Xiaxue's latest saga has revived itself.

In a 19-minute Instagram video, the blogger-turned-influencer expressed her stance against "cancel culture".

She also offered five free Instagram ads to brands in a move aimed at derailing the cancel culture momentum.

How it started

The term "cancel culture" has wormed itself to the forefront of Singaporeans' consciousness in the past few weeks, precipitated by the police reports made against Workers' Party Raeesah Khan over her race-related social media posts.

Xiaxue had commented on Khan's situation, which led to a police report lodged against the influencer's past tweets as well.

Xiaxue then hit back at the "woke mob":

Which was followed by a kerfuffle (or two) with Narelle Kheng, former member of local band The Sam Willows.

The two personalities had gotten into an online spat after Kheng dug up Xiaxue's posts on supporting Donald Trump.

Consequences vs. cancel culture

On July 22, Xiaxue followed up by explaining the difference between "consequences" and "cancel culture", as she felt that the two have been conflated.

She started by defining "cancel culture" as the formation of a mob to punish transgressors in the name of social change.

These transgressors are perceived to have committed an "unacceptable social behaviour."

Xiaxue then made a distinction between boycotting and cancel culture.

The former, she sees as a "passive behaviour," and a consumer's right to avoid or comment on a brand.

The latter, however, is defined as a "select group of people who are actively obsessed with causing harm", according to Xiaxue.

She also defined "cancel culture" as a supreme intolerance to differences in opinions.

During this period of time, Xiaxue added, many who are opposed to her have harassed brands to drop her, or pressured her influencer peers to "unfriend" her.

"A company choosing not to work with an influencer because they themselves believe the influencer doesn't represent their values — that's boycotting.

A company being forced to make a choice because of the harassment they have been receiving, that is cancel culture."

In response to brands who have dropped her, she said:

"Ask yourself this okay: Do you think that the companies who have dropped me right now, they don't know my personality before this saga? They know, because I've always been very consistent.

Most of the clients just told me that they just cannot be seen as ignoring the constant harassment that they have been receiving, so they had to do what the woke mob dictates."

Xiaxue subsequently argued that cancel culture and woke culture are "completely detrimental" to society, and listed her reasons for it:

• The mob never stops expanding on what they consider to be unacceptable behaviour
• What is considered unacceptable social behaviour is undefined
• Cancel culture means that you are guilty until proven innocent
• The complexity of humans, and the tendency for cancel culture to pigeonhole traits
• The sentence should fit the crime
• Cancel culture is wide open to abuse (i.e. anyone can use it on their enemies)
• Cancel culture promotes a hostile environment where all intellectual discourse goes to die

By the end of her reasoning, she named several ways that people can stop cancel culture.

You can watch her exposition here:

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CC637a5JGgr/

Free advertising

To wrap up the video, Xiaxue announced that she will be offering five brands a free advertisement on her Instagram page.

The brands should be "willing to give a F*CK YOU to cancel culture," she wrote.

The influencer added that this will help brands who are having a tough time due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Interested parties can apply here.

Top image via Xiaxue's Instagram page