This article originally appeared in our Elevenses newsletter.
Good morning. It’s kind of a riddle, isn’t it? Those who are it would never say they are it. Those who aren’t it seem to talk about nothing else.
For the past few years, few other words have attracted more vitriol than ‘woke’ in right-wing circles. It has made headlines, made book titles, made NatCon debates and even made government policy, giving rise to divisive characters like Lee Anderson – who called for the return of the death penalty because it has a “100 per cent success rate” – and Jonathan Gullis, who talked about his own constituents as “scumbags” and “scrotes”.
Described by Michael Harriot as a “modern-day blend of McCarthyism and white grievance”, the origins of the word woke are actually centuries old, but its latest reincarnation is rooted in the emergence of Boris, Donald and right wing populism in the UK and the US. More than simple gripes about ‘purple-haired gender-fluid vegan numpties’ (Piers Morgan), being ‘anti-woke’ is now an ideology in itself or, as Harriot puts it, “an attempt for the right to rebrand bigotry as a resistance movement”.
The latest example of the ideology in action has been the row over school pupils identifying as animals, which whipped up such a furore that government ministers felt obliged to step in despite the story stemming from a seemingly innocent squabble between a teacher and her pupils. A similar story had cropped up in the States a few months earlier when at least 20 Republican politicians claimed that schools had been providing litter boxes for students who identify as cats. The claims were, of course, untrue, and showcased little more than their own transphobic beliefs.
But while there’s often a temptation to decry ‘boomers’ and consign their opinions to increasingly closed-off parts of society, what I realised recently is that I actually feel quite sorry for them. People who can’t accept that gender norms are an outmoded construct and struggle to face up to the fact that discrimination has long played an unwelcome role (usually to their advantage) in the evolution of western societies are basically starting to realise that the world is changing around them, and that’s a scary thought. It’s the same reason climate change protesters are often referred to as ‘eco-zealots’. The world is burning, and it’s more comforting to dismiss that fact by hurling abuse at the ones pointing it out than to confront it.
Woke, in its most basic form, is rooted in these insecurities, and ultimately that is the burden of those who are ‘not it’ rather than those who espouse its increasingly accepted beliefs. As KathyBurke once said, “I love being ‘woke’. It’s much nicer than being an ignorant fucking twat”. Enough of the degradation of liberal, progressive values. It’s time to wear it.
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