wokeness doesn’t go back to Karl Marx — praxis

You’re right. It’s more like Rousseau. Went mainstream in the 1960s. Institutionalized by 2000s.

You sound like you could say what woke is. Weird. Why not, instead of saying I was wrong, just give us the accurate information. Do you see the “End of woke”? I don’t. But then, maybe woke never got started?

Wittgensteinian. And an ever-moving target, — jorndoe

Isn’t that a positive feature of woke ideology? Everything in motion on a sliding scale - gender, definitions of “woke”, etc.

[woke] Went mainstream in the 1960s. Institutionalized by 2000s. — Fire Ologist

Went mainstream in the 2010s. I can’t tell what your game is but it’s very late in the game to be playing games.

very late in the game to be playing games. — praxis

What were you trying to say?

Clearly woke went mainstream in the 2010s. Why would anyone say otherwise? There must be a reason.

Do you see the “End of woke”? — Fire Ologist

Interpreting events, institutions, and cultural norms in terms of power, inequality, and identity categories became mainstream in the 2010s. I imagine that lens will last as long as it is useful.

Interpreting events, institutions, and cultural norms in terms of power, inequality, and identity categories — praxis

That’s really helpful.

I would say two things about this:

1. What it says, in itself, reflects woke methodology. Interpreting events in a particular, woke way, reflects interpreting events in terms of power, distribution of equity, and identity categories.

2. There is more to woke than simply this method; there are specific woke conclusions one is to come to when using this method properly or one still hasn’t grasped wokeness. In other words, one could interpret events, institutions, and cultural norms in terms of power, inequality, and identity categories, but if one concludes from this process of interpretation that whites are being oppressed, or that females are not being oppressed, one has not achieved wokeness despite employing its methods.

I think it is simplistic to ask you to agree, because I’ve used the word “proper.”

But I’ll ask anyway. It seems to me 1, as method, doesn’t go far enough to capture what is woke.

Would you agree? There are woke conclusions and proper analysis, and there are unwoke conclusions and improper analysis (even of one is interpreting according to power, equity and identity categories)? So woke is more than method (it has its dogma).

You asked if I saw the end of woke and I responded to that question. I think the 'woke viewpoint' will continue because once a new and useful perspective is acquired it's difficult to forget, especially if there's an abundance of subject matter to look at from that point of view.

There's a difference between observation and action, however, and identity politics can ultimately be self-serving rather than serving the interests of the marginalized. For example, are "deplorables" actually doing better now than they were before MAGA? Are trans people doing better now than before woke became mainstream? Violence against the trans community is increasing. I imagine it will spike further after the Charlie Kirk incident and the way MAGA is politicizing the tragedy.

Regarding dogmatism, you're free to argue that whites are being oppressed and that women aren't. There is no God-like authority figure to judge you harshly for doing so. It's not a sin.

Hey Praxis, thanks for the reply,

For instance, the question of why shouldn’t a society bend to the weak? Efficiency, predictability, and hoarding wealth & power are also forms of weakness. — praxis

If the goal is emancipating the weak, woke doesn't work. We've seen data indicating that it seems to be bad for the mental health of the practitioners. Data going back decades that people having problems with hiring quotas - including people hired as a result of said quotas. California voting down AA propositions. we see enormous problems with dominant trans narratives - high profile agencies quashing research findings, the refusal to engage with a growing demographic of detransitioners, and increase

If you care about trans rights, the woke approach isn't working in some respects. Without woke, does Trump ban trans military members? Some people ARE trans. We know this because we have historical records from cultures everywhere. So why not engage with good faith questions about why thousands of years of history have been ignored when it comes to who identifies as trans?

Historically, this demographic has been 2/3 male to female. The majority of trans teens who identified as trans adults had patterns of early onset, prolonged insistence, etc. In good faith, we can assume that some of the arguments we are hearing - young, awkward gays and lesbians feeling 'pressured' into identifying as trans, the high prevalence of autistic young people. As many in the LGB community argued (using their acronym) a lot of these kids would have, in the past, simply identified as gay or lesbian.

Even the original proponents of the "Dutch Model" have spoken against the way it's been implemented, with years of psychological counselling and testing being replaced by single, hour-long interviews in some cases.

These concerns come from legit sources, powerful data - I'm happy to provide citations - but the impact of woke is to silence the centre. These conversations are too easily derailed by a litigious minority. I just finished Richard Hanania's book "The Origin of Woke" - I know of his problematic past, but value reading across the spectrum - and he makes a convincing case that the nature of the evolution of civil rights laws has lead to an outcome where it makes more sense for mainstream organizations to simply capitulate, cost of doing business.

You can argue against woke across the spectrum. "Left is not Woke". Adolph Reed and Walter Benn Michaels. Chomsky and Hermann's propaganda model applies to woke tactics.

Don't get me wrong - there is an equally worrisome contingent on the right. I just don't live in that universe the way I do the progressive one here in downtown Toronto. Conservatives acting violently, hatefully are wrong, in that they are violent and hateful. But they aren't betraying my progressive principles the way wokists that celebrate murder are.

I despise woke as a leftist. I saw it used to silence valid conversation over and over again for decades working in a Toronto high school. Deployed by the high status admin to deflect from their own failings to engage students. Wokeness was the language of OISE in 1997 when I did my initial teacher training, and was the language in the early 2000s when I did my masters of ed.

It feels safe to say that schools have been 'woke' since before the term emerged in popular parlance. Should we not hold these educational leaders - who have failed to curtail abseentism, declinging standards, increasing violence and declines in mental health, students and staff alike, accountable
for these failures?

Like the Kirk shooting video, I wish I could unsee that. — praxis

I hear you. I refuse to watch it.

Contrary to Fire’s rewriting of history, wokeness doesn’t go back to Karl Marx. It is also rather narrow in focus compared to full-bodied wokeness. — praxis

Fire? Not sure who you mean? But interested in what you trace wokeness to? There is definitely some Marx in there, although I believe Marx himself would have objected to the 'cultural turn'?

Sorry if I wrote too much here. I am sincerely endeavouring to operate in good faith, but, obviously, have some emotional internal conflict going on here

Hi jorndoe, thanks for the question.

have you found "woke" to be a postmodernist thing? — jorndoe

Postmodern, for sure, with the opposition to 'master narratives' (although woke is obviously one such narrative). Standpoint epistemology evolved from postmodern concerns such as these, no?

Foucault seems a huge influence, although I've only read him in excerpts.

How do you see the relationship between postmodernism and wokeness?

Per "Junk Bonds and Corporate Raiders", it sure feels like the obscurity of language and meaning is the point?

I admit to being a lay philosopher. Since being cancelled, I have a lot of time to try and catch up on reading, but I'm sure people can help me with some more in depth details. And apologies if I have missed previous relevant posts, I am working on catching back up with this thread.

you're free to argue that whites are being oppressed and that women aren't. — praxis

Maybe, but I asked if it was woke to argue these things?

My point is that it might be procedurally woke to argue power, equity, identity. But it’s not substantively woke to argue whites are being oppressed and women aren’t.

Do you agree with that at least?

the impact of woke is to silence the centre. T — Jeremy Murray

about trans rights, the woke approach isn't working in some respects. — Jeremy Murray

These are in line with my points. Certain woke-friendly principles and goals - such as equity, inclusiveness, defeating bias - are perfectly reasonable, and worthy of development. But many of the ways these principles and goals are implemented (by the woke) require, reverse-racism, inequity, unreasonableness, intolerance and exclusion. The impact, in the name of hearing voices, is to silence voices. The impact, in the name of victims, often creates victims. This is what we see between trans and women in sports. (It sounds like the type of contradictory cannibalism you might be painfully too familiar with.)

And the woke are unable to properly deal with shooting Charlie Kirk, for instance. The general woke response to Kirk’s shooting is that, it was wrong of course, but Kirk was a hateful idiot who practically asked for it. (One could argue that the true woke response is just, good riddance, but let’s push that to the extremists response.)

Shouldn’t the response have been, long ago, let’s beat Kirk in a public debate with own his microphone? After all, free speech is for every political speech. So violence against him should have been as horrifying to the woke as it was to Kirk supporters - we’ve all been silenced. The debate is over now. No one gets to win it.

But the woke have their own biases and desires, so the best they can say is “well I didn’t want him shot, but there certainly isn’t anything to cry about.” Yes there is - woke needs better advocates now. If they exist.

Wokeness was the language of OISE in 1997 when I did my initial teacher training, and was the language in the early 2000s when I did my masters of ed.

It feels safe to say that schools have been 'woke' since before the term emerged in popular parlance. Should we not hold these educational leaders - who have failed to curtail abseentism, declinging standards, increasing violence and declines in mental health, students and staff alike, accountable
for these failures? — Jeremy Murray

Absolutely, though it's not clear how much of these failures you're attributing to wokeism. I'm sure that plays a part. Anyway, funny coincidence that my wife did her initial teacher training at about the same time, teaching High School English, in the deep blue state of California.

My point is that it might be procedurally woke to argue power, equity, identity. But it’s not substantively woke to argue whites are being oppressed and women aren’t.

Do you agree with that at least? — Fire Ologist

I agree that it could be difficult to meaningfully argue, though you might have an uncommon argument that looks at it in a unique way.

If you're trying to say that wokeness is like religion in its moralizing, then yes, I completely agree.

Mischaracterizing CRT as something taught in public school — Mijin

It is, of course, taught ALL THE TIME in public schools, here in Toronto at least. Has been my entire career.

My general impression is that, broadly speaking, the median Woke position is simply contradictory. It is morally and epistemically anti-realist and strongly relativistic, while at the same time being absolutist. This is, in many cases, an unresolved, and perhaps often unacknowledged contradiction. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I like this summation so much I need a new emoji.

AmadeusD3.6k
I also think it is a characteristic of woke - if the other party doesn’t appear to agree with you, they must need to reevaluate their whole approach so let’s talk about that instead of whatever thing we both disagree with.
— Fire Ologist — AmadeusD

.Are you guys familiar with the perfect rhetorical fortress?

https://eternallyradicalidea.com/p/towards-a-more-perfect-rhetorical

The co-authors are a fun pair, the main guy at free speech goat FIRE, Greg Lukianoff, and Rikki Schlott, a young anti-woke conservative/libertarian. They make a principled combo for free speech, and "The Cancelling of the American Mind" is a great read.

And the woke are unable to properly deal with shooting Charlie Kirk, for instance. The general woke response to Kirk’s shooting is that, it was wrong of course, but Kirk was a hateful idiot who practically asked for it. — Fire Ologist

For sure. Greg Lukianoff is great on this topic - he attributes it to the idea that 'words are violence'.

Absolutely, though it's not clear how much of these failures you're attributing to wokeism. I'm sure that plays a part. Anyway, funny coincidence that my wife did her initial teacher training at about the same time, teaching High School English, in the deep blue state of California. — praxis

Sorry man, I thought I was clearly indicating I see wokeness as a primary problem for the issues I listed? I mean, there are non-woke related issues, but yeah, the failure of discipline, literacy rates? Wokeness wears a lot of that.

Could there be a relationship between this modern "in your face" sexuality and Woke? — Athena

I see this on the John Oliver show all the time, crude, sexual jokes about Reagan and such. It bothers me too.

I just read "Rebel Sell" by Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter, 2004, but still immensely valuable today. They identify opposition to 'conformity to a totalizing system' as the rebel 'stance' taken by much of the left since the 60s.

They note not just how silly much of that thinking was, but also how it came to valorize rejecting social norms of all kinds, social norms that have much more value than they ills that are supposedly reputed by 'sticking it to the man' and being rude.

It would be interesting to hear from someone that was full-on woke, but who has repented, to see how he was able to make peace with what he was doing. — NOS4A2

Easy. We had no idea what we were doing.

I didn't know just how much criticism woke ideas were garnering outside of my progressive bubble. And, in Toronto high schools, you are full-on indoctrinated in this stuff. People you like and respect advocate for it. Etc. Ultimately, I had no idea that the exact same 'difficult conversations' and PDs and so on were going on in pretty much every government bureaucracy everywhere in the WEIRD world.

I like your take on the misdirection inherent to the woke projection, but the central element that makes this particular delusion so powerful today was the emergence of smart phone tech back in the 2010s. Woke was just the perfect angry-making belief system for the left in that era.

I see this on the John Oliver show all the time, crude, sexual jokes about Reagan and such. It bothers me too.

I just read "Rebel Sell" by Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter, 2004, but still immensely valuable today. They identify opposition to 'conformity to a totalizing system' as the rebel 'stance' taken by much of the left since the 60s.

They note not just how silly much of that thinking was, but also how it came to valorize rejecting social norms of all kinds, social norms that have much more value than they ills that are supposedly reputed by 'sticking it to the man' and being rude. — Jeremy Murray

Attacks on custom have been a big part of liberal ideology for a long time. Obviously, one sees it more often in progressive liberalism than conservative liberalism because the latter has a sort of contradictory preference for the very customs and institutions that liberalism and capitalism erode.

I have two quotes I really like on this which I'll just link to:

The first if from Patrick Deneen's "Why Liberalism Failed" on Mill and the centrality of attacks on custom to liberal thought, and how they are meant to promote the interests of the "exceptional individual."

The second is from the author David Foster Wallace on the tyranny of irony in the post-modern period.

The far-right makes plenty of hay out of this when figures on the left want to advocate for moral anti-realism and take a sledgehammer to culture, particularly religion and patriotic symbols, but are thrown into fits by even joking references to racism or sexism. Actually though, this makes perfect sense from within the context of the ideology, even though it seems hypocritical at first glance. Progressive liberalism tends to focus on race and sex precisely because people do not "choose" to be members of these categories. Hence, discrimination based on these categories is a barrier to the freedom of individuals to individuate.

By contrast, the modern tend to pay far less attention to the identifiers the right wants to focus on: ethnicity, religion, class (ironically*), regionalism, etc. Why? Because the enlightened liberal presumably transcends these categories. They are personally responsible for ditching their religion or finding an appropriately modern/progressive variant, reducing ethnic customs down to an acceptable limit, "moving out of fly-over country," etc. Ethnicity, regionalism, and even religion might be thought to be more tied to place, and the ideal liberal citizen has transcended place, while each place itself also becomes every other place.

Sexual orientation and gender are interesting here. There is an intense focus on presenting these as immutable, inborn characteristics, precisely because then they would fit the same criteria as sex and race. Hence the backlash about the idea of people being "transracial," or against research that suggested a degree of social contagion in gender dysphoria. It is important that people are "born this way" for the paradigm.

Although, prima facie there is no reason why discrimination should be "more acceptable" because it is based on a "choice."

* Before anyone says anything, I am not suggesting that the left doesn't pay attention redistributive economics aimed at the lower end of the income distribution. I am pointing out that they no longer focus on class as an identity, nor particularly on "class discrimination." It's the right now that seems to more often appeal to "elitism."

Sorry man, I thought I was clearly indicating I see wokeness as a primary problem for the issues I listed? I mean, there are non-woke related issues, but yeah, the failure of discipline, literacy rates? Wokeness wears a lot of that. — Jeremy Murray

Literacy rates are typically attributed to socioeconomics, instruction quality, funding and resources, language barriers, and broader social factors like nutrition, healthcare, and family support. How does wokeness impact any of that?

Woke, like beauty and pornography, is in the eye of the beholder.

Why is it important to know all the sexual variations and judge people as right or wrong? I don't want to know. I like sex being a private matter.

There are 3 simple rules that seem to resolve most social problems.

1. We respect everyone. It does not matter who the other is, a bum or the mayor, because it is about our own character, not the other person's character. Either we are respectful people or we are not.

2. We protect the dignity of others. That can be hard to do, especially when everyone is playing "0ne-up-manship" and puts others down to be up.

3. We do everything with integrity.

Looking for an explanation of integrity, it dawned on me that we would not be fussing over woke if we had personal relationships with each other, and women stayed home to care for their families as they should. There are only so many people we can have in our lives. Only about 5 of these people will be intimate relationships and then come associates, and we are doing very well to know the names of 600 people and an idea of how their lives relate to ours. So when we stand in an elevator full or people, they will likely be strangers, trying to avoid contact and the cashier in our favorite store is a part of the register, not someone we have coffee with. The more impersonal we are, the more we need social rules.

Help me, how should this be explained? It is not natural for us to live in these huge cities where our lives are full of strangers. Without established relationships, there is a lot that can go wrong. How I react to you, and interpret what you say, is all about how well I know you, and if I don't know you, my gaurd is up and I am much more likely to be offended.

Sorry man, I thought I was clearly indicating I see wokeness as a primary problem for the issues I listed? I mean, there are non-woke related issues, but yeah, the failure of discipline, literacy rates? Wokeness wears a lot of that.
— Jeremy Murray

Literacy rates are typically attributed to socioeconomics, instruction quality, funding and resources, language barriers, and broader social factors like nutrition, healthcare, and family support. How does wokeness impact any of that? — praxis

I might know something about you, but I do not know you, and this is much more likely to lead to disagreement and defensiveness. I woke in a world of strangers, and a lot is going wrong! In the past I would turn to family, but family is another state, is not what it used to be when Mom was taking care of everything. Now she is working and I am on my own in a world of strangers. Get the F off my lawn, you freak. Bang, bang, the kid playing a joke is dead.

I fail to grasp your meaning.

By contrast, the modern tend to pay far less attention to the identifiers the right wants to focus on: ethnicity, religion, class (ironically*), regionalism, etc. Why? Because the enlightened liberal presumably transcends these categories. They are personally responsible for ditching their religion or finding an appropriately modern/progressive variant, reducing ethnic customs down to an acceptable limit, "moving out of fly-over country," etc. Ethnicity, regionalism, and even religion might be thought to be more tied to place, and the ideal liberal citizen has transcended place, while each place itself also becomes every other place. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Well said, and I think I've seen that theme touched on in variety of books and articles I've read - the 'somewheres' vs. the 'anywheres'.

It all seems highly neoliberal to me? I just finished Michael Lind's "Hell to Pay" and he is pretty blunt about tossing 'left neoliberals' and 'libertarian conservatives' into the same guilty basket.

Do you see any merit in the idea that 'woke' is simply a neoliberal control tactic?

Sexual orientation and gender are interesting here. There is an intense focus on presenting these as immutable, inborn characteristics, precisely because then they would fit the same criteria as sex and race. Hence the backlash about the idea of people being "transracial," or against research that suggested a degree of social contagion in gender dysphoria. It is important that people are "born this way" for the paradigm. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Another good point. It is strange to see the likes of Judith Butler taking this essentialist (?) stance.

* Before anyone says anything, I am not suggesting that the left doesn't pay attention redistributive economics aimed at the lower end of the income distribution. I am pointing out that they no longer focus on class as an identity, nor particularly on "class discrimination." It's the right now that seems to more often appeal to "elitism." — Count Timothy von Icarus

Do traditional 'lefties' even think to think about class, at all, anymore? That seems in keeping with your comment here?

Feeling deeply about anything (thymos), or especially being deeply intellectually invested in an ideal (Logos), as opposed to being properly "pragmatic" (which normally means a focus on safety and epithumia, sensible pleasures) is seen as a sort failing.

I have a book by Deneen somewhere, you have piqued my interest in it with your quote. And I very much enjoyed your conversation with GazingGecko. That David Foster Wallace quote is great, although perhaps my saying that makes me guilty of consuming 'wisdom porn' myself.

Do you have an opinion on Joseph Heath? He studied under Charles Taylor, and while I haven't gotten to Taylor yet, I have enjoyed his student.

I get a lot out of your comments man.

Literacy rates are typically attributed to socioeconomics, instruction quality, funding and resources, language barriers, and broader social factors like nutrition, healthcare, and family support. How does wokeness impact any of that? — praxis

Does your wife still teach? It's a tough gig, primarily because of appalling behaviour, regular violence, tolerance of disruption, etc. I was told thirty years back, during my b. ed, that we didn't need to 'worry' about discipline, because good lessons, culturally relevant material, etc would solve all the problems.

Wokeness has been the defining philosophical approach of public education for decades. Even the insistence on whole language over phonics is 'woke'.

Of course, I'm only talking about the what educators can control part of the equation.

Why any institution would want to convince people, especially children that it has been captured by 'white supremacy' and is therefore not to be trusted is beyond me.

the more impersonal we are, the more we need social rules.

Help me, how should this be explained? It is not natural for us to live in these huge cities where our lives are full of strangers. Without established relationships, there is a lot that can go wrong. — Athena

I agree about those rules Athena.

I read "Whiteshift" by Eric Kaufmann recently, and he describes this problem in great detail.

This is one of the problems with wokeness, as I see it - the insistence that everyone care for people far outside the 'intimate circle' you describe, goes against human nature, evolutionary biology / psychology, however you would like to put it. And that's not a bad thing, it's the nature of our brains.

I'm Canadian, and I used to feel great pride in that. Still do, to an extent, but now I'm a rarity - the right and the left here both seem to think it naive to be proud of your nation.

As we welcome more and more immigrants, don't we need to be thinking about what culture we are welcoming them to?

Does your wife still teach? — Jeremy Murray

Yes, she's taught high school English in a variety of districts—some more liberal, others more conservative; some affluent, and others less so.

Even the insistence on whole language over phonics is 'woke'. — Jeremy Murray

It's quite a stretch to consider the Science of Reading movement woke.

I fail to grasp your meaning. — praxis

I have heard English is not the best language for expressing some things. I know I am often groping for the right word without success. I spoke with a friend about the relationship problem I perceive, and she immediately knew what I was talking about because she and I basically have the same experience of things changing over time. She immediately spoke of how we all got along and helped each other on a job. Not she and I, because we never worked together, but just the workplace was different. We were more personal and less "professional". :lol: My daughter and I have very different ideas about how things should be on the job.

The boundaries and goals were different. If someone was having a hard time with something, someone else would step in and help. We never heard of job descriptions. The job was everyone's job, and we did it together. Since then, I have been fired for being "too friendly". I have listened to nurses explain why they will no longer work in the hospital. They saw their jobs as caring, and the new policy pitted nurses against each other, and was a worse top-down organization than hospitals once were. How horribly ignorant to destroy the intrinsic qualities of a caring job. Now nurses want money, and they are not so much working for intrinsic reward. In a way, this is about status. People with money have more status than someone who is very caring. Having control over others is status. Things have changed.

The status of the mother has super changed! :gasp: Who wants to be "just a housewife"? I don't know if we will ever regain the value of the homemaker. We are living in a different reality and I think that really matters.

Does your wife still teach? It's a tough gig, primarily because of appalling behaviour, regular violence, tolerance of disruption, etc. I was told thirty years back, during my b. ed, that we didn't need to 'worry' about discipline, because good lessons, culturally relevant material, etc would solve all the problems.

Wokeness has been the defining philosophical approach of public education for decades. Even the insistence on whole language over phonics is 'woke'. — Jeremy Murray

But the US is far less "woke" than most of Europe and the anglosphere, so by this logic we should all be envying the remarkably peaceful and disciplined American schools.

The reality is that it's the ways that the US genuinely is an outlier that makes schools more chaotic. Poor public funding, genuine poverty, a violent culture and parents who are suspicious of experts and science.

A personal bugbear for me is also how high schools are depicted on US TV. Every single time, even if it's a Disney movie or whatever, bullying is a significant plot point.
Don't get me wrong; kids are people and some people are jerks. Bullying happens. But having it central to the high school experience seems to normalize it IMO. Other countries manage to tell stories about kids that don't have to center around that behavior.