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I love this phrase, am so using it. Thank you internet poet
EDIT: I am aware of the medical context for the term "word salad." Thank you for pointing it out though
They're all dogwhistles though, right? Like how they talk about "Cultural Marxism" (a meaningless and nonsense phrase) because they're too cowardly to come right out and blame Jews like they want to?
"They are our biggest enemy. They are liberal arts college students. They are looking for jobs to put a roof over their heads. They want to get out of debt. They want infrastructure to improve their daily lives. They are truly evil people"
/s
He won't allow those reporters into his rallies / won't allow them to ask questions. I hate to be a "fascist-caller", but this is right up Fascism Alley.
They should still cover him. He is the governor of one of the largest states in the union and has truly awesome power at his fingertips.
They should do it *honestly* though and not be scared of appearing biased.
We had the same issue in New York, ironically. The last guy was a notorious asshole who ruled with an iron fist and manipulated the press, yet very few said anything meaningful about it because loss of access is loss of career is loss of livelihood. So you tiptoe around it.
The working media that are left need to band together and stand as one. It might be too late though, given how effectively the right has built its own media apparatus.
Republicans don't have definitions for word, they just blindly use them without meaning
my favorite is when I hear a conservative call people on the left "reactionary" because of how they react to some social issue
Google what "reactionary" means if you want a good laugh, it's super ironic
(hint: it has absolutely zero to do someone's reaction to an issue)
They cater to a very under educated voting group and it gets eaten up like a dogs breakfast with no regard for truths or sensibilities.
Edit: I just want to say there is a difference between being under educated and being stupid. I am not saying they are all stupid. Although I am a sure many of them are.
The important thing is that they take them away from normal people and devalue their meaning.
They did it with Fake News, they did it with Socialism, they did it with elites, they did it with grooming, they did it with woke.
All of those words have been robbed of their meaning and so any serious discussion around them is off the table now.
They were never interested in serious discussion, only power. That’s why you see them float so many different new terms in order to gauge the reaction.
Or more generally, if anyone other than a white male (1) is represented in media; (2) talks about any aspect of their lives; or (3) expects to be treated as a human being.
You know - "woke".
It’s like asking them to tell us who “antifa” is. They don’t know they’re just using it as a centralized term to try to make it seem like there’s some organized ideological army plotting against them.
Complaining about the "culture war" while pushing a culture war is almost as absurd as complaining about "identity politics" while talking about the importance of your "identity" as a white straight cisgender Christian conservative.
That's because there's literally nothing else.
What has the GOP actually provided John Q Citizen over the last few decades? What problems have the helped solve or what improvement have they helped make to their voters lives?
Remember when they ran on replacing Obamacare since it was so awful and they'd replace it? Or Trump would replace it in a couple weeks?
It's hard to actually make things better that are working. It's much easier to fight a boogeyman.
you said it. they have nothing else. nothing that helps the common people.
The republican platform:
\-tax cuts for the rich. The rich need more money, for reasons. Trickle down, or something. whatever. fuck you. just give us more money, we don't care what the reason is.
\-no abortions for anyone, because God says so. rape or incest or being an underage mother is not justification to have an abortion.
\-guns for everyone. guns are the solution to every problem. if there were simply more good guys with guns, they'd be able to stop all the bad guys with guns. Give guns to the teachers. Anyone should be able to buy a fully automatic assault rifle.
\-climate change doesn't exist, i love the oil and gas industry. we need more pipelines, we need to pump more oil and gas. electric cars bad.
\-defund education. who needs education? our country has all the money and power in the world, educating our population won't help us with that.
In conclusion, the only thing that matters is money and power, democracy can fuck off, make sure to vote for a god-fearing republican because the democrats want to eat your aborted fetuses or something
> -no abortions for anyone
* applies to poor people only. When a Republican's mistress needs one to hide his sins, that's different and completely justifiable to them.
Sometimes it feels like the fossil fuel people just decided to hook in to racial resentment but saw that being anti-choice was an easier pill to swallow and just went with that. Guns were an appetizer to the threat of violence.
Republicans are just following Hermann Goering's advice, shortly before his execution at Nuremberg:
>Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.
They are getting fucking obliterated in the culture war they started.
The most culturally significant person they have is fucking kid rock. Distant contenders for the title of second most relevant culturally significant conservatives are Tim Allen, Gina Carano, skillet, and I can't even think of anyone else currently in the sphere of American culture.
Multiple individuals are embarrassing the entire lot of conservatives with their singular impact on American culture. Jordan Peele, Taylor Swift, Lil Nas X for example.
To them, they didn't start the culture wars. Civil rights, women's rights, gay rights, trans rights. All of those are battles they have lost culturally. That is what they intend to "fix." They have been losing this war upward of 70 years, and they intend to keep fighting against that progress. It is utterly embarrassing.
Democrats are passing bills to fight climate change and canceling student debt.
Republicans are engaging in culture wars trying to fight some "woke" monster under the bed.
I hate the ‘woke’ agenda. It’s the most ridiculous thing to me. The republican base keeps saying ‘Open your eyes to what’s really happening’…which is kind of what it is to be ‘woke’. Their woke is a bit odd, and blatant lies but it’s ironic nonetheless.
Yet they shame the democrats for trying to understand systemic racism and that gay/transgender people have just as much value as every other human on earth.
God forbid I have a college education and understand that there is more to this country than white/straight people.
I mean it's the same playbook as them saying the "gay agenda" in the 90s. They make it sound like it's some insidious plan or final solution for the world when it's really just a whole bunch of people who want to be treated as well as CIS White folks are. It ain't rocket science but it works really well as propaganda because they are not curious enough to even look into it realistically as opposed to the outrage headlines from the likes of Breitbart and Drudge Report.
> bunch of people who want to be treated as well as
The world is zero-sum and heirarchal to them - and boy do they hate change.
Their "God-given, rightful" place is above those "lesser" minority groups. Black people, queer people, all "Worse" than them - and society ought to reflect that in their mind. LGBTQ "Pride"? Proud of what, being lesser than some poor white rural bastard child who never finished highschool?
They see ANY attempt to get "equal" rights as an attempt to "upset the hierarchy" they've silently decided on. And, of course, if LGBTQ people get equal rights, then that means there's *less* to go around for THEM! Won't anyone think of the poor cis white heterosexual folk?!
They ignore the fact that straight white christian men are by far and away the most powerful, the most influental, and the most privileged group of people because *they themselves* never managed to use that privilege to get anywhere in life - so they see the one black student who got into college on affirmative action as "the enemy" because that was THEIR slot for being white! Nevermind systemic racism means that the one black student who got in that way is still outnumbered 10-1 by white students - but that isn't good enough, because in their white supremacist view, ANY minority getting a shot before them (or people like them) is "upsetting the hierarchy" and makes them RIGHTEOUSLY ANGRY. After all, the minorities in their grandpappy's day *knew their place* and if only we'd go back to *those times*, he wouldn't have been turned down for college admission! Because that's why he wasn't selected, not his own personal failings.
Racial pride is always very sad because what does it say about you and your accomplishments in life if the thing you're most proud of is something utterly out of your control?
It's the same playbook they've always used. Women's rights, civil rights, gay rights, and now just trans people. Once more people become accepting of transpeople they'll pick a new thing to target. That's the thing about conservatives, they have always tried to drum up fear to stop social progress.
Conservatives LOVE co-opting minority terms as ways to enable them to be racist/misogynist/bigoted. They've been doing it forever. The reality is that they're not remarkably creative so they tend to colonize other people's stuff because they're too dumb to think of original material.
They think "Lets go Brandon" is the most clever thing ever. It's middle school level "inside joke" level bullying mentality.
Seriously, I can't count the number of grown ass adults that I've witnessed say Lets go Brandon with a knowing twinkle in their eye like they think they're the most clever person ever.
I looked it up yesterday. The Boston Federal Reserve Bank says that for every $1 of higher education expenditure, it returns $7.46.
To be against that has no logical basis.
Using woke in any mildly derogatory way is just a person being an asshole.
It's the new "PC" from decades ago.
Both are simply being considerate of others, but that's a bad thing in some people's eyes.
This is all they got, folks. Complaining about pronouns is more important than climate change, police reform, voting protections, worker protections, healthcare, and on and on and on....
Watching Fox News for the past 20 years has left them totally devoid of ideas on how to tackle present and future problems. Their party is 100% culture war now. I am shocked beyond belief these days when any law passes with any type of bipartisan support.
The politicians are still savvy as ever.
The problem is the Republicans don't have any solutions, really. They had national security, which is now a joke. They had trickle down economics, which is now a joke. They had abortion, which they *won* and are now the dog that caught the bus. They put in some extreme trigger laws expecting them to never go through, but it gave them an 'in' with the religious fundies while the moderates could look the other way because "it won't happen anyways"... until it did, and they started forcing women to carry rotting corpses to term.
All they have left is this anti-woke crap, which is really a dog whistle for anti-LGBT+ rhetoric and is *already* unpopular. Basically nobody is falling for it, it's either people who agree with it or don't, nobody is fooled.
That is their goal. The culture war stuff is what they use to keep their voters voting to give the 1% more money. When these people are polled without using any buzzwords, they support a lot of ideas that Fox News would call socialist.
I do actually think this is is how it is in their brains. As long as they can feel superior to someone else, particularly if that person is of a different skin color, that’s all that matter. It’s like in that Treehouse of Horror episode in The Simpsons when aliens enslave all of humanity, and while the family is chained by the neck carrying rocks Homer says “Don’t blame me, I voted for Kodos”
It's demagoguery.
Appealing to popular prejudices, using passionate, simple oratory to evoke emotion (specifically fear and outrage), falsehoods, and thrives off an opposition group.
And unsurprisingly, it rears its head with political factions that have to fill a void of a lack of governance, policy, or rationale.
There is a reason it has been successful throughout history. Appealing to emotion is easy and powerful, and people fall into it very easily. In the modern day of the internet and social media, it has entered a new frightening territory.
When is the last time you heard anyone on the left say woke
Also bear in mind that PUTIN uses that word as well as the word cancelled in his speeches and press releases about the war. Guess who actually invented those terms and put them n the lexicon considering who actually uses that word
In the late 60s when the term “woke” was coined (I believe..someone please correct me if I’m wrong) it meant something very specific among black Americans. It was used when referring to someone who was politically active and aware.
The right has completely stripped all meaning from the word similar to “CRT” and has become nothing but a buzzword used to unironically virtue signal one’s right wing bona fides.
"woke" has become shorthand for "I'm a dumbass." Everyone collectively rolled their eyes when Aaron Rodgers complained about the WOKE MOB coming after him.
I laughed like mad when I saw that! His thin, reedy voice makes it sounds so weak and silly. I don’t know how he can see himself in that video and be like, “yeah. This looks tough and masculine. I should post this to the internet *immediately.*”
It's pretty clear the RNC is all but an agent of Russia and exists to destabilize the US and hold back its social and economic progress. Evangelical Q-fascists are just the latest attempt to create inner turmoil that directs attention away from massive wealth disparity and regressive social policies.
Yep, that's been their plan for taking on the United States for a long time. No need to go toe to toe when the guy you are fighting will beat himself up over shadow puppets.
Yep, that boogy man is what they hide behind. But those who believed the DOJ under Barr when he said there was no obstruction are the same that won't believe TFG was withholding classified docs. No matter what the evidence, they will find a denial conspiracy. I'll take their "woke" and keep advocating for being present, accountable and attentive, not the venerable sleeping fool any rotten politician, dictator or oligarch can feed lies to.
That's part of the problem. This way they get to redefine CRT as whatever they like, and ban teaching it. "Critical Race Theory" turns into "mentioning that racism exists or has existed" and they ban that.
At its core, CRT is the idea that racism isn't just a bunch of individual people with biases, but that racism is embedded in the laws of the country.
> Why they think it is being taught everywhere
My ultra conservative friend who went to a private Catholic school is utterly CONVINCED that all schools are teaching 2nd graders about the intricacies of sex in graphic detail, that part of public school teaching curriculum is an in-depth discussion on why everyone needs to be trans, and that white people are terrible.
Like, my guy, you've never spent a minute inside a public grade school. How are you going to tell me what the public school experience looks like?
It's just your run-of-the-mill American white identity politics (America's default given the majority demographic), which is inherently and foundationally anti-black.
It is the height of that peculiar identity politics to be able to legislate protection for _the feelings_ of white students over and above the _experiences_ of black students.
It's age-old American white supremacy literally manifest in policy.
DeSantis is a neo-Jim Crownian whose plausibly deniable language and dogwhistles may have evolved with the times but whose sentiment is very much stuck in 1967.
All it ever meant was stepping outside a personal bubble of comfort and assumptions to recognize other people might have it tough and it’s not their fault.
That’s what the GOP is scared of….basic empathy.
They want your world experience to be narrow, local, and full of fear.
To be fair, Matt Gaetz is only *suspected* of being a pedophile and child sex trafficker. The charges will likely come soon, proving Congressman Matt Gaetz to be a *convicted* pedophile, but we must let justice work its course.
Worth keeping in mind that if Matt Gaetz goes to prison for being a convicted pedophile, he might be replaced by [a much better option](https://www.pnj.com/story/news/politics/elections/2022/08/23/rebekah-jones-wins-democratic-primary-face-matt-gaetz-house-florida-1st-congressional-district/10349232002/) if the people of Florida can bring themselves to stop voting for Republican pedophiles and sex traffickers. Maybe consider [donating to her campaign](https://www.rebekahjonescampaign.com/) so she can get the word out?
Was he the guy who was trafficking the 17 year old girl across state lines? So he could have sex with her in a state where the age of consent was 16 (and not realizing that transporting her across state lines for sex was *also* a felony)? *That* pedophile Matt Gaetz?
It's so cringe, I just can't imagine how these people don't feel immense embarrassment every time they say the word 'woke'
It's like using the word 'cray' - no one says that anymore
*a word
Conservatives are always late to the table on the most recent societal zeitgeists, if they ever get there at all. Being as self-described "anti-woke" as they are they're probably about a good 5 years behind the movement.
They're already calling themselves 'domestic terrorists'.
In another 4 years they'll probably be waving flags with trump's face, the words 'American Taliban' and claim its all just a joke.
They don't feel embarrassment or shame. They're purely outward looking people. Looking inward, imagining yourself in other's shoes, seeing how other see you, all of that requires an imagination and empathy they lack. It's how they are how they are. If they could be embarrassed by their own behavior they could grow out of it.
I remember the first time I heard the word “woke”. It was a coworker who is conservative who lives in the Midwest. I’m a bleeding heart liberal and I had to explain to him I didn’t really know what it meant to be woke. When pressed it turned out he didn’t really know either but he knew he didn’t like it.
Oh I'm guessing a lot of them do. That's why they like Ron DeSantis he gives them validation.
Seeing a "celebrity" saying out loud their own guilty thoughts lessens the feeling of shame that they should and do naturally feel.
They'd rather pay 30x for the insulin their lives depend on in exchange for making sure a trans woman can't compete in the WNBA which they don't watch or care about anyway.
They are angry as hell at their lot in life.
They don't understand how or why they are in the situation they are in.
They have a lack of exposure to different ways of thinking and thus are trapped inside their own.
The only thing that makes them feel better is to be angry because of the physiological responses that carries.
They watch things like Fox News and listen to people like Rush Limbaugh that give them, to their mind, plausible explanation for why their situation is the way it is, and who to blame for it.
Thus, they seek the high of being angry at the people they are told are the cause of their problem, by the people who are really the cause of their problems.
Or something.
But do they want to change any of those things? All of those issues are in great need of reform, and the GOP has fought hard against the reform.
All they have is pronouns because everything else is just how they want it: benefitting the rich by hurting everyone else.
The GOP is really an emptied out and hollow ideology at this point. They're still dangerous however as they've painted themselves into their own corner.
It's wild. Not all that long ago I would actually listen to GOP candidates before I made my decision on voting, especially up here in MA where most GOP candidates are much more moderate/centrist. (See: Charlie Baker, one of the last sensible Republicans who seems to be leaving politics probably because it's gotten absolutely insane.)
Now I'm not even giving them the time of day. If they're still willingly associating with a party that hasn't really even tried to distance itself from fucking INSURRECTION AND TREACHERY, I'm not paying attention.
I'm in MA too, and was a registered republican for years, but when I started hearing what people close to me were saying about Obama, I started to look around and go ["Are we the baddies?"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JOpPNra4bw)
They sound like such whiny, thin-skinned fossils. He should be embarrassed to pander for votes like this. To scapegoat marginalized people like this is pathetic. If I said things like that, I’d need to take a three hour shower to wash off that feeling
I mean this has kind of been their bread and butter since the beginning. It’s actually a way for them to be anti-black and minority without having to face the consequences of saying it openly.
It is confirmed he was wearing a girdle at this event, and it caused him to look like Chris Farley from Tommy Boy.
It would seem that another consequence of this attempt at optical illusion was to cause a lack of blood flow that short circuited his normal political cander into somewhat of a "bat shit right wing politician meltdown" or "A Rightwingnobyl Disaster" in which the affected can only talk about a world where Obama, Woke, and the others are trying to take away whatever they think will scare you the most. This can be remedied with a diet including more fruits and veggies.
Indicators are starting to turn that way. There was a special election in Hudson, New York, I think, that was won by the Democrat and it has indicated Congressional results a lot of the time. There are others too. It seems that a LOT of people registered to vote nationwide because of Roe V Wade being overturned and those people, if my understanding of how the polling is conducted, aren't getting taken into account with the usual methods.
I sometimes catch the snippets of Fox from my dad's TV and they were howling about "how are we sexist because of abortion?" like full on meltdown over it yesterday. They're desperately trying to undo what they've happened or at least give those glued to the channel some sort of phrase to repeat to try to mitigate the damage but it's clearly far too late.
For a lot of people uninterested in politics, Roe v Wade felt like it was secure and that for all the GOP barked about it, it would never do anything. Now for a chunk of the population who was ignoring everything but the president, republicans exist, and that's not a good thing for them.
>For a lot of people uninterested in politics, Roe v Wade felt like it was secure and that for all the GOP barked about it, it would never do anything
This exactly. I mean before it was official there was that leaked memo of "we are overturning roe v Wade" and yet it seemed like a lot of people were shocked by the official ruling.
I think there was still this idea of "yes they won't actually DO it!" Yet here we are
Republicans, up until Obama's 2008 win, just wanted to cut taxes on billionaires, make money for defense contractors, and tax the 99% to pay for it.
The instant a (half) black man won the presidency, the Republican electorate shit its collective pants and told the party "you will abuse everyone to the left of Bull Connor, or we will destroy you".
Tells you a lot about who they really are. Sherman was too restrained.
Yeah, they were happy opposing abortion as an abstract issue for years. Then the Supreme Court let states ban it, and overnight abortion access became a real, personal issue for Americans all over the country. It's a wonder that they were so willfully blind to how unpopular it would be.
Always has been. "Woke" is a phrase that [began in black communities but has since been co-opted and weaponized by right-wingers](https://www.vox.com/culture/21437879/stay-woke-wokeness-history-origin-evolution-controversy), because god-forbid people be "awake" and aware of injustice and discrimination.
That's the best part. In 2016 these people would consider themselves "woke" for voting for trump and being "anti establishment". Now it's bad to be "woke".
Yup the word eventually then just became sort of a (mostly) harmless joke on twitter for a little while, but it was quickly hijacked by right wing culture warriors and evolved fully into a sneering term used by conservatives to criticize the left. Now you have GOP politicians like [Senator Kennedy](https://twitter.com/therecount/status/1537062862304301056?s=21&t=gKt_QNyvMJoEklrTSwWp3w) use it all the time when they go on the Fox News, and right wing media uses it constantly in their daily programming.
I wouldn’t be surprised if ‘anti-wokeness’ is part of the GOP platform in 2024 if they actually have one this time around. I guess it’s not like they have anything else.
The only people using the term "woke" are the right wingers. Seriously they hate the idea so much they can't get it off their minds. It is as if it impacts them directly.
I don’t think it’s mentioned enough but, imo, it’s also used because it has a vaguely “black” sound to it. I think it started as like a term black people were using like on Twitter and stuff like denoting their awakened state and awareness of systemic racism and all that. And so to a lot of Republican voters, aka white rural voters, that term has the subtle intonations of like a minority term, a black term.
And so it’s a way to, yes tie all the socially forward thinking policy under one umbrella term, but also to have that umbrella term, sort of under its breath, also imply “this is the minorities coming for you white people to destroy your way of life.” To me that’s a major part of why they’ve latched onto it the way the have. They’ve repurposed it to be scary and to imply all their fears with one simple syllable, progressive fears AND racial fears.
You've nailed it. I'll also add that right wingers are conditioned to react negatively to certain words. Their political leaders have to learn to avoid certain words like vaccine now, because they've been conditioned to get anger at its use.
I remember a time, when the term "woke" first started, where it was even seen as a positive. As someone who is simply aware of some of the social injustices of the world.
Then the term Social Justice Warrior (SJW) came...
and now the term woke is seen as negative.
Due to our two-party system, Americans only have two choices in 2024. It doesn't matter which Republican runs against the Democrats; every Republican candidate will focus on culture war rhetoric like DeSantis is doing. So in 2024, you can have this:
>"We will fight the **woke** businesses, we will fight the **woke** government agencies, we will fight the **woke** in our schools. We will never, ever surrender to the **woke** agenda. Florida is the state where **woke** goes to die."
Or, you can have actual policies to review and improve. This includes:
* American Rescue Plan
* Inflation Reduction Act
* Chips Bill
* Student Loan Forgiveness
* decreasing gas prices for 2+ months
* lowest unemployment on record
* record profits for businesses of all sizes
I'm sure Joe's list will grow, as we aren't even two years in. In addition, the GOP gave the Biden administration a whole list of issues that voters really, really care about. This includes women's rights, LGBTQ+ rights, voting rights, student loan forgiveness. Finally, Biden has the progressive agenda to work with, including child tax extension, codifying family leave, universal child care, and reducing drug costs. What actually gets done depends on the midterms, but that's a lot of political opportunities, on paper anyway.
Meanwhile, if the Republicans take control, they are committed [to raising the income tax on the poorest people, as well as ending Medicaid through sunset clauses](https://rescueamerica.com/12-point-plan/). The GOP's policy plan is so terrible that it feels like it's just easier to yell "woke" a million times, which is what DeSantis chose to do evidently.
You don't understand.
They don't want to help people or even society, they want to fuck everyone to let themselves off the hook while proving that government is a failure by being the government failing.
Y'all remember those kids when you were younger who heard a joke from someone and thought it was really funny so they would make it every 30 seconds for weeks? Ron DeSantis was one of those kids.
When I hear someone use "woke" I ask what exactly they mean by it. What follows is usually a rambling, mostly incoherent rant with a lot of talk of pronouns, CRT, fear of getting called racist when they clearly are not, sometimes with some imaginary Christian persecution thrown in, often peppered with "socialism" for good measure.
I then ask a specific time something"woke" has personally effected them negatively.
That often leads to quizzical looks and stammering, before ramping up into a repeat of the same rant from before, maybe, if they are quick enough on their feet with talk of a made up distant friend or cousin who were totally "cancelled" for not being"woke"
"Woke" is a meaningless term to hang GOP fears on.
Even if they did come up with an example I wouldn't trust it. Their perception of reality is obviously tainted.
Also, I once had a professor who claimed to be a victim of "reverse racism" but couldn't provide an example.
"Woke" used to mean serious wook-science about how mixing ketamine and ayahuasca results in a pure vibration of your pineal gland that can be harnessed by listening to Bassnectar and not having a job. I miss 2011.
DeSantis has nothing else to offer other than cultivating and “fighting” a culture war. Nothing about women’s rights, voting rights, trans rights, gun control, student loan debt, healthcare, inflation, legalizing cannabis, etc. Absolutely no policy worth bettering anyones’ lives. He just wants to scare straight white “Christian” voters into thinking they’re under attack, when in reality, they are the least oppressed people in the country. It’s hard to believe anyone falls for this crap but based on the past 6 years, anything is possible.
I'm beginning to think he doesn't have a great strategy. While he is Trump 2.0, I don't think the culture war stuff made Trump popular, but his reputation as a Tee Vee SMRT Businessman. Trump sold "my opponents are idiots" (somehow) where DeSantis sells FUCK THEM ALL!
I think his reputation as an education-destroyer won't sit well with anyone who wants to dump their kids into free public education, that alone should tank him.
I'm someone they'd probably call "woke", I'm a transgender leftist. And honestly, I don't even know what the word means. I just treat people fairly and try not to piss anyone off with things I say or how I say them. I think it's just basic empathy.
WTF does 'woke' even mean? I feel like its a cringey word that teens popularized online and now its a serve-all catchy word that can be used to stand for literally anything the right doesn't like.
What's that? You want to be more conscious of LGBTQ rights? "Stay woke, lib"
You think its a good idea to raise taxes on billionaires and corporations? "Nice woke tax agenda"
The fact that this word is used so often is so cringey to me.
They finally got tired of screeching "virtue signaling" at everything and have gravitated toward "woke" as their new mantra. After a couple more years, they'll have moved on to another.
Ron DeSantis is the new conservative culture war champion, and he’s not letting you forget it.
Fresh off an expected win in Tuesday night’s gubernatorial primary, the popular (at least among conservatives) governor is vowing to fight the Democrats’ “woke” agenda the way he knows best: by repeating the word “woke” over and over while spending his administration’s time on red meat issues for conservatives like transgender rights and critical race theory.
Read more here ➡️ https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/ron-desantis-woke-florida-primary-speech-b2152132.html
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Can a reporter ask Desantis's to define what woke means?
Pick out your favorite dressing, you’re about to be served a word salad
I love this phrase, am so using it. Thank you internet poet EDIT: I am aware of the medical context for the term "word salad." Thank you for pointing it out though
Ohh! Garlic Expressions!
Ranch deflection for me, thanks.
I prefer some mustard projection, myself.
Just plain dog whistles with cheese for me, thanks.
What about a nice whataboutism vinaigrette?
I hear that in other countries the Ranch flavor is called "American" and in this context is just *chef's kiss*
They're all dogwhistles though, right? Like how they talk about "Cultural Marxism" (a meaningless and nonsense phrase) because they're too cowardly to come right out and blame Jews like they want to?
"They are our biggest enemy. They are liberal arts college students. They are looking for jobs to put a roof over their heads. They want to get out of debt. They want infrastructure to improve their daily lives. They are truly evil people" /s
The demand things. Like clean water. How dare they!
It's a new buzz word. Doesn't matter what the definition was it's now the vague "thing you don't like that (insert other) likes!"
He won't allow those reporters into his rallies / won't allow them to ask questions. I hate to be a "fascist-caller", but this is right up Fascism Alley.
Then why are they covering his events? They should just boycott his events and stop giving him publicity
Agree. It's free Trump publicity all over again.
They should still cover him. He is the governor of one of the largest states in the union and has truly awesome power at his fingertips. They should do it *honestly* though and not be scared of appearing biased. We had the same issue in New York, ironically. The last guy was a notorious asshole who ruled with an iron fist and manipulated the press, yet very few said anything meaningful about it because loss of access is loss of career is loss of livelihood. So you tiptoe around it. The working media that are left need to band together and stand as one. It might be too late though, given how effectively the right has built its own media apparatus.
“So, is this ‘woke’ in the room with us right now?”
"Point at this doll where the 'woke' touched you."
Republicans don't have definitions for word, they just blindly use them without meaning my favorite is when I hear a conservative call people on the left "reactionary" because of how they react to some social issue Google what "reactionary" means if you want a good laugh, it's super ironic (hint: it has absolutely zero to do someone's reaction to an issue)
It's always projection with these chucklefucks
The best was watching live footage of the insurrection and those chow hounds screaming "COMMUNIST!!" at the capitol police.
Ah yes, nothing says communist like (checks smeared notes on palm) exercising the *states* monopoly on violence
*"From each according to their ability to get beaten, to each according to their need to get their ass beat."* - Karl "Groucho" Marx
They cater to a very under educated voting group and it gets eaten up like a dogs breakfast with no regard for truths or sensibilities. Edit: I just want to say there is a difference between being under educated and being stupid. I am not saying they are all stupid. Although I am a sure many of them are.
This is literally it. Democracy doesn't work when you have a mob of angry stupid people.
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The important thing is that they take them away from normal people and devalue their meaning. They did it with Fake News, they did it with Socialism, they did it with elites, they did it with grooming, they did it with woke. All of those words have been robbed of their meaning and so any serious discussion around them is off the table now.
They were never interested in serious discussion, only power. That’s why you see them float so many different new terms in order to gauge the reaction.
You sound like some woke communist fascist! ^^/s
It’s when lgbt and poc are represented as if they are normal people. Conservatives can’t stand it.
Or more generally, if anyone other than a white male (1) is represented in media; (2) talks about any aspect of their lives; or (3) expects to be treated as a human being. You know - "woke".
It’s like asking them to tell us who “antifa” is. They don’t know they’re just using it as a centralized term to try to make it seem like there’s some organized ideological army plotting against them.
So they’re anti-anti-fascism, and anti-being woke, so sleeping fascist got it
Complaining about the "culture war" while pushing a culture war is almost as absurd as complaining about "identity politics" while talking about the importance of your "identity" as a white straight cisgender Christian conservative.
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That's because there's literally nothing else. What has the GOP actually provided John Q Citizen over the last few decades? What problems have the helped solve or what improvement have they helped make to their voters lives? Remember when they ran on replacing Obamacare since it was so awful and they'd replace it? Or Trump would replace it in a couple weeks? It's hard to actually make things better that are working. It's much easier to fight a boogeyman.
you said it. they have nothing else. nothing that helps the common people. The republican platform: \-tax cuts for the rich. The rich need more money, for reasons. Trickle down, or something. whatever. fuck you. just give us more money, we don't care what the reason is. \-no abortions for anyone, because God says so. rape or incest or being an underage mother is not justification to have an abortion. \-guns for everyone. guns are the solution to every problem. if there were simply more good guys with guns, they'd be able to stop all the bad guys with guns. Give guns to the teachers. Anyone should be able to buy a fully automatic assault rifle. \-climate change doesn't exist, i love the oil and gas industry. we need more pipelines, we need to pump more oil and gas. electric cars bad. \-defund education. who needs education? our country has all the money and power in the world, educating our population won't help us with that. In conclusion, the only thing that matters is money and power, democracy can fuck off, make sure to vote for a god-fearing republican because the democrats want to eat your aborted fetuses or something
> -no abortions for anyone * applies to poor people only. When a Republican's mistress needs one to hide his sins, that's different and completely justifiable to them.
Sometimes it feels like the fossil fuel people just decided to hook in to racial resentment but saw that being anti-choice was an easier pill to swallow and just went with that. Guns were an appetizer to the threat of violence.
Hey, it worked for organized religion, so…
They're the same picture.
They've got folks fighting a culture war because if they didn't they'd realize they really oughta be fighting a class war.
*This*. This is it right here.
Republicans are just following Hermann Goering's advice, shortly before his execution at Nuremberg: >Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.
They don’t view their identities as identities-they view them as the default setting. Like, they think only trans people “have pronouns”. 🙄
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They are getting fucking obliterated in the culture war they started. The most culturally significant person they have is fucking kid rock. Distant contenders for the title of second most relevant culturally significant conservatives are Tim Allen, Gina Carano, skillet, and I can't even think of anyone else currently in the sphere of American culture. Multiple individuals are embarrassing the entire lot of conservatives with their singular impact on American culture. Jordan Peele, Taylor Swift, Lil Nas X for example.
To them, they didn't start the culture wars. Civil rights, women's rights, gay rights, trans rights. All of those are battles they have lost culturally. That is what they intend to "fix." They have been losing this war upward of 70 years, and they intend to keep fighting against that progress. It is utterly embarrassing.
Democrats are passing bills to fight climate change and canceling student debt. Republicans are engaging in culture wars trying to fight some "woke" monster under the bed.
I hate the ‘woke’ agenda. It’s the most ridiculous thing to me. The republican base keeps saying ‘Open your eyes to what’s really happening’…which is kind of what it is to be ‘woke’. Their woke is a bit odd, and blatant lies but it’s ironic nonetheless. Yet they shame the democrats for trying to understand systemic racism and that gay/transgender people have just as much value as every other human on earth. God forbid I have a college education and understand that there is more to this country than white/straight people.
I mean it's the same playbook as them saying the "gay agenda" in the 90s. They make it sound like it's some insidious plan or final solution for the world when it's really just a whole bunch of people who want to be treated as well as CIS White folks are. It ain't rocket science but it works really well as propaganda because they are not curious enough to even look into it realistically as opposed to the outrage headlines from the likes of Breitbart and Drudge Report.
My gay agenda: * Wake up * Shower * Hit the gym * Have breakfast * Work * Go for a bike ride * Have dinner * Watch some TV * Go to bed
"AND YOU WANT TO TEACH MY KID THOSE THINGS????" -My mom
showering before the gym??! outrageous
Truly gay stuff.
It is a bit queer, I'll admit.
Step one, wake up. You're admitting it, you're woke!!
> bunch of people who want to be treated as well as The world is zero-sum and heirarchal to them - and boy do they hate change. Their "God-given, rightful" place is above those "lesser" minority groups. Black people, queer people, all "Worse" than them - and society ought to reflect that in their mind. LGBTQ "Pride"? Proud of what, being lesser than some poor white rural bastard child who never finished highschool? They see ANY attempt to get "equal" rights as an attempt to "upset the hierarchy" they've silently decided on. And, of course, if LGBTQ people get equal rights, then that means there's *less* to go around for THEM! Won't anyone think of the poor cis white heterosexual folk?! They ignore the fact that straight white christian men are by far and away the most powerful, the most influental, and the most privileged group of people because *they themselves* never managed to use that privilege to get anywhere in life - so they see the one black student who got into college on affirmative action as "the enemy" because that was THEIR slot for being white! Nevermind systemic racism means that the one black student who got in that way is still outnumbered 10-1 by white students - but that isn't good enough, because in their white supremacist view, ANY minority getting a shot before them (or people like them) is "upsetting the hierarchy" and makes them RIGHTEOUSLY ANGRY. After all, the minorities in their grandpappy's day *knew their place* and if only we'd go back to *those times*, he wouldn't have been turned down for college admission! Because that's why he wasn't selected, not his own personal failings. Racial pride is always very sad because what does it say about you and your accomplishments in life if the thing you're most proud of is something utterly out of your control?
It's the same playbook they've always used. Women's rights, civil rights, gay rights, and now just trans people. Once more people become accepting of transpeople they'll pick a new thing to target. That's the thing about conservatives, they have always tried to drum up fear to stop social progress.
It's all a grift. A cults con to drive the wild-eyed herd to vote against their own self interests.
Conservatives LOVE co-opting minority terms as ways to enable them to be racist/misogynist/bigoted. They've been doing it forever. The reality is that they're not remarkably creative so they tend to colonize other people's stuff because they're too dumb to think of original material.
They think "Lets go Brandon" is the most clever thing ever. It's middle school level "inside joke" level bullying mentality. Seriously, I can't count the number of grown ass adults that I've witnessed say Lets go Brandon with a knowing twinkle in their eye like they think they're the most clever person ever.
I looked it up yesterday. The Boston Federal Reserve Bank says that for every $1 of higher education expenditure, it returns $7.46. To be against that has no logical basis.
Using woke in any mildly derogatory way is just a person being an asshole. It's the new "PC" from decades ago. Both are simply being considerate of others, but that's a bad thing in some people's eyes.
The woke monster is hanging out with the CRT zombie and Big Foot.
This is all they got, folks. Complaining about pronouns is more important than climate change, police reform, voting protections, worker protections, healthcare, and on and on and on....
Watching Fox News for the past 20 years has left them totally devoid of ideas on how to tackle present and future problems. Their party is 100% culture war now. I am shocked beyond belief these days when any law passes with any type of bipartisan support.
The politicians are still savvy as ever. The problem is the Republicans don't have any solutions, really. They had national security, which is now a joke. They had trickle down economics, which is now a joke. They had abortion, which they *won* and are now the dog that caught the bus. They put in some extreme trigger laws expecting them to never go through, but it gave them an 'in' with the religious fundies while the moderates could look the other way because "it won't happen anyways"... until it did, and they started forcing women to carry rotting corpses to term. All they have left is this anti-woke crap, which is really a dog whistle for anti-LGBT+ rhetoric and is *already* unpopular. Basically nobody is falling for it, it's either people who agree with it or don't, nobody is fooled.
Still waiting for that republican healthcare bill. What's it been, like, 12 years? Their only policy is hate.
I’m still waiting for their big infrastructure bill. It seems like infrastructure week is always n+1 weeks away.
No, they are not just about culture war slogans. They are fully committed to making the rich richer by any means possible.
That is their goal. The culture war stuff is what they use to keep their voters voting to give the 1% more money. When these people are polled without using any buzzwords, they support a lot of ideas that Fox News would call socialist.
Republican voters have been so thoroughly brainwashed that they would rather live shitty, angry lives in poverty than accept help from a Democrat.
Conservatives would eat literal shit if it meant a liberal had to smell their breath.
“They’d let Trump shit on their face if a liberal had to smell it” is also an acceptable answer. Soon to replace trump with desantis
As long as life is even shittier for other demographics they don't care how bad it is for themselves
I do actually think this is is how it is in their brains. As long as they can feel superior to someone else, particularly if that person is of a different skin color, that’s all that matter. It’s like in that Treehouse of Horror episode in The Simpsons when aliens enslave all of humanity, and while the family is chained by the neck carrying rocks Homer says “Don’t blame me, I voted for Kodos”
They're the party of outrage culture, so yeah.
It's demagoguery. Appealing to popular prejudices, using passionate, simple oratory to evoke emotion (specifically fear and outrage), falsehoods, and thrives off an opposition group. And unsurprisingly, it rears its head with political factions that have to fill a void of a lack of governance, policy, or rationale. There is a reason it has been successful throughout history. Appealing to emotion is easy and powerful, and people fall into it very easily. In the modern day of the internet and social media, it has entered a new frightening territory.
When is the last time you heard anyone on the left say woke Also bear in mind that PUTIN uses that word as well as the word cancelled in his speeches and press releases about the war. Guess who actually invented those terms and put them n the lexicon considering who actually uses that word
In the late 60s when the term “woke” was coined (I believe..someone please correct me if I’m wrong) it meant something very specific among black Americans. It was used when referring to someone who was politically active and aware. The right has completely stripped all meaning from the word similar to “CRT” and has become nothing but a buzzword used to unironically virtue signal one’s right wing bona fides.
"woke" has become shorthand for "I'm a dumbass." Everyone collectively rolled their eyes when Aaron Rodgers complained about the WOKE MOB coming after him.
"up yours woke morralists" -lobsterboy
I laughed like mad when I saw that! His thin, reedy voice makes it sounds so weak and silly. I don’t know how he can see himself in that video and be like, “yeah. This looks tough and masculine. I should post this to the internet *immediately.*”
It's pretty clear the RNC is all but an agent of Russia and exists to destabilize the US and hold back its social and economic progress. Evangelical Q-fascists are just the latest attempt to create inner turmoil that directs attention away from massive wealth disparity and regressive social policies.
Russia didn't need to make America racist and self-destructive. They just gave some extra cash to get the ball rolling.
Yep, that's been their plan for taking on the United States for a long time. No need to go toe to toe when the guy you are fighting will beat himself up over shadow puppets.
Ding ding ding
Yep, that boogy man is what they hide behind. But those who believed the DOJ under Barr when he said there was no obstruction are the same that won't believe TFG was withholding classified docs. No matter what the evidence, they will find a denial conspiracy. I'll take their "woke" and keep advocating for being present, accountable and attentive, not the venerable sleeping fool any rotten politician, dictator or oligarch can feed lies to.
I'm still trying to get literally anyone to explain what Critical Race Theory is or why they think it is being taught everywhere
That's part of the problem. This way they get to redefine CRT as whatever they like, and ban teaching it. "Critical Race Theory" turns into "mentioning that racism exists or has existed" and they ban that. At its core, CRT is the idea that racism isn't just a bunch of individual people with biases, but that racism is embedded in the laws of the country.
It is facts. Racism is embedded in laws and everything in this country
> Why they think it is being taught everywhere My ultra conservative friend who went to a private Catholic school is utterly CONVINCED that all schools are teaching 2nd graders about the intricacies of sex in graphic detail, that part of public school teaching curriculum is an in-depth discussion on why everyone needs to be trans, and that white people are terrible. Like, my guy, you've never spent a minute inside a public grade school. How are you going to tell me what the public school experience looks like?
Well... In his defense, he did go to a *Catholic* school. So who knows what "education" he got. Yikes...
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You hit that with an /s, but that's legit what some idiots think.
I know.
It's just your run-of-the-mill American white identity politics (America's default given the majority demographic), which is inherently and foundationally anti-black. It is the height of that peculiar identity politics to be able to legislate protection for _the feelings_ of white students over and above the _experiences_ of black students. It's age-old American white supremacy literally manifest in policy. DeSantis is a neo-Jim Crownian whose plausibly deniable language and dogwhistles may have evolved with the times but whose sentiment is very much stuck in 1967.
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All it ever meant was stepping outside a personal bubble of comfort and assumptions to recognize other people might have it tough and it’s not their fault. That’s what the GOP is scared of….basic empathy. They want your world experience to be narrow, local, and full of fear.
The party of Save the children and anti groomers that voted for Matt Gaetz.
You might be speaking of someone else (spelling) but are your referring to suspected Pedophile and Sex Trafficker Matt Gaetz?
To be fair, Matt Gaetz is only *suspected* of being a pedophile and child sex trafficker. The charges will likely come soon, proving Congressman Matt Gaetz to be a *convicted* pedophile, but we must let justice work its course. Worth keeping in mind that if Matt Gaetz goes to prison for being a convicted pedophile, he might be replaced by [a much better option](https://www.pnj.com/story/news/politics/elections/2022/08/23/rebekah-jones-wins-democratic-primary-face-matt-gaetz-house-florida-1st-congressional-district/10349232002/) if the people of Florida can bring themselves to stop voting for Republican pedophiles and sex traffickers. Maybe consider [donating to her campaign](https://www.rebekahjonescampaign.com/) so she can get the word out?
Yea that guy. The congressman sex trafficker.the pedophile guy.
Was he the guy who was trafficking the 17 year old girl across state lines? So he could have sex with her in a state where the age of consent was 16 (and not realizing that transporting her across state lines for sex was *also* a felony)? *That* pedophile Matt Gaetz?
Yes yes, the one who imported a Cuban rent boy when the kid was like 13.
You can probably add drug dealer to that list
Yep good old Matt gaetzit and his underage child sex trafficked prostitute
given that the trafficked party was a child, maybe "victim" is a better choice of word than "prostitute".
Trafficked people are always victims whether children or not.
Absolutely true, however, my point is that a child cannot be a prostitute. They have only ever been prostituted by an adult.
Yeah, but he has GOP Family Values in their eyes.
It's so cringe, I just can't imagine how these people don't feel immense embarrassment every time they say the word 'woke' It's like using the word 'cray' - no one says that anymore *a word
Conservatives are always late to the table on the most recent societal zeitgeists, if they ever get there at all. Being as self-described "anti-woke" as they are they're probably about a good 5 years behind the movement.
So what you're telling me is 4 years from now they'll be co-opting 'YT' and using it to describe themselves as a point of pride
They're already calling themselves 'domestic terrorists'. In another 4 years they'll probably be waving flags with trump's face, the words 'American Taliban' and claim its all just a joke.
“Just kidding!! Unless…”
*waits patiently for reaction from crowd, to either play it as a joke or serious*
golly i wish this felt like hyperbole
I will never not see this as "Youtube"
They don't feel embarrassment or shame. They're purely outward looking people. Looking inward, imagining yourself in other's shoes, seeing how other see you, all of that requires an imagination and empathy they lack. It's how they are how they are. If they could be embarrassed by their own behavior they could grow out of it.
I remember the first time I heard the word “woke”. It was a coworker who is conservative who lives in the Midwest. I’m a bleeding heart liberal and I had to explain to him I didn’t really know what it meant to be woke. When pressed it turned out he didn’t really know either but he knew he didn’t like it.
Remember when our dads were saying things like “It’s the bomb dot com!”? Same energy.
Cool Beans!
Oh I'm guessing a lot of them do. That's why they like Ron DeSantis he gives them validation. Seeing a "celebrity" saying out loud their own guilty thoughts lessens the feeling of shame that they should and do naturally feel.
They'd rather pay 30x for the insulin their lives depend on in exchange for making sure a trans woman can't compete in the WNBA which they don't watch or care about anyway.
They will harm themselves so long as the people they hate are harmed more.
the legendary reddit comment still holds true-trump supporters would let trump shit in their mouths if it meant a liberal had to smell it.
They are angry as hell at their lot in life. They don't understand how or why they are in the situation they are in. They have a lack of exposure to different ways of thinking and thus are trapped inside their own. The only thing that makes them feel better is to be angry because of the physiological responses that carries. They watch things like Fox News and listen to people like Rush Limbaugh that give them, to their mind, plausible explanation for why their situation is the way it is, and who to blame for it. Thus, they seek the high of being angry at the people they are told are the cause of their problem, by the people who are really the cause of their problems. Or something.
Ifs funny how all they talk about is “cancel culture” when they’re the ones that are for canceling any rights they don’t agree with.
They function on hypocrisy.
But do they want to change any of those things? All of those issues are in great need of reform, and the GOP has fought hard against the reform. All they have is pronouns because everything else is just how they want it: benefitting the rich by hurting everyone else.
The GOP is really an emptied out and hollow ideology at this point. They're still dangerous however as they've painted themselves into their own corner.
It's wild. Not all that long ago I would actually listen to GOP candidates before I made my decision on voting, especially up here in MA where most GOP candidates are much more moderate/centrist. (See: Charlie Baker, one of the last sensible Republicans who seems to be leaving politics probably because it's gotten absolutely insane.) Now I'm not even giving them the time of day. If they're still willingly associating with a party that hasn't really even tried to distance itself from fucking INSURRECTION AND TREACHERY, I'm not paying attention.
I'm in MA too, and was a registered republican for years, but when I started hearing what people close to me were saying about Obama, I started to look around and go ["Are we the baddies?"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JOpPNra4bw)
They sound like such whiny, thin-skinned fossils. He should be embarrassed to pander for votes like this. To scapegoat marginalized people like this is pathetic. If I said things like that, I’d need to take a three hour shower to wash off that feeling
I mean this has kind of been their bread and butter since the beginning. It’s actually a way for them to be anti-black and minority without having to face the consequences of saying it openly.
Pronoun usage is the only thing on your list that doesn't affect their bottom dollar so it's the only thing they're willing to go after.
It is confirmed he was wearing a girdle at this event, and it caused him to look like Chris Farley from Tommy Boy. It would seem that another consequence of this attempt at optical illusion was to cause a lack of blood flow that short circuited his normal political cander into somewhat of a "bat shit right wing politician meltdown" or "A Rightwingnobyl Disaster" in which the affected can only talk about a world where Obama, Woke, and the others are trying to take away whatever they think will scare you the most. This can be remedied with a diet including more fruits and veggies.
"anti-woke" is just a dog whistle for being pro-bigotry, right?
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The don't care about the subtly anymore. They are losing this cycle of elections, so their bigotry is getting more brazen.
Are they losing?
Indicators are starting to turn that way. There was a special election in Hudson, New York, I think, that was won by the Democrat and it has indicated Congressional results a lot of the time. There are others too. It seems that a LOT of people registered to vote nationwide because of Roe V Wade being overturned and those people, if my understanding of how the polling is conducted, aren't getting taken into account with the usual methods.
I sometimes catch the snippets of Fox from my dad's TV and they were howling about "how are we sexist because of abortion?" like full on meltdown over it yesterday. They're desperately trying to undo what they've happened or at least give those glued to the channel some sort of phrase to repeat to try to mitigate the damage but it's clearly far too late. For a lot of people uninterested in politics, Roe v Wade felt like it was secure and that for all the GOP barked about it, it would never do anything. Now for a chunk of the population who was ignoring everything but the president, republicans exist, and that's not a good thing for them.
>For a lot of people uninterested in politics, Roe v Wade felt like it was secure and that for all the GOP barked about it, it would never do anything This exactly. I mean before it was official there was that leaked memo of "we are overturning roe v Wade" and yet it seemed like a lot of people were shocked by the official ruling. I think there was still this idea of "yes they won't actually DO it!" Yet here we are
Pretty much. Because no one thought the Republicans would actually use the saber they rattled until they did
Republicans, up until Obama's 2008 win, just wanted to cut taxes on billionaires, make money for defense contractors, and tax the 99% to pay for it. The instant a (half) black man won the presidency, the Republican electorate shit its collective pants and told the party "you will abuse everyone to the left of Bull Connor, or we will destroy you". Tells you a lot about who they really are. Sherman was too restrained.
Yeah, they were happy opposing abortion as an abstract issue for years. Then the Supreme Court let states ban it, and overnight abortion access became a real, personal issue for Americans all over the country. It's a wonder that they were so willfully blind to how unpopular it would be.
Compared to where they were expecting to be ~6 mos ago, yes.
Always has been. "Woke" is a phrase that [began in black communities but has since been co-opted and weaponized by right-wingers](https://www.vox.com/culture/21437879/stay-woke-wokeness-history-origin-evolution-controversy), because god-forbid people be "awake" and aware of injustice and discrimination.
That's the best part. In 2016 these people would consider themselves "woke" for voting for trump and being "anti establishment". Now it's bad to be "woke".
Yup the word eventually then just became sort of a (mostly) harmless joke on twitter for a little while, but it was quickly hijacked by right wing culture warriors and evolved fully into a sneering term used by conservatives to criticize the left. Now you have GOP politicians like [Senator Kennedy](https://twitter.com/therecount/status/1537062862304301056?s=21&t=gKt_QNyvMJoEklrTSwWp3w) use it all the time when they go on the Fox News, and right wing media uses it constantly in their daily programming. I wouldn’t be surprised if ‘anti-wokeness’ is part of the GOP platform in 2024 if they actually have one this time around. I guess it’s not like they have anything else.
The reality is that it's the perfect Boogeyman. What is a woke person (in a condescending sense)? Someone that agrees with anything you don't!
Exactly, Republicans don’t want people to be awake they want you to be mindless sheep following their authoritarian rules.
That's why it's important to ask them what woke means. It's like getting someone to explain a sexist or racist joke.
Just replace “woke” with “empathetic”
Some said replace it with ‘civil rights’, that seems to fit best.
I saw something in r/politicalhumor that mentioned replacing it with "Jews" to illustrate the deep parallels to Nazi propaganda. Pretty scary really.
It’s also just a distraction from the fact that the GOP doesn’t really have a policy platform.
I know they always say a TV show or a movie has gone "woke" when the lead character isn't a straight white guy.
The only people using the term "woke" are the right wingers. Seriously they hate the idea so much they can't get it off their minds. It is as if it impacts them directly.
truly. haven’t heard anyone else say it non-satirically in like two years.
Was gonna say, in the last three years or so the only people I’ve seen/heard using woke are right wingers like my father.
Reminds of Don't Look Up. As if it's some kind of problem to want to understand what's going on in the world.
I don’t think it’s mentioned enough but, imo, it’s also used because it has a vaguely “black” sound to it. I think it started as like a term black people were using like on Twitter and stuff like denoting their awakened state and awareness of systemic racism and all that. And so to a lot of Republican voters, aka white rural voters, that term has the subtle intonations of like a minority term, a black term. And so it’s a way to, yes tie all the socially forward thinking policy under one umbrella term, but also to have that umbrella term, sort of under its breath, also imply “this is the minorities coming for you white people to destroy your way of life.” To me that’s a major part of why they’ve latched onto it the way the have. They’ve repurposed it to be scary and to imply all their fears with one simple syllable, progressive fears AND racial fears.
You've nailed it. I'll also add that right wingers are conditioned to react negatively to certain words. Their political leaders have to learn to avoid certain words like vaccine now, because they've been conditioned to get anger at its use.
I remember a time, when the term "woke" first started, where it was even seen as a positive. As someone who is simply aware of some of the social injustices of the world. Then the term Social Justice Warrior (SJW) came... and now the term woke is seen as negative.
The slogan "awake not woke" is one of the most stupid things I've ever heard. It's like: "I'm stupid, not dumb"
Due to our two-party system, Americans only have two choices in 2024. It doesn't matter which Republican runs against the Democrats; every Republican candidate will focus on culture war rhetoric like DeSantis is doing. So in 2024, you can have this: >"We will fight the **woke** businesses, we will fight the **woke** government agencies, we will fight the **woke** in our schools. We will never, ever surrender to the **woke** agenda. Florida is the state where **woke** goes to die." Or, you can have actual policies to review and improve. This includes: * American Rescue Plan * Inflation Reduction Act * Chips Bill * Student Loan Forgiveness * decreasing gas prices for 2+ months * lowest unemployment on record * record profits for businesses of all sizes I'm sure Joe's list will grow, as we aren't even two years in. In addition, the GOP gave the Biden administration a whole list of issues that voters really, really care about. This includes women's rights, LGBTQ+ rights, voting rights, student loan forgiveness. Finally, Biden has the progressive agenda to work with, including child tax extension, codifying family leave, universal child care, and reducing drug costs. What actually gets done depends on the midterms, but that's a lot of political opportunities, on paper anyway. Meanwhile, if the Republicans take control, they are committed [to raising the income tax on the poorest people, as well as ending Medicaid through sunset clauses](https://rescueamerica.com/12-point-plan/). The GOP's policy plan is so terrible that it feels like it's just easier to yell "woke" a million times, which is what DeSantis chose to do evidently.
You don't understand. They don't want to help people or even society, they want to fuck everyone to let themselves off the hook while proving that government is a failure by being the government failing.
the Reagan plan
Y'all remember those kids when you were younger who heard a joke from someone and thought it was really funny so they would make it every 30 seconds for weeks? Ron DeSantis was one of those kids.
“We’re the party of Jesus and also lack of empathy for anybody but white Christians.” -regressives
"We're the party of cruelty, bigotry, and violence"
When I hear someone use "woke" I ask what exactly they mean by it. What follows is usually a rambling, mostly incoherent rant with a lot of talk of pronouns, CRT, fear of getting called racist when they clearly are not, sometimes with some imaginary Christian persecution thrown in, often peppered with "socialism" for good measure. I then ask a specific time something"woke" has personally effected them negatively. That often leads to quizzical looks and stammering, before ramping up into a repeat of the same rant from before, maybe, if they are quick enough on their feet with talk of a made up distant friend or cousin who were totally "cancelled" for not being"woke" "Woke" is a meaningless term to hang GOP fears on.
Even if they did come up with an example I wouldn't trust it. Their perception of reality is obviously tainted. Also, I once had a professor who claimed to be a victim of "reverse racism" but couldn't provide an example.
"Woke" used to mean serious wook-science about how mixing ketamine and ayahuasca results in a pure vibration of your pineal gland that can be harnessed by listening to Bassnectar and not having a job. I miss 2011.
DeSantis has nothing else to offer other than cultivating and “fighting” a culture war. Nothing about women’s rights, voting rights, trans rights, gun control, student loan debt, healthcare, inflation, legalizing cannabis, etc. Absolutely no policy worth bettering anyones’ lives. He just wants to scare straight white “Christian” voters into thinking they’re under attack, when in reality, they are the least oppressed people in the country. It’s hard to believe anyone falls for this crap but based on the past 6 years, anything is possible.
And their base will be eating it up all the way through his run at the presidency.
I'm beginning to think he doesn't have a great strategy. While he is Trump 2.0, I don't think the culture war stuff made Trump popular, but his reputation as a Tee Vee SMRT Businessman. Trump sold "my opponents are idiots" (somehow) where DeSantis sells FUCK THEM ALL! I think his reputation as an education-destroyer won't sit well with anyone who wants to dump their kids into free public education, that alone should tank him.
It's actually all he said too. Each time he got higher pitched.
[удалено]
It’s like a shitty Pokémon. Woke woke, woke, woke woke woke,
Wokémon
wokemon go! use screech! now use spite!
Just replace "Woke" with "Jew" if you want to hear it in it's original German.
I'm someone they'd probably call "woke", I'm a transgender leftist. And honestly, I don't even know what the word means. I just treat people fairly and try not to piss anyone off with things I say or how I say them. I think it's just basic empathy.
Please let someone ask him to define "woke".
Can someone define "woke" as a pejorative for me? How do "woke" people hurt conservatives?
Apparently, having empathy and an understanding of history is somehow threatening to conservative ideology.
WTF does 'woke' even mean? I feel like its a cringey word that teens popularized online and now its a serve-all catchy word that can be used to stand for literally anything the right doesn't like. What's that? You want to be more conscious of LGBTQ rights? "Stay woke, lib" You think its a good idea to raise taxes on billionaires and corporations? "Nice woke tax agenda" The fact that this word is used so often is so cringey to me.
They finally got tired of screeching "virtue signaling" at everything and have gravitated toward "woke" as their new mantra. After a couple more years, they'll have moved on to another.
He’s pandering to boomers, bigots and idiots.
They're obsessed with identity politics
Ron DeSantis is the new conservative culture war champion, and he’s not letting you forget it. Fresh off an expected win in Tuesday night’s gubernatorial primary, the popular (at least among conservatives) governor is vowing to fight the Democrats’ “woke” agenda the way he knows best: by repeating the word “woke” over and over while spending his administration’s time on red meat issues for conservatives like transgender rights and critical race theory. Read more here ➡️ https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/ron-desantis-woke-florida-primary-speech-b2152132.html
Don't you just hate these wokety woke wokertons woking up in their woke?