Those of us who love Britain, its history, its culture, its civilisation should be alarmed, frightened even, by the insidious undermining of all we hold dear by the malign and intended effects of “wokeism”.
“Woke” has become a common, everyday word, but where does it originate, what does it mean and what are the effects of “Wokery” or “Wokeism” on our lives?
The word “woke” originates in African-American slang and was originally understood to mean a state of being awake, or “woke”, to racial discrimination and prejudice as existing against African-Americans, particularly in the Southern States. This initial meaning has, however, been extensively extended over the past ten years or so to include various groups who are perceived as being persecuted based on their particular race, sexuality, disabilities, and gender.
Professor Eric Kaufman of Buckingham University describes “woke” as “the sacralisation of historically marginalised race, gender and sexual minority groups” and regards “wokery” as “cultural socialism” whose original aim was the protection from harm and discrimination of historically disadvantaged groups and, further, the attainment of equal outcomes for these groups through, for example, positive discrimination in education and employment. However, in order to achieve these objectives the revolutionary “Wokerati” insist that the whole of society must be re-educated and re-engineered to become “woke” and be awakened to their historical wrongs and failings, all of which emanate from being born White European, and particularly White British.
Whilst many will agree with the objectives of “Wokery”, it’s unfortunate, and dangerous, that those in pursuit of them from purely altruistic motives are guilty of gullibility, naivety and gross over-reach, whilst others use the movement to cloak their true, malign, revolutionary agenda.
The current concept of being “woke” has been imported lock stock and barrel from America mainly by left wing intellectuals, academics and educators who can be reasonably regarded as extreme socialists who desire the destruction of the western capitalist democratic model of free enterprise, free speech, private property, the rule of law and the rights of the individual and its replacement by a quasi-Marxist system of control of action, of speech, of thought and of free association.
What the “woke” ideologues believe is that our society is incorrigibly corrupt, founded on the racism of White Supremacy, and uncaring of other races and marginalised groups. Their only solution to this malaise is revolution and the overthrow of the status quo. In this endeavour they are being aided and abetted by “useful idiots” in national and local politics, schools and universities, the Church of England, much of the broadcast media and press, the arts, and social media.
Amazingly, this anti-democratic, anti-capitalist cause is also being vigorously, ignorantly and blindly promoted by gullible big business, government departments, quangos and the civil service through the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (“DEI”) movement. This is the Trojan Horse through which it is intended that “wokery” will prevail. Already it has led to:
- the closure of bank accounts if a business or individual is regarded as being “off message”;
- to new recruits for the Royal Air Force being excluded for being “useless white males”;
- to an estimated £500 million nationally being wasted in DEI training and the appointment of highly paid “Diversity Officers”, for example in the NHS and most, if not all, FTSE 100 companies. Whilst de-commissioning warships on the grounds of under-manning, the Royal Navy has still managed to divert trained officers into DEI roles;
- to university lecturers and school teachers being sacked and careers ruined for so-called mis-gendering of students or simply wanting to discuss transgenderism, for example Professor Kathleen Stock formerly of Sussex University;
- to people in all walks of life being vilified and threatened for stating the obvious fact that biological sex is immutable – a high profile example being author JK Rowling;
- to the stifling of free speech through no-platforming and the cancellation of anyone who seeks free, open and frank debate on “wokery” in all its manifestations;
- to the so-called decolonisation of our museums, art galleries, libraries and university curricula;
- to the de-colonisation of our “white” and “racist” countryside;
- to the wholesale rewriting of British history with the likes of Churchill, Gladstone, Hume, Nelson, Drake and Cook being damned for their real or imagined links to slavery;
- to the Bowdlerising of written classics of the English language to remove “offensive” or “hurtful” content, including works by Austen and Dickens;
- to the extensive use of “trigger warnings” of “hurtful content” in all manner of publications and media from Shakespeare to Disney, including in teaching aids and course material in universities.
The above are by no means exhaustive examples of how “wokery” is in the process of irrevocably changing and destroying British history and culture.
This is an insidious and frightening process that the German Marxist Rudi Dutschke has referred to at an earlier time as “the long march through the institutions” where “utopian intellectuals have sought to capture society from below by commandeering institutions of socialisation such as schools and universities.”
The capture of business, the civil service, national institutions, etc., through DEI is a classic example of Marxist entryism where an organisation is insidiously taken over and consumed from within until the canker finally prevails and the host dies.
“Wokeism” has now become manifest in almost every aspect of British society and culture, and its abrupt appearance into our lives can be traced to the explosion of the Black Lives Matter (“BLM”) movement in Britain following the murder by Derek Chauvin, a serving Minneapolis police officer, of the African-America George Floyd in May 2020. Quite why this shocking and tragic event in American should lead to such societal turmoil in Britain can only be explained by it becoming the casus belli that the revolutionary “Wokerati” were awaiting to wage war and launch their assault on Britain and its culture.
Following the murder of George Floyd, BLM and other groups such as Stand Up to Racism, Unite Against Fascism and Momentum organised protests and demonstrations throughout Britain during the Covid 19 lockdowns, notwithstanding that such activity was unlawful. The police chose not to enforce the law, with some officers “taking the knee” by kneeling down on one knee in front of the demonstrators (“Taking the knee” alludes to the method employed by Chauvin in killing Floyd by kneeling on his throat and choking him to death).
The demonstrations were not peaceful and significant physical damage was done to various public buildings, monuments, statues and art works throughout the country. The reaction to this phenomenon of the “Establishment” that runs Britain’s museums, art galleries, libraries and universities would be bewildering without the knowledge that they seem invariably to be run by left wing academics.
Suddenly, whole collections of artefacts, art works, books, educational programmes and traditions were to be “de-colonised” (whatever that means) to remove or criticise by way of explanation anything that remotely alluded to the British Empire and particularly to the evils of slavery. Statues of national heroes, benefactors and philanthropists were removed to storage, books were taken off library shelves, works of art were quietly hidden in the vaults, and the National Trust rooted out any association (however tenuous) of its donors’ links to slavery (even desecrating the memory of Churchill at Chartwell). Without a hint of irony there was the ludicrous sight of the “Rhodes Must Fall” movement at Oxford University being led by, amongst others, a Rhodes scholar.
British history is being trashed and rewritten by pseudo-historians of the left who argue that the British Empire was a vile and irredeemably evil creation and that Britain was primarily culpable for the horrors of slavery and that we as a nation should be forever punished and harangued for it. The ignorance of these people is staggering.
The British establishment has fallen totally for the dangerous yarns being spun by the “Wokerati” and is in the process of re-writing a thousand years of British history and irrevocably changing British society.
The “useful idiots” promulgating “Wokery” on behalf of the Marxist revolutionaries appear to have been brainwashed into a form of self-loathing and a perverse hatred of all that is British, but particularly English. They strive to assuage their perceived guilt for whatever wrongs our long-lost ancestors may have committed by figuratively, and sometimes literally, “taking the knee” to openly demonstrate their repentance and submission to the New Religion of Woke.
Frighteningly, even the leader of the Labour Party (our likely next Prime Minister) and his class-warrior deputy have been photographed “taking the knee”. This does not bode well for the future of our country.
If British history, culture and society is to be saved from this concerted assault the whole concept of “Wokery” must be resisted and rejected at every opportunity. The overdue resistance to this malignancy must begin with the ordinary people of Britain, you and I, in demanding from our so-called leaders in politics, academia, education, religion, business, the arts and, in fact, every aspect of society to cease and desist from this wanton destruction.
A General Election will be held in Britain in the coming months, so now is the time to demand action over “Wokery” from those aspiring to lead the country. Now is the time for the worm to turn and now is the time for Reform UK to become the voice and champion of reason and decisive action for all.