Our Collapsing Culture: How 'The Church of Woke' Upends Language and Ends Debate

The Church of Woke™ and its catechism are slowly and surely deconstructing American culture and institutions. To stifle dissent and excommunicate non-believers, they have several tools in their arsenal. To engineer the deconstruction, Wokeists have created phrases that upend the meanings of words to prevent thoughtful discussion and end ideological debate. This twisted language serves to increase division and polarization based on group identity.

For example, when LeBron James tweets that blacks are “literally hunted” when they step out of their homes, Wokeists will defend that as something called “his truth.” On the intersectional pyramid, you are never allowed to question a person speaking their truth if they are a member of an ostensibly oppressed group as long as they discuss issues related to that group’s identity. Even a multi-millionaire basketball player whose hyperbolic overstatement is remarkable should not be questioned.

Of course, this only works if you are speaking in support of the Wokeist worldview. The Church of Woke™ does not consider individual differences because they believe only group identity matters. An Asian male telling their truth about being passed over for admission to Harvard because of his race would likely be canceled, despite objective proof showing that could well be the case. Because Asian-Americans are quite successful in the traditional American meritocracy, their ethnic minority status does not reconcile with the Wokeist view of an oppressed minority. They will only be considered if it serves the Wokeist agenda.

Another example is former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams. To justify her electoral loss, she has had a national platform to accuse Republicans in the state of actively engaging in suppressing minority votes for several years. This assertion is her “lived experience” and is never questioned by the corporate media or Democrats. It has also brought tens of millions into her not-for-profit organizations. She has never provided any proof or data to support her position, and there is plenty of data to disprove her claims.

Now, suppose I say that after voting in Georgia for the last eight years, my “lived experience” is that something was distinctly different and unsettling about the 2020 election. In that case, I am dismissed and even censored if it appears on any number of social media platforms. Because I am white and not a member of the Church of Woke™, I would be dismissed as a racist who doesn’t want black and brown people to vote.

Wokeists would hurl these slurs to shut me up despite the fact we know that there was a coordinated national effort to reduce election security, according to Time magazine. It has also been documented that there was private funding of election offices in specific counties to create a get-out-the-vote machine. If I said I want everyone who votes to feel their vote matters and that I don’t engage in the soft bigotry of low expectations that asserts people’s ability to access the ballot varies by their skin color, I would still be called a racist. In reality, minorities nationwide and in Georgia have registered and voted at rates higher than white voters for several years prior to 2020.

“My truth” and “lived experience” denote opinions, perspectives, or an individual’s version of events. In the absence of data and evidence, they are meaningless in a public policy debate, a courtroom, or in straight news stories. They corrupt the institutions in our culture that we use to solve problems, judge guilt or innocence, and receive information.

The Church of Woke’s™ rules specify who may question these assertions and destroy cultural norms. How many riots have we seen following jury verdicts, no matter what the facts in evidence were? Why did the Biden administration feel the need to write an executive order on trans rights? Because of the new rules. If due process, the law, or a news story contradict an oppressed group’s “truth” or “lived experience,” it must be torn down or transformed.

If you are not a member of the Church of Woke™ and object, they dismiss you as the appropriate -ist or -phobe. If taking you down increases its power, you get excommunicated. Some call this cancel culture. It is actually a process used by a secular religion with institutional power that has no mechanism for redemption.

Another Church of Woke™ tool is dog whistles. These are opinions or symbols used by non-adherents that the Wokeists assert convey a secret message to bigots and fascists, such as the okay hand sign. It seems only Wokeists can interpret these because they are the only ones who can hear them. A recent example is the stage used at CPAC. According to actress Alyssa Milano, its shape resembled a rune that Nazis favored. If you don’t know what a rune is, they are symbols representing ancient Germanic letters used before adopting the Latin alphabet.

Anyone who really thinks Matt Schlapp and the planners of CPAC sat around looking for runes to send a secret message to their predominantly Christian and conservative crowd that strongly supports Israel may need a psychiatrist. As I understand it, runes are used as divination tools, much like tarot cards and crystal balls, not typically used by faithful Christians. If you were one of the people who heard that particular high-pitched noise upon laying your eyes on the stage, you might want to ask yourself why. Maybe you’re a bigot or fascist.

Finally, the Church of Woke™ uses false binaries. One of these is mask-wearing. If you disagree that you need to wear one at all times except perhaps in your own home, you are a heartless individual who doesn’t care if people die. False binaries are often used to virtue-signal, establishing one position as the moral one. As High Priestess Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez once asserted, she didn’t need to be factually correct. It is more important to be morally right. There is no nuance in a false binary.

The priorities of the Church of Woke™ become useful tools for political and institutional leaders who want to avoid ideological debates. The obfuscation of the fundamental issues facing our country, like a crisis at the border, saves them from difficult questions. However, the use of twisted language and group identity also threaten a culture based on logic, reason, and the open exchange of ideas. Ultimately, they seek to destroy the meritocracy and individual freedom that allowed the United States to become one of the most innovative, powerful, and wealthy nations the world has ever known.

Ronald Reagan famously said:

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.

If the majority who do not subscribe to the teachings of the Church of Woke™ do not speak up and act now, it will be us delivering that message to our grandchildren. There is no choice but to find the courage.