woke.

[Just Some Guy]

In my lifetime it's been called being right-on, being politically correct, being woke and possibly something else I've forgotten.

It's all cyclical too. Liberally minded people try to find a word for their attitude, the Right pick it up and mock it, make bollocks up (kids can't sing Baa-Baa-Black Sheep in nursery anymore being a favourite from the 1980s), then it gets misused to refer to something irrelevant (see the sandwich story a couple of posts up)....and then a new phrase comes along to sum up common decency.

Perhaps the difference this time is that, correct me if I'm wrong, the term Woke comes from African-American society, rather than well intentioned white folk like me.

That makes mockery of the term feel like an extra attack on the people for whom this meant something.

[Dr. Alan Grant]

48 minutes ago, Just Some Guy said:

In my lifetime it's been called being right-on, being politically correct, being woke and possibly something else I've forgotten.

I recall “social justice warrior” and “snowflake” bridging the gap between pc gone mad and woke. The good thing about these terms is that they help to identify those who use them as complete berks and you can save yourself the trouble of talking to them. 

[deathrey]

I was called a tree hugging hippie by some of my relatives (used in totally the wrong context, over never really been an eco warrior, just left wing and conscious of other people) also 'dole warrior' for defending the various reasons people claim benefits and not demonsing them. Lovely people I'm related to.

Edited November 18, 2024 by deathrey

[SuperBacon]

36 minutes ago, deathrey said:

dole warrior

That could be quite a good wrestler gimmick. 

[Merzbow]

Turns from an out of work working class babyface to a banana baron heel.

[westlondonmist]

9 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

That could be quite a good wrestler gimmick. 

Wasn't that who Awesome Kong played in GLOW?

 

46 minutes ago, deathrey said:

I was called a tree hugging hippie by some of my relatives (used in totally the wrong context, over never really been an eco warrior, just left wing and conscious of other people) also 'dole warrior' for defending the various reasons people claim benefits and not demonsing them. Lovely people I'm related to.

Are you Lianne Cartman?

[deathrey]

1 minute ago, westlondonmist said:

Are you Lianne Cartman?

I can neither confirm nor deny these rumours

[Mr_Danger]

44 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

That could be quite a good wrestler gimmick. 

He has to stop wrestling and pretend to be doing something else every so often because he’s being watched by the dole police. Signature moves are the Cash in Hand submission manoeuvre and the Giro Driver. Weaknesses are his bad back and poor stamina. I’m thinking Orange Cassidy meets Jim Royle.

[SuperBacon]

19 minutes ago, Mr_Danger said:

He has to stop wrestling and pretend to be doing something else every so often because he’s being watched by the dole police. Signature moves are the Cash in Hand submission manoeuvre and the Giro Driver. Weaknesses are his bad back and poor stamina. I’m thinking Orange Cassidy meets Jim Royle.

His finisher would be The Sanction. 

[BomberPat]

18 hours ago, lanky316 said:

That's all woke means, being respectful and aware of things. It's just become the latest version of "political correctness gone mad!" over things that haven't really happened or have nothing to do with any of that but the usual bigoted mob have decided to modernise a bit. The vast majority of people who describe themselves as anti-woke are usually old manning at clouds over things and can't even really say what it is they're offended by without basically saying "I want to be *insert phobia here* without people calling me out on it"

There's a Stewart Lee joke that I think is actually really instructive when it comes to making sense of how people see this, about how his Gran gets confused between political correctness and basic health and safety. They're both right-wing press bugbears that actually boil down to "we want less regulation on what we do", but people just see the stories and think that somewhere there's some nebulous group telling them that they're not allowed to do something that they've always done.

If you're not aware of the years, often decades, of work that has gone into campaigning about certain issues, and then suddenly you just see a news story that something "isn't allowed" or that some group is "up in arms" about it, or wanting something banned, it must feel like there is just some nebulous group arbitrarily banning things without rhyme or reason.

It's like the statue of Edward Colston being toppled - people acted as if it was a completely arbitrarily, senseless act, just done because of some flash in the pan racial awareness movement, rather than the culmination of decades of protest against the use of Colston's name in Bristol. When you only see the headline or the end of a story, I guess it can all look pretty bewildering - reminds me of my Gran constantly getting flustered about what you're "allowed" to call black people every time she saw one on TV.

[Devon Malcolm]

1 hour ago, BomberPat said:

It's like the statue of Edward Colston being toppled - people acted as if it was a completely arbitrarily, senseless act, just done because of some flash in the pan racial awareness movement, rather than the culmination of decades of protest against the use of Colston's name in Bristol.

Some of them were on here!

[SuperBacon]

20 minutes ago, Devon Malcolm said:

Some of them were on here!

Ah the good old days when people thought statues or visiting Rome were the only ways you could learn. 

[Mr_Danger]

There was a cracking bit on the soon to be appointed secretary of keeping it real’s latest podcast with Elon Palpatine where Musk was trying to demonstrate his AI’s great sense of humour and Rogan was asking it to make a joke about trans people in sports and the AI basically kept replying that the people up in arms about trans people in sports were baby snowflakes. Musk responding that it needs some work whilst Rogan keeps saying that it doesn’t make sense is beyond anything any of the great satirical comedians could conjure. 

[ReturnOfTheMack]

[Chest Rockwell]

Ugh. Can we keep Trump stuff in the Trump thread please? Mainly just so I don't have to see it.