In Milan Kundera’s debut novel The Joke, the character Ludvik Jahn in communist Czechoslovakia is expelled from college and the Communist Party and ends up conscripted to a hard labor camp as a result of a joke he included in a post card message to a friend. The joke was judged to run afoul of the ruling ideology.
How terrible the communists were in their relentless repression of free speech, many American readers would think when reading this novel first published in 1967. Some American readers would further think that fortunately nothing like that could happen in America.
Nearly sixty years later, a sudden and strong effort is being undertaken in America to ensure firing from jobs of just about any individuals who have commented regarding the murder of Charlie Kirk in ways spanning from expression of approval for his killing to mere expression of indifference to his killing. Even just liking a social media post expressing a view along these lines is enough to bring on demands for firing.
Beyond being a critique of the crackdown on freedom in 1960s Czechoslovakia, The Joke also provided a warning of what could happen elsewhere, including in America, in the right conditions.
The extreme “cancel culture” effort that has sprung forward in the last few days has much potential to expand in scope. It is important to nip in the bud this effort to destroy the lives of people judged to have communicated something “politically incorrect” regarding Kirk’s murder. Our freedom depends on it.
