At-Will Employment Is the Real “Cancel Culture”
The “cancel culture” debate never focuses on at-will employment, which allows most American workers to be “canceled” at the drop of a hat — even those teaching in higher education.
Like so many American laborers, most academic workers do not have just-cause provisions or other legal protections to turn to if they find themselves facing trial by spectacle online.
A specter is haunting academia — the specter of cancellation, ghostly in part because no one can agree about what it amounts to, much less whether it even exists.
There is further disagreement over what “cancellation” would involve if it in fact existed. Some understand it as a matter of cultural boycotts targeting prominent figures with questionable views, while others are more concerned about our tendency to treat social media platforms as de facto courtrooms.
But whether or not “cancellation” of either form haunts the hallowed halls of the university, something that manifestly can happen to you if you teach college courses is this: your students can take to Twitter to launch a vigilante campaign to get you fired.
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