Sorry I’ve been away for a few days. Here in Halifax, it’s so cold the internet froze.
While cooped up inside with my kids, we worked on this little science project where we built an elaborate balloon, but when I opened the front door it flew away. Wonder what happened to it?
My pop culture diet these days consists mainly of true crime and WW2 documentaries, so I kind if missed the whole Louis C.K. phenomenon even before he was #MeToo-ed.
But longtime fan “Jim Treacher” notes that he’s been low-key rebuilding his career in recent years, starting from the bottom in small comedy clubs and eventually working his way back to selling out Madison Square Garden:
Mr. C.K. (that is his legal name, right?) did this without the help of any major media conglomerates, and it does kind of make a point about “cancel culture” and how you can come back from it. If the you have the resources and the pre-existing fan base, at least.
Social media has given people unprecedented tools to destroy careers seemingly overnight, but it’s a double-edged sword: the tools are also there for the canceled to un-cancel themselves and keep making a living.
I’ve never been canceled myself, seeing as how you can’t really have your life destroyed if you never had a life to begin with. [Taps forehead] But I was able to launch a blog for free back in 2001, found a steady audience over time, and I’m still at it - and even making a little beer money - 22 years later.
Then there are YouTubers and TikTokers who did pretty much the same, but with much more success. We have some streaming subscriptions in my home, but my 11 year-old spends much more time watching YouTubers who (mostly) started with nothing but a shoestring budget and their own charisma.
Francis Ford Coppola (who admittedly might not be the best advertisement for financing projects yourself) called it when he spoke to Roger Ebert many years ago:
I remember interviewing Francis Ford Coppola in 1967, when he had just made "Finian's Rainbow." The successes of "The Godfather" and "Apocalypse Now" were far in the future; he was a kid just out of film school, plowing through a briefcase of film catalogs, telling me enthusiastically: "It's all gonna change. The day is coming when you won't need a $100,000 camera and a studio to make a movie. They're gonna invent video camera that people can actually carry around. They'll be affordable. People will be able to make their own movies! You wait and see."
If you were already kind of famous, you can keep your career alive on Substack, YouTube or through podcasts. That’s how several media figures have kept working even after being fired from major media outlets: Bill O’Reilly after himself being #MeToo-ed, Megyn Kelly for making allegedly racist comments and gaining poor ratings, Keith Olbermann after years of being Keith Olbermann.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Rigid Thinking to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.