‘Cancel Culture’ Heats Up, Claiming Justice Thomas & Dr. Seuss

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas is in good company. He’s on the same list as the author of “Green Eggs and Ham” and “The Cat in the Hat.”

Like the late children’s book author Dr. Seuss, several of whose books are being removed from distribution for not being sufficiently “woke,” Justice Thomas has been the victim of an ever more aggressive “cancel culture.”

Amazon, the giant online retailer, in February removed a popular streaming documentary entitled “Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words.”  The film began airing on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in May and streaming for free as part of Prime memberships on Amazon in October. It was among the top streaming documentaries and is still selling well as an individual product.

“For a while our film was, briefly, No. 1 in documentaries,” the film’s director Michael Pack told Wall Street Journal columnist Jason L. Riley. “And I think it’s still No. 25 or 30 or so.”

The movie rating website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a 99 percent audience approval rating. On the Amazon website itself, “Create Equal” has a 4.9 star rating (out of 5) from customer reviews, with 1,243 ratings, according to Breitbart.com.

Unequal Access at Amazon

Amazon still features less-popular documentaries about Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and two about Anita Hill, Mr. Thomas’s accuser at his confirmation hearing in 1991.

“So why don’t they offer ‘Created Equal,’? Mr. Pack asked. There’s obviously customer demand.”

Justice Thomas, the longest-serving black Supreme Court judge in history, was also denied any recognition at the Smithsonian-run Museum of African-American History in Washington, D.C. in its first year until it grudgingly added a small exhibit following a public outcry. 

What’s more striking about Amazon’s censorship is that the Thomas film was pulled during Black History Month, when many people try to learn more about historic contributions by blacks in America. 

Amazon also “pulled a similar stunt last fall,” wrote the Wall Street Journal’s Mr. Riley. “Eli Steele’s ‘What Killed Michael Brown?’ a critique of liberal social policies that was written and directed by his father, the race scholar Shelby Steele – was slated to stream in October, then held up for reasons the company never fully explained. Amazon eventually relented and made the film available, but only after these pages [the Journal] weighed in and made a fuss.”

Targeting the Author of Countless Best-Selling Children’s Books

As for Dr. Seuss, whose real name was Theodor Seuss Geisel (1904-1991), he became persona non grata after the Loudoun County, Virginia School Board announced in late February that it was removing six of the author’s books over racial “undertones.” The board said it would not feature him on Read Across America Day, which was established as an annual event by the National Education Association to commemorate the author’s birthday, March 2. 

Within days, the publisher announced cessation of six Dr. Seuss books (“And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street;” “If I Ran the Zoo;” “McElligot’s Pool;” “On Beyond Zebra!;” “Scrambled Eggs Super!” and “The Cat’s Quizzer”).

The books shot up on online sites such as E-Bay for thousands of dollars. In his presidential proclamation about Read Across America Day, President Biden omitted any mention of Dr Seuss, unlike his predecessors Donald Trump and Barack Obama.

In response to the Dr. Seuss clampdown, the sharp-witted Christian satire site Babylon Bee ran a piece about a “revised, more socially acceptable version of the popular Dr. Seuss book ‘Oh, the Places You’ll Go,’” renaming it “Oh, the People You’ll Cancel.” 

Here’s a sample:

You have a journalism degree,
And Twitter’s search function,
You can go find bad guys,
And throw ’em into a dungeon.
You’re a journalist now, and you know what to do,
Go find dead racists, like ol’ Dr. Seuss.

You’ll look up and down tweets. Look at ’em with care.
About some you will say, “This is racist, I swear!”
With your pen full of ink and your Macbook in tow,
You’ll write fiery op-eds saying, “Burn this book, bro!

Every day, the so-called “cancel culture” takes aim at a new target.  On Feb. 10, Lucasfilm announced it had dropped popular actress Gina Carano from its hit Disney/Star Wars series “The Mandalorian” over her conservative social media posts.

In early March, the Gannett newspaper chain announced that it would no longer distribute the comic strip “Mallard Fillmore,” inked for 27 years by conservative humorist Bruce Tinsley.   His crime? Two strips critical of Joe Biden’s transgender agenda and transgenders participating in women’s sports.

The Real Intent of “Cancel Culture”

The intent of “cancel culture” seems to be to wipe out any trace of America’s heritage, diversity and anything smacking of traditional values, to soften us up for a centralized authority to dictate what we can see, hear and read.

“This sad trend will continue unless people refuse to give in to the censorship and make an effort to protect cultural treasures and create new art that is God-honoring and excellent,” said Timothy Plan Founder and President Art Ally.

“One way we can fight back is to ensure that our investment dollars are not going to corporations that aid and abet the slide into immorality and censorship.

“At Timothy Plan, we avoid the inclusion of companies that devalue life, devalue God’s institution of the family, and devalue the liberty that our Founders bequeathed to us in this constitutional republic.”