Unintentional Harm

Let’s Name the Carnage Resulting from Cancellation and Estrangement

Photo by Stefano Pollio on Unsplash

Stories abound of lost relationships, jobs, and positions due to cancellation. This dismissive cultural trend has taught grown adults to discard decades-long, previously close relationships and has led intelligent and skilled professionals to be fired from their workplaces. Sometimes, decisions to sever a connection were made hastily in a reactive state. And often, they stemmed from virtue signaling to “send a message” or to exclude ideological diversity. An alternative perspective may have been deemed harmful, considered dangerous (even “violent”), or labeled as ignorant, racist, or phobic.

Cancel culture, which often lacks empathy, is sometimes socially rewarded. Sadly, in some circles, the casual cruelty of cutting off a relationship has been normalized. The ability to maintain an emotional and relational connection when perspectives differ seems lost. Cancel culture has far-reaching, damaging effects that those behaving impulsively may not have fully considered.

Personally, I’m over age sixty, and I only got a taste of being canceled in the last three years. It came as a shock to me. I’m not religious, and I’m a politically independent/unaffiliated voter. In that position, I’ve cultivated friendships with members of all political parties and people of different religions and faiths, as well as atheists and agnostics. In that moderate spot, I opened myself to a wide range of differing viewpoints while keeping an independent mind, and I have avoided being drawn into any groupthink.

My autonomous stance seems to bother some steeped in tribalism or a particular political party because I am unlikely to be converted to an extreme left or right belief system or an “us versus them” position. I’ve come to realize that my skepticism, questioning, and resistance to jump fully into a “new” or “progressive” ideology or identity group make me problematic to hardliners. People who deeply believe in a viewpoint find it challenging to be questioned or to speak with anyone who might cast doubt on their beliefs. Most people seem to have a low tolerance for listening to a dissenting voice or discussing a controversial subject. So perhaps, in their minds, it is better to push me away so as not to challenge their allegiance to a belief system, party platform, or social justice agenda they have aligned themselves with.

I like the reframing that Marty Makary, MD, provides. The author of Blind Spots: When Medicine Gets It Wrong, and What It Means for Our Health states, “People who actively work to be open and objective are impressive. They are also easy to spot. They surprise people with their positions on different issues. They don’t hop on bandwagons without compelling evidence. And they possess the courage to challenge assumptions and swim against the current.” Even medical specialists can become territorial and not tolerate challenges to their deeply held beliefs. A sound stance or treatment protocol welcomes discussion, debate, and, yes, dissent to ensure that harm is avoided.

Shifting to a focus on personal relationships, I’m observing that women are particularly prone to participating in cancel culture. The euphemisms of “mean girls,” malicious gossip, and ostracism among women throughout the ages aren’t new. How did that immature and petty behavior become elevated and normalized? How did some coaching and therapy circles, typically female, decide to amplify low contact, no contact, or estrangement as self-care or an empowered response to a differing opinion?

I’m not talking about truly abusive situations, which merit distance. I’m not talking about true workplace harassment or inappropriate behaviors, which might merit suspension. I’m addressing the trend of focusing on one differing perspective, a miscommunication, one event, or one thing that is magnified to overshadow everything else, including a person’s entire life or employment history. It disturbs me to see so many relationships tossed aside and former friends and family members dehumanized in cancel culture.

Perhaps the original intention behind ending a relationship was not to hurt the other person; instead, it was an attempt to cope with a situation that overwhelmed the person at the time. However, the longer the estrangement continues, the greater the potential harm and subsequent pain could become, making it harder to repair and heal. Ghosting someone, giving the silent treatment, enabling alienation, or encouraging the rejection of parents are not neutral behaviors.

Narrowing the focus to parental banishment, Rachel Haack writes a chilling account of what parents, including me, are experiencing. Her article, “When People Become Pathogens: How Moral Certainty Turns Relationships into Contamination,” exposes the script and narrative that circulate online and within some therapeutic and coaching circles.

When People Become Pathogens

“We take people who are inconvenient, destabilizing, or difficult to integrate into a preferred moral narrative and begin to reframe them not merely as wrong or limited, but as dangerous to be near, as though proximity itself carries risk. Once this shift occurs, the ordinary moral restraints that govern human behavior begin to loosen, as distance is reframed as virtue, exclusion is justified as care, and acts that would otherwise be recognized as harmful are recast as necessary forms of prevention, allowing those who participate in the exclusion to experience themselves not as cruel, but as morally responsible, even righteous.”

She continues, “What was once understood as ordinary intergenerational tension, shaped by differing norms, values, and historical conditions, is now frequently reframed as evidence of pathology, with older parents positioned as obstacles to psychological health rather than participants in a shared human struggle. Within this framework, moral suspicion replaces curiosity, proximity is treated as risk, and distance becomes not merely an option but an ethical imperative.”

Many parents, including myself, have reported receiving the scripted declaration from an adult child who went no-contact, stating, “I love you and wish you well.” Haack describes how this missive lands: “On its surface, the phrase appears benevolent, even mature. In practice, it closed the door on dialogue, foreclosed the possibility of repair, and recast permanent separation as care. It allowed the sender to experience herself as loving, even as she enacted something else entirely. … Because the cost of this moral certainty is not limited to the parents who are cast out, but extends forward into lineage itself, as children grow up inside ruptured family systems, deprived of continuity, memory, and the stabilizing presence of bonds that once endured complexity rather than fleeing from it.” Please read Haack’s article in its entirety to expand upon and contemplate this valuable insight.

We must look at the roots of this dismissive behavior that has been enabled and applauded for far too long. Are universities and schools teaching cancel culture, or are they teaching resiliency, honing critical thinking skills, and fostering the ability to cope, communicate, and engage in civil discourse and disagreement? We must also examine the roles of mainstream media and social media in breaking up relationships and families. What future are these educational settings and media platforms promoting? If one’s profession, platform, or focus is to censor, dismiss, defame, or use derogatory language and labels against someone who expressed a different viewpoint, then we have a troubling societal problem.

A culture that encourages the breaking of intergenerational bonds or diminishes parental value is neither healthy nor sustainable. The decline in valuing parents can be observed on a large scale and within select family units. New laws and legislative measures are reducing or eliminating rights for parents of minor children. And sadly, vulnerable teens are sometimes influenced to distance themselves or even run away from home to “free themselves” from parents who do not comply with the teen’s demands, or affirm, agree, and align with subjective beliefs or wishes.

The scapegoated truth-teller, speaker of reality, or challenger of a misguided narrative may become an inappropriate target for those who have an alliance to a particular strategy for coping with stress or distress. When a parent sees the big picture or understands the underlying issues more clearly than strangers, they often bear the brunt of angry retribution from an adult child who sees no way out of their preferred or chosen pathway. One reason we are seeing rampant estrangement stems from some therapists, online influencers and coaches socially reinforcing low or no contact with parents as a misguided empowerment strategy. Let’s question the propensity of blaming the parents. Let’s guide distressed kids and adult children toward a healthy way to ground themselves, calm their nervous systems, and make sound choices while maintaining contact and connection with their families. In some cases, it is appropriate to guide a child to slow down, pause, exit, or backtrack from their choices that may be maladaptive instead of digging deeper.

Regarding older adult children, the circulating motto in some social media and “therapeutic/coaching” circles that declares, “You don’t owe your parents anything,” is beyond comprehension and deeply disturbing. The normalization of going “no contact” with parents is moving toward elder abuse in some cases. Abandoning one’s mom or dad leaves parents with little to no trust that their children will be there for them as they age, help them during a health issue, or support them as they approach the end of life.

Steven Howard has written an extensive series on estrangement ideology. I’ll provide an excerpt from Part 21, “Can We Trust Them As We Age? A new era of uncertainty for aging parents: Loss of trust, aging, health and end-of-life concerns.”

Estrangement Ideology – Part 21. Can We Trust Them As We Age?

“In past generations, even strained parent-child relationships often retained a level of mutual obligation, particularly when it came to elder care, medical decisions and end-of-life support. Parents could generally assume that, barring extreme circumstances, their children would provide some degree of assistance—whether that meant handling medical decisions, overseeing finances or offering emotional and physical care in later years. Estrangement Ideology, however, has completely upended this expectation, leaving many aging parents uncertain about their future welfare and deeply distrustful of whether their children will support them in their most vulnerable years.”

The societal ramifications of estrangement are not positive. When parents lack the safety net of children to care for them at the end of life because the kids want no obligation or responsibility for parental care, the original social media influencers and therapists/coaches who encouraged their followers or clients to cut ties have fundamentally failed to provide sound or wise counsel. Might the person advocating for parent cancellation have a personal vendetta they are broadcasting to others for their own vindication? We must question and push back against those who profit or gain social media followers and fame by advocating the breaking of the bond between a parent and child.

Imagine a young adult who went no-contact with their mother or father several decades before one of them died. Will he or she attend the parent’s funeral or gaze at the grave marker and be satisfied with their dismissal and abandonment? What story will be told to their own children to justify this severing of a link with their family lineage and legacy? What will those who enabled the severance say to themselves to justify their encouragement to cut the ties?

It’s time to wake up before it’s too late to reconnect. If seeing a former friend’s or relative’s obituary might cause one to regret a past cancellation decision, it may be time for self-reflection and action to prevent that regret.

A fundamental connection is lost when an adult daughter cannot maintain emotional closeness with her mother because they hold different perspectives. A precious family tie is discarded when an adult daughter dismisses her mother’s entire life to focus on one event, moment, or viewpoint that she has made monumental when it is only one small aspect of her mother’s life and being. (Of course, this applies to sons and fathers too.) A moral principle is profoundly amiss when the culture declares parents as optional, insignificant, or disposable.

I titled this article “Unintentional Harm.” I may be letting some off the hook with the “unintentional” description. I suspect some intentionally cause hurt and harm as angry retribution that they have justified in their minds. Perhaps those experienced in estrangement can further explore the motivation behind this destructive movement. I join others in expanding the conversation on cancellation and estrangement culture that is often kept quiet due to shame, pain, and humiliation.

Subsequent articles will point the way to reconnecting. In the meantime, here is a “List of Family Estrangement Resources for Parents,” compiled by Cayla Cole.

List of Family Estrangement Resources for Parents

Lisa Shultz advocates for parents’ and women’s rights. She is also deeply committed to civil discourse and maintaining connections rather than suppression, silencing, and estrangement.