In early March, Woke Princess™ Meghan Markle told Oprah that she and husband Harry were victims of systemic racism inside Buckingham Palace. She refused to name names. She did not provide evidence that the alleged mistreatment was racially motivated. She was not asked by Oprah about the multi-million dollar inheritance she lives on courtesy of the Diana estate or the Netflix deal or the California mansion or the presidential ambitions. As far as Oprah was concerned, Markle’s claims of racial victimization at the hands of a major Western institution were consistent with the prevailing narrative. She was speaking her truth, which was akin to the truth.
That same week, Piers Morgan appeared on “Good Morning Britain” to give his opinion on the matter because it is his job to give his opinion on such matters. Piers said what we were all thinking: “I don’t believe a word she says. I wouldn’t believe her if she read me a weather report.” A quarter of Britons feel the same, by polling data. But a difference of opinion is for those who don’t feel enough, the truly cold-hearted and ill-tempered.
The show’s weather guy took issue and accused Piers on air of having a “vendetta” against Markle because she wasn’t friends with him anymore: “She’s entitled to cut you off if she wants to. And yet you continue to trash her.” Piers should’ve told the weather guy to “get back in his weather box” like he did in 2017. But this time he stormed off set not to return.
Because everything is stupid now, 41,000 people complained to the Office of Communications (Ofcom) – the actual British Thought Police whose job it is to censor “harmful” and “offensive” material. They wanted an investigation and Piers off the show for expressing an opinion they didn’t like. Morgan was going to be out anyway, presumably of his own volition — understandably tired of working with his leftist colleagues. But the public blowback from the woke mob signified to its broader adherents that only leftist opinions are permitted on television – and, unfortunately, Piers didn’t hold one.
This is the point at which things got interesting.
Sharon Osbourne, the still-sentient half of the Osbourne power partnership and co-host of “The Talk,” defended her friend Piers. She tweeted: “I am with you. I stand by you. People forget that you’re paid for your opinion and that you’re just speaking your truth.” On the show, co-host Sheryl Underwood asked Osbourne what she would say to people who felt that she was giving “validation or safe haven” to racist comments, “even if you don’t agree.” Osbourne asked why Piers had to be racist for criticizing Markle, why it couldn’t just be that he doesn’t like her.
That was all it took. Now, Sharon Osbourne was a racist too.
Facing the same blowback as her pal, Osbourne did what Morgan had the guts not to: she apologized to the woke mob. Then she left the show in disgrace, as reported this week.
She sold out her friend to save herself and got pummeled anyway. That’s how it works. If you cooperate against each other, you both get cancelled. If neither of you cooperate, you both get cancelled. If only one of you cooperates against the other, you both get cancelled.
The mob isn’t asking for repentance. It wants heads to roll as a warning to others. The cancellation game isn’t about purifying society. It’s aimed at terrifying the public into conformity with the totalitarian ethos imposed by our new elite ruling class. When you apologize to the mob, you cede your moral authority to a hoard of cretins who subsequently take your head. You don’t get to come back from this. Once you apologize, particularly if you’ve done nothing wrong, you forfeit your leverage and rip it out from under those who would’ve come to your defense.
When you speak your mind freely, you delegitimize the authority of the elite ruling class. When you refuse to apologize, you lock them out of their “safe haven” of smug moral and intellectual superiority. They don’t like that. So you don’t back down when the woke mob writes its letters and posts its tweets and bellyaches to management. You let the rest of the free world come to your defense. You can storm out indignantly and find work at another institution that values Western principles. But you don’t apologize. You don’t sell out your friends. And you never resign in shame. Otherwise, frankly, your cancellation is on you because you submitted to it.
Sharon Osbourne is cancelled. Piers Morgan is simply out of a job, for now.
We need to relearn intransigence in defense of our freedom. This means stop apologizing to the mob. Its legitimacy derives only from those who submit to it.
Kevin Catapano is a political science student at the University of Connecticut and a contributor for Lone Conservative. He has written columns for the student newspaper and served as a staff writer for the UConn Undergraduate Political Review.
(Photo: Flickr/Alachua County/CC BY 2.0)
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of Heroes Media Group