The Canceling of Rudolf

From 2020 to 2024, cancel culture was in its most virulent form resulting in loss of livelihoods and reputation. It certainly hasn’t disappeared and cancel culture is still going strong in first-amendment-challenged Europe, but it has weakened into a free speech imbroglio in the U.S. Here in America, cancel culture now feels more like a general corrosive force rather than the sword of Damocles ready to fall at any given moment. However, in the height of the panic, cancel culture seemed brand new, a terror newly invented to greet the new millennium. But it’s quite old, and believe it or not, we sang about cancel culture as children.

That song was Rudolf the Red Nose Reindeer. We should have paid more attention.

As the charming Christmas classic opens, we are introduced to the elite society of reindeerdom:

You know Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen
Comet and Cupid and Donner and Blitzen

Donner, I suspect, is the thought leader of the group although people tell me that Blitzen has a wicked sense of humor. But these characters fall to the background as the star of our epic appears:

But do you recall
The most famous reindeer of all?

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Had a very shiny nose
And if you ever saw it
You would even say it glows

Okay, the dude has a shiny nose. What’s the big deal? Apparently it was too much for small minds:

All of the other reindeer
Used to laugh and call him names

Yes, it’s the old story of the unconventional upsetting the hidebound order of things. It’s also remarkable how uncurious the other reindeer were. We are all capable of “biological electricity,” although it is rather weak and "slushy," utilizing electrolytes like sodium and potassium. Just imagine the sheer volume of ions required to power a nose with the luminous output of an Audi R8’s high beams! Rudolph was actually performing a feat of biological nuclear fusion. You’d think they’d wonder about that.

But that’s just me, an un-reindeer.

They never let poor Rudolph
Join in any reindeer games

For decades, reindeer games have confused us all. What actually are reindeer games? I don’t think it’s chess, as I suspect they are not the strategic type. I believe they have a more reactive nature, yielding to the demands of peer pressure. I would say shuffleboard is more their speed, although somehow modified to suit quadrupeds.

Then one foggy Christmas Eve
Santa came to say
"Rudolph, with your nose so bright
Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?"

Santa Claus’s reaction strikes me as odd. Imagine seeing one of your reindeer with a glowing red nose. Unlike Rudolph’s cruel and insensitive colleagues, a responsible person would say, “Oh my God, Rudolph, what happened to your nose?” You’d call an ambulance, right? (Not a vet, since we are firmly in the anthropomorphic realm here.) Of course, Santa has a sled that has fantastic speeds that defy time and space, so getting to Longyearbyen Hospital, the most northern hospital on planet Earth, would be no problem.

But Santa didn’t get to be Santa by passing up on fortuitous opportunities. He viewed Rudolph’s condition as an asset to ensure that toys reached every good boy and girl. So with Santa on board, the song now presents an absolutely mind-blowing development:

Then all the reindeer loved him.

Literally, and I mean literally, without missing a beat, reindeer society does a one-eighty as Santa grants Rudolph entrance to its hallowed halls. How quickly opinion can change if the right high-status person steps in! And it’s worth noting—wait for it—the herd-like nature of the tormentors. The shift is absolutely complete and total: all the reindeer, not some, but all the reindeer loved him. All it takes is the stamp of institutional favor for the herd to suddenly see virtue in the despised. The song concludes:

As they shouted out with glee
"Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
You'll go down in history"

At night in the magic stables, after Santa turns out the lights, I bet this crowd, while assessing world events, smugly talks about being on “the right side of history.” Never mind that they failed to anticipate Rudolph’s appointment with destiny right under their non-glowing noses. However, being on the right side of history has its privileges. As time goes by, the past becomes malleable, mere clay to be molded by the elite. Soon the record will show that they were always pro-Rudolph. They even let Rudolph go first in their reindeer games, says their new and improved history. After all, the herd is always right.

Unfortunately, those caught up in cancel culture usually don’t have a Santa to rescue them. (Although Oppenheimer had JFK and LBJ.) Many victims, assailed with mounting accusations, are left to twist in the wind, completely abandoned by their colleagues. Sure, the song recognizes the herd-like nature of people who easily ostracize those deemed heretics. But it may be a bit optimistic to think that after such punishment one’s good name and livelihood remain intact. Hence, someone in the middle of a cancellation may be forgiven for wondering, “Is there really a Santa Claus?”