I would add that the harm from cancel culture’s chilling effect may be a lot more severe than what people tend to imagine. The chilling effect does not only prevent people from writing things that would actually get them “canceled”. Rather, it can prevent people from writing things that they merely have a non-neglectable credence (e.g. 0.1%) of getting them canceled (at some point in the future); which is probably a much larger and more important set of things/ideas that we silently lose.
Thank you for writing this important post Larks!
I would add that the harm from cancel culture’s chilling effect may be a lot more severe than what people tend to imagine. The chilling effect does not only prevent people from writing things that would actually get them “canceled”. Rather, it can prevent people from writing things that they merely have a non-neglectable credence (e.g. 0.1%) of getting them canceled (at some point in the future); which is probably a much larger and more important set of things/ideas that we silently lose.
+1. I also think that the chilling effect can extend to people’s thoughts, i.e., limiting what people even let themselves think let alone write.
See also https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/2LtJ7xpxDS9Gu5NYq/open-and-welcome-thread-october-2020?commentId=YrRcRxNiJupZjfgnc
ETA: In case it’s not clear, my point is that there’s also an additional chilling effect from even smaller but more extreme tail risks.