Whither woke?

Up here in the Northern New Hampshire everybody’s asking: are we past the peak?

Yesterday, driving around and gazing at the brilliant oranges and reds glowing in the sunlight I realized that, contrary to what seems true when you look out my back window, the peak is not yet behind us. I’m glad I didn’t stay at home.

Clearly, you need a broader perspective to judge if a trend has peaked, or slowed down, or had a temporary setback or whatever.

There’s a circle of people that I tend to pay some attention to who are asking a similar question about a different trend. Have we passed “peak woke”? Unlike the foliage-obsessed, most of these folks are rooting not for a nay, but for a yay in answer to their question.

(What is woke, and isn’t there a better word for it?)  

Who are these people? They write or speak in the political podcasts and columns I read—a lot of them reside in Substack-istan. A lot of them tweet:

Wokeness has not peaked. Cancellation peaked because wokeness seized control of all the institutions it sought to control and drove out all dissenters, obviating the need for further cancellations as it imposes its agenda uncontested https://t.co/vnv2fyjqgs

— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) October 9, 2024

There are strong opinions. The most critical opponents of woke—especially victims of woke-driven cancellation like Mr. Yang—are more likely to be pessimistic. If identity politics seems to be less aggressive, it’s because it's work is mostly done, having succeeded in permeating civic institutions with woke values. Ibram Kendi’s star may be setting, but the Pulitzer Center’s 1619 project has gotten a very Kendi-esque message about the “foundational role” of slavery into US history curricula in all 50 states according to a five-year report the center issued last month.

Others seem to think that while a few bitter-enders (what someone referred to as “Blue MAGA”) continue to push radical (woke) identitarianism, these are “lagging indicators” and we’re mostly done with all that. 

A few examples that the great awakening is ending: some universities have stopped requiring diversity statements from job applicants. Corporations have cut back on DEI spending. Anti-woke writings issue from all directions on the political compass. Some news outlets have backed away from the woke advocacy that had seeped in to their coverage a few years ago.

The New York Times is the prime example. After some high profile cancellations during the 2020 “reckoning” (inquisition), the Times has adjusted its application of “moral clarity”  toward a more traditional version of journalistic objectivity. Hired in the wake of those fiascos, executive editor Joseph Kahn refused to capitulate to the demands issued in open letters by woke staffers who objected to coverage of transgender issues and the conflict in Israel/Palestine. The opinion page has also hired woke-critical writers like John McWhorter and Pamela Paul, also to the chagrin of some SJW staffers. Also, word usage. The Economist counted up the number of times “white privilege” appeared in the Times —2.5 per million in 2020 and just 0.4 in 2023.

Then there's the cyclical theory.  The movement is not dead, but has retreated to the shadows, as Freddie DeBoer puts it, “to reorganize itself and come up with new arguments” that will be unveiled at some point in the future. There really is no dustbin of history, it turns out, just rehab where out-of-fashion ideas go for rest and a makeover. 

But meanwhile, some of the ideas of the movement have become so deeply embedded into our cultural norms that we aren’t even aware of them. It’s like inflation. Prices have stopped rising, but they ain’t going back to what they were.

A key question about the current state of woke involves its current standing in the Democratic Party. Some would point to the triumph of Joe Biden, the least-woke candidate in 2020 and the fact that no significant Democrat ever endorsed “abolish the police.”

After the Democrat’s most cringe-worthy woke moment in 2020 when Congressional leaders took a knee and bowed their heads while wearing African Kente stoles in a moment of silence for George Floyd, the party has de-emphasized identity politics. 2024 nominee Harris hardly mentions that she would be the first female president and she’s abandoned most of her woke positions of 2020, like de-criminalizing border crossings.

But others think the Party hasn’t gone far enough. The decision to hand the nomination to Harris and her choice of the more liberal Tim Waltz over Josh Shapiro for VP are seen as signs that the Party isn’t going far enough. And Harris has renounced her woke 2020 stands, or said they were mistaken, or really offered any rationale for the change of position.

Brianna Wu recently cited a “Musicians for Kamala” YouTube event as typical of the way that “superficial identity politics” still dominate the Democrats' messaging and argued that the Party’s supposed “course correction” has been inadequate and is why Harris hasn’t pulled far ahead of the deeply unpopular Republican nominee.

Whether or not she is right about the party’s current direction, I think she is correct about the impact on Harris’s current standing in the polls. The great awokening has done perhaps irreparable damage to the Democratic Party’s ability to win elections and especially to the prospects of progressive reform within the party’s coalition.

As I was working on this essay, a Substack post from the Democratic strategist Ruy Teixeira landed in my inbox. His piece, “The Progressive Moment is Over,” diagnosed how the great progressive movement that was personified in Bernie Sanders, has been completely discredited and abandoned even by some of its most ardent supporters. 

He blamed four “terrible” progressive ideas, at least three of which can be categorized as “woke.” 

More on that soon: "Woke-the damage done."