the difference between chomsky and jk rowling, bari weiss, yascha mounk and pretty much every other hack who signed that harper's letter is that he made statements like these defending people who were actually "cancelled" by a mass smear and defamation campaign they unleashed 
the entire elite media class in both the US and UK, both conservative and liberal, engaged in this defamation. bill maher called corbyn an anti-semite on his show with bari weiss nodding in agreement. they destroyed countless people's lives with this grotesque smear campaign
but when this happening there was no letter with steven pinker, bari weiss, yascha mounk and jk rowling denouncing it as "cancel culture", saying that "open debate" was being "constricted": no, they gleefully fanned the flames, joined in on it, did the "cancelling" themselves
jk rowling would pick random corbyn supporters with 50 followers and parade them out to her millions of followers as anti-semites and stalinist barbarians. people with their real names, many older not internet savy labour members. she destroyed their lives with utter glee
but now that elites like jk rowling are criticized for their grotesque bigotries and hypocrisies by the very same people who have no other platform aside from their social media accounts we are witnessing The End of Western Civilization, the end of Open Reasoned Debate. FUCK OFF
the very same people who are now all "OMG IDPOL HAS GONE MAD" were finding traces of anti-semitism in every letter uttered by a corbyn supporter. there were viral tweets about how corbyn pronouncing epstein's name as "epshtein" was proof-positive that he's hitler. again, FUCK OFF
go to someone living through this deranged hysteria, this mob led by media elites at the new statesman/guardian/bbc/cnn/nyt, that elderly labour member who just wanted to see a better world but was defamed and smeared as an anti-semite, and say "jk rowling is being cancelled"
there were accounts on twitter, boosted by the likes of jk rowling and other celebrity hacks with millions of followers, whose sole purpose was to trawl through random corbyn supporters' twitter and facebook feeds to find things to "cancel" them over, to destroy their lives
their sole purpose for existing was to do this actual cancelling, and as jk rowling, yascha mounk and jonathan chait were seeing this, they thought to themselves: "LOL this is awesome I love these people's lives being destroyed GO GET THEM, DESTROY THESE PEOPLE I HATE"
but no, they're very worried about the state of society. they're sincerely troubled by this cancel culture, by the moral panic, it's insane. jk rowling is quoting orwell and the evils of "ostracizing". it's revolting
anyway, those who were calling out and documenting this actual "cancel culture", one that destroyed countless people's lives but was led by media elites so of course was never branded as such, are people you've likely never heard of, like @jsternweiner jacobinmag.com/2020/02/labour…
go back and read his articles like those linked here and see just how depraved this smear campaign got, and how every person now rage-whining about "censorship" and "cancel culture" were knee-deep in that vile shit.
opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocra…
opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocra…
opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocra…
opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocra…
and watch this documentary, which they tried to block from airing ("CENSORSHIP", oh no, jk rowling, yascha mounk and chait didn't give a shit). again, look at the depths to which these smear-artists sank, then ask: why was this not called "cancel culture"?
