Help, Help, I Can’t Be Published! | Whatever:
I was a reader of Christopher Hitchens; he wasn’t entirely editorially inflexible, and he didn’t exactly lack a willingness to go where the money was. I pretty strongly suspect that in the year 2020, Hitchens would have found a way to cast his thoughts in a manner that would be appealing to the market now. Either Brooks doesn’t understand that about Hitchens, or he thinks his readers don’t understand it, so he’s either a fool or a cynic (or both! It could be both!). Either way, he’s probably wrong.
Personally, I’ve never been much of a fan of Hitchens' stuff, but I agree with Scalzi here.
“Cancel culture,” like political correctness before it, is a made-up problem created by entitled assholes who are mad they can no longer say whatever dumb, offensive shit is in their heads without consequences.
If you are worried about cancel culture, you really need to spend some time re-examining your priorities.