In a conversation recent to when I first began writing this about a month ago, a friend asked me how I felt about the direction left-wing politics has taken, and I found myself launching into a diatribe about how I feel torn between the political faction I subscribe to and the stances its leadership have taken in recent years. What we did not know at the time, was that we were having this conversation only one day before Bari Weiss would announce her resignation from The New York Times citing issues of a work environment that prevented her from engaging in “wrongthink” and in discussions that have the potential to question the orthodoxy of the woke perspective. Josh Hammer, for The Forward, described Weiss as a casualty of “left wokeness”, and for many reasons, I’m inclined to agree.
As stated above, I have always identified as a fairly left-wing, liberal person. During high school and undergrad I dabbled with ideas of communism, I support classic “left” stances on wealth redistribution and the role of government in society, in addition to the left stance on social issues such as women’s and LGBTQIA2S+ rights, religious and racial equality, and climate change (though how that last one became politically divisive, I’m still unsure). But being left of the aisle is no longer sufficient.
The “woke” culture of the present-day left, and more specifically my generation, stands for many good things, and on its face it seems like the right side to be on if you are progressively inclined. But, the more I have interacted and been exposed to so-called "woke" individuals, the more I have found that their approach parallels that of those whose ideas and attitudes they seek to refute. Specifically, the rejection of all conversation about the flaws in any position or movement they have adopted, in favour of the dogmatic repetition of rhetoric.
My first confrontation with this strange posturing came around the time of the first Women’s March in 2017. Anti-abortion groups were removed from being official partners to the Women’s March due to its alignment with pro-choice values. Regardless of my own feelings on abortion rights, I feel bound to ask why women who oppose abortion for ideological and religious reasons are decried as somehow less entitled to fight for general women’s equality than those who are pro-choice? Are they less entitled to their own gender equality for the sole reason that they oppose abortion, even if they work adamantly for equal pay? Does the Women’s March truly represent the diversity of women in our community if it rejects those who oppose abortion?
That was only the beginning.
Over the nearly four years of the Trump administration the woke movement has become increasingly more vocal. For so many reasons, this is a really good thing. It is important for us–as individuals, and as a society–to be thinking about the way we deal with the wealth gap, gender equality, and human rights. But the woke perspective has gone much further than asking us to engage in the conversation on these issues.
Namely: it has stopped the conversation.
To understand the “Great Awokening” as labeled by Andrew Sullivan in his 2018 New York Magazine article, it is important to understand where the term “woke” came from. The term dates back to the mid-19th century Bohemians, but it’s modern usage can be tied more directly to the 1940s when it was used by J. Saunders Redding in the first issue of the Negro Digest published in 1942 to talk about labour unions. In 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. gave a commencement address at Oberlin College in which he spoke about being “awake to the revolution”. King, in his address, says: “We have made of this world a neighbourhood, and yet we have not had the ethical commitment to make of it a brotherhood. Somehow and someway we’ve got to do this, we must all learn to live together as brothers, or we will all perish together as fools”.
The term “woke” began growing in popularity in the 1990s, but its usage, according to a Google Books Ngram analysis, skyrocketed in 2013, peeking in 2017. This coincides with the murder of Trayvon Martin and the protests in Ferguson, MI, and the beginning of the #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo movements, two of the most prominent social justice campaigns of the past decade. Wokeness began trickling into our lives and our media, from politicians presenting themselves as the woke choice, to brands rushing to market their products in ways that align with this 21st century enlightenment.
As a 20-something law student, I live in a “woke-washed” world, where there is an expectation of wokeness, and where any view or discourse that could be perceived as criticizing or scrutinizing the woke perspective is rejected - cancelled, along with the person engaging in that conversation. Such is what happened to Bari Weiss, and such is the reason why any course involving a discussion component in first year law school went from a place of open conversation to a place where raising your hand meant risking cancellation within the first three-hour class session. Wokeness killed the conversation.
The “wrongthink” Weiss refers to in her letter of resignation was in her writing specifically about the #MeToo movement, and differently in her work on Antisemetisim. Weiss’ criticism of the #MeToo movement centres on the problems with the absolute statement “believe all women”. The discussion Weiss seeks to engage in is for the purpose of strengthening the #MeToo movement, focusing on the way that placing women’s allegations of sexual assault above interview or evidence keeps women in the role of the weak victim, rather than providing an opportunity to defend our rights and narratives, both for what they are, and for what they are not. Weiss further asks her readers to think about what level of conduct we want to see criminalized, and where we want to see the lines drawn. There is nothing inherently offensive in what she writes, and the conversation Weiss is trying to start is an important one to have when thinking about how we want sexual harassment and violence to be treated in our communities and workplaces. The “wrongthink” in her writing, from the woke perspective, was daring to engage in conversation about the #MeToo movement that was not blindly supportive, rather than subscribing to the "believe all women" tagline.
Weiss frequently writes about the problems of anti-Semesitism in America and Europe. This, unfortunately, doesn’t fit with the woke worldview. One of the many definitions of “woke” submitted by Urban Dictionary contributors is: “being aware of the truth behind things ‘the man’ doesn’t want you to know”. The Oxford English Dictionary has defined being “woke” as: “alert to injustice in society, especially racism”. What this has meant, in practice, is choosing sides, more specifically: choosing a victim and then putting them on a pedestal. The woke movement has done this time and again, and they have done it to Israel. To be woke it has become necessary to subscribe to the belief that Israel is an apartheid state, that the Palestinians are peacefully protesting for their rights, and–as classmates said on more than one occasion last year–that Israel is a white supremacist colonial nation that stole the land it’s on. To go back to the definition provided by the Urban Dictionary contributor, the argument would likely be that 'the man' wants you to be on the side of Israel, and to be woke is to the take the other side.
I’m not going to get into how this perspective rejects reality and history, there are many people out there who have already explained this much better than I can, Olga Meshoe Washington being a wonderful example. As a Jewish woman and Zionist who thinks critically about Israel, it is sad to see the Left being dominated by such a clearly biased perspective. I am further saddened because there are important conversations to have about Israeli politics, the settlements, Hamas and Hezbollah, and the role of surrounding Arab nations in the ongoing conflict. But we can’t have that conversation, because to have that conversation would require an admission by members of the woke community that the Palestinians are not without fault, and that Palestinian leadership is potentially interrupting any hope for a peaceful future. It would require acknowledging a history and a reality - that of the Jewish connection to Israel - that conflicts with their chosen narrative.
Martin Luther King spoke about being awake to the revolution, and looking at what has gone on in America this summer, it feels reasonable to say that a revolution - perhaps of a different kind than we have seen historically or in other countries - is brewing. Revolutions force us to have uncomfortable conversations about our country and our community, and the woke-washing of our campuses, and our social circles has prevented these uncomfortable but important conversations from taking place. Instead, we stay silent for fear of cancellation. We refrain from calling our classmates when they say things that lack logic, or promote a victim narrative that leaves out important parts of the story.
For King, being woke meant joining together to support each other in the fight against injustice and inequality. Being woke was not about branding, social media, or “cancelling” those who disagree with you, it was about making the ethical commitment to stand together, united, for what is right, fair, just, and best for our world. Be awake to the revolution, yes, but also be awake to bias - your own and other’s-and dogmatic rhetoric that stands in the way of asking deeper questions. Be awake to the flaws in the logic and embrace the reality that there is no perfect system, what we are working for is a better one, and to be better, we need to have some uncomfortable conversations. This is what our activism in the streets and online should strive for.
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