My Interpretation of Woke

Have you ever gone on YouTube or TikTok and have heard someone discussing wokeism? Me too. The word woke seems to have just appeared suddenly and the usage of the word has increased throughout recent years. Despite this, it seems that we don't have a distinctive answer to what it truly means to be 'woke.' Even if there is a definitive definition that you can easily find in the dictionary, it runs a bit deeper than that. I even struggle to truly understand and define this word. At the moment, it seems like it doesn't mean anything, but everything in our society at the same time. The dictionary definition of woke is 'alert to and concerned about social injustice and discrimination.' By that definition, I would consider myself woke. However, it has been twisted and used many times to become something negative.

On the political left, wokeness sometimes drifts into wokeism—a system of thought and behavior characterized by intolerance, policing the speech of others, and proving one’s own superiority by denouncing others. It has also become synonymous with political correctness, like how Disney is being unoriginal and making all their characters Black and increasing the amount of LGBTQ representation. They're doing it to stay relevant.

Woke gained a newer meaning that 'past tense of awake' and it has been weaponized for both the left and right sides. I'll try my best to explain or give an idea of what some people mean by woke, since it varies by context. Let's use Disney's new adaption of The Little Mermaid, the pending adaption of Snow White, or the new Barbie movie. What do they have in common. I would say that they push some type of political agenda. For example, the Barbie movie revolves around man-hating and gives the idea that she needs to act like a man to do something. She was always a feminist icon, she showed you can do anything you set your mind to. The upcoming Snow White and the recently release The Little Mermaid movie have a couple of things in common, other than being terrible money grabs. They share the idea of Disney's poor excuse of political correctness. They made Ariel Black (It's not a huge issue, but it's really unoriginal and is just exploitation in my mind) the seven dwarfs aren't even dwarves, and, like Ariel, there have been race-swaps.

Videos across the internet show Black children celebrating that "a princess looks just like me" like it's a 'gift.' Yet there are hundreds of stories of real Black princesses Disney isn't making films about. There is endless amounts of folkloric people and figures that Disney could write about. Many people have argued that changing her race isn't important and that it doesn't matter. If that was really the case, why make her Black at all?

Pushing for Black actors playing white characters while insisting race doesn't matter is rank hypocrisy. Many people are deluded and are acting like these race-swapped characters will break some kind of ground, as if Hollywood just freed the slaves with their benevolence.

This creates more division, and instead widens the chasm it was so poorly trying to close or impact. They all push some type of political standing or bias.

My interpretation of woke in the 'bad' sense is somebody trying to push their ideologies onto others. Whether it's in the form of a character in a children's show having two same-sex parents, or a book telling their child not to be racist. (How would a child even know what racism is? That's just implementing the idea of race being a thing, when children should just see others as people) In my opinion, there is good and bad woke. I think good woke is being aware of societal issues and trying to overcome them by uniting people. America has been divided from the color of our skin, our sexual orientation, right down to where we live and our salary and at this rate, we aren't getting anywhere.

We have to be aware of what is going on, but we can't force our ideas onto other who might not want to be a part of what you believe. Some people accept LGBTQ, some might not, that's an example of division in our country, but we shouldn't force our beliefs on one another.

(example) A person can transition if they want to, you have no say in it, it's their body, but that doesn't give that person the right to constantly berate people into supporting their choice. We have to accept our differences and come together. How are we going to combat these injustices if we are fighting against ourselves, which creates more issues?

Woke can be good and it also can be bad, but it overall depends on who you ask.

Thank you all for reading! I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I enjoyed writing it, and I hope it cleared up a few things for you. As always, have a good day🏙️/night🌃!

Remember to subscribe for more good reads, and share!

(My official blog: https://inkyrose.wixsite.com/inky-rose)

Have an opinion on this article? Comment on it! I would love to hear your opinion, and ALL OPINIONS ARE WELCOME! 🙂

(Stay tuned for sources and further reading!)

Sources and Further Reading:

What Does “Woke” Mean, and How Did the Term Become So Powerful? | The New Yorker

Woke - Wikipedia

Why ‘woke’ became toxic | LGBTQ | Al Jazeera

The Psychology of "Wokeism" | Psychology Today

'Barbie' slammed as 'woke' and 'man-hating' by conservatives (nydailynews.com)

Making White Characters Black Isn't Progress—It's Pandering. And It Insults Black Fans Like Me | Opinion (newsweek.com)