A candidate for president of the United States recently said: “wokeness is a virus that is more dangerous than any pandemic.” Other politicians claimed that wokeness caused the collapse of more than one bank, with billions of dollars in assets.
Given the potential for such dire consequences, I asked a few Kansans at random if they were woke, and what woke meant to them. Their responses included:
“I’m not sure exactly what woke means.”
“Woke is an attack on American family values.”
“Maybe, but I don’t know what a nonbinary person is.”
“I’m absolutely woke because I have respect for people of all races.”
“No. I don’t worry about being overly sensitive to the feelings of every person I encounter.”
Woke seems to have multiple definitions, but Kansas residents don’t seem to think that woke will give them a deadly virus or threaten the American banking system.
Readers will need to make up their minds about issues that fall within the range of wokeness. For example, is canceling speakers whose views we disagree with being woke? Both conservative and liberal speakers have been targeted, so where does that leave us? How about censorship of public figures on social media sites, whether Donald Trump or Nancy Pelosi?
Is it woke to say one should be blocked but not the other? Any point of view can be tagged as objectionable and thus wrong.
The biggest woke issue right now is gender. You can sort through multiple definitions; male, female, agender, bigender, cisgender, and gender fluid. We’ve seen debates over bathroom use and pronouns. On the other hand, the U.S. military has active-duty transgender soldiers who have fought in combat.
Next year is an election year. Wokeness has a lot of traction these days, and we’re likely to hear about the tedious issue for months to come. After election day in November 2024, I suspect that wokeness will disappear from the scene. In the meantime, when charlatans from all walks of life drone on about being woke, tune them out.
Wokeness will have little, if any, effect on the everyday lives of Kansans.
As amusing as it is to write about the absurdity of being woke, there is a dark side that citizens of all states cannot ignore. Weeks after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis criticized the Disney Corporation for being woke, protesters gathered outside Disney World in Orlando waving Nazi flags as families with children were entering the park.
In today’s America, it’s not out of the question to realize this could happen in other parts of the country. It could happen in Kansas.
