EASTER EGGS

PROMPT: Write about cancel culture in the voice of a character from a movie or television show.

CHARACTER: Ted Lasso

Cancel Culture—what’s that? I hear all these young folks are cancelling their Netflix subscriptions because they can’t share ‘em with more than four people. Is that it? Oh, you mean ‘cancel culture’ like when everyone suddenly attacked Ellen DeGeneres for creating a toxic workplace. I see what you mean. Listen, where I come from in Kansas, we don’t cancel nobody.  Just last month when my player Danny Rojas killed that greyhound, the British media was going nuts, PETA was demonstrating outside our practice facility, and Twitter was trying to cancel this man before the game was over! We need to slow down! Rewind ten years before everybody and their aunt was on social media and the stuff people are carrying on about now would be old news in a week. What did Jesus say? Let the dude who ain’t done nothing wrong throw the first rock. I know everybody is going to call me old-fashioned for saying this stuff—but I mean it! 

There’s another angle that we ought to consider too. Times have changed. I’m not a big fan of these Hollywood hotshots who get a “me-too” accusation and then start fuming that everyone is out to get them. If you’ve done somethin’ bad, you should expect its going to come around and bite ya’ in the ass eventually. There’s an old saying that my Pawpaw used to tell me: if you steal a man’s pig, don’t be surprised when you see your name in the newspaper. We all want poetic justice. Name me one person who doesn’t like to see the bad guy get his due at the end of the movie. Heck—my own kids started clapping when Scar died in The Lion King. Some people need punishment, sure. But everybody deserves a second chance.