3 ms·

Where did woke ideas start to spread?

4 points by xqcgrek2 4y ago

cocacola1 4y ago
Without the paywall: https://archive.is/aWOC8 https://archive.is/aWOC8
version_five 4y ago
Article says (with caveats) that Canada, Sweden, and Austraila are the early adopters. Of these I'm only familiar with Canada, in which the economy revolves entirely around government spending, with a few quasi-government oligopolies thrown in (banks and utilities that also have effective taxation power). This kind of administration heavy system is exactly where these ideas proliferate. They are all about exerting power over others, and in a bureaucracy that's disconnected from the real world they are a great way to jockey for power, so it's not surprising to see canada as a leader. No idea if this holds for the other two.
- maga_2020 4y ago
  I am thinking that the 3 countries you had mentioned are the 'vanguard' of the 'isms' in the western world, not because the populous there initiated these ideas -- but because these places are chosen to be the 'test grounds'. Sort of like it is easier to have biolabs or other testing facilities, in other places... to test out how those yet-to-be-fully-backed ideas will work out, without incurring costs of a 'blowback' in the financially-and-election sensitive places.. After all, the introduction of laws, the supporting 'academic research', and other elements -- will need to be built out... Cashless society is another idea that will be implemented in the 3 places you mentioned, first.
  - version_five 4y ago
    I definitely agree for Canada. A docile population that doesn't care much about anything, and the weird feudal / aristocratic corporate structure we have, rather than any real representative democracy. I understand Australia is similar but don't know first hand.
krapp 4y ago
The phenomenon, it seems, did not begin in America (see chart). Countries such as Australia, Canada and Sweden in fact led the charge. This is simply incorrect. "woke" started in the African American community. Its roots are in black activism. It was later co-opted by white leftists and - as with everything else white leftists take from the black community - all but entirely removed from its intended political context, that being opposition to white supremacy. To ignore this in service of an alternate history where "wokeness" began in Europe and Australia and didn't even take root in the US until after the millennium, and only when the "social justice warrior" movement in the US began to become culturally relevant, is grossly ignorant to the point of seeming like whitewashing. What "woke" means now is irrelevant - at this point its been so corrupted that its only stable point of equilibrium is as an anti-leftist pejorative. Even the article couldn't resist an eye-roll or two, because no one uses "woke" in good faith anymore. But we know where "woke" ideas came from, and it wasn't Foucalt and Derrida.
- jfengel 4y ago
  I never heard "woke" from a white leftist. I'm sure there must have been a brief period where it was used that way, but I never heard the term except as a pejorative. (I would not have heard it as it was used by the African American community.) It seems to have had much the same arc as "politically correct", which I never heard as a live usage. As with "woke", I know it had some live usages, but it was never widespread. (Or at least, not widespread enough to reach me -- not the most "with it" guy, to be sure, but you'd certainly expect me as a lefty to have heard of it if it really were a movement big enough to oppose.)

4 points by xqcgrek2 4y ago

Without the paywall: https://archive.is/aWOC8 https://archive.is/aWOC8

Article says (with caveats) that Canada, Sweden, and Austraila are the early adopters. Of these I'm only familiar with Canada, in which the economy revolves entirely around government spending, with a few quasi-government oligopolies thrown in (banks and utilities that also have effective taxation power). This kind of administration heavy system is exactly where these ideas proliferate. They are all about exerting power over others, and in a bureaucracy that's disconnected from the real world they are a great way to jockey for power, so it's not surprising to see canada as a leader. No idea if this holds for the other two.

maga_2020 4y ago
I am thinking that the 3 countries you had mentioned are the 'vanguard' of the 'isms' in the western world, not because the populous there initiated these ideas -- but because these places are chosen to be the 'test grounds'. Sort of like it is easier to have biolabs or other testing facilities, in other places... to test out how those yet-to-be-fully-backed ideas will work out, without incurring costs of a 'blowback' in the financially-and-election sensitive places.. After all, the introduction of laws, the supporting 'academic research', and other elements -- will need to be built out... Cashless society is another idea that will be implemented in the 3 places you mentioned, first.
- version_five 4y ago
  I definitely agree for Canada. A docile population that doesn't care much about anything, and the weird feudal / aristocratic corporate structure we have, rather than any real representative democracy. I understand Australia is similar but don't know first hand.

krapp 4y ago

The phenomenon, it seems, did not begin in America (see chart). Countries such as Australia, Canada and Sweden in fact led the charge. This is simply incorrect. "woke" started in the African American community. Its roots are in black activism. It was later co-opted by white leftists and - as with everything else white leftists take from the black community - all but entirely removed from its intended political context, that being opposition to white supremacy. To ignore this in service of an alternate history where "wokeness" began in Europe and Australia and didn't even take root in the US until after the millennium, and only when the "social justice warrior" movement in the US began to become culturally relevant, is grossly ignorant to the point of seeming like whitewashing. What "woke" means now is irrelevant - at this point its been so corrupted that its only stable point of equilibrium is as an anti-leftist pejorative. Even the article couldn't resist an eye-roll or two, because no one uses "woke" in good faith anymore. But we know where "woke" ideas came from, and it wasn't Foucalt and Derrida.

jfengel 4y ago
I never heard "woke" from a white leftist. I'm sure there must have been a brief period where it was used that way, but I never heard the term except as a pejorative. (I would not have heard it as it was used by the African American community.) It seems to have had much the same arc as "politically correct", which I never heard as a live usage. As with "woke", I know it had some live usages, but it was never widespread. (Or at least, not widespread enough to reach me -- not the most "with it" guy, to be sure, but you'd certainly expect me as a lefty to have heard of it if it really were a movement big enough to oppose.)