I am often asked about my opinion of “cancel culture.” As with many things along these lines, I don’t have a simple answer. Some elements of cancel culture I think are fine. Others, not so much. It really depends on the situation and one’s personal sensitivity to it. Who knows what’s right?

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Being right’s got nothing to do with it either. This is America, where you have a right to be wrong. Mostly I come down on the side of all this that posits that the best disinfectant for rancid thought is sunshine. The more that bad ideas and their sources are exposed, the more opportunity you have to lay into them. That’s what people like me do in mediums just like this all of the time.

Having said that, I’m a big one for live and let live. I know thousands of people by their first names and I like almost all of them. I’d like to have as many of them as friends as I can when I wake up tomorrow. You can’t vote everyone off the island with whom you have some disagreement unless you want to end up on a mighty small island.

But there are limits to my personal largess. As I’ve mentioned recently, some ideas, like those currently driving QAnon-addled conspiracy theorists, are so toxic, so dangerous and so demonstrably untrue that I’ve got to cut you loose if you persist in making them an issue. In case you are wondering, I draw the line somewhere short of war, murder, sedition and violence. If you’re for that, have a nice life.

Along this line, I see Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, on Fox crying about cancel culture and I almost can’t stop laughing. Whatever dim ignominy awaits this nimrod, it probably isn’t dim enough. Hawley has the education and intelligence to know that what he’s saying is BS, but he says it to pander to a base of people that he should be talking down, instead of winding up.

The real leaders in what’s left of the traditional GOP are doing just that — struggling to talk everyone back from the edge of an abyss. Due the the actions of Hawley and others if his ilk (including lawmakers in Idaho), we are watching the implosion of a political party in real time. All that Republicans have to do to keep losing national elections is to continue down the same path. As bad as the Democrats are, and that’s pretty bad, they are not worse than the nut jobs on the right calling for assassinations and insurrection. That begs for cancel.

To cancel or not to cancel is a dicier proposition when it’s someone outside of politics, or someone who’s not crazy, just arguably wrong.

I’ve never been big on boycotting businesses just because they donate to people or causes I do not support. A boycott affects all of the employees, suppliers and everyone else who depends on that business — many of whom may not share the views of whoever did the bad thing. It’s OK, I think, to factor this into purchasing decisions, but with some proportion and measure.

Worse, sometimes a business boycott is flat-out wrong because it’s based on a false narrative. A lot of small and medium-sized businesses suffer for this far more than they should. It’s a peril of internet mobs.

I think that one of the reasons that business boycotts are as popular as they are is that it gives envious individuals — those who could never, in a million years, start a business by themselves — a false sense of equality and power. Anyone can tear things down. Creating and building is much more difficult. In that case, a “boomerang cancel” would be a great invention.

What about athletes and celebrities? I’ve struggled with this, especially in the past few years. I appreciate athletes and celebrities who quietly go about making the world, in their eyes, a better place. I acknowledge the dignity of what they are doing even if I don’t particularly agree with it. If nothing else, funding some quixotic cause is probably better than spending the money on cocaine and gambling.

I draw the line with celebrities at how much they attempt to co-opt me into their advocacy. You can, as Bruce Springsteen has his entire career, be rabidly anti-nuke and I’ll still go to a concert. But when an artist spends time lecturing me at an event for which I bought a ticket — that’s going to cause a kerfuffle. On your dime, you can do what you want. On my dime, put a cork in it and play guitar.

I feel the same way about athletes. I think that it’s just fine when athletes to stand up for their causes — as long as they are not taking me along for the ride. When I pay several hundred dollars a seat to take my family to a NFL or NBA game, we’re there to watch you play ball, not for your take on social issues or anything else. When you can’t or won’t respect that we’ll stay away. There’s a growing body of evidence that indicates that I am far from alone in this point of view.

A difficult “cancel” for me was Michael Jackson. I was never a huge fan of Jackson, or really of his songs, but his musical genius is undeniable. When you are listening to any of Michael Jackson’s major works, you are listening to an undiluted torrent of musical quality. Jackson is simply the goods.

Michael Jackson argued with producer extraordinaire, Quincy Jones, about his vision for “Thriller” — and Jackson was right. That’s one of the most bodacious things I ever heard of in recording and producing.

But as much as I admire Jackson’s contributions to pop music, I also think that he was a pedophile who used his power and wealth to shield him from accountability — until that same privilege led to his death.

That being the case, the “Thriller” CD could come with Steve Lukather’s cellphone number in the liner notes and I still wouldn’t buy a copy.

Associated Press and Idaho Press Club award-winning columnist Martin Hackworth of Pocatello is a physicist, writer, consultant and retired Idaho State University faculty member who now spends his time raising children, llama farming, riding mountain bikes and motorcycles and playing guitars. His video blog, “Howlin’ at the Moon in ii-V-I,” may be found at facebook.com/HowlinattheMoonin251 and on YouTube at bit.ly/2SN745k.