The term woke goes back to the 1930s as a term used by black Americans for awareness of racial prejudice and discrimination. Being aware that these things are real problems that people face is being woke. Since then it's been generalised to include sexism, and more recently awareness of issues such as transphobia.
By itself it's no more left or right than the issue of prejudice is generally given that there are feminists, homosexuals and transgender people who are conservative politically but also woke in the original sense.
Very recently, in the last few years, it's been adopted as a pejorative term for far left identity politics. Now far left identity politics is a real thing, and it certainly is woke and probably deserves to have a pejorative term for it, but it has no ownership or exclusive claim on the term woke. unfortunately this may be a lost battle at this stage, but there are still a lot of people in the black community who have been using the term in its original meaning for generations and will doubtless continue to do so.
simonh|3 years ago
By itself it's no more left or right than the issue of prejudice is generally given that there are feminists, homosexuals and transgender people who are conservative politically but also woke in the original sense.
Very recently, in the last few years, it's been adopted as a pejorative term for far left identity politics. Now far left identity politics is a real thing, and it certainly is woke and probably deserves to have a pejorative term for it, but it has no ownership or exclusive claim on the term woke. unfortunately this may be a lost battle at this stage, but there are still a lot of people in the black community who have been using the term in its original meaning for generations and will doubtless continue to do so.
rzl777|3 years ago