Ask A Genius 1099: “Woke,” Wokeism, Wokeness, Wokeology
Author(s): Rick Rosner and Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): Ask A Genius
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2024/08/24
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: What do you make of “woke,” wokeism, wokeness, wokeology? Claims about it; facts about it.
Rick Rosner: Most of the talk about it is garbage. There’s a thing on the right that I guess is the right-wing version of “woke,” which is “based.” It’s an interesting question.
A congressman calls himself “Based Mike Lee.” He’s some dipshit from—I want to say Texas. He’s always getting worked up over some issue that’s important to right-wing bullshitters. So, left-wingers say that being “woke” is being aware of stuff.
This is true; you don’t have to agree with everything but can be aware of it. If you’re going to make jokes on social media, on Twitter, you do need to be “woke” in the sense of being aware of what the landscape is, what people are talking about, what people are getting upset about, even if you don’t think it’s worth getting upset about. It’s understanding the current discourse. Being “woke” is understanding the current discourse and sharing liberals’ upsetness about aspects of the discourse of the world. In that sense, I’m fairly “woke,” but I know you can play with the discourse. You can make jokes about it.
Jacobsen: So, when liberals say being “woke” is being aware, they’re largely correct. But at what point are they not correct?
Rosner: I would say that in being “woke” and upset, sometimes you’re playing into conservatives’ hands. The whole trans thing is important because you’re looking at about 1% of the population who might be trans and probably a couple percent more who are exploring gender fluidity but will eventually decide against it. Maybe. Doesn’t matter. But if you give that stuff too much attention, you’re playing into conservatives’ strategies.
The deal is that conservatives build a lot of their attacks on liberals over issues like trans rights to convince middle-of-the-road people that this is what liberals care about and to turn independents against liberals. So, if you invest too much in trans issues, you risk missing the issues where you can convince independents and middle-of-the-road people. It allows Republicans to get away with much bullshit. Maybe some of the energy that you put into trans issues should go into talking about things like Project 2025, the Republicans wanting to get rid of contraception, and their desire to fire everybody in the federal government who doesn’t share their political ideology.
There’s much sinister stuff from the Republicans and many good policies from the Democrats—like making it easier to buy your first home without that blowing up in your face two years into home ownership the way it did in 2007 and 2008. That whole thing was mismanaged; it was a scam where many people got put into homes they couldn’t afford with teaser-rate mortgages that exploded after two or three years, leading to them being evicted. There was a whole scam with selling shitty mortgages to investors because mortgages are normally fairly safe, but that’s a whole other topic.
But the deal is, the Democrats’ political positions are shared by 70% or more of Americans—things like background checks for guns and medical care that doesn’t screw you over. So, when you focus on more controversial stuff like trans issues, it takes attention away from mainstream, highly popular issues that the Democrats stand for.
And the Republicans have almost no political stances that align with most Americans. So, they look for these controversial stances held by a minority of liberals and try to get people to focus on them, making it easier for Republicans to manipulate the situation. Being “woke” can backfire and give an advantage to the Republicans. Was that clear?
Jacobsen: Yes.
Rick Rosner, American Comedy Writer, www.rickrosner.org
Scott Douglas Jacobsen, Independent Journalist, www.in-sightpublishing.com
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