I am truly not a fan of this accusatory “woke” labeling BS. It is a label used to deride folks who speak out without other people fully understanding what the insult is supposed to be. Labels are a short cut to tell members of their tribe to just ignore this person’s opinions without listening to them. But, indulge this 64 year-old white man raised in the south who was a Republican for 20 plus years, a Democrat for about 5 years and an independent for the last 15 plus years,
If awake is another word for woke, then it concerns me that the “woke-accusers” tend to support the former president’s bogus and woefully unproven election fraud claims, try to white wash his involvement in an insurrection against the government, rationalize his taking classified materials to a secure site that had an intrusion a few years ago by a Chinese agent equipped with spyware, and tell people how pro law enforcement they are when they vilify police officers who tell the truth about withstanding Trump instigated seditionists.
Coupling these with a lack of commitment to battle climate change and our global water shortage, to be blind to the stripping away of civil rights and civil discourse, to indict a health care insurance system because it was put in place by a Democrat, when adding some stabilization would help it, and to ignore that we have a huge hunger problem in the US, is just not a very awake crowd to the needs of our country and planet.
I am awake to these things as they concern me. I also am awake to the fact people who do not look like, love like, present gender wise like or worship like me have their rights being infringed on. I am also awake to the fact Michael Gerson, a conservative pundit, has said “the Republican Party is in decay” primarily because the party values its liars more than its truth tellers. So awake, woke, cognizant or aware matters as these folks are paying attention to what is happening. These are the folks whose opinions matter more to me. So, if I am woke, the response is “thank you for noticing.”
musingsofanoldfart 
Note to Readers: Our friend Jill has a great post on this subject that inspired mine:
The opposite of ‘woke’ is?
VJ, excellent point. Thanks, Keith
Liberal.
Asleep? Unwoke?
The term comes from the 60s civil rights movement. But (like any religion worth the name), the movement today called ‘woke’ has stolen the core meaning both you and Jill use to justify it and replaced it with an extreme left wing authoritarian meaning.
Another way to understand why it is a pejorative term today that means the opposite of what it once did is to contrast it with the extreme right wing authoritarian movement labelled ‘alt right’; that term for today’s ‘woke’ is ‘ctrl left’. Both are extremes and I do NOT think you identify with its Freirean (Paulo Freire, the Brazilian Marxist whose writings now are the foundation for teacher education) core group-based ideology. (But hey, I could be wrong.)
The meaning of today’s term Woke (or even Progressive, which is another stolen term… and always from the reasonable Left, have you noticed?… is to identify a believer in group ideology – an ideology based on viewing all human populations as if existing only as members of distinct groups. What this means is that each and every individual inherits (usually by birth) their ‘identity’ (another stolen term meaning one’s identity is determined by group membership and not by any other metric like merit or character) and so the power conflicts between these groups drives all social interactions. There are no and never can be any solutions to any social problem using this ideological framing, yet the ‘Woke’ insist that ‘progressive’ or ‘liberal’ social policies that ‘protect’ group identity from ‘discrimination’ will create a social utopia where all groups become magically equal by equity (equal outcomes), diversity (people who look different but believe exactly as you do), and inclusivity (exactly the same number of group representatives). The problem is that because the language has been stolen and/or co-opted by the ideologues, many good people support the hostile takeover of liberal values and replacement with totalitarian policies believing themselves advocates for those individuals harmed by unfair, unequal, and intolerant treatment. They do not see themselves as illiberals, as regressives, as extreme ideologues active in tearing down liberal democracy and personal autonomy in law in the name of ‘helping’ the ‘victims’ of ‘systemic’ discrimination.
Woke in today’s language means a believer in this framing of all people in the world as mere representatives of their group identity (interchangeable cogs of the social machinery, donchaknow). It also goes by the name of ‘identity politics’, as in believing that people are whatever they identify as. (So we need a Twitter Elect to decide who does and does not belong to which group.)
Sorry, Keith. I don’t think you are woke. Not for one second. I think most people are fundamentally liberals (meaning they support and respect individual rights in law for themselves and others) and have fallen into the trap of believing the false narrative widely taught and sold that groups are, in fact, real and the people who populate them are simply cogs subject to the inevitable social conflict between them. This narrative belief in the reality of groups deserving legal rights and privileges – whether from the right or the left – is illiberal to its core and that why there is a conflict between those who would elect representatives to override individual rights in law and insert their preferred group ideology imposed on everyone.
Thanks for your comment.
And thank you Keith for your succinct response
Good post, my friend, and a million thanks for the shout out and the link! Another ‘qualification’ of being ‘woke’ or awake & aware is thinking. Rather than simply following an ideology spouted by a politician or church leader, those of us who are awake stop and think, put that ideology into real-world terms, then decide if it is in the best interest of all, of humanity. Those who are still asleep simply play ‘follow the leader’, sometimes falling into a deep pit along the way. Thanks again!
Thanks Jill. Totally agree. Yet, at the heart of this BS is the use of a label as a denigrating shortcut and you know how I feel about using labels. Thanks again for the good post.
Indeed, and I agree about the labels. By the way … did you notice our friend Gronda posted today? I re-blogged … and I was so happy to see her again, and to know that she’s back in the saddle, at least for now!
And will those who blindly follow ever realize they’ve fallen into a deep pit? Hard to notice where you are if you’ve got your head up your….
So true!!! Some day they will pull their heads out, look around, and realize that the world is no longer the place it once was.
True.
It’s a word.
And like so many words has as many meanings as folk want it to have.
Currently like the laughably inaccurate and inappropriate ‘Snowflake’ it is being used by folk on the Right as an insult against those who even whisper about equality.
In my current mood if anyone was to tell me I was woke my response would be ‘Really? And what cereal packet did you read to reach that conclusion?’
Roger, well said. Snowflake is yet one more denigrating label, ironically to mean a person who gets his or her feelings hurt. I find it amusing the ones who say this the loudest seem to get their feelings hurt when people speak the truth about the former president. Right now, the former president has four well defined indictments that may be forthcoming. This is not a witch-hunt nor is it a bunch of snowflakes crying foul. Thanks for your comment, Keith
‘I find it amusing the ones who say this the loudest seem to get their feelings hurt when people speak the truth about the former president’.
Agreed Keith. Ver well put.
The fellow is a disgrace to any process of democracy and law.
Equity does not mean equality. Pushing the first believing it will achieve the second is delusional. At least, that’s what reality demonstrates.
Rather than ‘delusional’ I would use the word ‘hopeful’.
Also when it comes to politics and its sibling ‘social interactions’ ‘Reality’ is a very variable word.
At best we can hope to aim for a ‘balancing act’ and some form of general consensus within a society. Complete agreement and total satisfaction with circumstances will never be achieved.
When the ‘balancing act’ undermines shared rights and shared freedoms and imposes group-based quotas that establishes privilege based on a prohibited qualification (race, gender identity, sex, ethnicity) then discrimination and inequality is guaranteed.
Using woke language to defend illiberalism in the name of liberal principles (you encounter this bait and switch when the ‘new’ meaning is opposite to the original term, like equity pretending to promote equality when it produces inequality) demonstrates going along with a lie. This is never a good idea and deserves widespread criticism sorely lacking in today’s go-along-to-get-along social environment.
Tildeb, I do not need a response for this as your opinion is well-detailed. I am not saying you are necessarily correct, but you have studied this topic to an nth degree. Yet, most people do not. Here in the states, many do not know what “woke” means, but they do know it is a derogatory sledge hammer.
So, like most labels in the US these days, the conservative right is wielding this sledge hammer to beat people over the head with, mostly Democrats who are defending civil rights. It matters not if the sledge hammer hits the most accurate target, it is just being swung. That is why I hate labels whether they appropriately targeted or not – the point is to get the people who follow the hammer swinger’s opinion to not to pay attention to the target’s opinion.
Again, please do not respond to this as I have read your lengthy opinions. I have enough to chew on. Thanks for your thoughts. Keith
Hi Keith. I just think it’s really important for more people FROM the left to try to understand why supporting illiberal policies that harm real people in real life (under the pejorative term ‘woke’) should publicly and widely be criticized by moderates rather than relegated to be an ‘extreme right wing’ talking point and ignored as such.
I think you – like most commentators here – want to be staunch defenders of shared rights and freedoms for all citizens but are supporting certain positions that act contrary to these based on political tribalism. Like you, I think a federal Republican electoral victory is an existential threat to American liberal democracy and so it drives me crazy that so many reasonable people continue to feed the Republican political machine and attraction to the public it relies on by supporting insane ‘progressive’ policies and leaving the Republicans as the only critics of this intentional attack while vilifying any and all from the center and left of the political spectrum who dare to do so.
Far too often people really do feel good that they are supporting organizations (and the discriminatory policies they promote) that self proclaim their hostility to all things liberal and Constitutional and outline clear policy agendas meant to install an authoritarian Marxist regime in its place (like BLM). The point is that if reasonable liberals like thee and me do not point this out and criticize it, it ain’t gunna be criticized except by the worst elements of the right. And this attracts thee support from other critics. And we already see the results of this failure of real liberals to criticize and defend liberalism from the extreme left wing hostility to individual and shared rights and freedoms for all. This is the fuel USED by right wing authoritarians in Italy, Sweden, France, and certainly the US…. to electoral success. That’s why it matters so much.
Thanks for your comment. Your opinion is noted.
Since English is not my mother tongue, I am not familiar with the term. But however, in my opinion, you are awake when thinking independently!
Thanks. I agree with your assertion. Take care, Keith
I’m completely turned off by anyone using the term “woke” . I consider it one of many denigrating and belittling terms in the radical rights efforts to push their agenda.
Agreed, 100%. But, I am not a fan of any label used to denigrate. To me, they have always been a sloppy shortcut for those who want people to ignore another’s argument.
Like “tree hugger” and a few other terms meant to insult, I’m happily “woke” also.
Janis, I have often called myself a tree hugger who is a capitalist. I do that diffuse someone’s labeling me as only the former. Keith
Funny how disagreeing with those who think this movement to imposing equity, diversity, and inclusion policies (meaning discrimination, ideological capture, and intolerance) is somehow a net good (when reality demonstrates it’s not) automatically earns the label of right wing. Why is that? It seems to me to be liberal. But hey, why not capture and invert that term, too?
Thanks for your comments. Your opinions are noted. And, you are right equity is not equality. Never has been. Keith
My head is spinning. It seems the USA is almost always in an election cycle.
First I ever heard the term “woke” was from James Carvel in an interview.
That was about a year ago. Now, it seems it doesn’t matter. Both sides are dug in like ticks. The result is an astounding Lime Disease, which we all know is quite debilitating.
Always great t read your opinions/musings, Keith!
Resa, so true. It used to be the campaign rhetoric would be set aside and they would look at facts more. Now it is 24×7 campaign rhetoric. I love your metaphor of ticks. Well said. Keith
This is not a US political partisan movement; it is global movement throughout liberal democracies that is undermining and attacking its liberal foundation with this illiberal group-based ideology referred to as ‘woke’ or ‘progressive’. It is neither in fact. Hence the derogatory meaning by its critics. The Chinese, for example, use a term ‘baizuo’ to define the stereotype of people who go along with it and think well of themselves for doing so.
Thank you, Keith. Holly the poet taught me about metaphors.
I wish the politicians would be more creative. Perhaps they should all be made to go to life drawing classes?
Canadian politicians, too!
Thanks Resa. Agreed on the classes.
Well said, Keith! I must get to Jill’s next. Missing some fine posts these days, alas!
Annie, many thanks. Jill’s posts are always worth the read, in my view. Take care, Keith
Awwww … thank you, my friend!