L.M. - With due respect, you have been awakened to some new realities, which is great, but please do not call yourself "woke". The word has taken on meanings that I don't think you want applied to yourself.
As I see it, the word has evolved in current usage to represent someone who spends far too much time looking for and calling out m…
L.M. - With due respect, you have been awakened to some new realities, which is great, but please do not call yourself "woke". The word has taken on meanings that I don't think you want applied to yourself.
As I see it, the word has evolved in current usage to represent someone who spends far too much time looking for and calling out minor offenses against any group they think has been, in some sense, oppressed. Instead of educating and helping people to improve themselves, lots of "woke" folks seem to prefer tearing down those who don't meet their particular norms, which, to be clear, are not necessarily widely accepted, at least in the form they adhere to.
IMNSHO it's the "woke" people who are major instigators of "cancel culture".
I hope you are buying into the propaganda demonization of the metaphor "woke." innocently. "Minor offenses?" Like decades of redlining whole communities in terms of insurance, property values, grocery stores, school funding, water quality? Or killing for minor traffic stops vastly out of proportion to others? Arresting, imprisoning and convicting and - yes, executing - at stunningly higher rates compared to similar offenses? Oh, yeah, that's all "minor." "In some sense, oppressed?" Oh, I have read you right. What are "their particular norms...not necessarily widely accepted" that the "woke" are wrongly wanting to impose? Maybe not brutally beating a teenager and hanging him on a barb wire fence to freeze the rest of the way to death? I'll plead "woke" to opposing that "minor" offense. His murderers bleated "cancel culture," no doubt. His way of being wasn't "necessarily widely accepted," after all. I do indeed hope you are a well-intentioned victim of the propaganda campaign to de-legitimize the idea of "woke."
Mmerose - Please do not assume you know what I think about the horrors that have been visited on the working class and the poor (all colors) over the years. You have completely misunderstood where I'm coming from. I'm not a victim of anything.
I cut my political teeth in the civil rights movement in the 60's and was deeply involved in the antiwar movement in the 70's. I'm also quite aware of the brutality with which the Black community has been treated. In 1981 the last lynching in the US happened only a few miles from where I live.
But, when people who call themselves woke use that as a cudgel to beat on someone who, for example, says something in support of the Palestinians, that's a problem.
If your understanding of woke means being aware of and acknowledging the truth of all of those issues you justifiably rant about, that's fine. I'm not trying to change your mind. I just choose not to use the word to refer to those who understand our brutal history and the sh*tshow this country has become.
Respect. I read the Guardian article. I THINK (?) you are interpreting the Israel-partisan donors as "calling themselves woke." Trying to be brief, looking at this segment:
He (Salaita) said he was troubled by the emails, saying that they are “part of a nationwide concerted effort by wealthy and well-organised groups to attack pro-Palestinian students and faculty and silence their speech.”
“This risks creating a Palestinian exception to the first amendment and to academic freedom,” he said, adding it is an area that “should be worrying to all scholars and teachers”.
That sounds to me like the "woke" statement. The offended donors arrogantly using their financial clout to muzzle University speech and policy seem the opposite. As do the cowardly University honchos. But the whole faraglio is pretty "woke" murky. As is everything about, well, the whole Middle East. Sometimes I ponder the juxtaposition of Europe "giving 'Israel' back" to the Jews, who had not held hegemony there in over 2000 years. (when did the Romans take over?) And wonder, huh, America was only stolen from the native population beginning about 400 years ago! I could get thrown off a Univ. faculty in record time. But not by anybody "woke."
I think the students started it and the donors decided to make it happen.
Israel was created as a result of the Balfour Declaration of 1917 which announced British support for a "national homeland for the Jewish people" in Palestine.
I read recently about Theodor Herzl, considered the "Father of Zionism", and his original vision for a Jewish homeland. He envisioned a utopian society in which both Jews and Muslims lived together in harmony.
Unfortunately, the original Jewish emigres to that area were not interested in sharing. As a result, the State of Israel, i.e. the government, has become an apartheid state and IMNSHO they have become what they despised. Very sad.
I say this as a Jew who supports the idea of a Jewish state like Herzl advocated, but I am very much opposed to Zionism as it is defined today. I imagine that if certain people see this comment I will be flamed for being a self-hating Jew. Oh well, nevertheless.
L.M. - With due respect, you have been awakened to some new realities, which is great, but please do not call yourself "woke". The word has taken on meanings that I don't think you want applied to yourself.
As I see it, the word has evolved in current usage to represent someone who spends far too much time looking for and calling out minor offenses against any group they think has been, in some sense, oppressed. Instead of educating and helping people to improve themselves, lots of "woke" folks seem to prefer tearing down those who don't meet their particular norms, which, to be clear, are not necessarily widely accepted, at least in the form they adhere to.
IMNSHO it's the "woke" people who are major instigators of "cancel culture".
I hope you are buying into the propaganda demonization of the metaphor "woke." innocently. "Minor offenses?" Like decades of redlining whole communities in terms of insurance, property values, grocery stores, school funding, water quality? Or killing for minor traffic stops vastly out of proportion to others? Arresting, imprisoning and convicting and - yes, executing - at stunningly higher rates compared to similar offenses? Oh, yeah, that's all "minor." "In some sense, oppressed?" Oh, I have read you right. What are "their particular norms...not necessarily widely accepted" that the "woke" are wrongly wanting to impose? Maybe not brutally beating a teenager and hanging him on a barb wire fence to freeze the rest of the way to death? I'll plead "woke" to opposing that "minor" offense. His murderers bleated "cancel culture," no doubt. His way of being wasn't "necessarily widely accepted," after all. I do indeed hope you are a well-intentioned victim of the propaganda campaign to de-legitimize the idea of "woke."
Mmerose - Please do not assume you know what I think about the horrors that have been visited on the working class and the poor (all colors) over the years. You have completely misunderstood where I'm coming from. I'm not a victim of anything.
I cut my political teeth in the civil rights movement in the 60's and was deeply involved in the antiwar movement in the 70's. I'm also quite aware of the brutality with which the Black community has been treated. In 1981 the last lynching in the US happened only a few miles from where I live.
https://www.al.com/news/2018/04/last_lynching_in_america_shock.html
But, when people who call themselves woke use that as a cudgel to beat on someone who, for example, says something in support of the Palestinians, that's a problem.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/sep/09/professor-israel-criticism-twitter-university-illinois
If your understanding of woke means being aware of and acknowledging the truth of all of those issues you justifiably rant about, that's fine. I'm not trying to change your mind. I just choose not to use the word to refer to those who understand our brutal history and the sh*tshow this country has become.
Respect. I read the Guardian article. I THINK (?) you are interpreting the Israel-partisan donors as "calling themselves woke." Trying to be brief, looking at this segment:
He (Salaita) said he was troubled by the emails, saying that they are “part of a nationwide concerted effort by wealthy and well-organised groups to attack pro-Palestinian students and faculty and silence their speech.”
“This risks creating a Palestinian exception to the first amendment and to academic freedom,” he said, adding it is an area that “should be worrying to all scholars and teachers”.
That sounds to me like the "woke" statement. The offended donors arrogantly using their financial clout to muzzle University speech and policy seem the opposite. As do the cowardly University honchos. But the whole faraglio is pretty "woke" murky. As is everything about, well, the whole Middle East. Sometimes I ponder the juxtaposition of Europe "giving 'Israel' back" to the Jews, who had not held hegemony there in over 2000 years. (when did the Romans take over?) And wonder, huh, America was only stolen from the native population beginning about 400 years ago! I could get thrown off a Univ. faculty in record time. But not by anybody "woke."
Thank you.
I think the students started it and the donors decided to make it happen.
Israel was created as a result of the Balfour Declaration of 1917 which announced British support for a "national homeland for the Jewish people" in Palestine.
I read recently about Theodor Herzl, considered the "Father of Zionism", and his original vision for a Jewish homeland. He envisioned a utopian society in which both Jews and Muslims lived together in harmony.
Unfortunately, the original Jewish emigres to that area were not interested in sharing. As a result, the State of Israel, i.e. the government, has become an apartheid state and IMNSHO they have become what they despised. Very sad.
I say this as a Jew who supports the idea of a Jewish state like Herzl advocated, but I am very much opposed to Zionism as it is defined today. I imagine that if certain people see this comment I will be flamed for being a self-hating Jew. Oh well, nevertheless.
Stay safe, Mmerose.