Is Wokeism Best Understood as a Religion?

[Minimalist]

I don't know if they did a piss poor job.  It's just that Fuckface invented a bunch of lies which essentially told the Know-Nothings what they wanted to hear.

As my signature says, Americans want to be lied to.  We have a constant need to be told how fucking wonderful we are even when reality suggests otherwise.

[Rhythmcs]

Dark money and big data. He didn't invent them. He bought them. On credit, ofc. We told him exactly how we like to be lied to.

[Minimalist]

Religion and Wokeism have one thing  in common.  I don't believe in either of them.

[Vorpal]

I think the term wokeism should refer to the current application of the concept of intersectionality.

Intersectionality is a sociological framework that analyzes how social and political identities create unique experiences of discrimination and privilege. It's a tool for understanding how systems of oppression interact and create inequality.

Problematic application involves when two "minorities" are at odds, and a weight is misapplied. Certain oppressed cultures have oppressive doctrine. Islamic cultures can have a weird stand on women and homosexuality, but Woke extremists side wholeheartedly against an oppressor that may actually have more enlightened views. Powers that be want to dictate the priority rather than identify the dilemma. Efforts that address the dilemma make be regarded as biased against the oppressed/ weaker culture. These firm stands do smack of religion instead of an empirical approach.

[Rhythmcs]

It seems to me that we're registering a complaint against real or perceived cultural relativism in the fringes there.

I'll skip all the way to the end. Let's posit that most or all political positions can seem like religions..maybe even make the observation that all religious claims are political. Is that the problem? Such that the actual state of facts on the item allegedly in question is immaterial, and the observation we're to find informative is the seeming religiosity of any given position in it's political expression, instead?

[Paleophyte]

I think the term wokeism should refer to the current application of the concept of intersectionality.

If you want your BS to be believable don't start it with "I think...'

"Wokeism" is bastardized weaslespeak and should be retired in favour of meaningful terms.

[Vorpal]

I think the term wokeism should refer to the current application of the concept of intersectionality.

If you want your BS to be believable don't start it with "I think...'

"Wokeism" is bastardized weaslespeak and should be retired in favour of meaningful terms.

"I think" is simply a recognition of a work in progress, a willingness to hear how others think differently. I had a similarly forum-brained individual who was the leader of another site call me on "fallacy of incredulity" everytime I said I think.  You and he seem to share a reflexive empty forum culture bravado that you would do well to work on.

[Paleophyte]

If you want your BS to be believable don't start it with "I think...'

"Wokeism" is bastardized weaslespeak and should be retired in favour of meaningful terms.

"I think" is simply a recognition of a work in progress, a willingness to hear how others think differently. I had a similarly forum-brained individual who was the leader of another site call me on "fallacy of incredulity" everytime I said I think.  You and he seem to share a reflexive empty forum culture bravado that you would do well to work on.

And your psychic act needs work. Your sad need to cling to a pejorative term with no proper meaning demonstrates clearly your lack of thinking in favour of tweeting your dog whistle. Your babbling about intersectionality was hilariously mendacious, if only by accident. Few things funnier than a Republican trying on virtue signalling as if he gave a sailing damn about any of the groups in question.

[Vorpal]

"I think" is simply a recognition of a work in progress, a willingness to hear how others think differently. I had a similarly forum-brained individual who was the leader of another site call me on "fallacy of incredulity" everytime I said I think.  You and he seem to share a reflexive empty forum culture bravado that you would do well to work on.

And your psychic act needs work. Your sad need to cling to a pejorative term with no proper meaning demonstrates clearly your lack of thinking in favour of tweeting your dog whistle. Your babbling about intersectionality was hilariously mendacious, if only by accident. Few things funnier than a Republican trying on virtue signalling as if he gave a sailing damn about any of the groups in question.

It might have been poor word choice given its baggage which is greater than I expected.  I want to move on from the particular word and talk about the actual issue. People can call it what they like for all I care.  Some set up of operational terms is helpful but to be completely mired by semantics is ridiculous.  Republicans co-opted the term and I was claiming it back to a degree.

FYI, I am a lifelong Democrat and a member of a marginalized group.

I said you stink of the other forum, and lo and behold I see that you are a member. Not psychic but obvious by your initial self-important and frivolous drive-by approach.

[Rhythmcs]

Good luck taking it back. So, whatever it is you're talking about, are you primarily concerned with it's religiosity as you see it? Can you tell me about the woke religion? What's the shape of a good woke life? What is woke taboo? What rituals does woke engage in and what community engages in them?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Good luck taking it back.  So, whatever it is you're talking about, are you primarily concerned with it's religiosity as you see it?  Can you tell me about the woke religion?  What's the shape of a good woke life?  What is woke taboo?  What rituals does woke engage in and what community engages in them?

I'm pretty sure using racial slurs are verboten. Calling all of a certain nationality "rapists and murderers" is off the table. Rituals include paying attention to nuance and taking people as individuals rather than symbols. That shit's gotta hurt the non-woke, but hey.

Can't answer your other questions.

[Rhythmcs]

Unless we can identify these things and some community bound into a moral whole by these things then it probably wouldn't be useful or accurate to think of wokism as a religion even though a great deal of our political expression can be thought of that way and has been.

This is why I talk about wokism..at least as a religious phenomena or a component of american civil religion, being a right wing phenomena. Woke has bound them into a moral whole. They engage in public rituals and virtue signaling over woke. They believe that woke is a taboo, and that the shape of a good life is anti-woke. It has become an organizing principle of their political identity. Thus, the white supremacist beliefs they call wokism really do qualify as religious in the classic and contemporary sense...even though the left wing viewpoints they purportedly refer to remain a disorganized gaggle of cats no one seems to be able to herd.

[Vorpal]

Good luck taking it back.  So, whatever it is you're talking about, are you primarily concerned with it's religiosity as you see it?  Can you tell me about the woke religion?  What's the shape of a good woke life?  What is woke taboo?  What rituals does woke engage in and what community engages in them?

I am talking about a poor analysis and application of intersectionality that is becoming widespread. I liked the article referenced in the OP which compares religious extremism with extreme and rigid interpretation and dictates that have gained voice. The concept of woke was suppose to be a good jumping off point, it wasn't.  It could have been if people were less reactive and tribal.  Have fun getting off on the inadequacies of the metaphor while willfully avoiding the area the metaphor is apt.

[Rhythmcs]

If I were going to be concerned by religiosity I'd probably be concerned by the literal religiosity of white supremacist wokism as opposed to the metaphoric religiosity of left wing wokism.

Mind you, I'm not particularly concerned by religiosity in and of itself, just trying to engage with the hypothetical.

[Vorpal]

Unless we can identify these things and some community bound into a moral whole by these things then it probably wouldn't be useful or accurate to think of wokism as a religion even though a great deal of our political expression can be thought of that way and has been.  

This is why I talk about wokism..at least as a religious phenomena or a component of american civil religion, being a right wing phenomena.  Woke has bound them into a moral whole.  They engage in public rituals and virtue signaling over woke.  They believe that woke is a taboo, and that the shape of a good life is anti-woke.  It has become an organizing principle of their political identity.  Thus, the white supremacist beliefs they call wokism really do qualify as religious in the classic and contemporary sense...even though the left wing viewpoints they purportedly refer to remain a disorganized gaggle of cats no one seems to be able to herd.

Antiwoke can be criticized as you have said. However, your gaggle of cats are actually a pack of dogs with a pecking order.  Accusation of racism or other biases is sometimes used as a cudgel.  A small example: Caucasian elites fight for the removal of the terms Latino and Latina in favor of Latinex. This is a label no one asked for and it is cultural tone deaf given that nouns in Spanish have gender. In certain academic circles,  use of nonpreferred terms is punished.

[Rhythmcs]

It's not an issue of criticizing it. OFC I think it's dogshit, but even if I loved it white supremacist wokism is religious whereas left wing wokism falls short as a religion or thing that can be understood as one.

Think about your earlier hypothetical. Three woke parties, all disagreeing, two in open conflict against each other and the third effectively sniping both. Whatever they are, they're not members of the same woke religion. They disagree about what woke even is..in ways that the white supremacists don't, which are pretty central to the use of religious movements as a lens.

[Paleophyte]

I want to move on from the particular word and talk about the actual issue.

Fine. First let's identify if there is an actual issue and that you aren't chasing Republican shadows.

FYI, I am a lifelong Democrat and a member of a marginalized group.

Truly? You speak Republican and capitalize the "W" in Woke. I'll assume that you know what we call an "atheist" who capitalizes "The Truth".

I said you stink of the other forum

I'll try and bathe more often. I haven't seen you there and haven't seen you here until now. Perhaps your problem with everybody else isn't everybody else.

[Rhythmcs]

Truly? You speak Republican and capitalize the "W" in Woke. I'll assume that you know what we call an "atheist" who capitalizes "The Truth".

It might just sound that way because the ideas he's responding to are sourced from a far right wing think tank that actively disseminates the white supremacist religion of wokism.  

like so -

At the extreme, minorities are viewed as hyper-fragile children that must be protected from all harms, however microscopic or imaginary. The majority is hated and feared as a vicious predator against whom one must constantly stand on guard, and which should be attacked remorselessly.

[Vorpal]

It's not an issue of criticizing it.  OFC I think it's dogshit, but even if I loved it white supremacist wokism is religious whereas left wing wokism falls short as a religion or thing that can be understood as one.

Think about your earlier hypothetical.  Three woke parties, all disagreeing, two in open conflict against each other and the third effectively sniping both.  Whatever they are, they're not members of the same woke religion.  They disagree about what woke even is..in ways that the white supremacists don't, which are pretty central to the use of religious movements as a lens.

The part of the metaphor that works is the realization that extremists in a group can taint the whole enterprise and generate a really strong reaction from outsiders.  Look at the difference between Xtian fundamentalists and methodists.   If all Xtians were more like Methodists, a giant resistance would be unnecessary.


Another example is trans people in sports. Did an extreme hardline approach help or hurt trans rights?  Reasonable people can disagree on how to handle the sports aspect.  Why were people called transphobic for not accepting the one vision deemed correct.

[Rhythmcs]

The part of the metaphor that works is the realization that extremists in a group can taint the whole enterprise and generate a really strong reaction from outsiders.  Look at the difference between Xtian fundamentalists and methodists.   If all Xtians were more like Methodists, a giant resistance would be unnecessary.

Yikes...well, lets just say not to me - but it does help me understand who it is you're referring to when you say woke.  IDK.   I recall having recently read a bit about extremism and the crux of it was that it didn't work the way we imagined.  Take the moral angle out of this.  You're splitting things up into the good ones and bad ones and I can tell when you say woke and extremist you only mean the bad ones - but extremists can be good extremists or bad extremists...conceptually speaking...and both kinds do actually appear to help to advance their respective viewpoints in society.  Extremists are a net gain to the spread of the moderate forms of said beliefs.  So if you get a bunch of fucking nazis out there saying crazy shit the moderate nazis have a better shot at office than they did before because they seem more sensible..to some people...somehow.

Another example is trans people in sports. Did an extreme hardline approach help or hurt trans rights?  Reasonable people can disagree on how to handle the sports aspect.  Why were people called transphobic for not accepting the one vision deemed correct.

I don't do well when I'm asked to bounce around to every right wing grievance point in rapid fire fashion.  To me it seems like trans rights are doing better than they were before..theyre at least part of the conversation now..as opposed to being invisible monsters. Transphobes getting called transphobic isn't on my concern radar. Frankly, people who aren't transphobes getting called transphobes isn't either. I think at some point we've all been called or written off as things were not and some people react very poorly to that.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Unless we can identify these things and some community bound into a moral whole by these things then it probably wouldn't be useful or accurate to think of wokism as a religion even though a great deal of our political expression can be thought of that way and has been.

Right, I was just answering a couple of your questions, not arguing that wokism is actually a religious impetus.

[Rhythmcs]

Yeah I got that.

I think we can test some of the other items of concern as well. The idea that woke is whitey renaming brown people..and this new name becomes something that a person has to go with or they get kicked out of the woke group.

First let's just deal with the framing. It's not surprising that latinx as a term arose or that most hispanic people aren't connected to it. As was mentioned, the spanish language has gender...but latinx came out of groups specifically geared towards and made up of hispanic people who were gender non conforming and their allies. So..was it a bunch of pale face majority oppressors engaging in neocolonialism. No. Demonstrably not. Though that is a useful lie for the white supremacist and religious wokists, who have plenty of enthusiastic fellow travelers in the hispanic demo.

Now for the fun part. Latino latino latino. Latina latina latina. I've said the bad words many times and I've even suggested that conservative™ hispanics are in bed with white supremacists. I doubt there will be any consequences in my life whatsoever. No one's grabbing pearls. People who didn't like my style or substance before still don't, and people who could tolerate me before still do.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Yeah I got that.  

I think we can test some of the other items of concern as well.  The idea that woke is whitey renaming brown people..and this new name becomes something that a person has to go with or they get kicked out of the woke group.

First let's just deal with the framing.  It's not surprising that latinx as a term arose or that most hispanic people aren't connected to it.  As was mentioned, the spanish language has gender...but latinx came out of groups specifically geared towards and made up of hispanic people who were gender non conforming and their allies.  So..was it a bunch of pale face majority oppressors engaging in neocolonialism.  No.  Demonstrably not.  Though that is a useful lie for the white supremacist and religious wokists, who have plenty of enthusiastic fellow travelers in the hispanic demo.

Now for the fun part.  Latino latino latino.  Latina latina latina.  I've said the bad words many times and I've even suggested that conservative™ hispanics are in bed with white supremacists.   I doubt there will be any consequences in my life whatsoever.  No one's grabbing pearls.  People who didn't like my style or substance before still don't, and people who could tolerate me before still do.

My son rejects latinx. I think his mother would too were she still alive. I know her extended family would in large part, given their MAGAt leanings (yes, conservative™ hispanics). It sounds invented to me, but what's my opinion worth? I don't know who invented it or why. I just call 'em by their names, that seems to work.

[Vorpal]

Yeah I got that.  

I think we can test some of the other items of concern as well.  The idea that woke is whitey renaming brown people..and this new name becomes something that a person has to go with or they get kicked out of the woke group.

First let's just deal with the framing.  It's not surprising that latinx as a term arose or that most hispanic people aren't connected to it.  As was mentioned, the spanish language has gender...but latinx came out of groups specifically geared towards and made up of hispanic people who were gender non conforming and their allies.  So..was it a bunch of pale face majority oppressors engaging in neocolonialism.  No.  Demonstrably not.  Though that is a useful lie for the white supremacist and religious wokists, who have plenty of enthusiastic fellow travelers in the hispanic demo.

Now for the fun part.  Latino latino latino.  Latina latina latina.  I've said the bad words many times and I've even suggested that conservative™ hispanics are in bed with white supremacists.   I doubt there will be any consequences in my life whatsoever.  No one's grabbing pearls.  People who didn't like my style or substance before still don't, and people who could tolerate me before still do.

Origins aside it is clear that only five percent of the population described by the term approve of the term.  Over half say it is a complete non-issue.  It is academics and certain circles that correct others to say Latinx.  When it is a Caucasian enforcing the rule, not to say it is just whitey, it smacks of skewed priorities. The term makes sense when the gender neutral folks that it applies to prefer it for themselves.   At some level the gender of a word is arbitrary. The words for mouth and apple are feminine. There is no stigma around a man who eats an apple.

Traditionally, when a group including men and women is referred to, the masculine form is used.  That may be something that needs change. How to change it should come from Spanish speakers.

I always disliked the dubious practice in English to use she as a generic pronoun for someone of unknown gender.  This occurs in academic circles. The rationale is because "he" has been used in this fashion historically.  A construction with "they" seems the fairest solution.  Are pronoun reparations necessary?

[Rhythmcs]

IDK. If the problem isn't actually accuracy or religiosity - but skewed priorities....then I don't see the harm caused by a bunch of nerds using the term out of an overabundance of inclusivity....whereas the religious anti-wokist priority and what they're trying to condition normies like yourself towards is..literally..harm. Now there's a good lens. If things seem complicated...to you, to me, to the housecat, look at who they would harm. That tells you lot about where it's coming from.

As an aside, I often find myself wishing that left wing extremism really was the kind of thing the dolt in your article is always hyperventilating over. But alas, it's just a pretense to bitch about how affirmative action and welfare have ruined america. You know, brown people problems - in the generative sense. Concern trolling libs and then suggesting that the solution is to be less liberal.

..and as far as pronoun reparations are concerned...would it matter if they were? People are still waiting for acres and mules.