To be human is to be racist to some degree - that is a fact. But I wish people would spend less time running from the R-word and more time thinking about the comments and the actions that get them branded with it in the first place.

Here's what I find especially frustrating about all the railing against so-called "cancel culture": A) This sort of thing has been going on for decades, often instigated by the very people who are now moaning and groaning loudest about how un-American it is (see Dixie Chicks, Liz Cheney, and Adam Kinzinger). B) The supposed "victims" of cancel culture usually aren't victims at all. Rogan's Spotify deal remains intact, and he's still richer than probably every writer on Medium combined. The reactions that are supposedly so destructive and dangerous to society as we know it are basically people exercising their freedom of speech. Or does Joe Rogan's right to make millions without retroactive criticism or pushback supersede the freedom of people to take issue with him or even to drag out dumb comments from a decade ago when he was in his 40s and certainly old enough to know better?

As Birds of Mind commented below, why are some people more concerned with protecting the Rogans of the world than they are with actually fighting racism? Rogan doesn't need your help; perhaps someone who actually needs it might have benefitted from a thoughtful essay about why Rogan's offhand "Planet of the Apes" crack is a problem that can't be fixed with a simple apology. But maybe you have to be someone who has heard lines like that directed at people who look like you all your life to understand how damaging it is, whether it's coming from an unrepentant racist or from an "unflltered" comedian who's supposedly only joking.