Claudine Gay Is Not A Victim Of Cancel Culture | Bobby Burack

Two left-wing narratives have emerged since Claudine Gay resigned as president of Harvard over charges of plagiarism.

The likes of Al Sharpton and Jemele Hill first portrayed Gay as a victim of a right-wing smear campaign to bring down an innocent black woman.

We refuted that argument earlier this week. The right did not target Gay because she's a black woman. The right reported on Gay's misdeeds after learning she is a serial plagiarist and, unlike former PENN president Liz Magill, she held on after a cringe congressional testimony last month. You can read more about that here.

Others say Gay is a victim of cancel culture.

"The anti-cancel culture folks are predictably quiet about what’s happened to Claudine Gay. Of course," tweeted Boston Globe columnist Renée Graham.

"We are likely going to see an uptick in cancel culture coming from the right," added Greg Lukianoff, the president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. 

Hmm. Not quite.

Claudine Gay is not a victim of cancel culture, either.

Let us not conflate cancel culture from accountability. They are not the same.

Cancel culture is when someone is fired, demoted, or suppressed over an opinion of which the outrage machine disapproves.

For example, picking just one of the many, the Sacramento Kings basketball team fired broadcaster Grant Napear in 2020 for tweeting "All Lives Matter."

Napear lost his job because he espoused a political message that his employer didn't support. That is cancel culture.

Compare what happened to Napear to, say, Don Lemon.

CNN didn't cancel Don Lemon for having the wrong opinions. Rather, CNN fired him last year for repeatedly misbehaving behind the scenes and undermining management. That is not cancel culture.

There's a difference between losing your job over your speech and losing your job over your decision to violate company policy.

Claudine Gay falls firmly into the latter category.

Harvard forced her to resign as president for unethical behavior and because her congressional testimony prompted several billion donors to freeze their donations.

What's more, Harvard will continue to employ Gay as an administrator. According to the New York Post, the university will pay Gay more than $900,000 a year and eventually award her with a raise.

Casualties of cancel culture often have to sell their homes and create podcasts on Skype. They don't land cushier gigs for more money.

Claudine Gay did. She exudes privilege.

Of course, the left understands the difference between accountability and cancel culture. But every major news story must now be culture war-ed. And liberal media pundits understand it's their role to defend Claudine Gay at all costs.