Keep

Some donut left a comment on one of our workshop posts about it being “woke indoctrination.”

Woke is yet another term stolen from Black Americans and twisted by the right wing.

So what is woke? Back in the day, we’d tell each other to “stay woke.” I had a friend we used to call “woke brother James” with love (though he sometimes wasn’t that fun at a party, if you know what I mean).

Being woke means waking up to the realities of oppression and not hiding from it. It means understanding racism. Understanding history. Understanding political theory. Understanding capitalism.

Understanding, for instance, that capitalism REQUIRES a underclass. That BIPOC are more likely to be put into that underclass through discrimination in education, employment, healthcare, policing/law enforcement, food deserts, and on and on.

Being woke helps you understand what is happening to you. What is happening to your brothers, sisters and siblings around the corner and around the world.

Being woke helps you avoid falling for stupid rhetoric - like blaming immigrants from taking jobs. You understand that racism + capitalism means the brown person from across the planet is being used and the right person to blame is the boss who believes in money and exploitation over everything else.

Being woke helps you identify that trans people are being scapegoated and used. They are less than 1% of the population, so why the trumped up hubbub? (What’s the word for male hysteria?)

What they call woke indoctrination is, to me, just a call to love your neighbour and don’t judge.

I’m not trans but trans people get to decide how to live their lives. Nothing they’re doing harms me, so i can just mind my business (at the VERY least) or offer my love and support.

I don’t experience anti-Asian racism but I know how brutal racism can be, so how can I help? I listen, I learn, I act. Repeat. Love and support.

Be woke. Understand the myriad intersectional oppressions that exist and work against them. And know that ideas of “woke indoctrination” are just another way in which you’re being conned. Tricked into fighting the wrong people and distracted from the things we should all be fighting (lack of affordable housing, accessible healthcare/lack of healthcare professionals, environmental destruction and an ongoing climate crisis, low wages and a despicable work culture, corruption in government, etc.)

Stay woke y’all.

- Judith 💜💜

(Edited to correct the first sentence. Changed the word worship to workshop.)