Colwell: A GOP politician's favorite four-letter word
Are you woke?
No, I didn’t mean to ask if you are awake. If you’re reading this, you must be awake, even if the column eventually sends you off to slumber before you finish.
But whether you are "woke" is different, with different meanings in the language of wokeism. Most Americans don’t use that language or even understand it. In the world of political tweets and lingo of Washington politics, however, it is ubiquitous.
Woke, to describe alertness to racial prejudice and discrimination, was used in what is called African-American Vernacular English as far back as the 1960s, probably before. It came to some wider user in Black Lives Matter responses to police shootings that captured national attention. It spread a bit among leftists and finally was included in the dictionary as “aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues, especially issues of racial and social justice.”
Now, woke has been co-opted by Republicans on the right to describe all they oppose in culture wars and in just about anything else.
Usage, either way, still isn’t a part of normal conversation in most American conversations. And the way it’s used is confusing to many who don’t live in the political Twitter world or listen daily to TV commentators who popularize the word with their loyal listeners.
Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders used the word in the Republican response to President Biden’s State of the Union address. She called Biden “the first man to surrender his presidency to a woke mob that can’t even tell you what a woman is.”
What?
That and some other parts of her response left quite a few listeners — those not familiar with the language of wokeism and conspiracy theories — wondering what she was talking about.
Her speech worked. For her goal. Her task was to rally the Trump base, not to extend appeal in words more familiar with the rest of the nation. And being woke is being hammered as something negative. Negative works.
Gov. Ron DeSantis made use of that in his inaugural address in Florida, warning of “the woke mob” and its “woke ideology.”
It’s in use in Indiana, with Congressman Jim Banks, likely Republican nominee for the Senate, blaming military recruitment problems on “the Left’s culture wars” and a “woke agenda.” He just warned the Department of Defense that his subcommittee “prioritizes rooting out wokeness.”
Sen. Ted Cruz initiated the military issue by contrasting a Russian military recruitment ad showing a male solider ready to kill with an American recruitment video of a female soldier, daughter of two mothers, who enlisted in challenge to stereotypes.
“Perhaps a woke, emasculated military is not the best idea,” Cruz suggested. That was before the Russian Army’s performance in Ukraine.
Republicans running against wokeism are so pleased with the results that they now claim victory.
DeSantis declares he made Florida the place where “woke goes to die.”
Teachers and librarians are on the defensive in Florida and elsewhere. Corporations fear stands on diversity or global warming could bring state legislative sanctions.
Democrats sometimes have helped the anti-woke cause by hysterical responses, playing into the hands of those portraying a woke mob.
Often, there is no clear definition of what is being attacked as evil wokeness and what, if anything, would or could be done about it.
Many Republican primary contests next year, including for the presidential nomination, likely will feature debate over who is the fiercest fighter against wokeism.
Republican candidates then could pivot from wokeism to other issues more vital for swing voters in the general election. The economy and immigration rather than woke recruiting ads. Dealing with the threat of crime rather than the threat of transgender children.
That would be good politically. Good for the English language. Good for the nation. Bad, however, for Marjorie Taylor Greene’s hope of anti-woke anger bringing secession.
Jack Colwell is a columnist for The Tribune. Write to him in care of The Tribune or by email at jcolwell@comcast.net.
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Being "woke" is being hammered by GOP politicians as something negative.
