Angst
Rambling and inconsistent
Picking up on TMIT's claim in another thread, I think it's worth talking about.
I'm going with a short version and a long version of the OP.
Short version - litmus test. If someone says "political correctness" or "wokeism" they are not acquainted with any sort of the literature they're criticizing. Noone in the literature identifies themselves as such, and they're often diametrically opposed to each other. They're only identified as such when talked about between right wingers who, by the way, also have their speech reflected by virtue of not having read a damn article of the positions they don't like.
Long version.
I'm picking up on the claims specifically because they're representative how progressives are being talked about - other rather, talked over - in public conservative discourse. Whether TMIT is part of the right nor not, it's the structure of speech and discourse I often see. I'm going to talk about the post as presented and its nature as part of right wing discourse, this is not directed at TMIT.
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, how they define themselves, what "wokeist" speech looks like, and such. Now, the nature of "woke-ism" is short and ill-defined here, but that's not TMIT's fault, since he noted himself it was getting off topic for the thread. Still, this kind of talking about "wokeists" is also reflected in the usage of "political correctness" and similar. 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. Or in layman's terms, it's a strawman, built directly into right wing language. It's like me arguing against a Keynesian by clamoring about Ayn Rand, usually not having read Keynes at all. Why are you an objectivist, Keynes?
Anyone acquainted with "wokeist" positions and literature - anyone having been within the circle and properly talked to them, anyone that have read the literature and engaged with it seriously - would not call them wokeist. Same goes for political correctness. Very rarely do the progressives in question ever define themselves as this. Rather, they define themselves as feminists, post-modernists, marxists, etc., which all vaguely lean left but are not the same thing and will often disagree on fundamental tenets of the literature.
The people that do define progressive movements as "politically correct", etc, are often bloggers, journalists and online influencers of different sorts foundationally on the right that also often have no acquaintance with what the disjunct people they group together actually think.
Basically, whenever you read an opinion online, there's a very basic litmus test. If they say politically correct or, well, wokeist, they haven't actually read the literature they're trying to debunk. Because they never define themselves as that. The problem isn't that they're supposed to be convinced by the literature, but rather that it's nonsense that they're trying to debunk something that doesn't exist. It's not healthy for good public discourse when your premise of the group you talk about is a strawman.
Like, can I be part of a religion when it doesn't exist in my world? If I don't acknowledge it and confess to a different faith?
This thread is not about TMIT no, but about such posts in general. Here the post appeals to all of progressivism (I think?) as a unified movement ("religion") and can be arbitrarily used against people that have very fundamentally opposed ideas quite often. I think it's, bluntly, wrong. Like, not morally. It's not reflective of the world. It's a tool of rhetorical function, willing or not.
I'm going with a short version and a long version of the OP.
Short version - litmus test. If someone says "political correctness" or "wokeism" they are not acquainted with any sort of the literature they're criticizing. Noone in the literature identifies themselves as such, and they're often diametrically opposed to each other. They're only identified as such when talked about between right wingers who, by the way, also have their speech reflected by virtue of not having read a damn article of the positions they don't like.
Long version.
I'm picking up on the claims specifically because they're representative how progressives are being talked about - other rather, talked over - in public conservative discourse. Whether TMIT is part of the right nor not, it's the structure of speech and discourse I often see. I'm going to talk about the post as presented and its nature as part of right wing discourse, this is not directed at TMIT.
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, how they define themselves, what "wokeist" speech looks like, and such. Now, the nature of "woke-ism" is short and ill-defined here, but that's not TMIT's fault, since he noted himself it was getting off topic for the thread. Still, this kind of talking about "wokeists" is also reflected in the usage of "political correctness" and similar. 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. Or in layman's terms, it's a strawman, built directly into right wing language. It's like me arguing against a Keynesian by clamoring about Ayn Rand, usually not having read Keynes at all. Why are you an objectivist, Keynes?
Anyone acquainted with "wokeist" positions and literature - anyone having been within the circle and properly talked to them, anyone that have read the literature and engaged with it seriously - would not call them wokeist. Same goes for political correctness. Very rarely do the progressives in question ever define themselves as this. Rather, they define themselves as feminists, post-modernists, marxists, etc., which all vaguely lean left but are not the same thing and will often disagree on fundamental tenets of the literature.
The people that do define progressive movements as "politically correct", etc, are often bloggers, journalists and online influencers of different sorts foundationally on the right that also often have no acquaintance with what the disjunct people they group together actually think.
Basically, whenever you read an opinion online, there's a very basic litmus test. If they say politically correct or, well, wokeist, they haven't actually read the literature they're trying to debunk. Because they never define themselves as that. The problem isn't that they're supposed to be convinced by the literature, but rather that it's nonsense that they're trying to debunk something that doesn't exist. It's not healthy for good public discourse when your premise of the group you talk about is a strawman.
Like, can I be part of a religion when it doesn't exist in my world? If I don't acknowledge it and confess to a different faith?
This thread is not about TMIT no, but about such posts in general. Here the post appeals to all of progressivism (I think?) as a unified movement ("religion") and can be arbitrarily used against people that have very fundamentally opposed ideas quite often. I think it's, bluntly, wrong. Like, not morally. It's not reflective of the world. It's a tool of rhetorical function, willing or not.
