The origins of the cancel culture phenomenon

The article is focused on a topical phenomenon of modernity - the culture of abolition or cancelling. Based on a retrospective analysis of the development of Western philosophical and sociological thought, the authors come to the conclusion that the prototypes of the practice of cancelling individual members of society were found in ancient times and in many religious customs of the peoples around the world. However, the considered practices of the past are fundamentally different from modern cancelling in the sense that they had an institutional character and reflected the peculiarities of the socio-political order of their time. In recent years, the development of the Internet and new media has allowed marginalized but extremely active social groups to participate more actively in the life of society. As a result, under the influence of the ideas of Marxism, the cancel culture became one of the main tools of the “new ethics” to promote its own pseudo-liberal agenda.