https://amgreatness.com/2021/05/21/a-woke-lexicon/
At this point few will deny that there is a massive failure to communicate between the minions of the woke Left and those who have managed to maintain their equilibrium in a world gone off the rails. At least some substantial portion of that failure stems from the fact that too many of us hear woke Left terminology and take it literally, ascribing to it traditional definitions of the sort that might still be found in dusty dictionaries or that are tacitly shared by all involved in dinner-table conversations in ordinary American households.
Thus, for example, when we hear the accusation of “racism” cast about recklessly every which way, we might feel bewildered or even exasperated if we approach the matter from the standpoint of the word’s customary meaning. To clear this and other similar misunderstandings up, I have endeavored to offer below a necessarily partial compilation of woke terms and what they really mean when voiced by those on the other side of our growing political divide.
Please understand: as this is a work of cultural anthropology presenting a snapshot of the inner workings of an anti-culture that routinely purges its own most cherished creeds and their adherents, all definitions adduced here are necessarily provisional and may change drastically, even by the time you are done reading these words.
Please note, also, that in order to steer clear of even the appearance of Western imperialist hegemony, I have studiously avoided alphabetical order and presented the terms below in a sequence informed solely by the opaque workings of pure intuition and indiscriminate whim.
racism:
[archaic and rarely used in this sense today] the harboring, exhibition or embodiment in practices of ungrounded views or beliefs that some racial groups are inferior or superior to others in various ways
a generalized term of derision commonly used in a manner similar to how terms such as “jerk” or “scoundrel” might have been employed in earlier epochs
a label deployed in order to ostracize or as a prelude to a ritualized ostracism, roughly analogous to “witch” during the Salem witch trials
a rallying cry used to muster support for Democratic Party candidates or policies, especially for candidates or policies that stand against the interests of poor and working class Americans; also, the central tenet of contemporary Democratic Party politics that is most often deployed ironically, that is, to refer to anything and everything as “racism” or “racist” in order to institute “corrective” practices or policies that are, in reality, far closer to the traditional notion of “racism” than the practices or policies that they seek to correct; see also anti-racism
a fail-safe retort that may be strategically deployed to stifle disagreement or shut down debate, especially when it is a debate one is losing
a label for the emotion of BIPOC individuals when their feelings are hurt
a word news media companies with a shrinking audience, such as CNN or the New York Times, can and should throw around frequently and indiscriminately to drum up controversy and create fleeting spikes in viewership and/or readership to stave off their inevitable sell-offs and bankruptcies
a false charge to be publicly leveled at in-laws (ideally, during softball interviews with Oprah) by wealthy, privileged, status-seeking, profiteering, half-BIPOC C-list actresses who marry into the British royal family but find themselves, due to their thoroughgoing narcissism, unable to get along with others, whether their own family or their new in-laws, especially when said actresses become upset and disenchanted with the whole “royal” thing upon discovering that her husband likely will never become King.
