It turns out I've been 'woke' for most of my life | Opinion

I must confess my ignorance. I had been hearing the word "woke" in political discourse but had no idea what it meant. When I consulted my Webster's New World Collegiate Dictionary, Fifth Edition, published in 2020, I found it: "woke: aware of the injustice of the society in which one lives."

Now that I know what it means, I don't understand why people like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and others have such vitriol for the "woke mob." School boards have begun to ban books and say they don't want "wokeness" taught in their system. They seem to believe as DeSantis does that such information makes "Americans hate Americans."

Our society has long accepted books that describe the evils of slavery, racial segregation, prejudice against the LGBTQ+ community and other un-American injustices. We have praised the leaders of movements that help marginalized people merge into mainstream society. We recognize Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "l Have a Dream" speech as one of America's greatest, yet it is the epitome of wokeness. It exposes most of the elements of our shortcomings in race relations past and present. Will some people want it banned from school libraries, too?

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For decades I have been a part of the "woke mob" and have lectured on the achievements of Knoxville's Black community and the forces that kept it in check for 89 years. I have shared information with more civic clubs and church groups than I can count and spoken to more than 50,000 children in their schools. There was never any hate in my words, demeanor or intention.

My most dramatic effort in the world of woke occurred March 6, 1960, when I and 15 other Knoxville College students marched through dime stores in downtown Knoxville to protest the segregation of their lunch counters. We were not mean spirited; we didn't hate anybody. We were young Americans who just wanted to buy a hamburger, Coke and slice of apple pie.

I happen to believe it is imperative that the facts in our history be taught without omitting the bad ones. Slavery existed in this country for 246 years, and we had 89 years of segregation laws after that. The Jewish Holocaust is real. Gay people were treated as outcasts. Police brutality is still with us, but dark elements of our society would like to deny all of that.

Unfortunately, too many of our political leaders are mere followers. While they don't necessarily believe as the dark elements do, they seem to speak their language to get their vote. In so doing they encourage those voters to be openly hostile to their fellow Americans. In the world of good and evil, we can't have "good people on both sides." Evil thinking and evil doing come from evil people.

Negro History Week was created by Carter G. Woodson in 1926 so the achievements of Black Americans could be noted. At the time very few books had such information, so he encouraged publishers to be more inclusive. He asked schools to make students more aware of what Black citizens had contributed to society. In 1976 Negro History Week became Black History Month.

Now there are those political leaders who would banish that effort and leave all of our children in the dark. Our history is a true story and should be read and told as it happened.

Robert J. Booker is a freelance writer and former executive director of the Beck Cultural Exchange Center. He may be reached at 865-546-1576.

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Opinion: It turns out I've been 'woke' for most of my life