Julie Burchill: "Why I loathe the woke"

[beastlyslumber]

Just thought I'd share this piece of joy for anyone else who is fond of Ms Burchill...

[Momobeats]

Likewise "Karen" is not originally a word used to refer to white women in a context of racial prejudice but a misogynist slur coined by a very bitter man who posted about his wife, Karen, and how much he hated her.

QI klaxon

[Gncq]

We do need a word to describe the current political movement originating from North America, so popular amongst middle class university students, that is completely against free speech and is pro language control, that we now describe as "woke".
We need a word for it.
Any suggestions?

[Momobeats]

@BlameItOnTheBlackStar

OP apparently you need to now become the defender of the term woke, despite not actually using it yourself.

Username checks out.

[JessicaPipsqueak]

@HazelCarbyFan could you sound any more pompous?

[foxgoosefinch]

I do actually agree with you, Hazel - it’s unfortunate that the white Tumblrati adopted it for themselves, especially on identity / gender issues.

It definitely has a specific political meaning in AAVE - dating back further than the last decade, though - I’ve read it in that usage in African-American writing from the late 60s/early 70s onwards. I am uncomfortable with its current usage as a result.

I’m not sure the term as it’s used now will be easy to put back in the bottle though, as pp say upthread. I’ve heard my MIL using it and she’s a white working class Daily Mail reader living in Essex with zero knowledge of black political history….

[LookNorthbyNorthWest]

When it comes to the internet, "Woke" = clickbait and is guaranteed to get people thinking with their emotion rather than their reason. Serious people don't use it as a form of criticism. I do sometimes agree with Burchill, but I don't have much respect for her as a person. She's always been half intellectual, half drama llama.

[HazelCarbyFan]

The notion of “class consciousness” goes back to Marx, but nobody was using the specific term “woke.” The concept is not new, but the post-structuralists (largely writing in French) were not using “woke.” That is a term originating in contemporary Black culture within the last decade. Before that we talked about developing racial consciousness but we used to just call it “being conscious,” being real, etc.

[Shedmistress]

Hazel has come on to express just this POV and was shot down. I find a split between white and black women in feminism alarming and depressing, but it’s a natural consequence of not listening. It’s really clear to me in any case that the meaning of ‘woke’ has not changed for many people.

What's wrong with loathing these people that are misappropriating the word?

[foxgoosefinch]

@MichelleScarn 🤣 I know, it does sound so delightfully daft! Better than xie/fae/xir or whatever!

[TheAntiGardener]

@lightand

I agree with Hazel and Classica. The label is divisive because its original, still valid, meaning has been hijacked

Once a term has moved on from it's original, it cant be brought back, can it.
Language evolves.
You only have to look at old maps, or speak to a linguist.

I take your point, but I have read threads on here by black posters bemoaning ‘white feminism’ and giving the use of this term by white women as an example. Hazel has come on to express just this POV and was shot down. I find a split between white and black women in feminism alarming and depressing, but it’s a natural consequence of not listening. It’s really clear to me in any case that the meaning of ‘woke’ has not changed for many people.

[MichelleScarn]

@foxgoosefinch now all I can think of is 'Horton Hears a Hu' by Dr Seuss!

[foxgoosefinch]

Yes absolutely @Shedmistress! That was the origin for its use on the Chronicle (the boards were chock full of contemporary American lit people!)

They also tried to invent a gender neutral pronoun “hu” around the mid-2000s which didn’t quite catch on then, but there was already a lot of pronoun stuff mixed up in it all even then.

Personally, I rather prefer the daft “hu” to the singular they - it was pronounced somewhere between “hoo” and “huh” as I recall 🤣

[CharlieParley]

Interesting discussion.

It undoubtedly is an important word to black civil rights activism, but neither the word "woke" nor the concept behind it originate with the black activists using it today. It comes from the writings of post-modernists and post-structuralist, and found expression in various critical theories, around the 1950s and 1960s. Hence it does not merely describe someone awoken to the realities of racism, but it describes anyone who develops a critical consciousness around any aspect of social justice. (The consciousness raising sessions held by second wave feminists are another example of this.)

And the underlying concept, arising as it does out of critical theories and post-modernism is not without problem. (But nothing ever is when it comes to ideologies. Especially those intent on breaking and remaking the world in their image.)

Likewise "Karen" is not originally a word used to refer to white women in a context of racial prejudice but a misogynist slur coined by a very bitter man who posted about his wife, Karen, and how much he hated her. It took off from there. Later, black activists started using the term in the manner described. It always was and, I would argue even in the context of the discourse about race it continues to be a misogynist slur.

I think we should be able to at least consider that as the word woke is claimed by a number of other social justice movements, that there's some justification in Burchill using it the way she does.

[Shedmistress]

@foxgoosefinch

Interestingly I’ve heard people similarly object to the term “snowflake” on the grounds that it is a far-right 4Chan invention -- actually it wasn’t, it was first used on the US-basses university teachers’ online forum of the Chronicle of Higher Education in the very early 2000s to mean middle class university students, who were such delicate flowers that they practically melted if they didn’t have everything spoonfed to them, depended on their parents for everything and made constant complaints about being offended.

It was in Fight Club in 1999 I first heard it. [written 1996]...

'You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake'...and from then on yes it has been used [quite rightly] for the people you mentioned.

[LobsterNapkin]

Totally disagree that it is trying to describe a bunch of unrelated things.

That's really why it gets used, I think, people want to describe things they see as connected but they don't have a good "official" word to do so.

It doesn't help that when they try to pick a descriptions, something like Critical Theory say, they get all kinds of people telling them it's WRONG and they are just making things up. So they just use a word that seems descriptive.

[beastlyslumber]

Steak and kidney, or blood Georgia?

[MrsPsmalls]

Had no idea about the roots of this word. In general parlance round here (East of England) it is NEVER used re being awakened to racism or even sexism or religious bigotry. It is never used about being aware of big/real issues. It is only ever used about identity wankery or the professionally offended. This one is not going to return to its original meaning anytime soon.

[GeorgiaGirl52]

@JayAlfredPrufrock

And when I think how Americans have mangled the English language

At least we know what "pudding" is -- and isn't!

[beastlyslumber]

I think we could follow Burchill's discussion here and just call it the Establishment Ideology. Because it is being used as a way to keep working class people from having a voice or a role in almost all areas of the establishment, from government to business to journalism to the arts and entertainment. Really interesting to listen to Burchill describe her experience as a young journalist being told what she can and can't say (and defying it) and now as a mature and very successful journalist still being told what she can and can't say (and still defying it!)

[foxgoosefinch]

@Pascal80 - if you had read my post properly, you’d see that I said that I have heard people object to it on those grounds

Read things carefully before you comment!

[beastlyslumber]

No, you're right Hazel - the examples you give are not the same thing and it would be unhelpful and pointless to try to say they are. But the word we're talking about is used to describe a political movement that is based on identity - a hierarchy of identity is seen as the structure both by which society functions and by which it must be revolutionised. As well as identity, it prioritises language, and specifically the control of language, as a site of power and revolution - hence the censorship and cancelling etc. It is quite an amorphous movement, and has a religious structure in many ways, with those who consider themselves to be part of it ascribing to a list of views (or articles of faith) and not being "allowed" to diverge from them. So you can't be part of this movement unless you agree with ALL of its tenets. You might be cancelled if you're TWAW but you voted Brexit, for example. So it definitely is a singular, if amorphous, movement, and it does need a name to describe it. In my opinion. And, as I say, I'm happy to use whatever name works for the people who belong to that movement.

[Pascal80]

@foxgoosefinch

Interestingly I’ve heard people similarly object to the term “snowflake” on the grounds that it is a far-right 4Chan invention -- actually it wasn’t, it was first used on the US-basses university teachers’ online forum of the Chronicle of Higher Education in the very early 2000s to mean middle class university students, who were such delicate flowers that they practically melted if they didn’t have everything spoonfed to them, depended on their parents for everything and made constant complaints about being offended.

4 Chan is not ''far right''. It's a channel with a ton of subject boards on there. Ridiculous comment.

[LondonWolf]

Please stop using this term in this way.

No.

It was embraced happily and pridefully initially. Now it’s being used by onlookers to indicate a damaging ideology and a certain type of person who engages in cult like behaviours and now you don’t like it anymore. More language changes in order to assist the ushering in the aforementioned cult.

No, I will continue to use it in the scornful way it deserves to be.

[foxgoosefinch]

Interestingly I’ve heard people similarly object to the term “snowflake” on the grounds that it is a far-right 4Chan invention -- actually it wasn’t, it was first used on the US-basses university teachers’ online forum of the Chronicle of Higher Education in the very early 2000s to mean middle class university students, who were such delicate flowers that they practically melted if they didn’t have everything spoonfed to them, depended on their parents for everything and made constant complaints about being offended.

[HazelCarbyFan]

Beastlyslumber: I appreciate your engagement. Why is a broad term that links a number of things needed? Why not speak clearly about what are the specific things that are at issue? I think the very problem is trying to link together different ideas and movements and conflating them. Instead of one term, I think it’s more helpful and precise to address specific issues and objections to them, rather than a term that ends up applied to anything and becomes meaningless.

Trans women in sports is not the same as Black people being shot by the police. We don’t really need a term to put them together, on either side.