequences" for people saying things they don't like, hounding women out of their careers, and destroying people's reputations never once realised that the very same tactics could be used against them.

The price of free speech is hearing speech you don't like, even find abhorrent. If you want your free speech, that means you have to accept others' free speech, too. It's a basic and easy to understand principle.

People should not be sacked for saying stupid and offensive things, no matter what side of the argument they are coming from. It is very hard to understand why the left never saw this coming, though, especially after it was repeatedly pointed out to them as a fatal flaw in their approach.

Completely agree.
And seeing so many people celebrating his dictatorship is quite frankly terrifying.

As Hitchens C often pointed out, the solution to abject poverty and stripped rights IS the empowerment of women.

Do you think it's ok for someone to be murdered for their views?

Do you think having sympathy because someone was murdered is right wing?

Do you think laughing about someone being murdered is ok?

With respect, who are you?

This thread is in Chat, not politics, but it’s a bit of an overstatement to claim that all of MN is a cesspit of women concerned about women’s rights when anything trans related tends to be relegated to a single space on FWR vs the literally hundreds and hundreds (thousands) of threads on every other possible topic under the sun.

If you take the time to read the FWR threads you’ll also find that most posters there care deeply about abortion rights and maternity care and workers rights. In fact, oddly enough, anything that has to do with supporting women and children. On a forum called mumsnet.

Absolutely this.

Your post makes no sense. Your post suggests it serves those on the left right if they are sacked, but If you truly believe in free speech. All you have to say if Kimmel should not be sacked and leave it at that.