"Wokeist" - When people talk about progressivism without acquaintance

[Zardnaar]

Isn't "woke" the political branch of "hipster"? Both are terms no one uses to refer to themselves.

Maybe.

 

[Angst]

Of course: the real spirit of the Enlightenment isn't with those who continue to question and critique, it is with those who say "you know what? We've applied critical reason to enough of society; it's time to stop now."



Burke was correct empirically that societies & institutions are sort of like collections of inherited knowledge and traditions, but it's sure something for conservatives to simultaneously claim the mantle of the Enlightenment while basically declaring that you can't really apply critical reason to improve society because the traditions inherited from the past are simultaneously so powerful we can never transcend them even if we try but also so weak that they need to be defended by banning gay marxists from public schools or whatever.

Anyway I'm rambling but tell me what good points Burke had please.

Again, just wanna say, I don't like Burke. I don't think people are misusing Burke when using him for horrendous things. I think that's what he'd be like to be used for. So keep that in mind.

There's a point though. On his thoughts on the French Revolution he noted that abstract ideas of rights had superceded concrete reality. To put it very shortly, I believe that the French Revolution, while eventually working out in a sense re: the increase of democratic power and participation, at its time, it was also an event of mass terror in the name of an abstraction of what freedom entailed. Violence following instability of old structures being abolished is what we often see following revolutions. But his whole premise+conclusion in that the people had no mandate to overturn the crown and the old ... That part of his thoughts on the matter is unfair and cruel to me. He argued for something very horrible.

I'm afraid that I'm a bit lost with the amount of verbosity and possibly cultural references that might go over my head, but from what I've gathered in the OP, it feels like it's a long-winded way of accusing those who use "woke" of being ignorants who don't know/understand the ideas covered by the moniker they use.
Or, in another way :

With "woke" instead of "SJW".

Did I get it right ?

That's the general gist of what I believe, yes. I'm bad at being concise. That said, the point is less "look at these stupid people" and more "it does not help anyone if you work to counteract people over things they don't believe". Also just the general notice that when people use language that way, it's immediatelt obvious they haven't properly talked with a "wokeist" about what they believe and where they stand. Again, since wokeism isn't something anyone subscribes to.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Noone in the literature identifies themselves as such, and they're often diametrically opposed to each other.

saying this creates an interesting incongruence. when "the right" or other critics of "woke" call it out, why do people who "don't identify themselves as woke" take offense then, or believe it's referring to them? if i make a joke at expense of engineers or lawyers, it is weird to act like an engineer or lawyer in response while "not identifying" as an engineer or lawyer.

best i can tell, the closest way to approximate this is that people know what fits the category of "woke" broadly/imprefectly, and that it includes them, but they don't agree with the conclusions made about it. but if this is the case, they do in fact identify themselves as woke, otherwise any rejection of arguments would be more abstract and a lot less personal.

maybe a good point of comparison is calling someone a "trumpist". there are people who support trump almost no matter what, and people who picked him over the alternative grudgingly, because his policy stances were at least somewhat less bad than his competitior. these are not the same people. they will not behave the same way or select the same candidate(s) in other environments. yet they are commonly lumped together for convenience or just general criticism of picking trump for any reason. similar idea with "woke".

What's most damning of posts like this is that, to me, it's completely telling in basically every way that such posters are not acquainted with how you speak inside "wokeist" circles

doesn't matter any more than other people knowing how i speak in my circles matters. what matters is how people fitting the category act/attempt to influence others.

Both basically serve as a simulacrum of a (very broad) number of movements that never really existed as a cohesive whole, due to ill-defined limits and lack of understanding of how "wokeists" actually speak.

that's one of the biggest problems general, including here. "define our terms". woke claims to operate against societal injustice. sometimes it does, and often it instead advocates or actively causes injustice. generally, the same people area not working towards justice and injustice, rather different people who fit the "pursuant to social justice" category wind up doing one or the other most of the time.

all of that gets lumped into "woke". this means it can be rightfully criticized or defended, depending where you look.

including its dogma/beliefs without evidence and mix of useful + actively harmful elements, i consider the comparison to religion particularly apt. for example, christianity was used to commit some heinous crimes against humanity, and also used as a tool to advocate (unsuccessfully, unfortunately) for the rights of people in the western hemisphere in colonial times and against slavery. obviously, the same people were not doing both things. but they fit under "christians" all the same.

my observation is that presently, woke is more harmful than most religions while sharing many of its properties.

Critical Race Theory

it seems critical theory with focus on race is actually taught. but it's true that we should just call it what it actually is: racism. no need to put lipstick on pigs.

I didn't realize that people assumed that it was perceived as criticism of an actual academic topic, more that it was a criticism of their half-baked allies.

yeah, generally the criticism/dislike comes from cancel culture or otherwise interfering with others. the ostensible basis is that some activity or opinion is supposedly harmful, generally not accompanied by solid evidence.

yet another reason it brings religion to mind is how i recall right wing arguments against video game violence, games like dungeons and dragons being a gateway to the devil or some such, or other religious right nonsense from 1980-2005. i'm sure it was around earlier too, but i'm not old enough to remember it.

one might reasonably call those "cancel culture classic", since those social norms/pressures did do something similar. in a way it's kind of impressive just how well the shoe fits on the other foot with relatively few people noticing.

but implementing racist policy "because woke" is no better than banning teaching more scientifically accurate things in school "because christianity". those are not good properties of their respective faiths.

 

[Akka]

I mostly use it for short hand. People know the gist of it.

That's what it's supposed to be, a moniker for a subset of political opinions which has gained a pejorative tone. The Wikipedia definition feels rather on-point.

That's the general gist of what I believe, yes. I'm bad at being concise. That said, the point is less "look at these stupid people" and more "it does not help anyone if you work to counteract people over things they don't believe". Also just the general notice that when people use language that way, it's immediatelt obvious they haven't properly talked with a "wokeist" about what they believe and where they stand. Again, since wokeism isn't something anyone subscribes to.

The most generous way to see your point is that you blanketly accuse anyone using "woke" or "SJW" of using a strawman.
The least generous way is that you're playing a "lalala I hear nothing" when facing these people.

And in both case, we basically have to take your word for it.
You'll forgive me if I'm not convinced, it just feels like a cop-out, to be able to just dismiss/ignore/reject any argument that is directed at the ideological subset covered by these words - or to pretend there is no such subset.

 

[Senethro]

I don't know about you guys but all these blanket dismissals are not making me feel like Woke isn't just used as a blanket dismissal.

 

[El_Machinae]

It's weird that using the term 'woke sjw' (as a dismissal of someone I perceive to be uselessly (or harmfully) engaged in politics) would then cause me to be 'dismissed' by the more intellectual members.

Like, you have a moron at your rally saying dumb things, waving a placard and not knowing what he's talking about. Oh, I know you need him as a voice, number, vote, and donor - don't get me wrong. But he's a moron and should have any say in what I do, and definitely shouldn't be using his 'bulk' to interfere with daily process.

What do I call this fella?

 

[Gorbles]

It's weird that using the term 'woke sjw' (as a dismissal of someone I perceive to be uselessly (or harmfully) engaged in politics) would then cause me to be 'dismissed' by the more intellectual members.

Like, you have a moron at your rally saying dumb things, waving a placard and not knowing what he's talking about. Oh, I know you need him as a voice, number, vote, and donor - don't get me wrong. But he's a moron and should have any say in what I do, and definitely shouldn't be using his 'bulk' to interfere with daily process.

What do I call this fella?

I mean, you're using "moron" pretty effectively already, right?

 

[El_Machinae]

I mean, you're using "moron" pretty effectively already, right?

Well, in the sense that if I kept shouting 'red! red!' you'd eventually know I was talking about an apple.
It's a specific subset of moron. Or, more generously, someone who's assuming they should have more influence they deserve along a political line, one that I would like to describe efficiently.

If he's not a 'woke moron sjw', because tautologically both 'sjw' and 'woke' are great things, and if I use them like that *I* should be ignored .... then (I've been here before) I'll need a word.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

i don't see the issue with using woke/sjw in the context of pejorative if we accept angst's assertion that people don't self-identify with them. these terms seem to be doing their job in that sense.

it's a similar principle to how it would be surprising if a group of right wing conspiracy theorists actually made a group/called their discord channel "right wing conspiracy theorists" unironically. this sort of thing is widely used by people who are not in the group in question, not by the groups themselves.

 

[Gorbles]

i don't see the issue with using woke/sjw in the context of pejorative if we accept angst's assertion that people don't self-identify with them. these terms seem to be doing their job in that sense.

Or misogynists misogynists?

Well, in the sense that if I kept shouting 'red! red!' you'd eventually know I was talking about an apple.
It's a specific subset of moron. Or, more generously, someone who's assuming they should have more influence they deserve along a political line, one that I would like to describe efficiently.

If he's not a 'woke moron sjw', because tautologically both 'sjw' and 'woke' are great things, and if I use them like that *I* should be ignored .... then (I've been here before) I'll need a word.

I'd argue that if you have an absolutely necessity to call someone a moron, the particulars aren't going to matter a great deal unless you're quantifying it with some strong amount of precision that "woke" won't really do either.

Angst went to some length to explain the signifier of using the term in the first place, and what it tends to betray (of the user). I'd go a step further, and like I have attempted to point out to TMIT, and suggest that people who are a fan of it, aren't a fan of slurs the other way. That's a bit of chicken-and-egg though, as the people who get use out of "woke" as a pejorative will typically claim that they're only using it as such because a "woke" person called them something first. If the shoe fits, and so on.

Which is why I really like the OP, and keep on referring back to it. It's a far more qualitative framing of the usage and greater phenomenon.

 

[Edmund Ironside]

it seems critical theory with focus on race is actually taught. but it's true that we should just call it what it actually is: racism. no need to put lipstick on a pig

Some say CRT is racist, others say those who say that are racist. I say it is an interesting theory, but not proven yet. More significantly it is a prime example of the right-wing deliberately and successfully creating a mountain out of a mole hill.
The first half on this video by Jon Stewart excellently demonstrates this. The second half is spent bashing left wing media which you might enjoy more!

 

[Tiberiu]

This forum is pretty woke so I am really afraid to express opinions unrelated to gaming in it. I stumbled upon this thread and have to limit my activity to only lurking out of fear of dogpiling.

 

[Lexicus]

This forum is pretty woke so I am really afraid to express opinions unrelated to gaming in it. I stumbled upon this thread and have to limit my activity to only lurking out of fear of dogpiling.

That's okay; the world won't end if you keep your opinions on race and IQ to yourself.

 

[Akka]

Angst went to some length to explain the signifier of using the term in the first place, and what it tends to betray (of the user).

No, he went at length explaining his a priori about people using the word. It doesn't make this prejudice actually true.

 

[Gorbles]

No, he went at length explaining his a priori about people using the word. It doesn't make this prejudice actually true.

I guess then, nor does it make the prejudice of the people using it actually true? There's obviously a dissonance between how the word is used and the accuracy of its application, which isn't uncommon in semantics (I mean, it is semantics). The way I see it is that Angst was explaining that dissonance and how ideology factors into it.

 

[El_Machinae]

I'd argue that if you have an absolutely necessity to call someone a moron, the particulars aren't going to matter a great deal unless you're quantifying it with some strong amount of precision that "woke" won't really do either.

Yes, this is why I asked for another term. You don't have one. The risk of not having one is that we'll ignore people who've used the word while short-handing a legitimate criticism, which then creates a problem in communication.

I'm loathe to 'blame them' if I have no alternative. Language is invented all the time, and this seems to be a deficit.

 

[Edmund Ironside]

This forum is pretty woke so I am really afraid to express opinions unrelated to gaming in it. I stumbled upon this thread and have to limit my activity to only lurking out of fear of dogpiling.

That's okay. I think there is always room for different opinions. Just express yourself courtesly and hopefully you will be okay. For example I think this forum tends to skew towards being anti religion / anti Christian, but I am still able to make pro Christian posts without being dogpiled (so far).

 

[Gorbles]

Yes, this is why I asked for another term. You don't have one. The risk of not having one is that we'll ignore people who've used the word while short-handing a legitimate criticism, which then creates a problem in communication.

I'm loathe to 'blame them' if I have no alternative. Language is invented all the time, and this seems to be a deficit.

I'm saying you don't need one. The salient point here is "while short-handing a legitimate criticism". The entire point of the OP is to deconstruct it as a legitimate criticism, because it betrays a surface-level knowledge of literally anything about the demographics involved. Your specific example was of a random person at a rally. "moron" works there, there doesn't even need to be ideology from any part of the spectrum involved.

 

[El_Machinae]

I'm saying you don't need one.

Honestly, it's not up to you to say that a better word isn't needed. That's up to the people noticing the communication breakdown, the observation that I am making isn't wrong
And, another instance of Ralph & Sam "we don't need to" and "blame them". I think I'm going to end more of these discussions more quickly.

 

[Gorbles]

Honestly, it's not up to you to say that a better word isn't needed. That's up to the people noticing the communication breakdown, the observation that I am making isn't wrong
And, another instance of Ralph & Sam "we don't need to" and "blame them". I think I'm going to end more of these discussions more quickly.

You can end any discussion whenever you want, but that reads like a dismissal.

Your entire example was wanting a use case where "woke sjw" would be appropriate. If it's not up to me to say it's not appropriate, or that it's redundant because equally vague pejoratives already exist, then why on earth should your question matter? Why is it up to you to put them to people? Unless you're characterising "bad faith" as a "communication breakdown", which I don't think you are. My only guess is that you're equating a lack of understanding that drives the use of the ideological label with the breakdown in communication. I don't know. I don't understand why you have to invent a scenario where somebody really needs to call some other person it in the first place.

For someone who's very keen on being loathe to blame people, you should know that "woke" is often a point of blame. It's used as just cause (for responses to people designated as such). And it overlaps with existing marginalised categories to boot. Do you understand yet why I might be "up to" suggesting you don't need to use "woke", if the use case is "moron at a rally" (or similar)?