How Woke Won: the Elitist Movement that Threatens Democracy, Tolerance and Reason. By Joanna Williams: Spiked. £9.99.
According to one definition, a woke person is someone who is ‘very aware of social and political unfairness’ (Collins English Dictionary). Joanna Williams, however, uses the term in a very negative way, to refer to those who are obsessed with race and gender, and support cancel culture. Woke values supposedly ‘dominate every aspect of our lives’ and, while there is no grand conspiracy, the ‘cultural elite’ accept woke thinking as common sense. The woke project is described as an attack on the working class (not defined, but probably manual workers).
She is not at all clear as to who comprises this cultural elite. It is a ‘manifestation of the state’, it includes non-governing elites and even a sub-elite. It consists of the ‘professional-managerial class’, and runs business, academia, the church, mainstream and social media; its members work in HR departments and the cultural industry, and as doctors and teachers. It is hard to take seriously this depiction of a group which is allegedly so powerful but is characterised in such a vague way.
Having said that, there are some good points here. The kind of threats made against JK Rowling and others for saying that trans women are not women are indeed indefensible. This is not a matter of disagreement or argument but of intolerance and intimidation. Students can sometimes be unwilling to accept the expression of views they dislike. ‘Woke capitalism’ can promote gender inclusivity, for instance, as a way of selling razor blades or deodorant.
Yet there is also much that is objectionable, sometimes a matter of the omission of obviously relevant points. Williams mentions that journalist Suzanne Moore resigned from the Guardian after being bullied by colleagues, presumably for not expressing acceptably woke views, but does not say that Jeremy Hardy and John Pilger were barred from the paper for being too ‘radical’. In other cases, what is said is inconsistent. For instance, it is claimed that the supposed existence of institutional racism in the police moves policing ‘into the realm of politics’. Yet a few pages later it is said that the police now have new ways of pursuing old goals, effectively defending the interests of the ruling class (which is also political, after all).
Woke is allegedly a counter-revolution to the populism of Brexit. The election of Trump in 2016 is said to have shown the rejection of woke values in the US: as if voting for a racist, sexist, lying bully was an endorsement of tolerance and reason. The ‘political consensus’ is also said to be challenged by the internet publication Spiked (spiked-online.com), which Williams writes for, and also by the TV and radio channel GB News, which is largely a forum for such as Nigel Farage.
Overall, Williams says nothing about the lack of democracy under capitalism, and is just arguing for one establishment view against another that is to a large extent manufactured by its opponents.
Paul Bennett
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