If you follow trends on campus, you know that is where so-called “Woke” ideology is strongest, even entrenched. I put the word “Woke” in quotes not to ridicule it, but because I don’t want to be associated with people who do revel in making fun of “the Woke” or “Wokeness.” Ridicule has its place, but it detracts from a more thorough or deeper analysis of what’s really happening with Leftist politics today.
Apart from the causes that the Left espouses (end racism, trans rights, open borders and more, some or all of which we may or may not agree with based on social justice and humanitarian appeal) it is the people the Left are really against that is most instructive. It is not the people you might think: it’s not Fox News or the Republican Party; it’s not even Donald Trump and his MAGA supporters. It’s liberals they’re really after, at least in the long run, the only group the Left really views as a threat to its ascendancy.
This may seem a surprising claim. Aren’t Liberals and the Left close to each other? Haven’t we spoken of a Center-Left coalition to describe, say, the Democratic Party’s “big tent” that allows a broad range of Leftist, or Progressive, politics and along with more mainstream ideas? And, don’t liberals hate Fox News as much as “the Woke” do, and don’t liberals and “the Woke” both oppose the Republican Party of today?
All true, but beside the point, at least on campus, which is the epicenter and origin of so-called Woke ideology. Sex in mammals is not binary; systemic racism and white supremacism dominate our culture; it’s perfectly reasonable to force new academic hires and graduate students to affirm their commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion as a precondition to acceptance – these and other positions are the hallmarks of what’s happening on more and more campuses across the country today.
Take, just for one example, the insistence that sex is not binary and that a person’s view of his or her gender is the “authentic self,” and that sex is merely “assigned” at birth, but without any scientific basis for doing so. This is not the same as a liberal position which says we should not consider sex or gender or sexual preference when considering graduate school admission or academic employment, or as a disqualification for anything. The “Woke” are saying that sex as we’ve thought of it and as it exists among all mammals, including homo sapiens, somehow does not exist, and it is for that reason we must not discriminate. Because almost all faculty on elite and major American colleges are liberal or Progressive, such that pushback from Conservatives would be without any teeth, it remains only the liberals who are a threat to these new ways of thinking, which all seem to come from various theoretical, interpretive and speculative “studies” programs, but not the traditional science disciplines (which are now held to be all sexist, racist and white supremacist, anyway, so don’t trust the science, I guess).
But liberals – now they’re a problem. Liberals think you have to treat people as equals! If they’re older liberals, such as Professor Emeritus Jerry Coyne of the University of Chicago and author of the popular blog “Why Evolution is True,” people who proved their authenticity in the Civil Rights m and Anti-War movements of the 1960s, then they’re really a problem. They know the Authoritarian Left when they see it; they’ve studied how the former Soviet Union had the most liberal and Progressive Constitution in the world but was a totalitarian state under Joseph Stalin that murdered millions, and how it suppressed freedom movements in East Germany, Hungary and, most notably, Czechoslovakia in the decades after World War II.
It is people like Coyne (I follow his blog, in part because I’m a U of C alum) who have the credibility to expose what passes for “the Left” today, for what passes for “Progressive” politics today, and for what is denigrated as “Wokeness” not just by Fox News types, but by people who have seen this movie before.
Here’s a True or False history question for you: Did V.I. Lenin overturn the Tsarist regime in Russia on his way to establishing the Soviet Union as part of the much-vaunted October Revolution in 1917? I predict that most of you, even those who know a little history, will say Yes. Of course. Everyone knows Lenin did that.
Wrong! Lenin led a coup d’état against the interim, parliamentary government of Alexander Kerensky months after the Tsar had abandoned power over Russia. Why would Lenin and his lead henchman Leon Trotsky do that? Why? Because the real threat to the Bolsheviks (Lenin’s far-Left party) were the liberals! The Tsar already was gone (though he later was murdered).
Take heed: While the far-Right certainly is the near-term threat to democracy and freedom in this country, and it really is shocking that tens of millions of Americans still don’t understand that Donald Trump was attempting his own coup-d’état on January 6, 2021, the long-term threat to freedom and democracy comes from “the Woke.” And if I’m correct, it won’t really be the Right-wingers they go after should they achieve real power, not merely influence on campus, in the media, and over government, but real control, then it will be the liberals, first and foremost, who will have to be destroyed, just as Lenin did more than a century ago.
Be sure to check out my new short story collection, “Don’t Go,” from the Stephen F. Austin State University Press and available at online booksellers everywhere or order from your favorite local bookstore.
The Left Hates Liberals
According to Dictionary.com
The definition of WOKE:
adjective:
2. having or marked by an active awareness of systemic injustices and prejudices, especially those involving the treatment of ethnic, racial, or sexual minorities
3. Disparaging.
of or relating to a liberal progressive orthodoxy, especially promoting inclusive policies or ideologies that welcome or embrace ethnic, racial, or sexual minorities.
4. Slang.
aware of the facts, true situation, etc. (sometimes used facetiously)
So please help Me better understand which group is considered being WOKE.
If we took the political groups and placed them on some sort of Bell-curve with the top being the independents who claim to be in the center-claiming both Republican ideas & Democratic ideas; and going down the curve on the Republican side to the Tea Party and at the bottom the Q-Anon types; and on the opposite side, the Liberal Democrats and the bottom the FAR-Left; where is this WOKE group supposed to be?
Honestly, I have been a life-long Republican, but in the last 8-10 years find myself more of an Independent. I’d like to think I have always been “woke” according to the adjective definitions 2 & 4. I feel I have always tried to stay aware of issues happening around me and the world.
I am so dissatisfied with the political actions and verbiage of many this day and age. We ALL need to WAKE UP, take a step back and really LOOK & HEAR what people are saying and doing in the name of their political party.
None of us are a political party. We are humans and we all have a right to our beliefs. We need to learn to agree to disagree with each other in a non-hostile way. No more name calling, no putting people down for having a different point of view.
As a former teacher, I tried to instill this in my students. We would have debates in class and hear differing opinions, yet still be able to go play outside together and eat lunch together without animosity towards each other.