The Impacts of Cancel Culture on Brands and Celebrities PDF

MarkeFng, OperaFons and General Management Department The Impacts of Cancel Culture on Brands and Celebrities Matilde Lucena Leite da Silva Master in Marketing Supervisor: Professor Ana Brochado, Marketing, Operations and General Management Department ISCTE Business School Co-Supervisor: Professor Fernando Batista, Information Science and Technology Department ISTA Acknowledgments The elabora*on of this disserta*on was made possible with the support from a group of people to whom I am very grateful. First, I would like to thank my family, to my dad and Margarida, thank you for encouraging and mo*va*ng me throughout this process, it wouldn’t have been possible without your support. To my supervisor, Professor Ana Brochado, I am very thankful for your invaluable help and guidance during this process, for always answering all of my doubts and for showing interest in this research, which reassured me I was following the right path. To my co-supervisor, Professor Fernando Ba*sta, I want to express my gra*tude for the help and *me you’ve given me, this research wouldn’t have been possible without it. I would also like to thank my friends and my special someone, who supported and mo*vated me in this path and made this chapter of my life beEer. i Resumo A cultura do cancelamento é um termo e um fenómeno cuja popularidade tem crescido exponencialmente nos úl*mos anos e que pode provocar impactos reais nas reputações das marcas e das celebridades. A literatura sobre este tópico ainda está na sua fase inicial e existe ainda muita confusão acerca deste fenómeno e das consequências que pode causar. Por essas razões, decidiu-se estudar a cultura do cancelamento, tendo como foco principal os impactos que este fenómeno pode causar tanto nas marcas como nas celebridades, analisando não só as consequências, mas também os fatores que podem levar à tenta*va de cancelamento e aos diferentes resultados. Para além disso, analisam-se também os resultados posi*vos que podem surgir como consequência deste fenómeno e comparam-se os impactos que pode ter nas marcas face às celebridades. De forma a analisar os impactos deste fenómeno, foram selecionadas duas marcas e duas celebridades que já teriam sido canceladas previamente e foi desenvolvida uma análise de conteúdo qualita*va, com recurso a dados secundários da plataforma X. Estes dados foram analisados através de um soUware de análise de dados qualita*vos, o Leximancer. Os resultados da análise revelaram que os impactos nega*vos na reputação são mais duradouros no caso das celebridades do que nas marcas, no geral, os resultados indicaram que as marcas sofrem menos impactos nega*vos que as celebridades. Além disso, é possível a*ngir resultados posi*vos na sequência de uma tenta*va de cancelamento, como um aumento nas vendas, que decorre graças a um aumento do reconhecimento da marca. Adicionalmente, nos casos selecionados não se registaram impactos ﬁnanceiros signiﬁca*vos provenientes das tenta*vas de cancelamento. Palavras-chave: cultura do cancelamento; marcas; celebridades; impactos Classiﬁcação JEL: M31 - Marke*ng iii Abstract Cancel culture is both a term and a phenomenon that has been growing in popularity in the last few years and that can have real impacts on the careers of brands and celebri*es. The literature on cancel culture is s*ll in its early stages and there is s*ll a lot of confusion associated with this phenomenon and the consequences it can have. For those reasons, I decided to study cancel culture, focusing on the impacts of this phenomenon on both brands and celebri*es, analyzing not only the consequences, but also the factors that can lead to the cancella*on aEempt and to the diﬀerent outcomes. Moreover, I also analyze the posi*ve outcomes that can come from this phenomenon and compare the impacts it can have on brands versus celebri*es. In order to analyze cancel culture’s impacts, two brands and celebri*es that had previously been canceled were selected, and a qualita*ve content analysis was developed, using a secondary data from the social media pla_orm, X. This data was then analyzed using a computer assisted qualita*ve data analysis soUware, Leximancer. The analysis’ results indicated that nega*ve impacts on reputa*on are longer las*ng for celebri*es than for brands and that brands suﬀer fewer nega*ve outcomes than celebri*es. Furthermore, it is possible to have posi*ve outcomes following a cancella*on aEempt, such as a sales increase, due to increases in brand awareness. Addi*onally, in the selected cases, there were no signiﬁcant ﬁnancial impacts that came from the cancella*on aEempts. Keywords: cancel culture; brands; celebri*es; impacts JEL Classiﬁca:on: M31 - Marke*ng v Index 1. Introduc8on.......................................................................................................................... 1 2. Literature Review................................................................................................................. 3 2.1 Cancel Culture................................................................................................................. 3 2.2 The Role of Social Media in Cancel Culture..................................................................... 7 2.3 The Outcomes of Cancel Culture..................................................................................... 7 2.4 Cancella>on of Celebri>es.............................................................................................. 9 2.5 Cancella>on of Brands.................................................................................................. 10 3. Conceptual Framework...................................................................................................... 13 4. Contextualiza8on............................................................................................................... 15 5. Methodology...................................................................................................................... 17 5.1 Research Context.......................................................................................................... 17 5.2 Research Design............................................................................................................ 17 5.3 Data Collec>on.............................................................................................................. 18 5.4 Data Analysis................................................................................................................. 18 6. Results and Discussion....................................................................................................... 21 6.1 Kanye West.................................................................................................................... 21 6.2 J.K. Rowling................................................................................................................... 28 6.3 H&M.............................................................................................................................. 34 6.4 Goya.............................................................................................................................. 39 6.5 Discussion..................................................................................................................... 45 7. Conclusions and Recommenda8ons.................................................................................. 47 7.1 Theore>cal Contribu>ons............................................................................................. 47 7.2 Managerial Contribu>ons............................................................................................. 48 7.3 Limita>ons and Future Research Recommenda>ons.................................................... 48 References.............................................................................................................................. 50 Annexes.................................................................................................................................. 56 List of Tables and Figures Table 2.1 Cancel Culture’s Empirical Studies.......................................................................... 6 Figure 3.1 Proposed Conceptual Framework......................................................................... 14 Figure 6.1 Kanye West’s concept map grouped...................................................................... 25 Figure 6.2 Kanye West’s concept map with months tag.......................................................... 27 Figure 6.3 Kanye West’s conceptual framework..................................................................... 27 Figure 6.4 J.K. Rowling’s concept map grouped...................................................................... 31 Figure 6.5 J.K. Rowling’s concept map with months tag.......................................................... 33 Figure 6.6 J.K. Rowling’s conceptual framework..................................................................... 33 Figure 6.7 H&M’s concept map grouped................................................................................ 37 Figure 6.8 H&M’s concept map with months tag.................................................................... 38 Figure 6.9 H&M’s conceptual framework............................................................................... 38 Figure 6.10 Goya’s concept map grouped.............................................................................. 43 Figure 6.11 Goya’s concept map with months tag.................................................................. 44 Figure 6.12 Goyas conceptual framework............................................................................. 44 1. Introduc:on In the last few years, cancel culture has become a very controversial topic, gaining attention from researchers because of its role in changing the dynamics between customers and brands (Mohsen, 2022). Nowadays, with the access to social media, consumers are perceived to be “equal if not more powerful” than celebrities and brands, which were previously the ones who held the power (Saldanha et al., 2022, p.1073). However, this power that consumers now detain does not mean that they have greater strength or resources, it is the perception that they can take action to cancel brands and celebrities on social media, therefore, it is this power asymmetry that allows consumers to employ power tactics in order to influence celebrities and brands on social media. (Saldanha et al., 2022) Cancel culture is both a term and a phenomenon that has gained great prevalence on social media, having become a topic of discussion and public debate across media, culture, and politics (Demsar et al., 2023). It is a socio-political movement that works towards punishing financially and ostracizing a single person or a company as a consequence of a transgression committed by these entities (Hobbs & O´Keefe). These transgressions can range from the expression of controversial opinions to legal violations, such as criminal offenses (Hobbs & O´Keefe, 2023) Cancel culture thrives in an environment cultivated by Millennials and Gen Z, generations characterized for their need for social change, and that now hold immense power with the help of the internet (Pušić & Vojvodić, 2021; Costa & Azevedo, 2023). These generations are digital natives, and, because of that, they feel free to express their emotions online. Unlike the previous generations, and with the rise of the global pandemic COVID-19, the time spent on the internet increased significantly, which contributed to the acceleration of cancel culture (Pušić & Vojvodić, 2021). Today consumers can, without much effort, become aggressive and determined to harm the offending party, moved by their negative experiences allied to the power technology gives them (Arruda & Barcelos, 2021). That being said, it is increasingly important to have a deeper understanding about this concept since both celebrities and brands are becoming progressively vulnerable to its effects (Saldanha et al., 2022). The literature on the topic of cancel culture is still in its early stages, with some authors focusing on the perceptions and motivations that lead consumers to engage in cancelling behaviors (Saldanha et al., 2022; Tandoc et al., 2022), others exploring the way in which the cancellations unfold on different social media platforms (Bouvier, 2020; Bouvier & Machin, 2021; Lewis & Christin, 2022) and as a form of social and institutional change (Demsar et al., 2023). There is also literature about cancel culture’s origins and mainstream appropriation (Clark, 2020), cancel culture in the context of digital 1 media participation (Ng,2020) in the context of brand management (Pušić and Vojvodić, 2021; Reyes- Fournier et al., 2023), political science (Norris, 2021) and social psychology (Traversa et al., 2023). Although some of cancel culture’s possible implications have been addressed in the literature, there’s still a lot of confusion about the outcomes of this phenomenon and their duration (Ng, 2020; Saldanha et al., 2022; Lewis & Christin, 2022; Karg et al., 2022). Specifically, regarding cancel culture’s potential positive outcomes, there have been calls for further research about this topic (Saldanha et al., 2022). That being said, the purpose of this dissertation is to address this gap in the literature by focusing solely on the impacts of cancel culture. The research problem that motivates this study is to investigate deeply the impacts cancel culture can have on brands and celebrities, assessing the potential positive outcomes, and differential effects it can have for brands versus celebrities. In this sense, the following research questions were formulated: RQ1: How las*ng are cancel culture’s impacts on brands and celebri*es’ careers? RQ2: What are the poten*al posi*ve outcomes of cancella*on for brands and celebri*es? RQ3: How do the outcomes of cancel culture diﬀer for brands and celebri*es? In order to answer these ques*ons, two celebri*es and brands that had previously suﬀered cancella*on aEempts were chosen, and a qualita*ve analysis was conducted using secondary data retrieved from the social media pla_orm, X. This data was then analyzed using Leximancer, a computer assisted qualita*ve data analysis soUware, which resulted in two concept maps for each celebrity and brand chosen. The concept maps reveal the themes and concepts most present in the tweets about the celebri*es and brands, which were key for the analysis of the impacts the cancella*on aEempt had on these individuals and organiza*ons and, consequently, to answer the proposed research ques*ons. The ﬁndings of this study may represent valuable theore*cal and prac*cal contribu*ons for both organiza*ons and managers since the phenomenon of cancel culture threatens both brands and celebri*es. Furthermore, these ﬁndings provide a beEer understanding of the impacts of cancel culture while also considering the factors that lead to the cancella*on aEempt, and consequently, impact the outcomes for celebri*es and brands. Therefore, it provides managers with knowledge that can help them be more prepared and craU successful repair strategies for future cancella*on aEempts, in order to mi*gate the nega*ve eﬀects of cancel culture. 2 2. Literature Review 2.1 Cancel Culture Cancel Culture is a phenomenon that originated in queer communi*es of color (Clark, 2020), gaining more popularity among African American TwiEer users who used the term jokingly in 2015, making it into an internet meme (Tandoc et al., 2022; Clark, 2020). This term was then magniﬁed by the #MeToo movement, responsible for exposing sexual harassment and assault involving public ﬁgures such as Harvey Weinstein, James Franco, Louis C. K., and R. Kelly (Ng, 2020), and later prompted by other movements that demanded accountability from public ﬁgures (Saldanha et al., 2022). Cancelling shares some conceptual overlaps with already established concepts such as calling out, online shaming, trolling, doxing, and boyco|ng (Tandoc et al., 2022; Clark, 2020). However, Clark (2020) argues that “call-out culture” begat cancel culture and while these terms have been used synonymously, cancel culture involves the target’s past ac*ons while call-out culture tends to focus on the present ac*ons. Some conceptualize cancelling as a form of ac*ve consumer resistance that aEempts to delegi*mize a brand completely by withdrawing the support and encouraging others to do the same, although it is a more puni*ve form of ac*ve consumer resistance because it is a very unpredictable and unmediated phenomenon (Demsar et al., 2023). Clark (2020) deﬁnes cancelling as “an expression of agency, a choice to withdraw one’s aEen*on from someone or something whose values, (in)ac*on, or speech are so oﬀensive, one no longer wishes to grace them with their presence, *me and money” (p. 88). Cancel culture involves groups of tradi*onally marginalized voices condemning powerful public ﬁgures (Ng,2020). It is the total withdraw of support, that can take many forms such as social media follows, viewership and so on, from those who have done or said something deemed highly problema*c or even unacceptable, usually from a social jus*ce perspec*ve (Ng, 2020). It can involve rejec*ng the cancelled target, ignoring them, publicly opposing to their ac*ons or views, depriving them from all *me and aEen*on, and some*mes even their ability to make a living (Saldanha et al., 2022). Cancelling aims to respond against behaviors deemed socially unacceptable and it aEempts to punish these behaviors by publicly shaming and withdrawal of support (Tandoc et al., 2022), with the ul*mate goal of causing permanent damage to the cancella*on target (Demsar et al., 2023). Besides making the cancella*on targets suﬀer consequences for their ac*ons or words and holding them accountable, the broader and more indirect goals of cancel culture are to mobilize the public opinion, demand ac*ons from decision makers and share collec*ve expressions of moral outrage (Norris, 2021). There are a lot of diﬀerent views and debate surrounding the topic of cancel culture in recent years. On one hand, cri*cs argue about its dangers for suppressing free speech and open debate 3 between conﬂic*ng par*es or even disregard completely the existence of such concept (Norris, 2021; Mohsen, 2022; Phelan, 2023). They claim that the prac*ce has gone too far because while it may start with cri*cism of cases that spark general moral disapproval, it can also lead to the silencing of a collec*on of unpopular perspec*ves such as racist, an*semi*c, xenophobic views and so on (Norris, 2021). On the other hand, supporters claim it is a technique of civil resistance that holds powerful people accountable, while also empowering and giving a voice to previously voiceless marginalized groups (Norris, 2021; Mohsen, 2022; Phelan, 2023). The nature of cancel culture, which has been driven predominantly by TwiEer, has also raised concerns about the brutality of the campaigns, which may not be propor*onate to the transgressions that originated it in the ﬁrst place (Bouvier & Machin, 2021). As previously said, cancel culture was originally intended to combat social injus*ces (Tandoc et al., 2022). It is an emergent form of consumer ac*vism facilitated by social media (Demsar et al., 2023), but while it may be aimed at doing good, it may also help maintain the problems it targets, since cancelling can focus more on the individual or ins*tu*on it is targe*ng rather than its ac*ons (Bouvier, 2020; Bouvier & Machin, 2021). Therefore, running the risk of obscuring the nature of the very things they seek to challenge and miss some of their most cri*cal aspects (Bouvier, 2020; Bouvier & Machin, 2021). Clark (2020) cri*cizes the way cancel culture has been appropriated by social elites to refer to any form of online public cri*cism. She claims that this misappropriated use of the term serves to silence marginalized groups, while also crea*ng panic around the baseless fear of censorship and silencing. Norris (2021) also argues that the media specula*on regarding cancel culture has generated more “poli*cal heat than intellectual light” (p.169). However, Bouvier and Machin (2021) claim that while it may have its problema*c aspects, cancel culture’s existence implies the failure to address real pressing issues of social injus*ce by the exis*ng ins*tu*ons. Regarding the mo*va*ons beyond cancel culture, Saldanha et al. (2022) claim that “cancelling is an expression of power” and that it is a power imbalance or asymmetry between consumers and brands or celebri*es that causes them to engage in cancel culture behaviors, since power imbalances create a state of powerlessness which consumers seek to relieve (p.1072). Addi*onally, Tandoc et al. (2022) found that users are mo*vated to partake in cancel culture by a number of factors, such as the desire to hold people in places of power and inﬂuence accountable, the desire to educate others on par*cular issues, the desire to protect marginalized groups and to express their own moral values. However, there are also users who par*cipate because it gives them a sense of power and control (Tandoc et al., 2022). Power is a recurring theme around this topic, in speciﬁc power imbalances, since the subject of cancella*on is usually perceived as being in a place of power and inﬂuence who has abused it in some 4 way, therefore cancel culture can be seen as a way to correct those imbalances by giving common social media users a pla_orm where they can have a voice (Tandoc et al., 2022). Till this moment, there is very liEle empirical research about cancel culture. Bouvier (2020), and Bouvier and Machin (2021) inves*gate the limita*ons of X (previously known as TwiEer) cancel culture campaigns that aim to call out racism using hashtags; Costa and Azevedo (2023) explore cancel culture’s antecedents and consequences, analyzing the whole journey of brand cancella*on. In addi*on, Demsar et al. (2023) explore the phenomenon of cancella*ons as a form of social and ins*tu*onal change, with the aim of understanding how these unfold and impact markets, public rela*ons strategies, and consumer resistance; and Hobbs and O’Keefe (2023) study cancel culture through the lens of public rela*ons’ reputa*on management and deviance theory from sociology and media studies. Moreover, Lewis and Chris*n (2021) analyze the rise of cancel culture trough a study on YouTube drama, exploring the concept of accountability and the power dynamics between creators, celebri*es, and audiences. Addi*onally, Norris (2021) analyzes cancel culture in the context of poli*cal science, she tackles the myth that the phenomenon of cancel culture doesn’t actually exist and explores cancel culture within the academia. Furthermore, Pušić and Vojvodić (2021) explore the phenomenon of cancel culture in the context of brand management; Reyes-Fournier et al. (2023) inves*gate the rela*onship between the spread of informa*on in a cancel culture environment and the ﬁnancial indicators of success of an organiza*on, using the case study of the company Abercrombie & Fitch. Lastly, Tandoc et al. (2022) explore the percep*ons and mo*va*ons of Singaporeans towards cancel culture and Traversa et al. (2023) inves*gate cancel culture in the context of social psychology, exploring the poten*al posi*ve impacts of cancel culture, par*cularly its ability to provide collec*ve valida*on for the harmed groups. I provide a table with a synthesis of the eleven empirical studies on cancel culture I men*oned previously with the following columns: reference, research context, research design, sample size and research methods. 5 Table 2.1 - Cancel culture’s empirical studies Reference Research Context Research design Sample size Research methods Bouvier (2020) Global, TwiEer, Content analysis 8000 tweets Qualita*ve method Celebri*es Bouvier and Machin Global, TwiEer, Content analysis 3000 tweets Qualita*ve method (2021) Celebri*es Costa and Azevedo Global Quasi-experiment 178 respondents Quan*ta*ve method (2023) study, online Survey Demsar et al. (2023) Global, brands and Content analysis 63,515 tweets from Qualita*ve method celebri*es 45,855 unique users; 2,597 ar*cles. Hobbs and O´Keefe Global, TwiEer, Mul*ple case 24,000 tweets Qualita*ve method (2023) Celebri*es studies, sen*ment analysis Lewis and Chris*n Global, Youtube, Digital ethnography, 44 Youtube drama Qualita*ve methods (2022) Celebri*es content analysis, channels; 15 semi structured interviewees interviews Norris (2021) Global Survey 2446 respondents Quan*ta*ve method Pušić and Vojvodić Global, Celebri*es Content analysis, 9 scholarly ar*cles, Qualita*ve methods (2021) and brands In-depth interview 1 independent study; 1 interviewee Reyes-Fournier et al. United States, Correla*onal Tweets; Financial Quan*ta*ve method (2023) Abercrombie & analysis statements from Fitch the brand Tandoc et al. (2022) Singapore, Online survey, 20 interviewees; Mixed methods Celebri*es In-depth interviews 786 respondents 6 Traversa et al. (2023) Global Experimental 520 university Quan*ta*ve method studies women; 237 East- Asian Canadian and American par*cipants 2.2 The Role of social media in Cancel Culture Cancelling generally occurs publicly, and it is made easier by social media pla_orms, which oﬀer users some sense of anonymity, facilita*ng the ini*a*on or par*cipa*on in the cancelling, while also expanding the reach to a bigger audience. (Tandoc et al., 2022). Digital pla_orms play a big role in cancel culture since they can empower tradi*onally marginalized groups by facilita*ng large scale responses to content depic*ng acts deemed problema*c, therefore amplifying and accelera*ng the spread of nega*ve informa*on, while also highligh*ng the lack of debate and assessment, which can make it harder for people to recover from their transgressions (Ng, 2020). The nature of debate on social media, with a special focus on X, can lead to simpliﬁca*on of issues, ideological extremes, incivility, and moral rages rather than careful delibera*on and considera*on of issues, since these discussions tend to simplify narra*ves, involving only good and evil and are based widely on buzzwords and symbolism (Bouvier & Machin, 2021). In addi*on to that, the short-lived nature of twee*ng allows users to engage without long planning or reﬂec*on, therefore, users don’t necessarily have a deep commitment level to what they are twee*ng, which can create some distance between them and the person whom the cancella*on is targeted at, lowering the fear of consequences (Bouvier & Machin, 2021). Social media has given a place for previously voiceless groups to voice their dissa*sfac*on and have an inﬂuence and power that they didn’t possess (Saldanha et al., 2022). These pla_orms provide a space for regular people to demand accountability from powerful ﬁgures, both individuals and ins*tu*ons, due to the pla_orms’ collec*vity and immediacy (Clark, 2020). 2.3 The Outcomes of Cancel Culture The outcomes of cancel culture and cancelling itself aren’t well understood, since cancel culture doesn´t have a reasonable scale of transgression, it can give the same treatment to targets that only have one problematic incident or behavior, that it gives to people with an already established pattern of problematic behaviors (Ng, 2020; Saldanha et al., 2022). With instances of consumers being more 7 forgiving and other instances where consumers are not forgiving at all and engage immediately in cancelling behaviors (Ng, 2020; Saldanha et al., 2022). Cancellations can have temporary consequences and more permanent ones. Temporary consequences can be online public condemnation and shame, while more permanent outcomes can be harmed reputations and damages to brand positioning, cancelled contracts and loss of revenue (Saldanha et al., 2022). A cancellation represents a violation of relationship norms between the consumer and the brand or celebrity, it is an exercise of power that entails a two-way relationship (Pereira de Sá & Pereira Alberto). However, Saldanha et al. (2022) found that the presence of certain qualities, such as warmth or competence in the cancellation target can make consumers refrain from engaging in the cancelling behaviors and even forgive the celebrity or brand in question, given that the incident doesn’t exceed a certain threshold. Nevertheless, if the cancel threshold is crossed, consumers will ‘exit’ the relationship, which is an extreme negative outcome (Saldanha et al., 2022). When consumers attempt to cancel large, established corporate brands, they are less likely to succeed. Demsar et al. (2023) argue that in those cases consumers target their efforts to “transgressive products, services, marketing campaigns, or events” instead of the brand in general, since these attempts are more likely to have a real effect (p.334). Consumers realize that if a brand is powerful and well established in its field, complete delegitimization will be unlikely (Demsar et al., 2023) On the contrary, regarding personal brands, consumers find it easier to invalidate these brands by withdrawing all support and encouraging others to do the same, which makes them more vulnerable to successful cancellation attempts (Demsar et al., 2023). However, the negative effects it has on people have been somewhat exaggerated, Ng (2020) gives the example of comedian Louis C. K. who was back doing shows just after one year of his sexual harassment accusations, showing that these previously silenced groups that participate in cancelling can make only a small dent on the power of the privileged people they are targeting. Additionally, Lewis and Christin (2022) found that “individual celebrities rarely faced any significant career consequences” after a cancelation, which can also spark doubt about it being a reliable process to demand accountability on social media (p.1650). Cancel culture can be a confusing phenomenon since its consequences can be varied and, although cancelling involves the withdrawal of support, as previously said, sometimes it can ultimately have other effects. Lewis and Christin (2022) give an example of the cancellation of YouTube creator James Charles that after initially suffering a loss of subscribers, ended up regaining and even surpassing the subscriber count he had prior to the cancellation. Moreover, Karg et al. (2022) give the example of Logan Paul, which is a celebrity that faced a major scandal when he recorded a body from a person who had committed suicide in a forest in Japan, having even made fun of the situation. This was the first in many scandals involving the celebrity and he was highly criticized and cancelled on different 8 platforms, even losing sponsors and a movie arrangement. However, his brand and followership kept growing throughout all of this (Karg et al., 2022). From these examples we can see that positive outcomes can come from cancel culture after the initial backlash. However, mostly negative outcomes have been studied by researchers. 2.4 Cancella:on of Celebri:es The cancellation of celebrities by consumers has been rising, giving light to innumerous celebrity scandals, and while the reasons for cancellation may vary it is usually related to celebrities’ involvement in highly controversial, problematic, or unacceptable behaviors in the present or past (Saldanha et al., 2022). Celebrities have always been associated with scandals and, today, these can even add to their status. However, the type of scandal, the image repair strategies employed, racial aspects and the cultural sector in question are some factors that influence if the scandal will enhance or diminish the celebrity’s public image (Mortensen & Kristensen, 2020). Celebrity transgressions are violations of societal behavioral expectations, usually moral behaviors (Rifon et al., 2023). They can pose as a dilemma specially for individuals that have developed strong attachments to these figures, because on one hand it can result in conflicts with their own moral beliefs, and on the other hand, they cannot detach themselves from these celebrities just to defend their moral beliefs (Lee et al., 2020). Therefore, when the transgression compromises moral standards, people tend to develop moral reasoning strategies to cope, which will be dictated by the individuals’ level of attachment, as will the outcome of the cancellation (Saldanha et al., 2022). Moreover, blaming a celebrity for a transgression is intrinsically related to the consumer’s belief about the celebrity’s culpability for said transgression (Rifon et al., 2023). However, forgiveness is related to other factors that allow consumers to look past the transgression and give the celebrity another chance, therefore, consumer knowledge about the celebrity’s past behavior influences the decision to blame or forgive the celebrity for the transgression (Rifon et al., 2023). Facilitated by social media, consumers can get attached to a celebrity and perceive as if they are close to said celebrity and, because of that perceived closeness, when a transgression occurs, they may see themselves as victims, even though they are not affected by it nor have any involvement in said transgression (Finsterwalder et al., 2017). They can perceive threats to that celebrity as threats to their own identity, making them more compelled to defend the celebrity, they might also have a hard time changing their prior view of the celebrity in light of transgression because of their past commitment to them (Karg et al., 2022). Therefore, we see that even when transgressions are very severe, consumers who identify firmly with the transgressor might not withdraw their support. 9 Individuals that are highly committed and attached to a certain celebrity might suffer from cognitive dissonance, when presented with the celebrity’s transgression (Karg et al., 2022). Because of that, these individuals may attempt to reduce cognitive dissonance by maintaining their support and showing compassion towards the transgressor, instead of experiencing the negative feelings associated with the transgression. Finsterwalder et al. (2017) also show that compassion for the transgressing celebrity is a common response among fans. Conversely, celebrity transgressions can also influence negatively not only the celebrity’s own endorsement potential, but also brands endorsed by the celebrity (Rifon et al., 2023). Wang and Kim (2020) found in their study that high severity transgressions result in more negative attitudes and perceptions from consumers towards the celebrity, and also generates less favorable reactions regarding purchase intention and brand attitude towards endorsed brands. Moreover, Mortensen and Kristensen (2020) introduce the term ‘de-celebrification’ to designate when celebrities lose their legitimacy, their public image, positive media visibility and status. This can be an extreme negative consequence of celebrity cancellation. Because de-celebrification is often triggered by severe transgressions, such as charges of sexual crimes and criminal offenses, and it results in the loss of public recognition, status, and marketability (Mortensen & Kristensen, 2020). 2.5 Cancella:on of Brands Even though there are many cases of celebrities getting canceled, products are not immune to it either (Saldanha et al., 2022). Many brands fail to access the potential impacts that being cancelled can have on their business. Cancellations can have several damaging consequences for brands that can be hard to recover from, especially if it involves third parties (Demsar et al., 2023), therefore it is critical for marketeers to study and understand this phenomenon. Today consumers increasingly expect brands to take a stance on issues and to support their point of view by taking actions that will generate change. Therefore, when consumers cancel brands, it creates a difficult and challenging climate for marketeers, since people expect them to maintain the positioning of the brand by taking a stand on social issues, while at the same time not risking offending a portion of their target who may not agree with the brands stance on the issue (Saldanha et al., 2022). Because of that, cancel culture has become a controversial topic in the field of marketing because of the detrimental effects that brand cancellation can have on brands’ reputation and equity (Mohsen, 2022). The changes in customer-brand dynamics and the rise of social media are two factors that enabled cancel culture (Mohsen, 2022). As consumers now have gained more control in their relationships with brands, social media empowers them and gives them a platform where they can stand up for their 10 demands and be heard, which allows consumers to share their opinions and express their anger against specific companies, while also encouraging others to do the same (Mohsen, 2022). That being said, consumer’s online participation can be a challenge for companies as it can pose risks to brands’ images, since it can influence positively or negatively online corporate image and reputation, which is a measure of trust for consumers (Arruda & Barcelos, 2021). As previously said, cancellations arise after a transgression has been committed, which is an act deemed unacceptable by consumers. Regarding brand transgressions specifically, consumers evaluate them and determine if they are irreparable or not, this evaluation usually considers the brand’s profile, size, history, values, type, and the transgression type and severity (Demsar et al., 2023). Moreover, Fetscherin and Sampedro (2019) argue that the type and severity of brand transgressions impacts brand forgiveness. Finding that value-related transgressions, such as corporate wrongdoings and image-related transgressions are more unlikely to get consumers’ forgiveness than performance- related transgressions. When the transgression is perceived as irreparable, consumers mobilize to attempt to delegitimize the brand. However, when a brand has history of repeated transgressions, a new transgression is more likely to be seen as irreparable, therefore the call for cancellation is validated and consumers mobilize quickly and, in some cases, more aggressively (Demsar et al., 2023). In the case of brands, they can not only be affected by their own behaviors and transgressions, but also by their celebrity endorsers’, although the extent of the effect on the endorsed brand depends on the severity of the transgression (Saldanha et al., 2022). When consumers’ expectations are not met by the brand, it affects the perceptions they have about the brand’s honesty, integrity, and credibility, leading to perceptions that the brand is irresponsible or imprudent (Arruda & Barcelos, 2021), which can ultimately lead to the cancellation of the brand. When consumers engage in brand cancellation, the spread of negative eWOM, and subsequently the bad publicity and outrage that exists on multiple networking websites, can trigger other users to form negative perceptions about the brand being cancelled, which in consequence can lead to a lower propensity to purchase or repurchase anything from the company in question (Mohsen, 2022). However, Saldanha et al. (2022) found that consumers with strong emotional attachments to a product are less probable of engaging in negative activities towards the brand, which decreases even more when there’s an absence of replacements for the product of the brand being boycotted. After an irreparable transgression occurs and calls for cancellation arise, brands might attempt to preserve their legitimacy trough apology (Demsar et al., 2023). However, these apologies need to be interpreted as sincere or else they could further validate the cancellation attempt. Costa and Azevedo (2023) found in their study that, after a transgression has been committed, if the brand apologizes, it leads to brand forgiveness, a reduction in the public’s intention to cancel the brand, and an increase 11 in word of mouth and purchase intention. Which means that an apology by the company has the power to diminish and mitigate some of the effects of the cancellation attempt. Brand cancellation has increased quickly in the last few years and because of that, companies need to change and respond quicker to avoid becoming a cancellation target themselves (Mohsen, 2022). Since no brand has immunity over being cancelled, it is crucial for companies that desire to maintain their reputation and achieve sustainable growth to understand customers new needs, expectations and demands (Mohsen, 2022). Brands are now aware of the power consumers hold and when brands commit a transgression, they should focus on brand recovery management, since the survival of the brand not only depends on consumer power but also on the brand’s recovery strategy (Pušić & Vojvodić, 2021). Moreover, Abbasi et al., (2023) argue about the importance of recognizing that cancel culture exists to hold brands accountable, and that its implications pose a great risk to brands, therefore disregarding this phenomenon can lead to financial costs and loss. 12 3. Conceptual Framework In this study we focus on the impacts cancel culture has on the reputa*ons of celebri*es and brands. Therefore, we provide a conceptual framework of cancel culture that gives a clearer view of the whole process that leads us to the outcomes of this phenomenon. The process is ini*ated by the brand or celebrity transgression, which is an act deemed unacceptable by consumers, a viola*on of societal behavioral expecta*ons (Rifon et al., 2023). Factors such as the type and severity of the transgression will aﬀect public response. Regarding the ﬁrst one, the type of transgression, cultural sector in ques*on and racial aspects are some factors that can inﬂuence public response (Mortensen & Kristensen, 2020). The various severity levels of transgression are also an important determinant of how individuals perceive if the behavior of the celebrity or brand was harmful or harmless (Wang & Kim, 2020). The severity of the incident shouldn’t exceed a certain threshold, otherwise public response can be extremely nega*ve, with consumers exi*ng the rela*onship with the brand or celebrity in ques*on (Saldanha et al., 2022). Moreover, there are other factors related to the celebrity or brand that can inﬂuence the public’s response, such as the prior history of transgression, the consistency of transgression, and the popularity of the brand or celebrity in ques*on among the public. Regarding to the prior history of transgression, if the celebrity or brand has a history of repeated transgressions, the new transgression is more likely to be seen as irreparable and the call for cancella*on is validated, with consumers mobilizing quickly and, at *mes, even more aggressively (Demsar et al., 2023). Furthermore, the transgression consistency refers to how consistent the transgression is with the celebrity or brand’s past behaviors (MaEhews & Luebke, 2023). When a transgression is viewed by the public as a sincere, one *me only mistake, rather than a mistake that is perceived as characteris*c and central to the iden*ty of the individual in ques*on, the public response is more likely to be weaker (MaEhews & Luebke, 2023), leaning towards forgiveness instead of cancelling. The last factor is the popularity of the brand or celebrity in ques*on among the public. In the case of celebri*es, consumers can iden*fy ﬁrmly with them, get very aEached and get a sense of perceived closeness to the celebrity in ques*on, which can make them perceive threats to the celebrity as threats to their own iden*ty, causing them to be more compelled to defend and not withdraw support even when transgressions are severe (Finsterwalder et al., 2017; Karg et al., 2022). Moreover, consumers who iden*fy themselves as fans of a celebrity, are more likely to demonstrate forgiveness and tolerance for the celebrity’s transgressive behavior (Wang & Kim, 2020). Furthermore, In the case of brands, consumers with a strong aEachment to the brand’s products are less likely to engage in the cancella*on 13 aEempt towards the brand, which decreases even more when there’s a lack of replacements for the products in ques*on (Saldanha et al., 2022). Another factor that can inﬂuence the public’s response is the brand or celebrity response to their own transgression. This is, the existence of an aEempt to apologize and repair the damage (Demsar et al., 2023) However, these apologies have to be deemed sincere by the public, or it could further legi*mize the cancella*on aEempt. Considering the factors men*oned before, the public responds and, if the public response is posi*ve, the celebrity or brand will be forgiven, which is a possible posi*ve outcome. However, if the transgression is deemed irreparable, the public will mobilize quickly to cancel the celebrity or brand in ques*on, which is the cancella*on aEempt. The cancella*on is the total withdraw of support from those whose ac*ons or sayings can be deemed highly problema*c or even unacceptable, with the goal of making the cancella*on targets accountable for their wrongdoings and punishing them through public shaming and rejec*on, with the ul*mate purpose of causing permanent damage to the cancella*on targets (Ng, 2020; Saldanha et al., 2022; Tandoc et al., 2022; Demsar et al., 2023; Norris, 2021). It can lead to long las*ng impacts such as harmed reputa*ons, cancelled contracts, loss of revenue, damages to brand posi*oning, loss of legi*macy, public image and status (Saldanha et al., 2022; Mortensen & Kristensen, 2020). Or short- las*ng impacts, such as loss of followers, online public condemna*on, and shame (Ng, 2022; Saldanha et al., 2022). These short-las*ng impacts can also lead to a posi*ve outcome, the celebrity or brand in ques*on can experience a temporary loss of viewers or followers but, the publicity and aEen*on generated by the cancella*on aEempt can lead to posi*ve outcomes for these en**es (Ng, 2022) with some even gaining more fame and aEen*on than they had before the cancelling event took place. Figure 3.1 – Proposed Conceptual Framework 14 4. Contextualiza:on In this study, we will use two cases of celebri*es and two cases of brands that have been cancelled previously, in order to study the impacts of these cancella*ons trough the analysis of tweets about these en**es. The celebri*es chosen are rapper Kanye West and author J.K Rowling, and the brands are H&M and Goya. In this sec*on some context will be given regarding the celebri*es and brands chosen, in order to explain the cancella*on events they were involved in. Rapper Kanye West, who now goes by Ye, has been involved in various controversies throughout the years that sparked cancella*on aEempts on social media pla_orms mul*ple *mes. His ﬁrst big controversy was in September 2009 at the MTV Video Music Awards, when Kanye invaded the stage during Taylor SwiU’s acceptance speech for the Video of the Year award and declared that Beyoncé was more deserving (Rose, 2023). From there, the ar*st has been involved in mul*ple controversial moments but, the speciﬁc transgression we will focus on took place in May of 2018. Kanye visited TMZ’s oﬃce, accompanied by Candace Owens, a conserva*ve commentator, and in that visit, he made a statement about slavery being a choice (Ihaza, 2023). In his words, “We’ve been hearing about slavery for 400 years. For 400 years? That sounds like a choice” (Ihaza, 2023). Besides the controversial statement, this was also around the same *me that the ar*st was seen mul*ple *mes wearing MAGA (Make America Great Again) hats, showing is support for former United States President, Donald Trump, which also caused some public outrage (Rose, 2023). More recently, the ar*st has s*rred up more controversy by wearing a “White Lives MaEer” shirt and sharing his an*semi*c views on X, which led to companies like Balenciaga and Adidas to sever *es with the rapper. (Tumin, 2022). J.K. Rowling, the author of the book series Harry PoBer, received major backlash in December of 2019 aUer tweets expressing her support for a woman that had history of making transphobic comments (Aviles, 2019). This was the ﬁrst *me the author voiced her views on trans people, although being accused of transphobia before in October of 2017 and March of 2018 for liking tweets that promoted transphobic views (Aviles, 2019). When cri*zed, the author reinforced her ideological stance and con*nued to post allegedly transphobic comments, with each occurrence adding weight to the cancella*on aEempt (Demsar, 2023). The author is also one of the public ﬁgures that signed the leEer cri*cizing cancel culture published on Harper’s Magazine in 2020 (Ackerman et al., 2020). In early January of 2018, the brand H&M sparked controversy online for an ad that featured a black child wearing a sweatshirt with the phrase “coolest monkey in the jungle” on the front. The public deemed this as a racist and inconsiderable ac*on from the company, condemning it online (West, 2018). This wasn’t the only controversy that the brand has been involved in, but it was one of the most debated online by both social media users and media outlets, having also reached ar*sts such as The Weeknd and G-Eazy, who cut *es with the brand in light of the scandal (West, 2018). 15 Goya is a La*n food brand that suﬀered signiﬁcant backlash in July of 2020, when its CEO praised the former United States president, Donald Trump, during a White house mee*ng, which triggered a boycoE and a buycoE movement, with the hashtags #Goyaway and #BoycoEGoya trending on TwiEer shortly aUer (Liaukonytė et al., 2022). Simultaneously, a counter buycoE movement started gaining aEen*on amongst Trump supporters and days later, the former president and his daughter posed with Goya products, which created a second wave of calls for boycoEs and buycoEs (Liaukonytė et al., 2022). The buycoE social media posts and coverage in the media dominated the buycoE one, and unexpectedly, Goya sales increased by 22%, although this eﬀect was only temporary and disappeared completely in three weeks (Liaukonytė et al., 2022). 16 5. Methodology 5.1 Research Context The present research aims to understand cancel culture and assess the impacts it has on brands and celebri*es. It is increasingly important to understand the consequences and impacts cancel culture can have on both brands and celebri*es, since it is a phenomenon that is growing in popularity and that can have serious implica*ons in the careers of these en**es. Moreover, the literature on this topic is s*ll very scarce, leaving some research gaps to be ﬁlled. In that sense, three research ques*ons were formulated: RQ1: How las*ng are cancel culture’s impacts on brands and celebri*es’ careers? RQ2: What are the poten*al posi*ve outcomes of cancella*on for brands and celebri*es? RQ3: How do the outcomes of cancel culture diﬀer for brands and celebri*es? 5.2 Research Design In order to answer the research ques*ons men*oned previously, the method chosen was a qualita*ve content analysis, using secondary data from the social media pla_orm X, formerly known as TwiEer. Content analysis is a method that seeks to reduce and interpret a substan*al amount of qualita*ve data by iden*fying its key consistencies and meanings (PaEon, 2015). It is a research technique that allows researchers to make valid replicable inferences from content such as: text, images, art, sounds, symbols, and so on (Krippendorﬀ, 2019). It increases researchers understanding of a speciﬁc phenomenon and gives new insights that help researchers recognize meanings, which is the ul*mate goal in content analysis (Krippendorﬀ, 2019). X was the social media pla_orm chosen for data collec*on for this study, because of the pla_orm’s prominent role in shaping public discourse, in empowering social mobiliza*on and the social jus*ce dialogues it displays, which makes it central for par*cipa*on in ac*vi*es such as cancela*ons (Demsar et al., 2023). X allows researchers to gather data about people’s feelings and opinions about certain issues, their interac*ons, and their behaviors, therefore providing a suitable way for researchers to develop a comprehensive understanding of the a|tudes and ac*vi*es of a certain popula*on (McCormick et al., 2017). This pla_orm has also been used in previous cancel culture studies (e.g. Bouvier, 2020; Bouvier & Machin, 2021; Demsar et al., 2023; Reyes Fournier et al., 2023). Addi*onally, simultaneously to the Leximancer analysis, we analyzed magazine ar*cles related to the outcomes of the cancela*on event for each of the celebri*es and brands chosen. This was done in order to further explore the impacts cancel culture can have on the careers of these en**es, speciﬁcally 17 to get more insights on the impacts on the sales numbers post cancella*on event, and the overall impacts on their reputa*ons. 5.3 Data Collec:on In the data collec*on process, we collected tweets wriEen in English, Portuguese, Spanish, French and Dutch that were related to the two celebri*es and two brands that have been cancelled previously. As men*oned before, the two celebri*es are: Kanye West and J.K. Rolling, and the two brands are: H&M and Goya. The collec*on of data was done by scrapping tweets from the *me of the cancella*on incident, up to 6 months aUer the transgression, in order to analyze the impacts the cancella*on has over *me. It was done using speciﬁc keywords, which were mainly the names and usernames of the chosen celebri*es and brands. Regarding Kanye West, the data collec*on period was from 1/05/2018 to 1/11/2018, using the keywords “Kanye” and “kanyewest”. For J.K Rowling the data collec*on period was from 19/12/2019 to 19/06/2020 using the keywords “JK Rowling”, “jk_rowling” and “J.K. Rowling”. Regarding the brands, for H&M the data collec*on period chosen was from 8/01/2018 to 8/07/2018, using the keywords “H&M”, “hm”, “H&M” and “h&m”. Finally, for Goya, the data collec*on period was from 9/07/2020 to 9/01/2021, using the keywords “Goya” and “GoyaFoods”. With this process, we collected a total of 378 328 tweets, 263 374 are related to Kanye West, 54 832 are related to J.K Rowling, 25 465 are related to H&M and 34 657 are related to Goya. 5.4 Data Analysis To analyze the content collected from X, an automated text analysis was conducted using Leximancer. Text contains informa*on about the individuals that generated it, it reﬂects informa*on about the contexts of its crea*on, and causes an impact on the behaviors, preferences, or a|tudes of its consumers (Berger et al., 2019). Therefore, text analysis acts as an invaluable tool by enabling researchers to monitor changes over *me, to compare groups and to quan*fy qualita*ve data (Berger et al., 2019). An automated text analysis, or computer-assisted analysis is an approach that u*lizes compu*ng power to answer ques*ons related to diﬀerent ﬁelds in which language is fundamental (Humphreys & Wang, 2018). Computers analyze text and provide systema*c comparisons, measure the variables of interest, and at *mes, ﬁnd paEerns in the text that human researchers cannot detect (Humphreys & Wang, 2018). 18 Academic researchers are increasingly using Leximancer to analyze social media content (Morgan et al., 2021). Computer assisted qualita*ve data analysis soUware (CAQDAS), such as Leximancer, has been used in recent studies that explored large qualita*ve data, in order to reduce the researcher’s bias that is frequently present in techniques that involve data being handled manually (Wilk et al., 2021). Leximancer uses an itera*ve process to iden*fy concept seeds from frequencies of words within the text. These concept seeds are the star*ng point for the deﬁni*on of concepts, which are then grouped into themes and represented visually in a Concept Map (Leximancer, 2021). Leximancer’s Concept Map represents the main concepts from the text, and the rela*onships between these concepts (Biroscak et al., 2017) Leximancer oﬀers various advantages, such as saving researcher’s a huge amount of *me, since content analysis can be a very *me-consuming process, and it also reduces the common concern associated with this research method, which is unreliability (Biroscak et al., 2017). The program automa*cally generates a concept list form the text itself, which makes it more reliable, reproducible, and more likely for unexpected or uncommon rela*onships to appear (Angus et al., 2013). Wilk et al. 2019, found that Leximancer’s process impar*ality is “very useful” in exploratory studies because it enables a more eﬃcient and objec*ve analysis of the data, since it is the program who iden*ﬁes the concepts and themes within the data, rather than the researcher. In this same study, Wilk et al. 2019 also found that the Leximancer analysis revealed informa*on that was not possible to be obtained in their QSR NVivo analysis. 19 6. Results and Discussion 6.1 Kanye West In the case of Kanye West, the transgression commiEed was oﬀensive speech during a visit to TMZ’s oﬃce in May 2018 (Rose,2023; Ihaza, 2023). During his visit, Kanye made the controversial statement that “slavery was a choice” (Rose, 2023). The ar*st’s remarks can be considered oﬀensive, racially insensi*ve, and also a misrepresenta*on of history, in that sense, Kanye’s transgression is a moral transgression of high severity level. As previously men*oned in the contextualiza*on chapter, Kanye West has a prior history of transgression, having been involved in mul*ple controversies over the years. His long, explosive rants ﬁlled with conspiratorial and conserva*ve rhetoric during interviews are known by many (Ihaza, 2023). From his 2005 “George Bush doesn’t care about black people” statement on live television, to his very controversial moment at the 2009 VMA’s, to his public support of former US President Donald Trump (Rose, 2023), Kanye has always been involved in controversy and has a history of mul*ple transgressions. Because of his history of outrageous remarks and conserva*ve and conspiratorial speech over the years, we consider his oﬀensive statement about slavery consistent with his past behaviors, able to be perceived as characteris*c and central to his iden*ty. In order to assess the popularity of the celebri*es and brands among the consumers, we will use diﬀerent metrics that adapt to the celebrity or brand in ques*on. Therefore, in the case of Kanye West we will assess his popularity trough social media followers. Despite the fact that the rapper has already been banned from Instagram and X previously, as of the *me of wri*ng, he accounts for a total of 50.6 million followers in the two pla_orms, with 18.6 million followers on Instagram and 32 million followers on X. Besides the number of followers, we can also consider the number of tweets collected during the six-month period, which was 263 374 tweets, with the ﬁrst and last month of collec*on being the months with most tweets. This is the largest number of tweets in this study by far so, for this and the aforemen*oned reasons, we can consider that is popularity is very high among the public. Regarding the existence of apology and repara*ons aEempts, Kanye apologized for his remarks and also for wearing the Donald Trump MAGA hat on a Chicago radio sta*on, three months aUer the transgression occurred (Rose, 2023). During the emo*onal interview, the rapper eventually blamed his controversial statement on his bipolar disorder, which he had disclosed just months prior (Izadi, 2018). Using Leximancer, we generated a concept map that shows the most recurring themes and concepts present in the tweets regarding Kanye West. Leximancer iden*ﬁed twelve themes with relevancies ranging from 2% to 100%. The theme with most hits is the ar*st’s name, “Kanye” (100% relevance), followed by his X username “kanyewest” (60% relevance), “people” (8% relevance), “black” 21 (6% relevance), “Trump” (7% relevance), “hat” (3% relevance), “album” (9% relevance), “feel” (4% relevance), “Drake” (4% relevance), “Kim” (2% relevance), “Snl” (2% relevance) and “free” (2% relevance). AUer analyzing the concept map, four groups were created: the transgression group, the public response group, the work group and the personal life group. Star*ng with the transgression group, this group contains one theme, “black”, that is intrinsically connected to the transgression itself. Regarding the theme “black”, Leximancer found nine concepts within that theme, as we can observe in the map. This theme is very connected to the transgression, and it contains both words used by Kanye in his oﬀensive statement where he stated that “slavery was a choice” for the black community. This theme overlaps with the theme “trump” and “Kanye” from the public response group and with theme “Kim” from the personal life group, with some people bringing up Kim Kardashian, Kanye’s now ex-wife to the conversa*on and even blaming her for his ac*ons. Some examples of tweets from the transgression group are: “kanye west really said slavery was a choice omg someone save this man from himself” “Kanye with the worst take yet "You hear about slavery for 400 years. 400 years?! That sounds like a choice." “Kanye just said that in the 400 years of slavery, it was a CHOICE of the black people.... I tried to jusSfy all the other shit he’s done in the past few days but this has gone overboard, kanye you need some help my friend @kanyewest” “Wait, wait, wait, wait. WAIT! Press Pause. HTFU! Did @kanyewest just say that the enslavement of Black people was our CHOICE?? hBps://t.co/16xm84Zw7o via @TMZ” The public response group contains eight themes that are related to the public’s response towards Kanye’s transgression, which are: “Kanye”, “kanyewest”, “people”, “Trump”, “hat”, “feel”, “Snl” and “free”. Regarding the theme “Kanye”, Leximancer found ten concepts within it, and it relates to the public reac*on towards the transgression. It is also very related to the public’s response towards Kanye’s support of former United States President, Donald Trump, and to a mee*ng between the two. This mee*ng happened in early October of 2018, when Kanye was invited to go to the White House and meet with Trump to discuss prison reform (Cillizza, 2018). The mee*ng sparked some controversy, and it also brought the topic of the transgression again, with Kanye talking to the then president about 22 abolishing the 13th Amendment of the United States Cons*tu*on, which prohibits slavery (Cillizza, 2018). This also explains the concepts “Donald Trump”, “mee*ng” and “White House”. Moreover, the theme “kanyewest” has six concepts within and the ar*st’s name is wriEen without any spaces because that is his username on the pla_orm X, it is also one of the themes with most hits because people men*on Kanye’s username on their tweets very frequently. The theme “people” contains twelve concepts within, and it is also very related to the public response aUer the transgression. The concepts within this theme contain some reac*onary words used by the public in the discussion about the ar*st’s transgressions. Furthermore, the theme “Trump” has nine concepts within, and not only relates to the public’s response towards the transgression, but also to Kanye’s support of Donald Trump as we can see clearly with the concepts “Trump” and “support”. This theme also has connec*ons to Kanye’s mental illness history, with people men*oning his disorder while also reac*ng to his transgressions. Regarding the theme “hat”, Leximancer found eight concepts within it, and it relates deeply not only to the public’s response towards the main transgression but also other transgressions, in this case, Kanye’s support of Donald Trump. The concept “hat” refers to the Make America Great Again (MAGA) hat that Kanye wore in diﬀerent occasions in support of the former president. In this theme we also see the concept “Realcandaceo”, which is the username of Candace Owens. She is a conserva*ve poli*cal commentator, also a Trump supporter, that accompanied Kanye on the TMZ interview where the main transgression was commiEed. This concept appears oUen with people men*oning Candace Owens in their tweets reac*ng to the transgression. Moreover, the theme “feel” has three concepts within and, in this theme, we can see people discussing Kanye’s rela*onship and support of Donald Trump, hence the “Realdonaldtrump” concept, that is Trump’s username on X. Addi*onally, theme “Snl” has two concepts within, and it refers to Saturday Night Live, a late-night comedy program, where Kanye made a guest appearance at the end of August 2018. In this appearance he was wearing the MAGA hat and, aUer performing, made a speech in support of Donald Trump as the show was coming oﬀ air. Lastly, the theme “free” has only one concept within and it is also very related to the public’s response, with people discussing free speech aUer Kanye’s oﬀensive remarks at TMZ’s oﬃces. Some examples of tweets from the public response group are: “But on the real, Kanye cancelled unSl he seeks mental help.” “@Reuters @reuterspictures Kanye may feel like superman with a Maga hat, but it just makes him look like he's oﬀ his meds” 23 “Kanye wearing his MAGA hat is the best joke of tonight. What a fucking fool. #SNLPremiere” “@kanyewest so, when you said slavery was a choice, and then showed up at the white house to kiss trump’s racist a**, that was you being used? man, you are one privileged dope.” The work group contains two themes, “album” and “Drake”, which are both deeply *ed to Kanye’s work as an ar*st. Regarding the theme “album”, Leximancer found three concepts within that theme. This theme relates deeply to Kanye’s albums, speciﬁcally, it relates to the album Ye, which Kanye launched just a month aUer the original transgression. Moreover, the theme “Drake” contains one concept within. This theme is very connected to Kanye’s work life, more speciﬁcally to his rela*onship with other ar*sts, in this case, with Drake. It all started when Kanye produced a song for another ar*st, where the laEer aEacked Drake in the lyrics. This started a feud between Kanye and Drake which went on for several years (Saponara, 2024). Some examples of tweets that illustrate this group are: “Now Sme to wait for this Kanye album to drop” “When you see the same people that "cancelled" Kanye a few weeks ago, popping up in Wyoming for the album” “Drake Disses Kanye West 'Yeezy 350' Shoes in his new song & tells women not to wear them around him” The personal life group contains only one theme, Kim, and it is intrinsically connected do Kanye’s personal life. Kim refers to Kim Kardashian, Kanye’s now ex-wife. In this theme, users tweet about Kanye’s personal life with Kim and there’s even people blaming Kanye’s ac*ons on Kim. Some examples of tweets that illustrate this group are: “Okay for real you guys have got to stop blaming Kanye’s acSons on Kim.” “I’m curious to know if Kim Kardashian agree’s with Kanye on slavery being a “choice”.” “What does Kim feed Kanye abeg... How does he get so much energy to be PoliScally wrong all the Sme?” 24 “That’s why Kanye needed to marry black. Kim can’t relate to this shit nor set him back on straight” Figure 6.1 - Kanye West’s concept map grouped In the concept map we have six tags that iden*fy the month of the collec*on period, labeled “months_m1” which is the ﬁrst month of the data collec*on period, un*l “months_m6” which is the last month of the collec*on period. The month with the most relevance is the ﬁrst month (58%), followed by the last month (57%), the second month (35%), the ﬁUh month (27%), the fourth month (20%) and lastly, the third month (14%). As we can see in the concept map, the transgression topic was very discussed within the ﬁrst month, with concepts “choice” and “slavery” being the most debated. In opposi*on, in the second month of collec*on, the topic most discussed was Kanye’s work, mainly is new album Ye which was launched in the beginning of that month, as previously said. 25 Although the main transgression kept being discussed throughout all the months of collec*on, it had a big decrease aUer the ﬁrst month not only because of Kanye’s album launch, but also because of the other transgressions commiEed by the ar*st during the period of data collec*on. We can see that clearly in the ﬁUh month of collec*on, which corresponds to September of 2018, where the concepts “Snl” and “Maga” get some emphasis, because of Kanye’s transgression on Saturday Night Live, which happened in the last days of August. In addi*on to that, in the sixth month of collec*on, which corresponds to October of 2018, concepts like “White House”, “Cnn” and “Maga” are more prominent. This is because of yet another transgression, which refers to the White House mee*ng between Donald Trump and Kanye, that happened in the beginning of that month. Moreover, the topic of transgression also had an increase in the last month of collec*on, with central concepts like “slavery” and “choice” ge|ng an increase in hits. This can be due to the fact that Kanye brought up this topic once again in the White House mee*ng, as previously men*oned, when he discussed the abolishing of the 13th amendment, which prohibits slavery. In the case of Kanye West, it is hard to analyze how long the cancela*on eﬀects last because he keeps commi|ng new transgressions, that lead to new cancella*on aEempts. However, even though he keeps ge|ng cancelled by the public, each cancella*on aEempt has short las*ng impacts, because the public moves on to discussing the next transgression. Furthermore, this cancella*on aEempts do not aﬀect his sales and plays on streaming pla_orms. We can see that clearly with the album Ye that was launched just a month aUer the transgression and quickly reached the number one on the Billboard’s chart, having 180 million streams and selling 85 thousand copies in its ﬁrst week in the United States (Sisario, 2018). This is not the only example of how his cancella*on aEempts do not aﬀect his sales at all, more recently, aUer his latest transgression in 2022, that involved an*semi*c speech and that lead major brands to sever *es with the ar*st, Kanye launched yet another album, Vultures 1, in February of 2024. This album also topped the Billboard’s charts in its ﬁrst week, with 168 million streams and 18 thousand copies sold (Sisario, 2024). Moreover, it is also possible to assess that Kanye has a very loyal fanbase that keeps suppor*ng the ar*st transgression aUer transgression. As men*oned in previous chapters, when presented with the celebrity’s transgression, people that are highly aEached and commiEed to a celebrity may aEempt to reduce cogni*ve dissonance by maintaining their support towards the celebrity, instead of experiencing the nega*ve feelings that come associated with it (Karg et al., 2022). Besides that, the constant transgressions have become on brand for Kanye, there is a lot of consistency of transgression, and it is not that unexpected for the public, therefore, although it gives Kanye a temporary increase in public aEen*on, we cannot assess if it has any posi*ve outcomes. 26 Figure 6.2 - Kanye West’s concept map with months tag Figure 6.3 – Kanye West’s conceptual framework 27 6.2 J.K. Rowling Regarding the case of J.K. Rowling, the transgression the author commiEed was transphobic speech. The issue started in December of 2019, when the author voiced her support for a woman with history of making transphobic comments, and it con*nued throughout the following years, with her sharing her transphobic views trough tweets, on interviews in a lengthy manifesto posted on her website and even on her new podcast The Witch Trials of J.K Rowling (Romano, 2023). Transphobia is an “irra*onal fear of, aversion to, or discrimina*on against transgender people” (Merriam-Webster, n.d.), therefore, J.K. Rowling’s transgression is a moral and ideological transgression, with high severity level since it discriminates and compromises the safety of an already marginalized group. Although this transgression was the ﬁrst *me the author voiced her views about transgender people, she had previously been accused of transphobia for liking transphobic tweets between the years of 2017 and 2018 (Romano, 2023; Aviles, 2019), therefore, we consider this as prior history of transgression. Furthermore, besides the “liking” of tweets in the past, aUer the main transgression, J.K Rowling kept voicing her transphobic views publicly, so we consider there is consistency of transgression. Because it wasn’t a one-*me only mistake, it is consistent with her past behaviors and can be perceived as characteris*c and central to the iden*ty of the individual in ques*on (MaEhews & Luebke, 2023). To assess J.K Rowling’s popularity among the public we will also consider social media followers. In this case, the author has only one social media account, on X, with 13.9 million followers. Therefore, we can consider that her popularity among the public is quite high. Besides the number of followers, we can also consider the number of tweets collected during the six-month period, which was 54 832 tweets, with the last month of collec*on being the month with the most tweets, followed by the ﬁrst month of collec*on. This is a quite large number of tweets men*oning the author, which can lead to the conclusion that her popularity is high. Regarding the existence of apology and repara*ons aEempts, as of the *me of wri*ng, the author hasn’t issued an apology, on the contrary, she has reinforced her ideological stance and kept sharing her an*-trans views publicly in the years following the main transgression. The content analysis using Leximancer produced a concept map that shows the most recurring themes and concepts present in the tweets about J.K Rowling. Leximancer iden*ﬁed twelve themes with relevancies ranging from 5% to 100%. The theme with the most hits is “trans” (100% relevance); followed by “need” (31% relevance); “books” (34% relevance); “poEer” (76% relevance); “*me” (24% relevance); “transphobic” (45% relevance); “sex” (38% relevance); “children” (15% relevance); “stop” 28 (10% relevance); “Daniel Radcliﬀe” (13% relevance); “explain” (8% relevance) and “case” (5% relevance). AUer analyzing each theme, three groups were created: the transgression group, the public response group and the work group. The transgression group contains four themes that are very connected to the transgression itself, which are “trans”, “transphobic”, “sex” and “case”. Regarding the theme “trans”, Leximancer iden*ﬁed seventeen concepts within that theme, as we can observe in the concept map. This theme is part of the transgression group because it is strongly related to the transgression commiEed by the author. Moreover, within the theme “transphobic” Leximancer found six concept and, as the previous theme, this theme is also central to the transgression. Furthermore, the theme “sex” has ﬁve concepts inside. This theme is very related to the transgression and the discussions about gender iden*ty and sex issues that came as a consequence of J.K Rowling’s tweets. Lastly, the theme “case” also relates closely to the transgression and to the case of Maya Forstater, which is the woman J.K Rowling voiced her support for in the ini*al tweets. Maya Forstater is a tax expert that did not have her contract renewed aUer sharing tweets with gender-cri*cal views, she lost the original case against her employee, appealed, and won two years later (BBC, 2023). Some tweets from this group: “@jk_rowling okay, wow. it's very upseqng and disappoinSng to see you supporSng transphobia, but at least this Sme you were very clear about it.” “J.K Rowling just tweeted in support of a woman who *lost her case* arguing for the right to conSnue abusing trans people as and when under freedom of religion TLDR: A) JKR is a T*rf B) abusing trans people is not protected as a religious or philosophical pracSce.” “Trans women are women. Trans men are men. Non-binary people are non-binary. CC: JK Rowling” The public response group contains ﬁve themes that are related to the public’s response to J.K Rowling’s transgression, which are “need”, “*me”, “stop”, “Daniel Radcliﬀe”, and “explain”. Regarding the theme “need”, Leximancer iden*ﬁed nine concepts. This theme is very related to the public’s response aUer the transgression and it is the ﬁrst *me in the concept map where we see the word “Terf”, which means trans-exclusionary radical feminist (Merriam-Webster, n.d), that was what the public was calling J.K Rowling aUer she shared her transphobic views. Moreover, within the 29 theme “*me”, Leximancer iden*ﬁed eight concepts. As we can see in the concept map, this theme has a lot of reac*onary words, that show the public reac*on towards J.K Rowling’s transgression, while also men*oning her work and profession. Furthermore, the theme “stop” has four concepts associated with it, it’s also very related to the public response against the author and it includes the concept “happy”, that displays frequently with people twee*ng about Pride Month and against J.K Rowling’s views on transgender people. Lastly, the theme “Daniel Radcliﬀe” only shares boundaries with the themes “transphobic” and “case”, from the transgression group. Daniel Radcliﬀe is the actor that plays Harry PoEer in the movies based on J.K Rowling’s books and, in the beginning of June 2020, the actor published an open leEer speaking out against J.K. Rowling’s transphobic views (Sharf, 2022). Lastly, the theme “explain” is also connected to the public response, with people reac*ng to the author’s transgression, while also men*oning her lifelong work. This can also explain why this theme only overlaps with the theme “children”, that is part of the work group. Some tweets that illustrate this group: “@jk_rowling How does someone who touched a generaSon, who is in a posiSon to know BETTER, get it so wrong? You could be a beacon of light to a beBer world and instead doubled down on the kind of peBy intolerance that GETS PEOPLE KILLED JUST FOR BEING“ “@jk_rowling Fucking TERF... Watching you be transphobic hurts because I adored your books as a kid. It's such a shame you're like this.” “Really wish JK Rowling would stop tweeSng, or at least LEARN something. Anyway Trans Rights and happy #PrideMonth “ “JK Rowling should just stop tweeSng.” In the last group, the work group, we have three themes which are all related to J.K Rowling’s work as an author. These themes are “books”, “poEer” and “children”. The theme “books” has eight concepts within, and it is mostly very related to the author’s work. In this theme we can also see that, at *mes, the public demonstrates love for her books while also reac*ng to the transgression, in order to show their disappointment with the author. That can also explain the overlaps with themes “*me” and “transphobic”. Moreover, the theme “poEer” has four concepts associated with it and it is clearly very connected to the author’s most known work, which is 30 the Harry PoEer series. Lastly, the theme “children” has ﬁve concepts within, and it relates heavily to J.K Rowling’s work for children. Some tweets that beEer illustrate this group: “Deeply disappointed in @jk_rowling As a proud cousin to a beauSful trans man who sought inspiraSon from your books when he was ﬁrst coming to terms with who he is, I simply can not take these sort of things silently. Check your privilege immediately!” “I knew jk rowling was trash but it sSll hurts in my heart to know that she created a whole magical world that so many children took refuge in, and for lgbtq children the person who created that escape for them would not welcome them in their refuge because of who they are” “The best thing on TwiBer in recent days? In, what had been a diﬃcult 2020 for many, @jk_rowling giving glowing praise to many children for their illustraSons of #TheIckabog.” Figure 6.4 – J.K. Rowling’s concept map grouped 31 In the concept map we have six tags that iden*fy the month of the collec*on period, labeled “months_m1” which is the ﬁrst month of the data collec*on period, un*l “months_m6” which is the last month of the collec*on period. The month with the most relevance is the last month (100%), followed by the ﬁrst month (27%), the ﬁUh month (11%), the fourth month (11%), the second month (3%) and lastly, the third month (3%). As we can see, in the case of J.K Rowling, most of the themes were talked about during the whole six months, with the excep*on of “Daniel Radcliﬀe” that only starts being talked about in the fourth month of the collec*on period, and it is highly talked about in the sixth month, which goes from 19th of May un*l 18th of June. As previously men*oned, Daniel is the actor that plays Harry PoEer in the movie series and, in the beginning of June 2020, the actor published an open leEer speaking out against J.K. Rowling’s transphobic views (Sharf, 2022). Addi*onally, we can also observe that the conversa*on about the transgression has not only lasted the six months, but also increased in the last month, with the concept “Terf” having a 71% likelihood in that month and the concept “transphobic” with a 74% likelihood. This can relate to the non-existence of apology and repara*ons aEempts, instead the author kept reinforcing her ideological stance and kept sharing her trans views. This led to the public response, and consequently to the cancella*on aEempt that, in this case, we can observe had long las*ng impacts on her reputa*on online. However, although the las*ng impacts on reputa*on that s*ll pursue J.K. Rowling to this day, the impact of the cancella*on aEempt on the author’s sales was short las*ng. In June 2020, just six months aUer the ini*al transgression, when the overall sales in print books rose in the United States, J.K Rowling’s sales had a minimum increase that wasn’t consistent with her sales for the rest of the year (Vary, 2020). This didn’t last long with reports of her sales rising 35% in the ﬁrst half of 2022 alone (Warrington, 2022). 32 Figure 6.5 – J.K. Rowling’s concept map with months tag Figure 6.6 – J.K. Rowling’s conceptual framework 33 6.3 H&M Regarding the case of H&M, the brand’s transgression was oﬀensive adver*sement. The brand released an ad that featured a black child wearing a sweatshirt with the phrase “coolest monkey in the jungle” wriEen on its front (West, 2018). H&M was heavily condemned by the public, who accused the brand of racism. This transgression is a racial transgression of high severity level since it oﬀends and targets people based on race. As previously men*oned, this isn’t the only transgression of the brand. H&M has been involved in mul*ple controversies over the years, such as: cultural appropria*on in 2013, racial insensi*vity regarding H&M South Africa in 2015, clothing waste, bad condi*ons and wages regarding H&M factories in Cambodia and Bangladesh, greenwashing, allega*ons of labor abuse at factories in Myanmar, and so on (West, 2018; Doherty and Toh, 2023). Therefore, we can consider that H&M has, in fact, a prior history of transgression, and that the transgression is consistent with past behaviors of the brand. Regarding the popularity of H&M, we are going to assess it by considering the followers of the brands’ social media proﬁles. At the *me of wri*ng, H&M has 7.7 million followers on X, 38.4 million followers on Instagram, and almost 429 thousand followers on Tik Tok. This sums up to around 46.5 million followers in total. Besides those metrics, we can also consider the number of tweets collected in the six-month period of data collec*on in order to assess the brand’s popularity. We collected a total of 25 465 tweets, with the ﬁrst and last month of collec*on being the months with the highest number of tweets respec*vely. Although the number of tweets collected is the smallest in this study, H&M s*ll has a preEy big following on social media, as previously men*oned, so we can consider that the brand’s popularity is high. Following the incident, H&M took several ac*ons to try to repair the damage, such as issuing a public apology and hiring a diversity leader (West, 2018). The content analysis using Leximancer produced a concept map that shows the most recurring themes and concepts present in the tweets about H&M. Leximancer iden*ﬁed eight themes with relevancies ranging from 1% to 100%. The theme with the most hits is “black” (7% relevance); followed by “H&m” (100% relevance); “racist” (11% relevance); “clothes” (6% relevance); “need” (8% relevance); “playing” (4% relevance); “today” (5% relevance) and “work” (1% relevance). AUer carefully analyzing each theme, three groups were created: the transgression group, the public response group and the brand group. The transgression group contains only one theme, “black” that relates deeply to the transgression itself. Regarding this theme, Leximancer found ﬁUeen concepts within it, that are all intrinsically connected to the transgression commiEed by the brand. The concepts inside the theme clearly 34 describe the adver*sement itself, that is the main transgression, with words such as “ad”, “black”, “child”, “boy”, “wearing”, “hoodie” appearing. Moreover, the words on the hoodie the black boy was wearing in the adver*sement, “coolest monkey in the jungle” also appear as concepts. This theme overlaps with two other themes from the public response group. Some tweets from this group: “H&M is canceled. No company will get my black ass dollars in 2018 and beyond who can’t respect my race.” “So the black kid gets to wear the H&M sweater with "Coolest monkey in the jungle" and the white kid with "Survival expert"…” “This hoodie by H&M is unacceptable. hBps://t.co/P5q2EBZPRy I need answers H&M hBps://t.co/CJtOk3wOk2” “Who approved this!? Where is his mom, did she bump her head!? #notcool #h&m #hm #disgusted hBps://t.co/Ya0Wx8qdRt” The public response group contains ﬁve themes that are related and display the public’s response towards H&M’s transgression. These themes are: “H&M”, “racist”, “clothes”, “today” and “work”. Regarding the theme “H&m”, Leximancer found ten concepts within that theme. It relates deeply to the public’s response to the brand’s transgression, and it even contains some reac*onary words used by the public to express their dissa*sfac*on with H&M, such as “boycoE” and “mad”. This theme overlaps with themes from every group. Moreover, the theme “racist” only contains three concepts and it is very connected to the public’s response. The concept “racist” is a central concept in this transgression, it is a reac*onary word used by the public towards H&M following the transgression, which was indeed a racial transgression. This theme also contains two other concepts “shopping” and “ass”, with users calling out other X users for shopping at the brand aUer the transgression. Furthermore, the theme “clothes” contains four concepts within, and it also displays the public’s reac*on towards the transgression. This theme contains a central concept to the transgression, “racism”, and other concepts such as “clothes”, “stores” and “fashion”, with users using these concepts to react to the fashion brand’s transgression. Moreover, the concept “stores” also refers the South African stores H&M had to close temporarily, just a few days aUer the transgression, because of protests that leU several stores damaged (For*n, 2018). 35 The theme “today” contains just one concept, and it is more prominent around the *me of transgression, with users calling for the cancella*on of the brand and discussing the transgression and the brand itself on the day it happened and the following days. Finally, the theme “work” has one concept within, and it relates to the public’s response following the transgression. This theme also refers to ar*st The Weeknd cu|ng *es with H&M and refusing to work with the brand following the oﬀensive adver*sement. Some tweets that illustrate this group: “The H&M "mistake" was purposeful. You big plaworms are giving them free adverSsing. There's NO WAY these companies keep making racist ads are mistakes.” “The Weeknd ends his partnership with H&M over controversial photo” “#H&M I will never buy your clothes or set in your store again. #PiSful #racist #insane” “Wake up guys!! TranslaSon for non Swedish speakers; if you’re going to boycoB h&m you should also boycoB the other stores h&m owns; all these stores are part of the h&m group. hBps://t.co/xWF16DqNkD” The brand group contains two themes, and it relates to the conversa*on about the brand itself, their products and stores. These themes are: “need” and “playing”. Regarding the theme “need”, Leximancer found three concepts within that theme, and it relates deeply to the conversa*on about the brand itself. This theme has concepts such as “need”, “sale” and “sweat” which refer to the brand’s products, sales, the users’ needs for those products and so on. Furthermore, the theme “playing” has four concepts within and it is also connected to the conversa*on around the brand itself, its products and stores. The theme “playing” also appears frequently with fans of South Korean boy band Exo talking about their songs being played on H&M stores around the globe. Some tweets that beEer illustrate this group: “Are we sSll boycoqng H&M? Because I need some new jeans” “H&M have a nice lil winter sale I need some winter clothes” “I just entered h&m playing exo oh my god I'm so proud right now” 36 Figure 6.7 – H&M’s concept map grouped In the concept map we have six tags that iden*fy the month of the collec*on period, labeled “months_m1” which is the ﬁrst month of the data collec*on period, un*l “months_m6” which is the last month of the collec*on period. The month with the most relevance is the ﬁrst month of data collec*on (100%), followed by the last month (11%), the fourth month (10%), the third month (7%), the ﬁUh month (6%) and lastly the second month (5%). In the case of H&M, the topic of transgression was discussed heavily on the ﬁrst month, the month of the transgression, and then lowered signiﬁcantly in the following months. In the ﬁrst month concepts like “racist”, “racism”, “child” and other concepts intrinsically related to the transgression had great prominence, with likelihoods over 90%, which then dropped signiﬁcantly in the second month of collec*on and kept dropping un*l the last month of collec*on. Therefore, we can observe that the discussion around the transgression started to fade, and, in the sixth month of collec*on, it was almost nonexistent, there was very liEle discussion about it. Besides the short-las*ng impacts on reputa*on, we can also assess that there was no impact on the brand’s sales. According to H&M’s annual report of that year, their sales increased in comparison to the prior year and so did their store number. 37 Figure 6.8 – H&M’s concept map with months tag Figure 6.9 – H&M’s conceptual framework 38 6.4 Goya In the case of Goya, the transgression was commiEed by its CEO, in 2020, when he praised former United States President, Donald Trump, during a White House mee*ng. Goya is a La*n food brand therefore, the La*n community took to X to express their disappointment with the CEO of the brand because of Trump’s previous oﬀenses to La*n immigrants and ci*zens, resul*ng in a boycoE movement (Liaukonytė et al., 2022). This transgression can be considered a rela*onal transgression (Miczo et al., 2018) because the CEO’s ac*ons can be perceived has a betrayal to the rela*onship with Goya’s key customer base, the La*n community, and to the implicit trust that the brand had cul*vated with these customers for years. The severity of this transgression is quite diﬃcult to classify because it is very subjec*ve, so we will classify it as medium severity, taking into considera*on the transgressions presented previously and their severity level. Goya doesn’t have a prior history of transgression therefore, there is also no consistency of transgression. Regarding the popularity of the brand among the public, we will consider the number of followers of Goya’s social media proﬁles. At the *me of wri*ng, the brand has an oﬃcial Instagram proﬁle and an X proﬁle, with 150 thousand followers and 57 thousand followers respec*vely. This sums up to a total of 207 thousand followers. Besides the number of followers, we can also consider the number of tweets collected in the six-month period of data collec*on in order to assess the brand’s popularity. We collected a total of 34 657 tweets about the brand, with the majority of tweets, 30 590, being from the ﬁrst month of collec*on. Although this is not the smallest number of tweets in the study, most of them belong to the ﬁrst month, so we can see that the brand wasn’t talked about much during the ﬁve other months of collec*on. Taking this into account, and the number of followers, we can conclude that Goya’s popularity is quite low. Goya’s CEO, Robert Unanue, appeared on Fox News the week

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