Social media is an influential part of everyday life, and many students base their future on it. It brings opportunities for people to build careers and hobbies online. With all its  positives, social media brings some disadvantages such as cancel culture.

Cancel culture is a defensive reaction found on social media when a celebrity, or anyone with a high number of followers, says or does something a group of people do not agree with.

“I think that cancel culture is really toxic because it can ruin a person’s life for things that they did like 10 years ago when they did not know anything,” Anthony Berberi, junior, said. 

 This problem is typically handled by “canceling” or boycotting the person by not watching their videos or unfollowing them. Celebrities build up their careers on social media, so being canceled means one’s whole career can be ruined alongside their follower count.

“It is devastating for these celebrities that have potential in this world to do something great. I get it; people make mistakes, and we are here to learn from them, but sometimes, society can go a little overboard,”Alicia Isenberg, freshman, said. 

Many celebrities and social media influencers have been affected by cancel culture. One well-known Youtuber is James Charles. Charles’s whole YouTube career almost went down the drain this summer due to certain allegations. Being one of the few lucky celebrities to survive cancel culture, Charles still has a large follower count on his YouTube channel, Instagram, and Twitter. Although he survived, Charles’s career will always be affected. 

“I do not agree with what James Charles allegedly did, but I still do not think we as a society should be this quick to cancel someone,” Sasha Beltran, sophomore, said.

As social media has grown in presence, so has the effect people can have on each other’s lives. One post can have positive or negative effects on others; sometimes though, the world needs a little bit of positivity. Changing social media to be more positive starts with the acceptance of others and to cancel cancel culture.