Is Being ‘Woke’ A Free Pass To Offend?
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I woke up this morning so, I must be woke. If I wasn’t I’d be asleep. Woke is one of the ‘new words’ that have popped up over the last few years in the UK. BAME is another – Black and minority ethnic – although I was told it’s not used much in the USA anymore? Oh well. Britain is often a wee bit behind the USA in some things. I suppose we must have woke up? (I refuse to apologize for the awful pun).
According to the Oxford English Dictionary “woke” is defined as: “Originally: well-informed, up-to-date. Now chiefly: alert to racial or social discrimination and injustice.”
The Urban Dictionary, however, simply says: “Being woke means being aware… knowing what’s going on in the community (related to racism and social injustice).”
To summarize: woke means a person is consciously awake.
It’s of African American origin and refers to a perceived awareness of issues concerning social and racial justice.
Well, as I’m consciously awake, regardless of what the wife might tell you, I am clearly ‘woke’ simply because I am awake. So there.
Except I’m not.
I am actually about as ‘woke’ as any person asleep could be and I’m happy that way.
In my experience, ‘woke’ people seem to spend most, nay, all of their lives trying to find something that will offend them. One way or another they will succeed. You have to admire their determination to be offended.
Then they shout and/or scream and/or complain about whatever it is.
What they can’t seem to get their silly heads around is this. We are entitled to offend you. It is our right to offend you. Indeed, it is also your right, you ‘woke’ idiot, to offend others whether intentionally or otherwise.
Admittedly, intentionally offending someone isn’t a nice thing to do, but, it is your right.
If you want to call me ‘a fat northern git’ you have every right to. I might well pour your beer over your head if you do, but I will defend your right to offend me.
I tried explaining this to a ‘woke’ friend. They often look aghast at some comment or other I make and say “You can’t say that!” – Well, actually, I can. I am not saying anything that incites hatred nor violence, therefore, under our freedom of speech laws, I can say it. I then often tell him he is a ‘plonker’, which also seems to offend him.
I do actually feel sorry for ‘woke’ people. So easily offended as they often are.
I try to explain to them: “Look. It’s OK to be offended. It doesn’t hurt you. You haven’t been punched in the mouth. You won’t wake up with a fatal illness you know. You feel offended. Get over it, you pillock!” – which invariably offends them because A) I’ve told them it’s OK to be offended and B) I’ve called them a pillock.
There has been an extraordinary amount of ‘wokeness’, (is that a word or have I just invented it? Oh well, you know what I mean), in the UK for quite some time. It used to amuse me a lot, now it just bores me.
“You can’t call him fat! That’s body shaming!” – “I didn’t go up to him and say ‘you’re fat’, I said to you ‘isn’t he fat?'”
“You can’t say she’s got a face like a smacked ass!” – “Well, she has!”
Bored now.
I would never go up to someone and intentionally say anything to upset nor offend them. Well, unless they have really really pissed me off anyway.
I wouldn’t drive down the road and shout “Lard ass!” at a fat lady. That’s just rude and uncalled for, but, equally, neither will I spend my life wondering what everyone else might think is, or isn’t, appropriate to say.
I have my own moral compass thank you very much and, if my moral compass is pointing in a completely different direction to yours, then tough.
It’s freedom of speech again, isn’t it? I have the freedom to say most things, as have you.
I defend the right for you to say anything you like to me, providing it doesn’t incite hatred nor violence and, I defend my right to say anything I like to you, under the same rule.
It’s nice and sunny here as I look out of the window. I hope that lady wobbling by doesn’t bend over. There’d be a total eclipse!
Not sorry ‘wokes’. Get over it.
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As Bill said: “You can’t fix stupid.” I’m also with everyone else on this thread. Quite frankly I still don’t know what “word” means. People have been saying “word” now for a couple of years and it makes no sense to me. It appears, at first glance, it appears to be a strong indication of affirmation. Like BAME, and WOKE, I think it’s stupid. Thanks for your time 🙂
That’s oldz have figured out the language that has been out for years now, time to get new words 😉
It is nothing more than a disquieted way of getting attention by the uncouth. It is somewhat like telling someone to “Get Real”. Real what?. Those are the things I just hang my head and walk away from because it is stupid and as Ron White has said, “You can’t fix stupid.”
I’m a language snob and rather protective of our beloved tongue. Consequently I’m predisposed to feel hostile toward snobbish egotistical jargon that exists only to separate the user from lesser people who have adequate vocabularies and don’t need to invent words to fill the holes.
It’s easier to win arguments of course, if you invent your own terms and dictate the meanings, so if you suggest I become more enlightened the next step would still be to ask what the hell you meant. “Woke” leaves you in the same place. I have no idea what game is being played with BAME. Never heard of it unless it’s the Brotherhood of American Mining Engineers.
It’s taken me a while to be aware of the game but I now reject all such attempts to frame disputes and rig discussions. After all “enlightenment” is completely relative. To some Buddhists, enlightenment may even be defined as rejecting such silly arguments out of hand as nothing really means anything anyway.
So sorry – woke is a joke and for me Satori is the story.