Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Cancel Culture and the Trope of the ScapegoatA Girardian Defense of the Importance of Contemplative ReadingJoakim Wrethed (bio)What unfolds in this article encompasses violence, language/reading, and ethics. René Girard addresses these topics primarily in terms of mimesis, its potential violence, and the trope of the scapegoat. Still, toward the end of his career and life, he relentlessly pointed out the dangers implicated in the dynamism of these forces. He addressed it clearly in his "apocalyptic book" Battling to the End (2010):I have been accused of repeating myself too often, of turning my theory into a fetish, of using it to explain everything. Yet it has described mechanisms that recent discoveries in neuroscience confirm: imitation is the initial and essential means of learning; it is not something acquired later on. We can escape mimetism only by understanding the laws that govern it. Only by understanding the dangers of imitation can we conceive of authentic identification with the Other. However, we are becoming aware of the primacy of moral relationship at the very time when the atomization of humanity is being realized, and when violence has increased in intensity and unpredictability.1[End Page 15] It is this thin line between necessary/harmless imitation and its dangerous versions that will be the central theme in the analysis. As Girard states, a vast amount of established research confirms that the mimetic impulse is innate.2 We should pay specific attention to "the atomization of humanity," since it zooms in on our contemporary epoch's paradoxical "mass-individualism," evidently tremendously enhanced by information and communication technology (ICT). In order to contribute to Girard's lifework and to extend it beyond his own writing, we outline a few contemporary phenomena that clearly exhibit the primordial dangers of human violence that Girard draws attention to. These phenomena are initially only roughly sketched, but subsequent sections give them sharper relief. The central phenomena are cancel culture, speed, and the reading of literature. Just to be clear, the intended mode of reading should be construed in a broad sense, thus potentially including philosophy and theology, if one is inclined to emphasize the differences between these disciplines and the reading of literature.3Cancel culture in certain ways makes manifest a social welfare society version of escalating violence, indicating that "violence has increased in intensity and unpredictability."4 A succinct definition of cancel culture will initially suffice:Cancel culture refers to ending (or attempting to end) an individual's career or prominence to hold them accountable for immoral behavior. Driven primarily by young progressives, often through social media, cancel culture has attracted controversy since it swept into the national conversation.5This definition can easily be extended into larger historical patterns in which, for instance, colonial crimes are highlighted and demands are raised for contemporary acts of atonement. As Rob Henderson points out, the obvious flip side is that "the swift and decisive nature of cancel culture can stifle debate, and some believe that dialogue is a more productive way to foster change."6 The "swiftness" and the immediate collectable consequences are decisive in their functions as social punishment and exclusion; in other words, digitalized speed accomplishes verdict and punishment in a very short time span, which is a reflection of desire pure and simple. The rapidity from intention to anticipated effect rather resembles an instinctive and violent action more than the forwarding of a carefully thought through argument or statement. The present becomes an invincible ivory tower bristling with power to finally mete out the justice that the erroneous ethics of earlier times were incapable of conceiving and achieving. An always already accelerating modernity speeded up immensely through [End Page 16] the fast growth of information and communication technology (ICT). To be sure, the whole evolution of computer technology is defined primarily in terms of processing speed, together with the quantity of information that can be contained in as small a spatial entity as possible. The present-day reality of having almost everything only one or a few clicks away on a screen—as a modern day realization of the library in Alexandria—enhances the relevance of a phenomenon historians have referred to...