By Tim Wood
One never knows what’s around the corner concerning harmful rhetoric within today’s political climate. But lately, the level of harmful rhetoric emerging through the conservative extremists have met a new low-height.
The book banning is almost surrealistic and the institutional makeovers that they advocate with their own brand of Christian morality certainly resemble the early Nazi movements, at least to me; and I must say, again, for me, the anti-woke rhetoric seems to have whipped the dead horse at least 10 times over.
I have always embraced the fact that I consider myself a “woke” individual. I’ve always considered “being woke” a virtue for any person, ever since it’s modern usage within the Black communities. My research into it gave me a little surprise: “Woke” terminology seemed to have started from a “little song” (his words) that Huddie (Leadbelly) Ledbetter wrote in 1938, “Scottsboro Boys.” Ironically, it had nothing to do with enlightenment, it was a warning.
In 1931, nine Black teenage boys were accused of raping two white women in Scottsboro, Ark. Leadbelly was warning his community about the roving lynch mobs: “… I advise everybody, be a little careful – best stay woke, keep their eyes open.” It was then popularized by the African American author, William Arthur Kelley, in 1962 as part of the “beatnik” appropriated slang from African American culture: “If you’re woke, you dig it.”
My mom disliked slang and I was forever being corrected to not say “ain’t,” and instead use all the proper “not” pairing words: am, are, is, have, and has. The “Little Rascals” always said “ain’t” so that was good enough for me. So terms like “I sees ya,” “y’all,” “I’m a-comin’,” “piggin’ out” and a litany of others, have never offended me.
Unfortunately, there is a litany of offensive slang as well, and apparently “woke” is on the conservative extremist’s “offensive” hit list. Still, it is not on mine and it makes me angry that they have appropriated and bastardized woke with anti-woke; making anti-woke a sort of perverted goal within their brand of Christianity.
Slang within every single language on our entire Earth is constantly evolving … “like” forever! It is the blood of any language; pulsating, growing and forever changing. I just hate to see a great slang like “woke” being vilified. And I’m upset knowing the right-wing extremists have saddled “anti” with the wonderful “woke” slang of our time; but they are experts at bringing our progressive natures down.
“Woke” to them implies socialism, communism, “bleeding heart” liberals, and anti-Christianity; they should know better but they simply like to tear down any form of liberalism. They would rather embrace an illiberal society; this means they desire to restrict our freedom of thought and behavior, when, at the same time, flaunt theirs. The horrible truth is that radical conservatives employ lies, deceit and intolerance.
I become very upset witnessing a minority hobbling the governance of a majority of our “good-intentioned” congressmen and women. I actually yearn for politically correct discourse. This simply means I yearn for accountability for lying and spewing alternate facts, rude and insulting behavior and advocating violence for a narrow, ideological change with fascist overtones. Simply put, I yearn for all the virtues I still expect in civil discourse, not the present “road-rage” politics advocating changes that would actually impair our democracy and stifle our civil rights.
It is vital that people remember what being “woke” is, here and now: Woke is simply “being aware” of social and racial prejudice, discrimination and injustice; Empathy for citizens living in poverty and migrants being taken advantage of and/or abused; The right for citizens to be able to vote safely and fairly; That no child becomes malnourished or lacks medical care; Being concerned about our natural environment.
So, if you cannot love everyone (who can?), at least treat them with a civil, respectful discourse. Remember there are active, radical extremists out there now capitalizing on societal and political hyper-polarization in order to mainstream their ideologies and conspiracy theories into the public discourse. Heads of state like Hitler, Putin, Orban, Stalin, Hussein, Assad, and yes, Trump, along with many others, have already done this, and it has brought nothing but harm and suffering to their own fellow citizens along with sending their shared cultures backwards.
On and on it goes it seems. So, dig it! Be Woke! And yes, I’m proud to say, I am awake.
Tim and Kristy Wood moved to Beaufort in 1974. He worked as a carpenter in both restoration and new home construction, as well as operating a shop specializing in custom woodwork, Wood on Wood Specs. He is semi-retired, involved with fine woodworking and formerly sat on the City of Beaufort Zoning Board of Appeals.
