People Have Redifined "Woke" So Much It's Nothing Anymore

For a long time, the word “woke” referred exclusively to being “awake to racial discrimination.”

Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter, the black folk singer who popularised the term, used it to warn black people to avoid the fate of the Scottsboro boys, a group of nine African American teenagers falsely accused of raping two white women in Alabama.

But then, around 2010, woke hit the mainstream.

Progressives used "wokeness" as a virtue signal, conservatives used it as an insult, and political commentators used it as a gotcha to stump their “anti-woke” guests. 

So in my article, Hamas Finally Answered the Question: "What Is Woke?", I tried to clear up some confusion. 

In 2024, we’re well past the point where woke describes a specific social issue. Instead, it describes a social worldview. A worldview that reduces human beings to categories like oppressors or oppressed. A worldview that decides which of these you are based entirely on your group identity. A worldview that sticks to this simplistic analysis no matter what, even if it means defending terrorists.

Rich thought I was focused on the wrong side of the political aisle. 

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Rich:

People have defined and redifined "woke" so much it's nothing anymore. That's why the right started using it, with a sneer: To muddle it's meaning, remove it's value and turn it fully ugly. It was intentional. The takedown of woke was a think-tank driven attack on black history and political involvement.

I agree that the Hamas/Israel thing surfaced a lot of conservative leftists. By that I mean people who align with the left but use conservative tactics of reductionism and binary "with us or against us" logic. I'm not sure why people don't recognize what this is really about: A far-right Israeli gov't and a far right Gaza government (Hamas) making war because that's what conservatives do. They reduce the "other" to caricatures so there's no empathy left and release the hounds of hatred; the dogs of war. Again, this is a think-tank driven strategy by conservatives.

So a minority right-wing extremist government that doesn't even recognize the best interest or values of their own majority, on both sides of a fight. What else is new? Lots of helpless citizens with no agenda killed, maimed and abused by both sides... and that just feeds the anger, as intended. Nothing props up right-wing ideals like outrage, because outrage leads to extremism which leads to violence which feed more outrage.

We've got to recognize that moderate conservatives have been manipulated worldwide towards extremism by very conservative wealthy bigots and warmongers in the pursuit of power and hegemony. Whether it's Netanyahu or Trump or Bolsanaro or Putin or... the list is endless. Fascism is in the air, and conservatives are breathing deep, while the rest of us can hardly breathe at all.

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Steve QJ:

“I agree that the Hamas/Israel thing surfaced a lot of conservative leftists. By that I mean people who align with the left but use conservative tactics of reductionism and binary "with us or against us" logic.”

Come on now. You have to be more honest than this. I'm a "leftist." I've been on the political Left my entire life. I dutifully went through my socialist phase as a teenager. And even then, I saw that it was ridiculous to pretend that reductionism and binary thinking weren't features of left-wing thinking too.

Racist or antiracist. Nothing in-between. Trans women are literally women or you're a transphobe. Nothing in-between. "Leftist" or far-right/alt-right/fascist. Nothing in-between. Which side of the political aisle do you think these binary worldviews are coming from?

There's nothing conservative about the people I'm describing in the article. They're much more likely to advocate "burning it all down" than clinging to the past. It's time more people on the Left learned that the extremes on the far Left are capable of being just as awful as the far Right. I mean, you don't think communists and socialists ever started any wars or pursued power?

We also need to recognise that part of the reason for the rise of populist figures like Trump and LePen and most recently Milei in Argentina is the horrendous out-of-touchness of some people on the Left. Watch it happen in Canada next. We're so, soooo bad at looking in the mirror when things aren't going our way.

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Rich:

You're right that the "nothing in between" is a problem. The main problem with it is, if person A concluded, say, that people can be whatever gender they feel they are, then anyone (people B) who hasn't reached the same conclusion is a bigot... well, the in-between there is not that person A is wrong, or not moderate, in the conclusion about LGBTQ. What's wrong is a fiery knee jerk attack on anyone who disagrees... which is a conservative response (it's binary, "with me or against me"). It leaves person B entrenched. It's not persuasive.

The in-between here is not about accepting LGBTQ people and the necessities of their lives, because there's no in-between there. You either honor their feelings and needs or you reject them. The problem is, some people need information they don't have. They need to meet and talk with someone they care about to make the transition away from bigotry. Some will. Some will not. But we know gays made huge headway when they came out because it turned out a lot of bigots had important people in their lives who were gay. And they changed their minds. Some didn't. They were too conservative. They never will. They are willing to force people to comply or die. Those are the hardcore right.

The in-betweeners can be converted to any cause that's rightous. But they're not liberal enough to just see it. They need personal tangible experience of the problems of Trans people to "get it". But they're now living in a hate bubble. More hate won't help. The left has hate because a lot of them are the injured parties but they're psychologically conservative and lash out. That's not being liberal, it might be hard left. But if you go left that far, you've become the right.

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Steve QJ:

“well, the in-between there is not that person A is wrong, or not moderate, in the conclusion about LGBTQ.”

Well, I'd say that the first step is to have person A be very clear about what they mean by "gender" and what words they're using to define it.

Having spent a fair amount of time talking about this topic, I can say with confidence that it's basically impossible to get person A to do this. Because the internal logic of their position falls apart under the gentlest scrutiny. So what almost invariably happens is that they freak out and call whoever is exposing this shaky logic a transphobe.

And no, the only choices are not honouring somebody's feelings or rejecting them. There is, as there almost always is, in-between there too.

For example, you can, while fully respecting somebody, point out that their feelings about something are illogical or in some cases delusional. And this isn't limited to trans people. Think anorexia or schizophrenia or any of the various forms of body dysmorphia. You can respect their right to present in any way they choose without pretending that this change of presentation literally or legally turns them into something else. You can find ways to legally accommodate and protect new forms of expression without erasing laws that accommodate and protect women (by the way, every other culture that embraces gender diversity has managed this. We're the only ones who seem to be struggling to accept that trans women are different to women).

I think most liberals can understand and accommodate all this. It is not "hate" to want or even demand it. But there's a meaningful chunk of people at the extremes who are too narcissistic to accept any compromise or obstacles to their "validation." Whether they be women's rights, basic logic, or reality itself. And that's why they rely on these "nothing in-between," "with us or against us," arguments. These people won't change their minds either.

Again, I don't think these people are conservative in any sense. They aren't arguing for the status quo or or small government or unconstrained capitalism or family/Christian values. Conservative isn't just a synonym for "things I don't like."

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As I’ve mentioned once or twice before, I mostly agree with Rich’s initial point. The word “woke” has been redefined so much that it’s barely worth using.

I mean, once a word has been used to describe everything from caring about gay people to making toys that represent disabled children to an insufficiently sexy rebrand of M&Ms, it’s probably reached the end of its usefulness.

The problem is, there are still things in the world that we need to be able to talk about. And everybody has a rough idea of what people mean when they say “woke,” even if they pretend they don’t. 

After all, like so many words nowadays, quibbling about the definition of words is much easier than acknowledging the problems the words describe.

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